The Patriarch Formerly Known as Abraham

Genesis 23

After 127 years, Sarah passes on, and in his grief Abraham seeks to find a burial place. Apparently, they were traveling at the time of her death and Abraham was forced to find somewhere amongst the Hittites to leave Sarah's body.

When he tries to buy some property, the Hittites reply, "Sir, listen to us. You are a mighty prince among us. Bury your dead in the choicest of our tombs. None of us will refuse you his tomb for burying your dead."

Was this response based on Abraham's socio-economic status? Or was it based on Jehovah's presence in Abraham's life? While God had done some amazing things in Abraham's life at this point, it seems that most of them were things that would be more amazing personally and not on a large scale. The birth of Isaac and his near sacrifice, while amazing, would be easier to explain away by skeptics than say, the plagues, the parting of the Red Sea or Christ's resurrection. Not that skeptics can't find ways to cast doubt on these too, I just wonder at the legendary status of Abraham's life during his lifetime- although earlier on the kings had heard about the wife/sister controversies.

So Abraham says sell- they say- no you can have it for free- Abraham says- please sell me a certain cave, I'll pay full price- they say please take it for free- Abraham says no, please let me pay, they say you can have it, but it's worth 10 pounds of silver.

It seems like Abraham is having a hard time excepting charity. This is such a tough issue for so many people to deal with. While at times we may be amazingly generous with what we have, sometimes the real challenge comes in humbling ourselves enough to take what's being offered.
I sense that Abraham is a rich dude, without much need of financial help, and maybe he saw this act of buying a tomb as a way to honor his dead wife- but it also might be true that a group of people who respected him and wanted to pay tribute and honor to him were denied the opportunity because he was unwilling to accept their charity.

It's often difficult to express love and actually find things we can DO for each other, especially in this culture where it's a struggle to think of something we want for Christmas that won't sit in a closet or clutter up our lives. We don't NEED anything- we've pretty much gotten most of the financial concerns under control most of the time. But when we don't, others finally have an opportunity to show their love by doing for us- if we'll let them.

Now these folks seem like strangers, and maybe Abraham made the right choice by actually using what he had- money- to feel like he had some control of the world spinning around him after Sarah passed. But I think the lesson here might be to offer help when people are suffering-even if they are strangers- even if they might not need it.

We get plenty of detail about the lot and the fact that it was deeded to Abraham. Seems like filler material, but it must be there for some reason. Any insights?