I've entitled today's message,
Esau despised Christ and Jacob had to have him. That's the case
of every child of God. We have to have the Lord Jesus
Christ. Can't live without Him, and we'll
do anything to get to Him. And that's the gift of God's
grace of faith in our heart that He gives to us. So we want to
consider this chapter in the Bible today. We're just going
through the book of Genesis, and I want to bring out a few
points from this text of scripture. Before we do, let's ask the Lord
to be with us. Gracious Father, we pray that you would give to
us today from your own Son. You gave him, gave him up to
judgment, gave him up to bear all of the sins of all of your
people. And by your gift of Christ, our Lord and Savior, you've saved
us from our sins and you've sent your Spirit now into our hearts.
We pray, Lord, you'd send your Spirit now through the preaching
of your gospel that we might see our Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ once again, and see that our salvation is in Him, and
that we're saved by His grace, all to Your glory, in spite of
what we are and who we are. Thank You, Lord, that You've
drawn us to Him. Thank You that You've given us His grace. Be
with our children. Be with all of us. For Christ's
sake we pray, in His name, amen. I'm just going to go through
this chapter with you, verse by verse, and we'll read through
it, but I want you to see here as an overview. There's really
four people. There's Jacob and Esau, and then
there's Isaac and his wife Rebekah, and there's this matter of the
blessing. Isaac is not sure when he's going
to die, so he calls his son Esau to him to bless him. His intention
is to give him the blessing. But God has another intention,
and that's what actually prevails in this case. And we're going
to see all this as we go through this. We're going to see the
ways in which this all came about. It's quite surprising that what
God intended actually ended up being brought to pass, considering
all those who were involved and what they were doing. But this
is the way of God's grace. Chapter 27 of Genesis. It came
to pass that when Isaac was old and his eyes were dim so that
he could not see, he called Esau his eldest son and said to him,
my son. And he said to him, behold, here
am I. And he said, Behold, now I am
old, I know not the day of my death. Now therefore I pray thee,
take thy weapons, thy quiver, and thy bow, and go out to the
field, and take me some venison, or hunt me some venison. Isaac
was old, and his eyes were dim, he couldn't see. And that was
because of his age. But what we see in this chapter,
and we're going to see this more clearly as we go through it,
that he meant to actually pass the blessing of Abraham on to
Esau. That was his intention here.
And the fact that it says his eyes were dim because of age,
it also is a testimony to the fact that his heart was actually
clouded now, his judgment was clouded because of his affections
for Esau. He intended to do something that
was actually against the promise of God. He was going to bless
Esau and give him the blessing that God had promised to give
Jacob. And so that's the first thing we see here, is Isaac's
intentions and actions show that not only were his eyes dim, but
his spiritual perception was clouded by his affection for
Esau. He did not see God's promise
of salvation. and his promise of eternal inheritance
in Christ coming to Jacob and through Jacob, as God said that
it would. So he put his natural affections
for Esau above the purpose and the promise and the glory of
God. And it shows in this way that Isaac actually had unbelief
in this. He was acting in disobedience
to God's revelation, but God overrules it in the end. So we're
going to see that. And then he said in verse 2,
where we just read, he says, I'm old and I know not the day
of my death. Isaac acted at this time because
he wanted to be sure to take care of this before he died.
He didn't know when he was going to die. And so what we learn
from that is that whether we're old or young, we must do all
that our hand finds to do with all of our strength. In Ecclesiastes
chapter 9, it says this, verse 10, Whatsoever thy hand findeth
to do, do it with all thy might. For there is no work, nor device,
nor knowledge, nor wisdom in the grave, whether thou goest.
We're young or we're old, whatever we are, we only have so many
days. God has given us a life. He's
given us today. Therefore, we must do what we
can today in order to do the will of God. and so Isaac did
that. But it wasn't his intention right
now to do that. He spoke, the Lord Jesus, remember
when he spoke to the woman at the well? He said, give me to
drink. I refer to this often because
it's often on my mind, so maybe you've grown tired of hearing
it, but I don't grow tired of this. What Jesus required of
her He told her after he said that, if she knew the gift of
God and who it was that spoke to her, she would have asked
Him, and He would have given her living water. The principle
is this, whatever God asks us to do, we're to go to Him. in order to have what He's required
of us, given to us, that we might give it back to Him. And that's
such a fundamental principle. Whatever God has told us and
given us to do, we must never think that we can do it except
by His grace. When He commands us, we must
go to Him, in whom all grace and strength reside, and ask
Him to do what He asked of us. It says in Ephesians 5, verse
15, "...see then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools,
but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil." What
that means is we're to buy up the time, make the most of the
time God has given us. Walk circumspectly means to walk
with our eyes open, taking care in everything, not as fools.
Walk diligently, as wise men, because the days are evil. Do you live today? Has God given
you life today? Then thank Him for that life,
and ask Him for grace, that you might know and depend on His
grace, and so live, that by the grace He has given you, you might
return praise to Him for His grace. Everything is by God's
grace in Christ. And so in Hebrews chapter 12
it says, let us have grace that we may serve God acceptably with
reverence and godly fear. And I pray that all of us today
would call upon the Lord that we might know who it is that
speaks to us from God's word and know the gift of God, the
Lord Jesus Christ. And ask him to give us this living
water that we might live by him and live for his glory. That's
what Isaac did. He was intent on getting this
done before he died. And we should be intent on doing
whatever God has given us to do, knowing that it only can
be done by His grace. Has He told us to believe on
the Lord Jesus? And we think, well, we can do
that. But you can't. Even that faith we need. The
man, the father whose son was sick, said to the Lord Jesus,
I believe, help my unbelief." And that's our attitude. The
attitude God teaches us through the trials and humbling process
where He makes known to us our sin and helplessness is to point
us to Christ and teach us that all grace comes from Him. In
verse 5 we read this, And Rebekah heard when Isaac spake to Esau
his son. And Esau went to the field to
hunt for venison, and to bring it. And Rebekah spake to Jacob
her son, saying, Behold, I heard thy father speak to Esau thy
brother, saying, Bring me venison, and make me savory meat, that
I may eat, and bless thee before the Lord. I'm sorry, bless me
before the Lord before my death. Now therefore, my son, obey my
voice according to that which I command thee. This is Rebecca
talking to Jacob. She says, my son, obey my voice,
what I command you. She's telling him to do this.
Verse 9. Go now to the flock and fetch
me from thence two good kids of the goats. And I will make
them savory meat for thy father, such as he loveth. And thou shalt
bring it to thy father, that he may eat, and that he may bless
thee before his death." So, many things are pointed out here.
Rebecca heard what Isaac said to Esau. And she knew what her
husband's intentions were. She knew that they were opposed
to the promise of God. And that's a difficult thing
in our everyday lives. I know that this happens a lot. We know what God's promise is.
We know that someone has done something in our family who is
leading us in a way that's not according to God's promises.
This was Rebecca's case. What do I do? What do I do? My
husband wants to do this, and I know God's promise is that.
What do I do? And so what did she do? Well,
she had a good intention. She loved Jacob. She loved him. And she didn't take time or think,
perhaps, that it would do any good to reason with her husband
and remind him of God's promise. She should have. She should have
acted that way. She acted to do all that she
did instead that Jacob might have the blessing of God that
he had promised while her two sons were still in her womb.
Remember, God said to her, the elder shall serve the younger.
The blessing of birthright from Isaac was the blessing of Abraham. The blessing of Abraham. Remember
what that is? Turn to Galatians. Hold your place in Genesis chapter
27 and turn to Galatians chapter 3. I just want to remind you
of this so that you know it from scripture. Galatians chapter
3. He says this in verse 7. Know
ye therefore that they which are of faith Faith meaning those
who see Christ as all of their salvation. Those that know that
righteousness before God must be from him. It must be because
of what he has done by his blood and righteousness. He says, Know
ye therefore that they which are of faith the same are the
children of Abraham. And the scripture foreseeing
that God would justify the heathen through faith preached the gospel
to Abraham saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed. So then
they which are of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham. The blessing
of Abraham that God promised to him and then to Isaac, and
now that was about to be passed from Isaac, at least Rebecca
thought, to Esau, was this blessing. That God would justify the heathen
through Christ. And she understood something
about that blessing. Eternal salvation in Christ. Eternal inheritance and all blessings
are in Christ. And in Christ alone. And she
said, I've got to have that for my son. God promised it to him.
And so she acted back in Genesis chapter 27. She acted according
to what God had told her. And according to her love for
her son Jacob. She wanted to do all that she
could so that Jacob would have the blessing God promised. The
blessing of that birthright that was given by God first to Abraham
and then to Isaac and now was up in the air for her. She knew
it needed to go to Jacob and so she acted. Even though her
husband was going in a different direction. Therefore, if we look
at her actions here, if we just look at her actions, we would
condemn her because of the way she acted. Apparently, it was
in deceit. It looked like it was in self-interest.
But if we judge the outcome, if we judge based on the promise
of God before, given, then what we see is that she acted out
of faith. And that's a difficult thing
to grasp in all this chapter here. We see that here both in
Rebecca and we see it later in Jacob. And it's a principle that
we're going to understand hopefully from this about ourselves and
about our walk with the Lord Jesus Christ. She acted in faith,
in God's promise, in interest, in a love for her son, in an
interest in that promise for him, in all that she did, even
though the way she went about it was wrong. So if we judge her actions by
the outcome, we won't condemn her actions. We will commend
her faith. God's purpose was to bless Jacob,
and so she acted according to that purpose. Her intentions
were good. But the way she accomplished that was deceitful, and therefore
it was wrong. The end purpose she had for Jacob
was according to God's promise, and her end purpose was right,
therefore. But the way she went about getting
that done was wrong, because it was a way of deceit. She didn't
consult God, but though she didn't consult God, God used it all
for good. And that's an amazing thing.
It says in Proverbs chapter 21 verse 30, there's no wisdom,
nor understanding, nor counsel against the Lord. What does that
mean? It means that nothing is going
to prevent God from doing His will. No matter what men do,
God is going to do His will. And it was God's purpose to bless
Jacob. And so He's going to bless him. Even though the way in which
Rebekah went about it was all wrong. It says also in scripture
that all things are for the elect's sake. In Matthew chapter 24,
it says, "...for the elect's sake, whom he hath chosen, he
has shortened the days." Jesus said that. He shortened the days
of the tribulation because of the elect. God does everything
for his elect's sake. The apostle Paul, in 2 Timothy
2 verse 10, says, "...I endure all things for the elect's sake."
that they may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with
eternal glory. Paul, in all of his life, everything
he did and suffered was for the elect's sake. I'm going to be
bound. I'm going to go to Rome. I'm
going to spend time in jail. All my life, the rest of my life,
I'm going to spend writing these epistles for the elect's sake.
And God used it for their sakes. And then in Isaiah 43, it says
this, if you want to follow along in Isaiah 43, Very amazing section
of scripture. In verse 1 it says, This is what
God says to all of his people. Don't fear. You're mine. I've called you. When you pass
through the waters, I will be with thee. And through the rivers,
they shall not overflow thee. When thou walkest through the
fire, thou shalt not be burned. Neither shall the flame kindle
upon thee. For I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel,
thy Savior. Why are we saved? Why don't we
fall from the Lord? Why do we continue in the faith? Why do we grow in grace? Why
does every trial work for our good? And why does it always
bring us to a deeper dependence upon Christ, realizing our need
for grace, our sin, and our need for salvation by Himalaya. Why?
Because the Lord says, I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of
Israel, thy Savior. Because of Him, it has nothing
to do with goodness found in us. I gave Egypt, He says, for
thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee. And since thou was
precious in my sight, thou has been honorable, and I have loved
thee. Therefore, I will give men for
thy life, and people men for thee and people for thy life."
This is amazing. Fear not, he says, I'm with thee. I will bring thy seed from the
east and gather thee from the west. I will say to the north,
give up, and to the south, keep not back. Bring my sons from
far and my daughters from the ends of the earth, even every
one that is called by my name. For I have created him for my
glory. Doesn't that sound like the way
God treated Jacob here? That's exactly the way he treated
him. He made him for his glory, and he's going to fulfill that
purpose. Remember what the Lord says here
in this chapter when Isaac gets to the end of it. He's going
to say, Blessed are all those that bless thee, and cursed are
all those that curse thee. of Jacob, of Israel, of God's
people. He says, all that bless you are
blessed and all that curse you are cursed. What was Rebecca's
intention? It was that Jacob might be blessed. Therefore she was blessed. And
the name Jacob here, you know what Jacob means? The word, the
name Jacob, it means cheat. A lying cheat. And yet that name Jacob is precious
to God because it refers to his people. And later his name was
changed to Israel because the same name that's used to describe
Jacob, later changed to Israel, is altogether meant to teach
us of Christ, the one God loved and favored, and his people in
him. And themselves and ourselves
were nothing but sinners, cheat, and lying, and conniving, and
yet we're in the Lord Jesus Christ, we're precious to God, we're
God's elect, saved from eternity in the Lord Jesus Christ. She
blessed her son Jacob, she wanted the blessing for him, therefore
he was blessed. Isn't that amazing? Remember what Psalm 27.4 says? One thing have I desired of the
Lord, and that will I seek after. What was the one thing that Rebecca
sought for? Christ and eternal salvation
for her son. and all those who would be saved
by the Lord in Him." In Christ. To be justified by His grace.
Later in Galatians 3.13-14 it says that Christ was cursed for
us. To remove the curse for us in
order that we might be received. And God sent His Spirit because
of that. He hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being
made a curse for us. As it is written, Cursed is everyone
who hangs on the tree, that the blessing of Abraham might be
given to the Gentiles, the blessing of the Spirit of God. And so
the blessing was given to us because Christ was cursed. He
was made sin that we might be made the righteousness of God
in Him. And this is what her desire was. One thing have I desired, that
I might dwell in the house of the Lord and inquire in His temple. But we might wonder here about
this lesson from the scripture. Why did God ordain in His secret
counsels, because He did, all things that come to pass are
according to God's preordained secret counsels, why did He ordain
in His secret counsels that Rebekah would lead her son Jacob to deceive
his father Isaac in order to obtain the blessing? Do you ever
wonder about that? Why do you think that God ordained
this for her to do? Even though she didn't know it
was God's will, just like we don't know how God's going to
use all the events in our lives. Why? Why does God do it that
way? There's several reasons, and I want you to think about
these, because understanding these reasons, I think, help
us appreciate what's going on in this chapter of Scripture.
Rebecca wanted the blessing for Jacob so bad that she was willing
to do anything to get it. She wanted Christ so bad, she
was willing to do anything to get him. And Jacob wanted that
blessing so much that he was willing to compromise his integrity,
risk the curse from his father in order to get it. Why does
God do it that way in this chapter? I think it's partly due to what
he says in Matthew 11 verse 12, that the kingdom of God suffers
violence and the violent take it by force. God is pleased with
those who pursue Christ because they have to have him. God put
it in them. And God is pleased with His own
work. And when we're driven to Christ by God's loving kindness,
operating in our lives in the providence of His grace, with
His Word coming to us, driving us to Christ through this God-given
faith, God is pleased when we have to have Him. That's the
first thing I see here. The second thing I see here is
that it shows that God ordained that he would overrule all of
man's attempts to thwart his purpose of grace for his elect
people. Isaac was determined to bless
Esau because he liked him best. He favored Esau the best. But
God had another purpose and God overruled Isaac's purpose to
establish his own purpose. And so God does that in our lives.
He overrules every attempt to deprive his elect people of salvation
and all the blessings of eternal glory because it's his purpose
to give it to them. In fact, he does it in a way
so that he shows he's going to use the evil intent of men and
this world and Satan and even our own sin in spite of that
to bring us to Christ. that shows God's grace, to the
glory of His grace. It says in Job 12, verse 16,
with Him, with God, our strength and wisdom, the deceived and
the deceiver are His. He'll use all to bring us to
Himself according to His will. God uses Satan and this world
and our own sins, even our own sins, to bring about His will.
We must trust Him in all things and take our concerns to Him,
even when they appear to go against His purpose and grace. even when they appear to go against
his purpose of grace for us. And don't you find that? Iniquities
prevail against me. But as for our transgressions,
who taught the psalmist to say that in Psalm 65.3? First of
all, his iniquities were prevailing against him. God showed that
to him. We aren't even aware of our sins being our enemy until
God gives us that grace. But more than that, he showed
the psalmist where the solution was found, where the victory
was. As for our transgressions, thou shalt purge them away. It's
in the atoning work of Christ. And so it says in Proverbs 21.3,
I mentioned it before, there's no wisdom, nor understanding,
nor counsel against the Lord. He's going to bring it to pass.
But we must never presume on God's ordained will in order
to have our liberty to sin. We should never presume on God's
eternal secret purposes in order to act contrary to his revealed
will. And yet God used the disobedience
first of Isaac, and then the deceit of Rebekah and Jacob,
in order that we might know that though the world is full of wickedness,
even in God's people, yet God's purpose will be fulfilled. So that's the second thing I
see here. Another thing I see is this, though we fall... Isaac
messed up here, didn't he? Rebecca, she had the right intent,
but her motives were right, but the things she did were wrong.
And so was Jacob. Though we fall, and though we
are unfaithful, yet God is faithful. Isn't that what it says in 2
Timothy 2.13? God is faithful. Look at that, 2 Timothy 2.13. God can't deny himself. He will
not change, even though we change, even though we fail. He says
in 2 Timothy 2.13, if we believe not, yet he abideth faithful,
he cannot deny himself. Isaac failed. Rebekah with good
intentions, a good purpose in view, she failed in the process
and so did Jacob. And yet God was faithful. God
is faithful. It draws our eyes of dependence
and reliance and appreciation and adoration to God who gives,
God who saves in Christ and not to ourselves. It pulls us away
from all that we are to see that our salvation is all in Christ
and what he did and who he is. And then I think that this thing,
this is also a reason why God did this. What does Jacob's name
mean? It means a lying cheat. A lying
cheat. What is my name? Am I any different
than Jacob and myself? He was a lying cheat. I think
I'm a lot worse than that. How much hypocrisy do we find
in ourselves? How much coldness of heart? How
little strength, how little diligence do we give to pursue Christ? In all these things we see our
own utter weakness and sinfulness, don't we? But though my name
is Jacob in myself, though I am in myself a cheat and a liar
like him, and though all I do to pursue Christ in the way that
he did it was infected by what he was by nature as a liar and
a cheat. All that he did here in this,
even though that was the case, like him, God has given us something
called faith. And with that faith, we have
this intent. We cannot not pursue Christ. We have to have him. And so Jacob
had to have the blessing. I don't know what it's going
to take to get it, but the way he went about getting it was
all Jacob. And yet, the desire to have it was all God's. And
so we see that here, don't we? And the last reason I think God
does it this way is because He removes from us all cause of
boasting in ourselves. God accomplishes our salvation,
and even the salvation of our children and our loved ones,
in such a way that when it's all said and done, we'll look
back on it and see it was all God's doing. I would have messed
it all up, but He brought it to the right conclusion. I didn't
know how He was going to do it. I couldn't change their hearts.
And yet God held fast to His purpose and He accomplished it
to His glory, to His praise, of His grace. And I have to say,
I have no cause for boasting except in Christ and Him crucified. And so we look at verse 11 of
chapter 27, after Rebecca told her son to do this. It says,
And Jacob said to, I'm sorry, verse 11, And Jacob said to Rebekah
his mother, Behold, Esau, my brother, is a hairy man, and
I am a smooth man. My father, peradventure, will
feel me, and I shall seem to him as a deceiver, and I shall
bring a curse upon me, and not a blessing. And his mother said
to him, Upon me be thy curse, my son, only obey my voice and
go fetch me them." So here we see Jacob's reluctance to do
what his mother said because he thought he was going to be
caught in the process. And here we see that Rebecca
was willing to take the curse if Isaac were to curse Jacob
in the process. That sounds... She wanted this
for Jacob, didn't she? I want this so bad for my son,
I'm willing to take a curse for him. I could wish myself a curse
from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen, according to the
flesh." Isn't that what the Apostle Paul said in Romans 9.1? If it were possible that they
could be saved, Paul said, I would wish myself a curse from Christ.
It was not possible. It was not possible because it
was not God's will to save those who were not his people. And yet, when Rebecca says this,
doesn't it remind us that there's only one who can take our curse?
Upon me, she said, be thy curse, my son. Isn't that what the Lord
Jesus Christ said? It's only because the Lord Jesus
said, upon me, be thy curse, my son. Only because he interposed
himself under the curse are we free from the curse. He was made
sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.
He didn't know sin. We knew sin. It was our sin and
He was cursed. And so God laid it upon Him.
And that's the reason that we're saved. And yet, here, Rebekah
knows that God had purpose to bless Jacob. Remember what it
says in Numbers chapter 23 when Balaam was told to curse Israel. Balak tried to get Balaam to
curse Israel. And Balaam said at that time,
that God is not a man that he should lie, neither the son of
man that he should repent. Hath he said, and shall he not
do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall
he not make good? God has determined to bless Israel,
Balaam told him. And who am I? I cannot do but
what God has done. I can't say anything but what
God has said. And Rebecca knew that God had determined to bless
Jacob. And so when she said, upon me
be thy curse, she knew that he couldn't be cursed. God had blessed
him. who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect. How shall I curse, Balaam said,
whom God hath not cursed? How shall I defy whom the Lord
hath not defied? Numbers chapter 23. And here
we see this. Unless God himself pronounces
the curse, man's words can't curse us. It doesn't matter what
man can do to us. The Lord is my helper. I will
not fear what man can do to me. And so she, even though she offered
to take his curse, there was really no curse for her to take,
because God had determined to bless him. And yet, we see in
this, there was a curse that had to be taken. It was the curse
laid upon us for our sin. And so Jesus said, if you seek
me, let these go their way. We might wonder here, did Rebecca
hate Esau? She wanted the blessing for Jacob,
not for Esau. Did she hate Esau? No, I don't
think so. But she loved Jacob. You see,
when Esau, earlier in his life, it says that Esau took wives
from among the Canaanites. And when he did, it says that
it was a grief of mine to both Isaac and Rebekah. It wouldn't
have been a grief of mine to her if she hated Esau. And so
we see again here, the purpose of God Paul wanted his brethren
to be saved after the flesh, but they couldn't be because
it wasn't God's purpose. And so, it wasn't because Paul
hated the Jews that he taught them the gospel, those who were
unbelieving. There's not an excuse. Men can
raise an objection. Well, you believe God's sovereign
and everything, so only those are going to be saved, will be
saved, and we can't do anything about it. and so on. But that's not a fault
you can lay at the feet of God's people. Paul didn't want these
people, his brethren after the flesh, to perish. It wasn't an
objection that they could raise. So we couldn't say here that
Rebekah hated Esau. But we do what we do because
we have to have Christ. And we love Christ above all. And above all, we want God's
will to be done. We ask God to save His people. We ask Him to save them, even
though we don't know who they are. Even among our loved ones,
we ask him, Lord, save them if it be your will. Save them for
Christ's sake. Save them for the sake of your
glory. And we look to him to be found
in him. And we believe his word. And
we believe that if he's going to bless, he's going to bless
us for Christ's sake. And so we pursue him. She loved
God, she believed God, and she pursued these things for her
son. Don't you find yourself rooting
for Jacob in this account here? Don't you find yourself hoping
that Jacob wins the blessing? Because, like her, we cheer. We cheer for God's purpose to
save His people, don't we? We cheer. We want God's elect
to be saved. We want His salvation to come
to all of them. And so we do all that we do in
our lives that God's people will be brought to Christ, just like
this woman did. In verse 14 it says, And he went,
Jacob went, and fetched and brought these things that his mother
commanded him. He brought them near to his mother, and his mother
made savory meat, such as his father loved. And Rebekah took
goodly raiment of her eldest son Esau, which were with her
in the house, the clothes that were in the house that belonged
to Esau. Rebekah took those clothes and
put them upon Jacob, her younger son. And he put the skins, I'm
sorry, she put the skins of the kids of the goats upon his hands,
and upon the smooth of his neck, and she gave the savory meat,
and blessed, and the bread, which she had prepared, into the hand
of her son Jacob." This is pretty fantastic, isn't it? Could you
believe it? Would you think to take the skin
of a goat and put it on your son's hands and on his neck,
and think that you're going to fool your husband? He's going
to feel this. This is not even warm. It's not
even like skin. Are you kidding me? You don't
sound like Esau. You feel funny. That's weird. You really think you're going
to fool him? It's fabulous here what happened. How could it have
been that she actually accomplished? How could her and Jacob actually
have gotten through all of this to get the blessing? Because
it was God's purpose. It was God's purpose. Jacob obeyed
his mother. He wanted what she wanted. He
did what she said. He did what he did because he
wanted the blessing. And the same thing his mother
wanted for him. Believers need and want all that
God has promised sinners in Christ. Don't we? I want all that God
has for sinners in Christ. I want it. And believing the
gospel declared to us by those sent of God, we obey the Lord. That's what he did. He obeyed
his mother. And so when we hear the gospel
and we pursue Christ out of God-given faith, by the Spirit of God,
we're drawn to him, we're obeying the gospel, aren't we? We're
obeying those who preach the gospel to us. We're born of God,
but we're born of God through the means of the preaching of
the gospel, which comes through the church, doesn't it? And isn't
the church called the mother of us all? Jerusalem above is
the mother of us all. We believe because we want to
be saved by Christ. We do what we do because we want
to. Not out of constraint. imposed upon us, there's an inward
motive that's put within us that draws us to Christ. I don't want
to be saved any other way. I have to have Him, even when
what we do is directly opposed to our fallen, sinful nature. On the one hand, I must have
Christ. On the other hand, all that I
am by nature is opposed to that, and there's this conflict constantly
going on. Even though there's a conflict,
I have to have Him in my life. In everything I do, things in
my life are ordered in order that I might have Him. God has
put that there. And it goes against what I naturally
want to do. And so that's the way it was.
The good that I would, I do not, but the evil which I would not,
that I do. We want to believe Christ. We
want to be saved by His will, and by His virtue, and by His
work alone. We do not want to be saved for
anything found in us. We want to serve God acceptably. We want grace to do so. We want
to be good. We want all these things. And
yet that's in opposition to what we are by nature. And so, when
our old man opposes, what do we do? We act according to God-given
faith. But it seems like I'm losing.
What do we do? We act according to God-given
faith. The Lord said salvation is of
the Lord. I'm going to trust Him. Even though it seems like
I'm not winning, yet I know my hope is only in Christ. Blessed
is the man whose hope, whose trust the Lord is. And so in
verse 18 it says this, And he came to his father and said,
My father, And he said, Here am I, who art thou, my son? And
Jacob said to his father, I am Esau, thy firstborn. I have done according as thou
badest me. Arise, I pray thee, sit and eat of my venison, that
thy soul may bless me. And Isaac said to his son, How
is it that thou hast found it so quickly, my son? And he said,
Because the Lord thy God brought it to me. And Isaac said to Jacob, Come
near, I pray thee, that I may feel thee, my son, whether thou
be my very son Esau or not. And Jacob went near to Isaac,
his father, and felt him. And he felt him, and said, The
voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau.
And hereby the will of God, he discerned him not, because his
hands were hairy as his brother Esau's hands, so he blessed him."
Jacob lied. He told his father Isaac that
he was Esau. That was a lie. He said he was
his father's firstborn. That was a lie. He told Isaac
he had done what his father told him to do, to bring him venison,
and that was a lie. And later on when his father
asked him plainly in verse 24, Art thou my very son Esau? Jacob
said, I am. He deceived his father. When
Isaac asked Jacob how he was able to find the venison so quickly,
Jacob lied again, Because the Lord thy God brought it to me.
Did you notice he didn't say, because the Lord, my God, brought
it to me? Even in his answer, Jacob's conscience
prevented him from calling God his God while he was lying to
his father. It was wrong for him to lie,
wasn't it? It was wrong for him. It's a sin if we do wrong because
we might ask this question. Is it a sin if we do wrong because
we want God's blessing? Is it? I want the blessing. Can
I get it by any means, even sinful means? It's a sin if we do it
in the wrong way. It's wrong to do wrong. Even
though we might want the right thing, it's wrong to go about
it the wrong way. We must tell the truth at all
costs. But in the end of our lives,
even though that's the case, in the end of our lives, God
will show, even though we won't be able to live according to
this rule, God will show this, that He gave us grace, to do His will, even when our
motives, our ways were wrong, He will show that His will towards
His people, His will of grace and blessing us for Christ's
sake, is fulfilled even though we acted sinfully. And that's
what I see here. I'm a cheat. I'm a liar. Everything
I do is infected by that. And yet God has given me this
faith, and in the new man, I myself serve the law of God. Even though
in my life I struggle and so on, God brings me to Christ.
That's his promise. He will save us to the uttermost.
God alone is to be thanked. God alone receives all the glory.
We want to be free from our wretched man, don't we? We want to be
free from our iniquities that prevail against us, don't we?
We don't want any iniquity to have dominion over us. We cry
daily for mercy because we need mercy daily. We cry because our
sin humbles us and makes us know our need for grace, that it is
great, and because our sin is great. God always works in spite
of our sin to do us good. This is an amazing thing, an
amazing principle. Remember Peter? Three times he
denied the Lord Jesus, but God worked it all for his salvation. Jesus looked at him, and Peter
went out and wept bitterly, and after that The Lord Jesus brought
him in and asked him, do you love me? David said in Psalm 51, he said
that when the Lord would teach him, would blot out his transgressions
and restore to him the joy of his salvation, that he would
then teach sinners God's way. That's what we do, don't we?
I'm a great sinner and I am nothing at all, but Jesus Christ is my
all in all. We pursue him. God has given
us that. And here we see that in Jacob.
Jacob had one pursuit and one motive. I need the blessing. I need eternal salvation. I need eternal blessings in Christ. That's what we see here. Now,
one of the things we see here is when Jacob came to his father
Isaac dressed in the skins of the goat, it could be that this
is an indication of how every believer must come to God. I'm
not saying that this was intended here in the text, but we know
this is the truth, so we might as well point it out. Here, Jacob
comes to his father Isaac. His father favored his older
son, didn't he? And Esau was the firstborn, wasn't
he? But Jacob came clad in the skins
of the goat. And when he came that way, he
was accepted by his father. And so, perhaps that's meant
to teach us that we can only come to God the Father in one
way, clothed in the Lord Jesus Christ's righteousness. It could
be that. An allusion to that could be
here. Remember, it was only by the The goats that were in Leviticus
16, that we have atonement with God. And so, God only accepts
us in Christ. That's a truth. We know that's
true. But whether that's intended here or not, I can't say. Because
it's not quite clear from the text. Esau was a profane man. And he came dressed in the profane
clothes of that profane man. So I'm not sure if that's what
it means here. But look at verse 25. He says, and he said, Isaac now
says, once he's convinced that he is, he's actually Esau, Isaac
was fooled. He said, bring it near to me,
my son, and I will eat of my son's venison, that my soul may
bless thee. And he brought it near to him,
and he did eat, and he brought him wine, and he drank. And his
father Isaac said to him, listen now what he does. Isaac calls
Jacob to come near. And then Jacob kissed his father,
and Isaac praised his son. He's going to commend him for
the way he smells. And then Isaac prayed for his
son. He calls him near. Jacob kisses his father. Isaac
praises him because he loves his smell. And then Isaac prays
for his son Jacob. Listen to what it says here.
Isaac said to him, Come near now and kiss me, my son. And
he came near and kissed him. And he smelled the smell of his
raiment, his clothes, and blessed him and said, See, the smell
of my son is as the smell of a field which the Lord hath blessed.
Therefore God give thee, this is the blessing now, he's about
to pronounce on him. He said, therefore God give thee
of the dew of heaven and the fatness of the earth and plenty
of corn and wine. What is he doing here? Isaac
is praying for his son. God give thee. That's a prayer.
Isaac prays for him. Who prays? Who prays for his
people? Doesn't the Lord Jesus Christ?
Didn't he say in John 17, I pray for them. I pray not for the
world. It was for his son Jacob. Even though he thought it was
Esau, he was praying for his son Jacob. What was he saying? All these blessings that he gives
to Jacob, you know what he leaves out? Nothing. Everything he had
to give and to bless, he passed it on through Jacob. Everything. There was no blessing left for
Esau here. What does that teach us? All
blessings that God has for sinners are only in one, in the Lord
Jesus Christ. There's only one name under heaven
whereby we must be saved. It's in Christ. There's no blessings
from God for sinners, no blessings of salvation and eternal life
and glory outside of Christ. It's all given to Him. Jesus
said, The Father loveth the Son, and hath given Him all things
into His hand. Everything is given to the Son.
And so Esau gives everything to his son, Jacob, and gave it
to his son, Jacob, meaning Christ, and all of his people in him.
He says here, God give thee the dew of heaven. The dew of heaven. What is the dew of heaven? Well,
remember when the manna came down from heaven in the wilderness
and the dew came down and it lay on the ground and when the
dew was gone up, it says the manna was there on the ground.
What does that dew represent then? It represents God giving
his son to give his life, to break his body and shed his blood
for our life. The manna from heaven is Christ
and him crucified. The dew of heaven. That's Christ.
God give thee the dew of heaven and the fatness of the earth.
When we hear the gospel in Isaiah 55, it says, delight thyself
in fatness. And what is the fatness? The
fatness was put on the altar and it was burned to God. Delight
yourself in fatness. Delight yourself in the fact
that God receives sinners in Christ. That is the fatness of
the earth and plenty of corn and wine. Who is the corn? Who
is that seed that fell into the earth? And because he fell into
the earth and died, brought forth much fruit. Isn't it our Lord
Jesus Christ and his death? And then he says in verse 29,
he says, Let people serve thee. Look at Daniel chapter 7. see
this about the Lord Jesus, let people serve thee. In other words,
he gave him dominion. He gave his son dominion. He
gave him all these blessings, the dew of heaven, the fatness
of the earth, plenty of corn and wine, and then he said, let
people serve thee. In Daniel chapter 7 verse 14,
a prophecy is given of the Lord Jesus. It says, In verse 13,
Daniel said, I saw in the night visions, and behold, one like
the Son of Man came with the clouds of heaven and came to
the Ancient of Days, and they brought Him near before Him.
The Son of Man came near to the Ancient of Days. And what happened?
Verse 14, And there was given Him by God the Father, giving
the Son of Man, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is His Son, not just
a son of man, but son of God, but he's a son of man as the
Lord Jesus Christ. He says, and there was given
him dominion and glory and a kingdom that all people, nations, and
languages should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting
dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which
shall not be destroyed. And that was fulfilled. Luke
1.33 says when he was born, his kingdom will be an everlasting
kingdom. But look at Ephesians 1 and see
how this blessing was not just for Christ, but for his people. Ephesians 1 says this in verse
17. Paul prays that the God of our
Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the
spirit of wisdom and revelation and the knowledge of Christ,
that the eyes of your understanding being enlightened, you may know
what is the hope of his calling and what the riches of the glory
of his inheritance is in the saints. What is the exceeding
greatness of His power to us who believe? According to the
workings of His mighty power, which He wrought in Christ when
He raised Him from the dead and set Him at His own right hand
in the heavenly places. When God raised Christ from the
dead, He raised all of His people with Him and set Him at His own
right hand heaven ruling over all things verse 21 for far above
all principality and power and might and dominion in every name
that is named this is our Lord Jesus the Son of Man not only
in this world but also in that which is to come and have put
all things under his feet and gave him to be the head over
all things to the church for this purpose that he might rule
over all things to the church for the purpose of, for their
benefit, on their behalf, and they with him, which is his body,
the fullness of him that filleth all in all." And you can look
throughout scripture, Hebrews chapter 2 and other places, it
talks about this. God gave Christ dominion over
all things. And so back in In Genesis 27,
Isaac also says this, Cursed be every one that curses thee,
and blessed be he that blessed thee. Everything is given to
him, and all who bless him are blessed, all who curse him are
cursed. You see, God is a friend of all
of Christ's friends. And he's an enemy of all of Christ's
enemies. That's an amazing thing. Read
Psalm chapter 2 if you want to see that. Kiss the son. Kiss
the son. Who is Esau? Who is Esau? Hebrews chapter 12 says Esau
sought the blessing but forfeited it. Esau was a profane man. You know what profanity is, don't
you? Profanity is like swearing. Esau was a profane man. He had
no regard for holy things. That's what profanity is. No
regard for God and spiritual things. It also says in Hebrews
chapter 12, he was a fornicator. An unclean, perverse man. First
thing he did was he married Canaanite women. That was the first thing
that happened. First he sold his birthright,
then he married Canaanite women. He had no regard for Christ. He had disregard for eternal
blessings in Christ. He sold his birthright. Completely
rejected Christ. And then he went out and married
Canaanite women. That's a profane man. A fornicator. A fornicator
and a profane man is someone who has an idolatrous worship
for everything that's not Christ. Seeking salvation in all that's
not Christ. Looking somewhere else for salvation
and satisfaction and to know God outside of Christ. That's
what a profane fornicator is. Esau was that. But you know what
Esau was? He was a man who sought the blessing
out of his... He presumed upon his position
as the firstborn. Didn't he? I'm the firstborn.
He's going to give it to me. My dad likes me best. He's just
going to give it to me. He thought he had an inside track
with his father. And it was just going to happen
because of that. It was not going to happen that way. God's purpose
had to be fulfilled. And so, what we see here is that
he was a man who depended on his birthright. He had no regard
for Christ. He rejected Him. When he sold
his birthright, he rejected Him. And he went after these strange
women of Canaan, and then Ishmaelites later. He had no spiritual, he had no
faith. He was a man without faith. He
was a reprobate. He was a man like the Jews. They would not submit themselves
to the righteousness of Christ. The righteousness of God, which
is Christ. They refused it. When he came, they rejected him.
Just like Esau rejected the birthright. Hebrews chapter 12 is trying
to teach us that Esau was like those who trust their own works
for salvation and look to something other than Christ. The whole
book of Hebrews is to teach us there's perfection, not by our
keeping the law, but in Christ alone, by his work, his saving,
his sacrifice of himself, fulfilling God's will, himself, and our
place in him is the only way we can be saved. But Esau rejected
all that. And so in Hebrews 12, God says, you're not come to
the mouth that might be touched. Not to Sinai, you're come to
Zion. But Esau was like those who go
to Sinai. Those who trust their works.
So he was a profane man. A fornicator, God calls him. He took wives of the Canaanites.
He sold his birthright. He rested on his birthright as
his entitlement to the blessing. He trusted in what he was by
nature. He's every reprobate man. That's who Esau is. He's everyone
who trusts in their own works. Everyone who rejects Christ,
who doesn't need Christ. Who seeks a blessing from God
out of their profanity and fornicating ways in the sight of God. They have no interest in Christ.
They won't submit to His righteousness. This is Esau. And what happened
when he learned that there was no blessing for himself? You
know what he did? He blamed his brother. He said, he's a deceiver. He came in here, he tricked me
twice. He tricked me out of my birthright and now he took the
blessing from me. Such a little deceiver. What
is that? That's self-righteous, self-conceit,
blindness to your own sin. Esau couldn't even see it. It
was his fault. And he blamed it on Jacob. And
that's every unbelieving Jew, that's every unbelieving Gentile,
that's all of us by nature, until God gives us this grace that
he gave to Jacob. Who is Jacob? He is the Lord
Jesus Christ, our great Savior, and he's every believer in Christ.
He represents our Lord Jesus, but he also represents us, because
the blessing was given to him. All the promises of God are in
him. All the blessings of God are
in Christ, and God has chosen us in Him and given us all blessings
in Him. What are we to do? What Jacob
did, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. To think you can make
yourself acceptable to God is spiritual adultery. is to not
see any beauty in Christ. It's to think that God's justice
is so low that you can satisfy it, or that his law is so unholy
that you can fulfill it. But that's not the way. We can
only be saved by Christ, and Jacob shows us that. Jacob shows us God's glory, that
he saved this man, even though he was a sinner. May the Lord
save us for his namesake to the praise and the glory of his grace
by his Son alone. And may we see it in every day
of our lives so that in all of our lives, even though we find
sin, May God uphold us in His faith to see that His salvation,
ultimately, His faithfulness, ultimately, will be the only
reason that we're saved. Let's pray. Dear Lord, we thank
You for Your mercy. Thank You for the Lord Jesus.
Thank You for salvation by grace, even of sinners like us. We're
only sinners saved by grace. Help us now, Lord, to see it.
Help us to live upon Him and pursue Christ with all that we
are and have. And all that we do, Lord, even though we have
this wrestling with our inward, fallen nature, we pray, Lord,
that Jesus will be held up to us in the gospel and that you
would uphold this in this faith. We wouldn't fall away. We wouldn't
turn away. We wouldn't go back to the place
we left. But we would hold to Christ and
not go beyond Him. And we would be saved for your
glory. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.