Watch

Last week we sat in the hard, honest mess of Abraham's household — the Hagar story, where fear and impatience turned a family in on itself. It wasn't a comfortable text. But it was a true one, because it looked a lot like our families too. This Sunday we move ahead roughly sixty years, past Abraham, into the life of his son Isaac. And what we find is unsettling: the same sin, in the same place, coming out of the same family — only now it's the son wearing his father's mistakes. Same fear. Same lie. Same town, even. Like father, like son. Turns out the things we swear we'll never repeat have a way of showing up in us anyway. Habits get handed down. Fears get inherited. Priorities pass quietly from one generation to the next, whether we mean to pass them along or not. But that's not where Isaac's story ends, and it doesn't have to be where ours ends either. Come tomorrow, and let's ask it together: what are we handing down to the people who come after us? And is there anyone strong enough to break the chain?

More Messages from Major Dalton

From Series: "The Genesis Of The Family"