1 At one time, Abraham moved his camp south to the Negev desert, and he lived between the 2 towns called Kadesh and Shur. Then later, he moved his camp to a town called Gerar. 2 While Abraham and Sarah were in Gerar, Abraham told everyone that his wife Sarah was his sister, not his wife. The big boss of Gerar was called Abimelek. He believed Abraham, so he sent somebody to get Sarah so that he could marry her.* Genesis 12:13; 26:7

3 God was not happy that Abimelek was going to marry Sarah, so one night he gave Abimelek a dream, and in that dream, God told him, “You are going to die. You took Sarah to be your wife, but she is already married to Abraham.”

4 Abimelek said, “But God, I haven’t married Sarah yet. I have not slept with her, like a man sleeps with his wife. Me and my people, we haven’t done anything wrong. Will you kill us for nothing? 5 Abraham told me himself that Sarah was his sister. And she said that Abraham was her brother. I didn’t know that she was already married to him. I didn’t want to do anything wrong.”

6 God kept talking to him in that dream. He said, “Yes, I know that you didn’t want to do anything wrong. You didn’t know that Sarah was a married woman. That’s why I did not let you touch her. I stopped you from doing a bad thing. 7 So now, give Sarah back to Abraham. He is my special man, and he will pray for you, so that you will not die. But I’m telling you, if you don’t give her back to Abraham, I will kill you, and I will kill everyone that lives with you.”

8 So early in the morning, Abimelek called a meeting for all his important workers. He told them everything that God said, and they were all very frightened. 9 Then Abimelek sent somebody to get Abraham to come to that meeting. Abimelek said to Abraham, “Look, you have made trouble for me and my people. What did I do to you, so that you pay me back with this trouble? You have done a bad thing to us. 10 Why did you do that? Why did you tell us that Sarah is your sister?”

11 Abraham said, “I’m sorry. I thought that nobody here respected God, so I was frightened of you mob. I reckoned that you would kill me so that you can marry Sarah. 12 But anyway, Sarah really is my sister. We have the same father, but different mothers.” You see, in Abraham’s culture, men could marry their half-sisters.

13 Then Abraham said, “God told me to leave my father’s country, so we moved around from place to place, and I was frightened of the people. So I told Sarah, ‘Be good to me and tell everyone that you are my sister. Then I will be safe.’ ”

14 Then Abimelek did what God told him to do. He gave Sarah back to Abraham, and he also gave him some sheep, and some goats, and some cows, and some bulls, and some workers, both men and women. 15 And Abimelek said to Abraham, “Friend, look around at all my country. You can live anywhere you like in this country.” 16 Then Abimelek said to Sarah, “I’m giving Abraham, your brother, a lot of money, to pay for the trouble I gave you. I’m giving him 1,000 pieces of silver money to show your mob, and everyone else, that you did nothing wrong.”

17-18 Then Abraham prayed to God and asked him to make Abimelek and his mob better. You see, before, at the time when Abimelek got Sarah so that he could marry her, God made Abimelek sick and stopped all the women in Abimelek’s house from having babies. But then God talked to Abimelek, and Abimelek gave Sarah back to Abraham. So then Abraham prayed to God, and God made Abimelek better, and he made Abimelek’s wife better, and he made all the women that lived in Abimelek’s house better too, so that they had babies again.