A Undeserved Inheritance
Notes
Transcript
THIS NARRATIVE BEGINS with Isaac’s aging condition that he decides that the time has come to give his blessing.
In reality, Isaac lives for about FORTY more years—he dies just ten years before Jacob and his family move to Egypt, more than a decade after Joseph is sold as a slave.
Nevertheless, Isaac desires to put his house in order by giving a blessing to Esau.
Aging had also left him visually impaired and dependent upon his family—and demanding.
But most notably Isaac, notwithstanding his authentic faith, had come to oppose the revealed will of God regarding Jacob and Esau.
He was well aware of the battle that had taken place between the twins in Rebekah’s womb.
He knew that God had said, “The one shall be stronger than the other, the older shall serve the younger” (25:23).
Rebekah would not let him forget it. And the fact that Jacob had manipulated Esau to sell his birthright to him was a longstanding source of irritation to Isaac, and a subject of contention with his strong-willed wife.
He was also painfully aware that Esau had married two Canaanite women—and that they had made life bitter for both him and Rebekah (cf. 26:34).
But against the weight of all of this, Isaac was determined that though Esau had lost his birthright, he would now give him the firstborn’s blessing.
Isaac adored his manly, hairy, red-bearded hunter son. Esau’s very smell intoxicated him. And dreams of a hunter’s feasts filled his vacant eyes.
Beware of taking GOD’S work into YOUR hands.
Beware of taking GOD’S work into YOUR hands.
Isaac in his old age had given himself over to willfulness and self-gratification.
And he determined to have his way despite God’s word.
When Isaac was old and his eyes were dim so that he could not see, he called Esau his older son and said to him, “My son”; and he answered, “Here I am.”
He said, “Behold, I am old; I do not know the day of my death.
Now then, take your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt game for me,
and prepare for me delicious food, such as I love, and bring it to me so that I may eat, that my soul may bless you before I die.”
Isaac’s desire that his “soul” would bless Esau indicates how intensely passionate he was about it.
This is more than saying, “I desire with all my heart.”¹ It was with his whole being.
Isaac was willing to ignore God’s word and the desires of his wife and his elect son (who now had the birthright) in order to bless his immoral, freebooting son.
Isaac thus tossed a relational torch into the tents of his family. And because of his sin no one would do well—neither he, nor Rebekah, nor Isaac, nor Esau.
There are no heroes in this story—only sinners. And old Isaac was chief.
BEWARE OF TAKING GOD’S WORK INTO YOUR OWN HANDS.
Beware of deceptive plotting—even if it appears like you are honoring God with your plan.
Beware of deceptive plotting—even if it appears like you are honoring God with your plan.
Now Rebekah was listening when Isaac spoke to his son Esau. So when Esau went to the field to hunt for game and bring it,
Rebekah said to her son Jacob, “I heard your father speak to your brother Esau,
‘Bring me game and prepare for me delicious food, that I may eat it and bless you before the Lord before I die.’
Now therefore, my son, obey my voice as I command you.
Go to the flock and bring me two good young goats, so that I may prepare from them delicious food for your father, such as he loves.
And you shall bring it to your father to eat, so that he may bless you before he dies.”
Of course, Rebekah heard the whole plot. Tent walls hide nothing, especially when there is domestic strife.
Besides, the blind and perhaps hearing-impaired old man’s volume had likely increased a few notches over the years.
As soon as Esau departed, artful Rebekah went into high gear.
She rehearsed the gist of the plot to dutiful Jacob and sent him on his way to secure a couple of goats for a counter-feast to be served by Jacob instead of Esau.
BUT JACOB WAS HESITANT...
But Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, “Behold, my brother Esau is a hairy man, and I am a smooth man.
Perhaps my father will feel me, and I shall seem to be mocking him and bring a curse upon myself and not a blessing.”
His mother said to him, “Let your curse be on me, my son; only obey my voice, and go, bring them to me.”
Jacob’s hesitance about her plan was not moral (he had no reservation about deceit).
Rather he feared the CONSEQUENCES if he could not pull it off.
He might receive a curse instead of a blessing.
But Rebekah was supremely confident and self-assured.
So he went and took them and brought them to his mother, and his mother prepared delicious food, such as his father loved.
Rebekah knew the recipe well. She missed nothing.
She knew that the way to Isaac’s heart was through his stomach.
IF YOUR WIFE RANDOMLY MAKES YOUR FAVORITE MEAL FOR YOU>>>WATCH OUT!!!
Deftly she slaughtered the goats, dressed them out, and brought the meal to perfection.
But her greatest brilliance was disguising Jacob.
Then Rebekah took the best garments of Esau her older son, which were with her in the house, and put them on Jacob her younger son.
And the skins of the young goats she put on his hands and on the smooth part of his neck.
And she put the delicious food and the bread, which she had prepared, into the hand of her son Jacob.
She placed the best in Esau’s wardrobe on Jacob, so as to imitate his profile and imbue Jacob with his smell.
Esau was incredibly hairy—so hairy that goatskins had to be bound on the exposed parts of Isaac’s body to imitate his feel.
How absurd Jacob must have looked and felt as his mother placed the steaming meal in his hands.
Jacob hoped no one would see him.
Almost surely, Rebekah hovered in the background gesturing to her ridiculously costumed favorite.
But there is a deeper absurdity here—the mother and son’s belief that God would not be able to accomplish his own purposes without their help.
Mother and son believed that what they were doing helped God’s revealed will along, and therefore their deceitful ways were justified.
They believed that unrighteous acts were appropriate and good if they aided the righteous work of God.
In today’s world many similarly believe that personal ethics are irrelevant if what you are doing helps effect the will of God.
The variations of this ethical absurdity are endless:
“It’s God’s will that I provide adequately for my family. Therefore a financial partial-truth told to a client is OK.”
“God wants people to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth. So it’s OK to utilize unbelievers as cameos and entertainers to get an audience.”
“World missions are at the very heart of God. So it’s permissible to be deceptive about our intentions in order to get into a closed country.”
Righteousness can never be laid aside, even though our object is yet more righteousness. In personal life, in home life, in church life, in endeavors to win men for Christ, in missionary enterprise, in social improvement, and in everything connected with the welfare of humanity we must insist upon absolute righteousness, purity, and truth in our methods, or else we shall bring utter discredit on the cause of our Master and Lord.
Always TEST the advice you receive against Scripture—even if it is from someone you trust.
Always TEST the advice you receive against Scripture—even if it is from someone you trust.
BECAUSE JACOB DIDN’T TEST EVEN HIS OWN MOTHER’S ADVICE>>>HE WAS JUST AS COMPLICIT
Jacob set his hesitations aside. Wearing his ridiculous disguise, he played his part to the best of his abilities.
Of course, his Esau imitations did not work…
So he went in to his father and said, “My father.” And he said, “Here I am. Who are you, my son?”
Jacob said to his father, “I am Esau your firstborn. I have done as you told me; now sit up and eat of my game, that your soul may bless me.”
But Isaac said to his son, “How is it that you have found it so quickly, my son?” He answered, “Because the Lord your God granted me success.”
Then Isaac said to Jacob, “Please come near, that I may feel you, my son, to know whether you are really my son Esau or not.”
So Jacob went near to Isaac his father, who felt him and said, “The voice is Jacob’s voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau.”
And he did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy like his brother Esau’s hands. So he blessed him.
Jacob lied three times.
First, when he said to his father, “I am Esau your firstborn” (v. 19a).
Did these lying words choke him?
Did he hesitate? We wonder.
And second, Jacob lied when he named the Lord as the reason for his good hunting: “Because the LORD your God granted me success” (v. 20b)—which was bald-faced blasphemy.
He made God his accomplice.
The claustrophobic intimacy of the deception fascinates us.
Covered with animal skins, Jacob came face-to-face with the unseeing eyes of his father as his father felt his goat-skin covered hands and neck.
Old Isaac was satisfied enough to go ahead with the blessing.
Another moment of concern came over Isaac...
He said, “Are you really my son Esau?” He answered, “I am.”
THIRD LIE
Then he said, “Bring it near to me, that I may eat of my son’s game and bless you.” So he brought it near to him, and he ate; and he brought him wine, and he drank.
CAN YOU IMAGINE HOW TERRIFYING THIS MUST HAVE BEEN FOR JACOB>>>HAD HE SIMPLY TRUSTED GOD INSTEAD OF HEEDING TO THE ADVICE OF HIS MOTHER>>>HAD REBEKAH SIMPLY TRUSTED GOD…
Then his father Isaac said to him, “Come near and kiss me, my son.”
So he came near and kissed him. And Isaac smelled the smell of his garments and blessed him and said, “See, the smell of my son is as the smell of a field that the Lord has blessed!
God BLESSES His people in SPITE of their sin.
God BLESSES His people in SPITE of their sin.
THE BLESSING - FOUR POETIC VERSES (STANZAS)
So he came near and kissed him. And Isaac smelled the smell of his garments and blessed him and said, “See, the smell of my son is as the smell of a field that the Lord has blessed!
The stolen garments, smelling of the country, reminded Isaac of
the promise of the land, which produces abundantly.
May God give you of the dew of heaven and of the fatness of the earth and plenty of grain and wine.
Dew is a favorite Hebrew metaphor for God’s goodness in providing abundance and invigoration.
Dew has always provided the main source of water during the rainless summer months when the water-laden air of the Mediterranean is condensed by the cool night temperatures to a life-giving mist.
“Dew,” “fatness,” and “plenty” formed an invitation of refreshment and prosperity upon his Jacob.
Let peoples serve you, and nations bow down to you. Be lord over your brothers, and may your mother’s sons bow down to you. Cursed be everyone who curses you, and blessed be everyone who blesses you!”
“Let the Peoples serve you, and nations bow down to you...
“Isaac’s fierce pride in Esau demanded an empire for him”
He utterly rejected God’s word to Rebekah that “the older shall serve the younger” (25:23b).
Isaac blessed pseudo-Esau with universal dominion.
“Cursed be everyone who curses you, and blessed be everyone who blesses you!”
This final blessing reiterated God’s words to Abraham invoking
dynamic protection (cf. 12:2, 3).
So we see that Isaac’s passionate desire erupted to bless his Esau (Isaac disguised) with the covenant mantle of fertile land and God’s good bounty, empire, and protection, and his word stood.
Isaac had thwarted God, so he thought.
But Jacob, in Esau’s clothing, snuck away in breathless excitement.
He had displaced Esau—again.
Even through our careful planning, God will ALWAYS prevail.
Even through our careful planning, God will ALWAYS prevail.
HERE COMES ESAU…
As soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob, when Jacob had scarcely gone out from the presence of Isaac his father, Esau his brother came in from his hunting.
He also prepared delicious food and brought it to his father. And he said to his father, “Let my father arise and eat of his son’s game, that you may bless me.”
His father Isaac said to him, “Who are you?” He answered, “I am your son, your firstborn, Esau.”
Then Isaac trembled very violently and said, “Who was it then that hunted game and brought it to me, and I ate it all before you came, and I have blessed him? Yes, and he shall be blessed.”
As soon as Esau heard the words of his father, he cried out with an exceedingly great and bitter cry and said to his father, “Bless me, even me also, O my father!”
But he said, “Your brother came deceitfully, and he has taken away your blessing.”
The Shock that went through Isaac… He KNEW God had won...
Before a great work of grace, there must be a great earthquake. Isaac had put his personal love of Esau ahead of the will of God.
Down came his idol, and the edifice of willful love collapsed before the shaking power that took hold of him.
The arrogant pride which had slyly planned to thwart God toppled to the ground, broken beyond repair. When Isaac trembled exceedingly, all his desires were shattered.
Isaac’s mind was set… “Yes, and he shall be blessed” (v.33)
By faith Isaac invoked future blessings on Jacob and Esau.
How so? Was his willful, sinful blessing of Jacob (who he thought was Esau) an act of faith?
No. Rather, Isaac’s “by faith” blessing of Jacob took place immediately after the shattering spiritual earthquake, when he affirmed of Jacob, “Yes, and he shall be blessed.”
Esau poured forth bitter sarcasm that reinterpreted Jacob’s name as “cheat” as he mourned the loss both of his birthright and blessing.
Esau said, “Is he not rightly named Jacob? For he has cheated me these two times. He took away my birthright, and behold, now he has taken away my blessing.” Then he said, “Have you not reserved a blessing for me?”
But despite this accurate characterization of his brother, the ultimate responsibility for losing his position remains Esau’s, as Hebrews makes so clear:
See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled;
that no one is sexually immoral or unholy like Esau, who sold his birthright for a single meal.
For you know that afterward, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no chance to repent, though he sought it with tears.
Esau said, “Is he not rightly named Jacob? For he has cheated me these two times. He took away my birthright, and behold, now he has taken away my blessing.” Then he said, “Have you not reserved a blessing for me?”
All that was left was simply an anti-blessing…a revelation that the true blessing went to Jacob
Isaac answered and said to Esau, “Behold, I have made him lord over you, and all his brothers I have given to him for servants, and with grain and wine I have sustained him. What then can I do for you, my son?”
Esau said to his father, “Have you but one blessing, my father? Bless me, even me also, O my father.” And Esau lifted up his voice and wept.
Then Isaac his father answered and said to him: “Behold, away from the fatness of the earth shall your dwelling be, and away from the dew of heaven on high.
By your sword you shall live, and you shall serve your brother; but when you grow restless you shall break his yoke from your neck.”
Esau’s destiny was not “dew” and “fatness” but to be “away” from such blessings.
His descendants would live by the sword, from violence.
And for a long time they would be subservient to Israel.
This was Esau’s “blessing.”
This story was real life.
Everyone in the story sinned.
No one looked good—not Isaac, not Rebekah, not Jacob, not Esau.
The patriarch Isaac fought against God’s word.
The matriarch Rebekah, through her favorite son, attempted to manipulate life so as to ensure that God’s promise would actually happen.
She and Jacob thought that God needed help, even if the help was dishonest and self-serving.
Esau, the patriarch’s favorite son, disregarded God’s word.
Indeed, he despised the promise.
Everyone in the family sought the blessings of God without bending the knee to God.
This little family was fraught with ambition, jealousy, envy, lying, deceit, coveting, malice, manipulation, stubbornness, and stupidity.
And everyone lost. Rebekah was forced to send her pet son to far-off Mesopotamia, away from his father’s house, in a destitute condition.
Jacob was gone for twenty years, and it appears that his mother never saw him again.
Jacob’s exile was just payment for his deceiving Esau as he experienced the extended miseries of conflict and exploitation at the hands of his Uncle Laban.
Truly, blind old Isaac had tossed a torch into his families’ tents by his fighting against God’s word.
And Esau, who despised his birthright, lost everything.
IN THE END, GOD WINS
The story is told of the deacon whose property adjoined that of a golf course.
One Sunday morning he decided to skip church and take in some golf.
He slipped over the fence onto the third fairway and began to play.
As in the case of Job, Satan was standing before God and asked what God intended to do to punish the deacon’s dishonesty. “Just wait and see what happens on the fifth hole,” God replied.
The fifth hole was only a par 4, but was the most difficult on the course and often was responsible for destroying many hopes for a good game.
On this particular Sunday morning, however, the deacon (whose handicap was a barely mediocre 33) drove the ball straight and true.
Not only did it find the green, but also it took the slope of the terrain and went right in the cup: a hole-in-one.
Satan was furious. “Why have you rewarded this horrible, sinful conduct with such remarkable success?”
“It looks like success now,” replied God, “but who is he going to tell?”
God cannot and will not be anything but faithful to his unfaithful children.
HE GIVES AN UNDESERVED INHERITANCE
God will be faithful to his word and to his own—even when they manipulate and fight against his will.
And more, his word will prevail.
Believer, are you playing games with God’s word?
Are you attempting to control its application?
Are you engaging in unrighteous means to bring about its righteous end?
Are you fighting against his word?
If so, stop it! Give it up. Say with your Savior, “Your will be done.”