Lamp and Light Bible Reading Plan

January 29, 2026 - Genesis 25 & Psalm 22:1-15

• Josiah Smith - Compass Bible Church South Valley

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We trace Genesis 25 from Abraham’s last days to the rise of Jacob, then pair it with Psalm 22:1-15 to show how God’s promises advance through real prayer and patient trust. Sovereignty, lament, and daily obedience come together in a clear call to value what God values.

• Abraham’s legacy and the shape of many nations
• Isaac as the covenant line and answered prayer for Rebekah
• Ishmael’s twelve princes as fulfilled promise
• Esau trading his birthright and the cost of impulse
• God’s sovereignty and prayer as His chosen means
• Psalm 22’s pattern of lament, memory, and trust
• Encouragement to wait on God’s timetable
• Hope under mockery and perseverance in holiness

For more information about Compass Bible Church South Valley, visit compassbiblesv.org. Keep reading. Keep growing. God’s Word is a lamp to your feet, and a light to your path.

Welcome And Reading Focus

SPEAKER_00

Welcome to the Lamp and Light Bible Reading Plan, where we are seeking to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength with God's word lighting the way. I'm Josiah Smith, joined by Tyler Sanborn. Today is Thursday, January 29th, 2026. Listen intently to God's written word. Genesis 25. Abraham took another wife whose name was Ketara. She bore him Zimron, Jokshan, Medon, Midion, Ishbok, and Shua. Jokshon fathered Chaba and Dedan, the sons of Dedan were Asharim, Letushim, and Le Umim. The sons of Midian were Apha, Ephir, Hanek, Abida, and Elda. All these were the children of Ketarah. Abraham gave all he had to Isaac, but to the sons of his concubines Abraham gave gifts, and while he was still living, he sent them away from his son Isaac eastward to the east country. These are the days of the years of Abraham's life, one hundred and seventy five years. Abraham breathed his last and died in a good old age, and an old man and full of years, and was gathered to his people. Isaac and Ishmael, his sons, buried him in the cave of Makpela, in the field of Ephron, the son of Zoar the Hittite, east of Mamer, the field that Abraham purchased from the Hittites. There Abraham was buried with Sarah his wife. After the death of Abraham, God blessed Isaac his son, and Isaac settled at Bir Lahi Roy. These are the generations of Ishmael, Abraham's son, whom Ahagar, the Egyptian, Sarah's servant, bore to Abraham. These are the names of the sons of Ishmael, named in the order of their birth. Neboath, the firstborn of Ishmael, and Kader, Abbil, Mibsum, Mishma, Duma, Masa, Hadad, Tama, Jetur, Nafish, and Ketamah. These are the sons of Ishmael, and these are their names, by their villages and by their encampments, twelve princes according to their tribes. These are the years of the life of Ishmael, one hundred and thirty seven years. He breathed his last and died, and was gathered to his people. They settled from Havilah to Shur, which is opposite Egypt in the direction of Assyria. He settled over against all his kinsmen. These are the generations of Isaac, Abraham's son. Abraham fathered Isaac, and Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel, the Aramean of Padon Aram, the sister of Laban the Aramean, to be his wife. And Isaac prayed to the Lord for his wife because she was barren. And the Lord granted his prayer, and Rebecca his wife conceived. The children struggled together within her, and she said, If it is thus, why is this happening to me? So she went to inquire of the Lord. And the Lord said to her, Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you shall be divided. The one shall be stronger than the other, the older shall serve the younger. When her days to give birth were completed, behold, there were twins in her womb. The first came out red, all his body like a hairy cloak, so they called his name Esau. Afterward his brother came out with his hand holding Esau's heel, so his name was called Jacob. Isaac was sixty years old when she bore them. When the boys grew up, Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field, while Jacob was a quiet man dwelling in tents. Isaac loved Esau because he ate of his game, but Rebekah loved Jacob. Once when Jacob was cooking stew, Esau came in from the field and he was exhausted. And Esau said to Jacob, Let me eat some of that red stew, for I am exhausted. Therefore his name was called Edom. Jacob said, Sell me your birthright now. Esau said, I am about to die. Of what use is a birthright to me? Jacob said, Swear to me now. So he swore to him and sold his birthright to Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank and rose and went his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright.

Esau And Jacob: Birthright Traded

Psalm 22: Lament And Trust

Three Ps: Promises Provision Purposes

SPEAKER_01

Psalm twenty-two, verses one through fifteen. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night but I find no rest. Yet you are holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel. In you our fathers trusted, they trusted and you delivered them. To you they cried and were rescued. In you they trusted and were not put to shame. But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people. All who see me mock me, they make mouths at me, they wag their heads, he trusts in the Lord. Let him deliver him, let him rescue him, for he delights in him. Yet you are he who took me from the womb, you made me trust you at my mother's breast. On you was I cast from my birth, and from my mother's womb you have been my God. Be not far from me, for trouble is near, and there is no there is none to help. Many bowls encompass me, strong bowls of Bashan surround me, they open wide their mouths at me like a ravineing and roaring lion. I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joints. My heart is like wax, it is melted within my breasts, my strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to my jaws. You lay me in the dust of death.

SPEAKER_00

I want to give you three words today to summarize Genesis 25. And they are alliterated. We love alliteration here, right, Tyler? Do we? I try I I try I try not to sometimes. What do you think the number one letter that is alliterated is? Is it the letter P? I think it I think it is. The letter P. I don't know. There's something at power, purpose, provision, promise. There's just so many, so many P's. And sticking with that theme, today I want to give you three P's to summarize Genesis 25. And those are promises, provision, and purposes. So I want you to think about Genesis 25 as a memoir of God's promises, provision, and purposes. And there's three key individuals that are being highlighted to accent those three things: Abraham, Isaac, and Ishmael. And even, of course, we see the birth of Jacob and Esau. And Genesis is going to turn now and focus more on Jacob. It's been focusing primarily on Abraham, but now it's going to turn and focus on Jacob. But in this chapter, chapter 25, we see Abraham. He has more kids, and those kids are the father of different nations and clans. And we see the fulfillment, the beginning of the fulfillment, that Abraham would be the father of many nations. And so we see that promise and that provision coming true, at least in part in Genesis 25. We see Isaac, he is the promised offspring to him and Sarah in their old age. And he is the one through whom the promise of this covenant that God made with Abraham would continue. And so we see his offspring, we see his children, him and Rebekah. Then, of course, we have Ishmael, Abraham's other son, through Hagar, his servant, who God made some promises with and made a covenant with. And he said that he was gonna have twelve princes. And we see in this chapter 12 sons, and we see a fulfillment of that promise. And so we have God fulfilling his promises, we have God providing very clearly, and we get to see, at least in part, the purposes that God has for these individuals. Now, the three main patriarchs that they're often called from Genesis are Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And that gets repeated throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament. You'll hear something like, I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God himself says that. So we've looked at Abraham, we've studied his life, we've we've followed in his footsteps, we've learned lessons of faith. And now we're turning the corner and we are going to be looking at Isaac and learning about him. And we've seen some of that already already in Genesis 22 and even here in Genesis 25, and his son, Jacob, and we'll learn more about him, of course, in the coming chapters. But think about those three words: promises, provision, and purposes.

SPEAKER_01

Pastor Josiah, something that I was thinking about this morning was uh the ways that we fellowship and as we look at uh our parents and our parents' parents and the ways that they chose to fellowship and the ways that they chose to pursue the Lord. I was thinking about my life group and other life groups here at Compass Bible Church South Valley in the way that we pursue fellowship and the way that we pursue the Lord. And I am looking at uh just the the things that we want to focus in most, and one of those things in life groups is prayer. We we choose to commit time, set aside time to prioritize prayer. And uh I'm looking at the the different ways that sometimes our our deepest desires and our deepest hopes and dreams are are cast upon the Lord. We we have these good uh these good desires that God puts on our heart, and oftentimes they're in his design. And we look at a prayer, that the prayers of the fathers, uh the fathers of David, um Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and we we look at the ways that they model prayer for us and the ways they go about pursuing God and and leaning into his promises. And uh I see that here again in our text today in Genesis 25. Uh no, when you guys pray, Pastor Josiah, at your life group, um, how does that look like? What what do you guys do? Do you do you have a theme or do you have certain prompts that you guys uh pray to?

Waiting On God’s Timetable

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, we'll do a variety of different things, but we have uh prayer prompts on the back of the note sheet from Sundays and last night that we met together as a life group and we prayed through those different uh prompts. And uh usually they're connected to the sermon and seeking the Lord's help to apply the sermon and also just things going on in the life of our church and wanting to seek the Lord for the resources there. And we see an example of that as well in Genesis 25, where it talks about Isaac, Abraham's son, who has yet to have an offspring. And so we kind of find ourselves in a similar situation, Abraham and Sarah, where's the offspring? Where's the child? And now, if Isaac is going to be the one through whom this promise continues, then of course he needs to have an offspring. Uh now, good news is the good news is is you know there's no servants involved and other things like that, but they're struggling to conceive. Uh, Rebecca at this point has not been able to conceive. And so uh what does Isaac do in verse 21? Isaac prayed to the Lord for his wife because she was barren, and the Lord granted his prayer, and Rebecca his wife conceived. Now, I want to I just this might be a little bit more than we can uh chew today on the podcast, but I want to just briefly touch on God's sovereignty over all things and our prayers because we we see that kind of intersecting here with Isaac's prayer, asking for the Lord to provide, seeking his uh his power and his provision. And uh, the Lord does ultimately grant to this request, and they do have uh twins, right? Which is uh double the joy. And I would love to have twins, I think that would be fantastic. Um, but what we see here, just a glimpse of it, and we'll see it in other places, is um God is sovereign over all things. Of course, that is so clear in the scriptures. Um, no one can stay the hand of God, no one can thwart his purposes. Um, and yet, though God is sovereign over all things, though he is um in control of all things, our prayers still matter. And our prayers uh are there there's an intersection between our prayers and God's sovereignty. And so one of the simple ways, just to make this hopefully short, is God uses means to accomplish his determined ends. So think about as an example, Tyler. So, how does someone get saved? Right, someone gets saved. Well, it just depends on what you mean by that, right? Ephesians 1, you were chosen before the foundation of the world. Someone is saved because God has set his affection on them, he chose them in Christ before the foundation of the world, that they should be holy and blameless before him. Now, in time, of course, how does someone get saved through the gospel?

SPEAKER_01

Through repentance and faith.

SPEAKER_00

Right? The proclamation of the gospel. This is what Paul talks about in Romans. How will they hear if no one tells them? Right? How will they uh how will they how will they respond if they don't know? Right? So faith comes from hearing, hearing through the word of Christ, and he talks about how beautiful are the feet of those that bring the good news. Of course, that is a quotation from the book of Isaiah. And so God saves people sovereignly by his eternal decree. We're using big words here, but we see that in Ephesians 1 before the foundation of the world. Now, that is the end. The end in this example is salvation. What is the means that God uses to accomplish that end? He uses someone proclaiming the gospel. So God is sovereign both of the means and the ends, but prayer is something similar where a God will accomplish his purpose, God is working in the world, and prayer is one of the chosen means that God uses and and has chosen to use in his divine wisdom to accomplish his purposes. So think about the the the Lord's Prayer as an example, where Jesus tells us to pray, Your kingdom come, your will be done.

SPEAKER_01

We have to be in line.

SPEAKER_00

Now, here's a an obvious question, it's more rhetorical than anything, but will God's kingdom come and his will be done apart from our prayers? It's a little bit of a misnomer. Let me put it this way Does He need our prayers? No, no, like God's God's God is going to accomplish his purposes, but he has chosen for us to pray for his will to be done and for his kingdom to come. That's Jesus instructs us to do that. So, you know, of course, it's God's not waiting around for us to pray and going, Man, I really wish my will would be done. I really wish my kingdom would come. If only my people would pray. No, God, God is not inept, right? He's He's all powerful, He is in control of all things, but He has chosen a specific means to accomplish His purpose. And what does that mean? It's prayer. That's why we are instructed to pray, Your kingdom come, your will be done.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, what a privilege for us to step into the commands and leadings of of the Lord and and pray for the things that he says will be done, or do what you say you will do. Yep. Uh sit Lord save the the prayer of a righteous person accomplish as much as it's working. And we can we can look, say, God, outside of what you have called me to do, like I you're gonna do what you you say you're gonna do. If I if I pray something outside of uh outside of your promises, what what state what what foundation do I have to make these requests?

SPEAKER_00

Right. And so it is, I think we just see an example of this in Genesis 25, 21, where God is he's sovereign, right? So it's not it's not as if Isaac is like, or let me put it this way, it's not as if God is waiting around for Isaac to pray to be true to his promises, right? Because Isaac has to have an offspring for God to be true to his promises. He again, he's not he's not handcuffed by whether or not someone chooses to pray, right? But he just in his wisdom and in his sovereignty utilizes the prayers of his people to accomplish his purposes. And so that's there's some mystery there, of course, how all that works, but we see that on display here. So essentially, as Isaac is praying for an offspring for Rebecca's womb to be opened, he's he is praying that, Lord, keep your promise, keep your promise that that he would be a part of this promise that he made to Abraham, that he would continue uh the line, that would be a part of making Abraham the father of a of a great nation, that he uh would do those things. And we see again, though God is sovereign, he can do whatever he wants, whatever he wants, he has chosen to use specific means, aka prayer, to accomplish his ends. So the end here is being faithful to his promise. And what does he use? He uses Isaac's prayer uh to accomplish that, at least in this situation.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, and oftentimes it's much easier said than done to trust God's timetable, uh God's timing in the way that we are waiting for for prayers to be answered. We can we can pray with with certainty that God will save, though we don't know who that will be. Uh, we don't know who is in the Lamb's book of life. God does. Um we we go about our lives uh feeling many different things as we transition and we look to the the heart of David. He's he's a master at creating images for our minds to kind of get around uh as he's describing how he's feeling, his position in life. Uh we look at the um the the words he's choosing to use to describe himself as he's he's feeling so so left out, so abandoned, forsaken. Some familiar words we look at verse one my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me from the words of my groaning? And David is is understanding where he is, how he's feeling, and and the next in the next phrase, understanding where God is and who God is. Um, and that's an encouragement for us um to put into perspective, we need to remember uh the realities of of our our finite nature here. Uh we could be gone tomorrow. We could we could take our last breath uh while we're sleeping. And at the same time, we know where God dwells, we know uh how he's been faithful, as David says. He's referencing the fathers, um, the people of Israel, the the patriarchy. They trusted and you delivered them.

Mockery Perseverance And Reward

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, and I think the challenge and the encouragement in Psalm 22 is that God doesn't always answer our prayers on the timetable that we would like. And that's kind of what David is saying. Oh my god, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest. Now he's not talking in ultimates. God, of course, does answer, he does hear, he does respond, but there's a sense in which David wants something in a specific way on a specific timetable, and he's coming to grips with just in his soul, it's not happening in the way that I pictured and that and I envisioned it. But what does he do in verse three? Yet you're holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel, and you, our fathers, trusted. They trusted and you delivered them. To you, they cried and were rescued, and you they trusted and were not put to shame. And so he's recalling okay, this isn't happening in the timetable, the expediency, whatever that I envisioned. But let me let me remind myself of what you have done and how you have provided and how you had have answered, how you have seen, even thinking about Beer, La High Roy, that that place that we talked about yesterday, the the well, right? That that where God sees uh all of that coming together here in Psalm 22. And and that's that's true for us. We struggle. We we can we can feel these things that David's feeling. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning? Where where are you, Lord? And of course, the Lord is. Is is always there. He hears our prayers. He hears our cries, but he may not respond immediately, at least in the way that we would hope, or in the way that we imagined. And in those seasons when we feel like, okay, the Lord hasn't given a clear answer, or maybe we're we're waiting on the Lord. And what should it take verses three through five and just pray through these? Yeah, you are holy. You're enthroned on the praises of Israel. Remind yourself of who God is, who who he has been to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and you are fathers trusted. They trusted you. And what did you do? You delivered them. There's even some Exodus themes there. You delivered them from the bondage and slavery of the Egyptians. He's he's recalling these things, and he's finding great comfort in them.

SPEAKER_01

Here's another reminder, uh, Pastor Josiah, verses six through eight of Psalm 22. Um, David is is being mocked, he's being despised, he's he's addressing himself as a worm and not a man. He's so low, he's even so low that he's in the earth and slothering around in the dust. As worms live. And he's addressing um he's add he's addressing the people that are around him that are mocking him, they're wagging their their their heads at him, they're making their mouths, uh, they're they're making funny faces, they're scoffing at him. And uh this is this is a reminder for us when we stand for Christ, when we stand for what God um has called us to do, uh, to be bold, uh, to live a life set apart and holy for him, this this will be the norm for us. This is a good reminder for us to remember uh in the words of of Jesus in in the book of Matthew, uh in chapter five and and in chapter ten, uh, blessed are are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. We can rejoice and we can be glad. Why? Our reward is great in heaven. Uh and this isn't this isn't new. The the the prophets got the same treatment. Uh and we we look Jesus himself. Jesus himself. The the the words at the beginning of the psalm and in the middle of the psalm, uh, very familiar uh tones and themes and even words uh from verse one, we look, we look to the cross. This strong, intense feeling uh of disconnection. There's there's a intense language here in uh Matthew 10, uh we're gonna be hated for Christ's name. Uh we're we're gonna be ultimately saved, uh, those who endure, but we will face persecution. Uh we will experience um this treatment that David's experiencing.

Closing And Next Steps

SPEAKER_00

And great is our reward, and great is our God's. We hope that's an encouragement for you uh today. Well, thanks for joining us today on the Lamp and Light Bible Reading Podcast. For more information about Compass Bible Church South Valley, visit compass bible sv.org. Keep reading, keep growing. God's word is a lamp to your feet and a light to your path.