And the worst thing was, she wasn’t even right. How could she be? Her sons were a gift of God, an answer to prayer. Without God, she would have no sons. So if he wanted them to be raised by the great prophet Abraham rather than by a foolish woman like Rebekah, how dare she covet her own children and refuse to let them have the gift that God’s servant was offering them?

In her heart she offered a silent prayer: O Lord, forgive me. If it is thy will to have my sons raised by others, I will submit to thee. I beg thee not to do it, but I will bear it if that is thy will. Amen.

But then, in her most secret heart, without her even thinking of it first, a deep true prayer leapt out through her lips: “Please don’t take away my beloved sons.”

At once a thought came clear into her mind: Why do you think God gave you two sons, if not to take one of them to himself?

She rested her hands on her belly and wept. One of them would belong to God, and only the other one would be her own to raise.

But there would be the one. God was kind and merciful. She would have one son to be her own, and the other to be turned into whatever it was that Abraham wished Isaac had been.

Abraham did not even stay the night, but got up on his camel and rode back to Kirjath-arba. And Isaac—whatever he was thinking, he kept it to himself.

So much of Isaac’s behavior made sense to Rebekah now. He had lived most of his life with the knowledge that, forced to choose between his child and his God, Isaac’s father had chosen God. What could Isaac do, except agree with his father? Agree to die for him. Agree that his whole life was nothing but a taw in a game between God and his prophet. Agree that he had no worth in himself, no life, no dreams, no plans, no hopes that could not be swept away as if they were nothing.

And Abraham thought that God had been testing him.

Rebekah hardly emerged from her tent in the days and weeks to come, wondering in the shadows of her cloth-walled chamber what God was trying to do with their lives, where it all might lead.

Is it thy plan for every parent to be willing to give up their child?

And if that is thy plan, why didst thou create us to have so much love for them?

These quarrelsome, troublesome boys who wrestle with each other here just under my heart—why didst thou make me so my heart breaks with love for them before I’ve even seen them?