Sarah Would Bear a Son
God promised Abraham that Sarah would bear a son and instructed him to call his name Isaac. God said His covenant would be established with Isaac. See Genesis 17:15–21.
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Isaac — The Covenant Son
Genesis Collection • Exhibit 6 of 8
Isaac was the son God promised to Abraham and Sarah in their old age. His birth brought laughter and fulfilled a promise that had seemed humanly impossible. Through Isaac the covenant line continued, eventually passing to his son Jacob, whom God would later name Israel.
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Isaac's story stretches across several generations of Genesis. He is introduced as the promised child of Abraham and Sarah, appears in one of Scripture's most dramatic tests of faith, marries Rebekah, becomes father of Esau and Jacob, and receives God's confirmation of the covenant promises given to Abraham.
God promised Abraham that Sarah would bear a son and instructed him to call his name Isaac. God said His covenant would be established with Isaac. See Genesis 17:15–21.
Isaac was born when Abraham was one hundred years old. Sarah declared that God had made her laugh and that those who heard would laugh with her. See Genesis 21:1–7.
The name Isaac is associated with laughter in the Genesis account, recalling Abraham and Sarah's reactions to the extraordinary promise of a son in old age. See Genesis 17:17–19; 18:10–15; 21:6.
When conflict arose concerning Hagar and Ishmael, God reassured Abraham that the covenant line would be called through Isaac. See Genesis 21:8–13.
Abraham sent his oldest servant to his family to find a wife for Isaac. The servant prayed for God's guidance, met Rebekah at a well, and she agreed to go with him. See Genesis 24.
Isaac brought Rebekah into Sarah his mother's tent, took her as his wife and loved her. Genesis says Isaac was comforted after his mother's death. See Genesis 24:62–67.
Rebekah was barren, and Isaac pleaded with the LORD for his wife. The LORD granted his plea, and Rebekah conceived twins. See Genesis 25:20–21.
Esau was born first, and Jacob came afterward holding Esau's heel. Isaac was sixty years old when Rebekah bore them. See Genesis 25:22–26.
Genesis 22 records God's test of Abraham involving Isaac. Abraham traveled to the land of Moriah with Isaac. Isaac carried the wood and asked his father where the lamb for the burnt offering was. Abraham answered that God would provide. At the decisive moment, the Angel of the LORD stopped Abraham, and a ram caught by its horns in a thicket was offered instead of Isaac.
During a famine, the LORD told Isaac not to go down to Egypt but to remain in the land He would show him. God reaffirmed the promises concerning land, descendants and blessing. See Genesis 26:1–5.
Isaac sowed in the land and reaped a hundredfold in the same year. Genesis says the LORD blessed him and that he continued prospering until he became very prosperous. See Genesis 26:12–14.
Conflict arose over wells. Isaac moved rather than remaining in continual contention. After Esek and Sitnah, his servants dug another well without a quarrel, and Isaac named it Rehoboth. See Genesis 26:17–22.
At Beersheba the LORD appeared to Isaac, told him not to fear and promised to bless and multiply his descendants for Abraham's sake. Isaac built an altar and called on the name of the LORD. See Genesis 26:23–25.
When Isaac was old and his eyes were dim, Rebekah and Jacob carried out a plan by which Jacob received the blessing Isaac intended for Esau. The episode brought deep family conflict. See Genesis 27.
Isaac died at the age of one hundred and eighty, old and full of days. His sons Esau and Jacob buried him. See Genesis 35:27–29.
Isaac stands at the center of the covenant's transition from Abraham to Jacob. His very birth demonstrates the fulfillment of a promise that appeared impossible by ordinary human circumstances. His life also contains quieter but important themes: prayer, family, provision, conflict, patience, worship and God's faithfulness from one generation to the next.
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The covenant story now passes to Jacob: the younger twin who receives the blessing, journeys away from home, encounters God at Bethel, wrestles through the night and receives the new name Israel.