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Isaac pleaded with the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was unable to have children. The Lord answered Isaac’s prayer, and Rebekah became pregnant with twins. Genesis 25:21

You see it in the movies all the time, especially love stories. The beautiful maiden is abused by her attacker. She struggles alone until all hope is lost. Finally, just as all hope is gone and she is about to be defeated by the enemy, in rushes the hero, the mighty warrior. With mighty valor and superior strength he defeats the enemy and rescues his lovely maiden. Of course, the live happily ever after, after all, isn’t that how all fairy tales end?

John Eldredge states, “Every woman is waiting for a knight on a white charger to come and rescue her.” Normally our vision of that white knight is a mighty warrior with weapons far superior to the adversary. What we don’t often think of is that weapon to be prayer.

For nearly 20 years Isaac and Rebekah prayed for a child. In our culture we don’t grasp the significance of that story. Children were as good as gold to a couple. For the husband/father, children were his posterity. Sorry for the chauvinism here but sons were more valuable than daughters because they carried on the family name.

For the wife/mother, children were a testament of her love for her husband and a sign to the community that she was fertile. Fertility was a sign of wholeness. A woman who could not bear children was considered flawed, and perhaps even under the curse of God for some sin committed by her or her parents.

Infertile women were worthless women. Even God likened Israel’s faithlessness to being as repulsive as an infertile woman. Some Jewish components of the Law allowed divorce if a woman was barren for more than ten years. Infertility was always the woman’s problem and never the man’s.

That’s what makes this love story so powerful. Isaac pled for his wife. The Hebrew words here are strong, powerful, risky. This was no casual request to make his wife pregnant. This was a fervent request to rescue his lover from the clutches of the evil enemy of ridicule, self-doubt and emotional distress.

Isaac was a man that understood the turmoil his wife was having. He stood by her physically, but more importantly, spiritually. Our women need men who they can count on to provide physical support to be sure. But more importantly we as men of God need to be willing to plead and beg for our lover’s emotional and spiritual stability as well. We need to take time to listen, to understand, to seek Godly wisdom and most of all, to pray! We need to be Isaacs for our wives. We need to be the mighty prayer warriors that pray for our wives and not about our wives. We need to be the ones to stand by them and help defeat their enemies.

PRAYER: Lord God I pray for my fellow men. May we be men that pray for our wives and not about our wives. Let us do battle on our knees on their behalf. Amen.