Cheating, Genesis 25:19-34; 27:1-41

Cheating
Genesis 25:19-34; 27:1-41

We've entered an era that seems so very far removed from the late Twentieth Century. Shepherds and nomads living in goatskin tents in the arid climes of the Middle East -- what relevance can this have to us? Once we understand the culture a bit, we find that people haven't changed that much in three or four millennia.

Rebekah, a woman of God?

As the passage begins, Abraham's son Isaac marries his cousin from far away. She is by herself in Canaan, her family many hundreds of miles away. She is isolated by a different land, different customs, and she is shamefully barren. Shameful because for a women to be childless in that culture was to be somehow incapable of performing one's primary function: to bear children. How ashamed she must have felt. But she had a husband who loved her (Genesis 24:66), and who prayed to Yahweh for her.

Note: In the Old Testament where you see the word LORD in small caps in your Bible, it stands for the Hebrew word Yahweh (which used to be mispronounced Jehovah), God's given name (Exodus 3:14-15). The word comes from the Hebrew word "to be". God identifies himself as the One who was, and is, and is to come -- always present -- the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.

What does it take to help a husband to learn to pray? So often we try to solve problems on our own, and when we fail we give up. Isaac had been married to Rebekah for 20 years (vss. 20, 26) before she got pregnant. How long did it take him to bring the problem to the Lord? We don't know.

But he prayed, and the Lord answered his prayer -- twice over. Rebekah was pregnant with twins! And almost despairing when the babies started kicking and moving violently within her. What's going on? Why is this happening? She was so troubled about it she, too, prayed. What's going on, Lord?

And the Lord answered her:

Two nations are in your womb,
and two peoples from within you will be separated;
one people will be stronger than the other,
and the older will serve the younger (vs. 23).

Here's a wife who has heard from the Lord. Up to that point (if chapters 25 and 26 are arranged chronologically), she had heard more from the Lord than had her husband Isaac. She was a spiritual woman, one who has heard from God. She knows more about her sons' destiny than Isaac does. Did she tell him? Or did she keep her knowledge to herself? We don't know. All we do know is that Isaac loved Esau (the older), and Rebekah loved Jacob (the younger). If she told Isaac, he didn't take it to heart like she did. She knew that her younger son would be dominant, and even though Esau was a man's man, macho, a hunter, she knew that something in quieter Jacob would distinguish him. So she became his champion.

The Supplanter Begins Young

The birth, too, was an acted prophecy of the future. Esau comes out first, all red and hairy. Esau means "hairy," while Edom, which became his home and the home of his descendents, means "red." Jacob wasn't far behind. His tiny hand was gripping his brother's heel as they pulled Esau out, and they had to pry his little fingers off before they could free Esau. Jacob was second, but he was grasping at first place from the first, and soon achieved just that. They named him Jacob, "he grasps the heel," or figuratively, "he deceives."

Dad is 60 when the boys are born, and they bring great joy into his life, especially Esau. He loved the out-of-doors like his dad, and they would go hunting together. Esau became a skilled, renowned hunter, who would track deer in the wilderness and bring them down with his bow and arrow. Esau is happiest when he is out in the wild hunting.

Jacob is just the opposite. He is quieter and stays around the tents. He and his mother Rebekah grow close, and this spiritual woman helps him understand something of his destiny. Does she tell him of the prophecy that he will rule over his brother? I think so. I think she implants the idea, reinforces it, and pushes him to fulfill it.

Obtaining the Birthright

One day while Esau is out hunting, Jacob is home cooking stew in a pot over the fire. (KJV calls it "pottage".) Esau is famished and exhausted, and craves the red stew. "Quick, let me have some of that red stew!" He can't wait. Jacob has been waiting all his life, and now sees his opportunity.

"First, sell me your birthright," he says.

"Hey, I'm about to die," replies Esau. "What good is the birthright to me?"

This exchange tells us a great deal about the character of both brothers.

Esau betrays his own tendency toward instant gratification. "I want it now, I can't wait for the future." In so doing, he bargains away his future options. Jacob, on the other hand, is willing to deny himself in the present to obtain in the future what he values most. Each of us faces temptations -- strong temptations -- to get our gratification now. Instant pleasure, instant wealth, instant popularity. And for this we trade away our futures. If we smoke pot now, we limit our careers in certain fields. If we obey the pull to sexual gratification now, we may ruin whatever hope we have in the future of a happy marriage. If we cheat now we destroy our future influence and trust.

I've found that Satan's voice is the insistent one. "You've got to do this and do it now!" he shouts. God's voice, on the other hand, is gentle but persistent. As we grow in our faith, we learn to discern between these voices. We learn to say "yes" to God and "no" to the destroyer of our souls.

Now Jacob's motives aren't pure here. Though Esau accuses him of deceiving (27:36), Jacob isn't guilt of deception -- this time. Jacob takes advantage of Esau's weakness, and in a weak moment extracts from him a binding promise.

"Swear to me first." So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob." (vs. 33)

Is Jacob being honest? Is he being a good businessman? Do we really get ahead by taking advantage of others' weaknesses and shortsightedness? Are we obligated to disclose to them their potential mistakes? How can we love our neighbor as ourselves in business? Jay Conrad Levinson has written a whole series of books beginning with Guerrilla Marketing based on the hypothesis that business is war and conflict, and that the little guy can gain advantage by being smarter, quick on his feet -- and ruthless. Somehow, I think Jesus calls us to a higher standard in our business practices. He would be much more pleased by the "win-win" deal than the one that took advantage of the weakness of a brother.

I've wondered if such an inherent right as a birthright could be sold or transferred in such a manner, and there's no clear precedent either in ancient literature or Biblical literature. There is a 15th Century BC text from Nuzi as a parallel where a man named Tupkitilla transfers his inheritance rights to a grove over to his brother Kurpazah in exchange for three sheep. While not parallel in every aspect, it does indicate that one brother could sell inherited property to another. In Ruth 4 we see a legal transaction between Boaz and his relative which gives Boaz the right to marry Ruth -- and purchase her mother-in-law Naomi's property. The relative relinquishes his right and formalizes it by taking off his sandal and giving it to Boaz in the presence of witnesses. Neither Esau nor Isaac seem to question that Jacob had obtained the birthright (25:36).

This passage also says a lot about one's value of spiritual things, if we can consider the birthright in a spiritual as well as legal light. Esau values stew more than the birthright, while Jacob values the birthright above his own integrity. The author of Hebrews uses this incident in a moral sense:

See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many. See that no one is sexually immoral, or is godless like Esau, who for a single meal sold his inheritance rights as the oldest son. Afterward, as you know, when he wanted to inherit this blessing, he was rejected. He could bring about no change of mind, though he sought the blessing with tears (Hebrews 12:15-17).

Indeed, Esau did seek his father's blessing with tears:

When Esau heard his father's words, he burst out with a loud and bitter cry and said to his father, "Bless me -- me too, my father!" (27:34)

... "Do you have only one blessing, my father? Bless me too, my father!" Then Esau wept aloud (27:38).

God is merciful and can forgive us of sin, but there are some doors we forever close for ourselves by our actions, actions that cannot be undone. This is a sobering warning for us. It speaks directly to our character.

Tricking Isaac into a Blessing (chapter 27)

While Jacob's acquisition of the birthright might have been strictly legal (if not ethical), his acquisition of his father's blessing seems grossly deceptive and unrighteous on its very face.

Tent walls are thin. Jacob's mother Rebekah overhears old, blind Isaac telling his firstborn Esau to hunt some venison and cook it for him, and then receive the formal father-to-son blessing before Isaac dies.

Quick, Rebekah tells her favorite son Jacob. Do what I say. Trick your father into giving you his blessing rather than Esau. She comes up with a hair-brained scheme to trick the old man:

A well cooked meal of domestic livestock -- he'll never know it wasn't venison
Esau's gamy-smelling clothing to make blind Isaac think he is speaking to Esau. (Isaac had apparently lost his eyesight, but not his sense of smell. Or maybe Esau had a particularly rank odor, who knows.)
Goat's skin pieces on Jacobs arms and neck to simulate Esau's hairiness. (Can you really fool Isaac with fur? Or was Esau that hairy?)

Jacob is afraid that if his father discovers the ruse he will curse Jacob. "Let the curse fall on me," says his mother. "Just do what I say."

And so Jacob follows his mother's instructions and begins the deception. Isaac seems to suspect something and asks Jacob directly: "Are you really my son Esau?"

"I am," Jacob says without hesitation.

And so Isaac blesses Jacob with a blessing Isaac had intended for the minutes-older twin Esau. It includes:

Heaven's dew and earth's richness -- an abundance of grain and new wine
The subjection of whole nations.
Priority and superiority over his brothers,
Protection from the curses of others, and
To be a source of blessing to others.

When Esau returns too little and too late, his father gives him a kind of anti-blessing, but the promise that he will overthrow his brother's domination at some point.

What kind of blessing is this?

What kind of binding blessing is this? It is clear from Isaac's reaction ("violent trembling") when he discovers the deception, that he didn't have a clue that he was pronouncing a blessing on the wrong person.

But this is more than the blessing of a father to a son. It is a kind of spoken and binding prophecy that comes from the Lord himself, spoken through Isaac as a spokesman to the person God intended to bless. We can see other examples later in Genesis.

In his final years elderly Jacob blesses Joseph's two sons Ephriam and Manasseh (Genesis 48). Joseph arranges them before the old man in such a way that Jacob's right hand (the hand of honor and priority) would rest on the older son, Manasseh, while his left hand would rest on Ephriam, the younger. Jacob crosses his hands so as to put his right hand on the head of the younger son, Ephriam. Joseph corrects his Dad: "No, my father, this one is the firstborn; put your right hand on his head."

But Jacob refuses. "His younger brother will be greater than he," God has shown him, and he is obligated to prophesy what God would have him say. Here Jacob is acting as God's spokesman, a prophet of God.

In chapter 49, Jacob calls all his sons together and prophesies a specific blessing over each son, speaking of future things that he had no way of knowing unless God had shown him.

So Isaac's blessing of Jacob and Esau wasn't in one very real sense his to give. One could argue that Rebekah was more spiritual than her husband Isaac, in that she knew that "the older will serve the younger" (25:23), and made sure that nothing -- not even righteousness and her husband's will -- would stand in the way of God's will for her favorite son, Jacob.

Can God bless through unrighteousness

I have a real problem with Rebekah's and Jacob's deception. If God is a God of truth, then this is the opposite of truth. It is a sin. It is unrighteous. And though it is quite in keeping with Jacob's opportunistic and deceptive character so far, it is hardly worthy of approval -- except perhaps by shrewd people who value expediency over integrity.

Can God -- does God -- intend sin to work out his purposes? The surprising answer of Genesis is "yes." Later in Genesis we come to the sordid tale of Joseph's brothers selling him into slavery out of jealously, and then deceiving Jacob by dipping Joseph's coat in animal blood and giving it to the grieving father. But in spite of being a slave, and an untrue charge of rape, because God's hand is on him, Joseph appears before Pharaoh, prophetically interprets Pharoah's dream, is appointed second in command in the entire kingdom, and saves an entire nation from starvation through his preparations for the famine. After Jacob finally dies, Joseph's brothers are terrified. Now that their father is dead he won't hesitate to punish them for selling him into slavery many years before. They come to him pleading their father's deathbed wishes. Listen to Joseph's answer:

"You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives" (Genesis 50:20).

While Joseph's brothers had sold him into slavery with the basest of motives, and a clear sin against him and against their father, "God intended it for good ...." Does this mean that somehow Joseph's brothers are innocent, that God made them do it and they had no choice? No. They were responsible for their sin, just as Judas was responsible for his sin, even though in his sin he was fulfilling prophecy.

"The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him. But woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man! It would be better for him if he had not been born." (Mark 14:21)

God's sovereignty and man's free will

We see human sin and responsibility on the one side, and God working out his plan on the other. Of course, we're getting deep into things we scarcely understand. We throw around such words as predestination, foreknowledge, foreordination, and the like as if we understood them. They are merely theological constructs to label what we've never experienced firsthand. Whole churches have divided over views of God's sovereignty and man's will, and there's no need to re-visit these sorry controversies.

But to be biblical and balanced we must affirm two seemingly contrary truths:

God is sovereign
Man has a free will

Both are somehow true. I take great comfort in Romans 8:28-29:

"And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers."

In spite of man's evil, God will still work good and his plan out of it and in spite of it. True, man's evil causes great pain and suffering which God does not always shield us from -- nor did he shield his own Son -- but he will work out his plan.

Preferring one child over another

Rebekah loved Jacob which Isaac loved Esau (25:28). What trouble this caused! But Jacob himself made the same mistake by loving the sons of his beloved wife Rachel -- Joseph and Benjamin -- to the obvious pain and jealously of their brothers. Later, David makes a similar mistake to the run of his family.

As parents, we need to learn from this. While we cannot love our children the same, we must love them equally if we want to produce a peaceful household and children whose lives are blessed. Of course, our children are different, and we show our love in different ways to them. One is an athlete, and we encourage him in sports. Another is an artist and we encourage her in her art, and try to find ways of furthering her talents and skills. Yes, here brother may misunderstand our attentions, but we must make him feel loved, too. Sometimes it's a difficult balancing act, but we must stay on the tightwire. If we don't, we produce children who feel unloved by their parents, and cause both family strife and great personal unhappiness. Love is the key.

Jacob have I loved ....

We can't leave this passage without looking for a moment at God's preference of Jacob over Esau. Esau was a descendent of Abraham, but didn't have the spiritual acuity to appreciate it. While God blessed his descendents with nation-status, the country of Edom, they were subjugated again and again by the sons of Jacob (Israel). Why?

Here we really get into the thick of predestination. In explaining God's sovereignty in Romans 9, Paul uses Jacob and Esau as examples and quotes Malachi 1:2-3:

"Was not Esau Jacob's brother?" the LORD says. "Yet I have loved Jacob, but Esau I have hated, and I have turned his mountains into a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals."

This indicates, says the Apostle Paul, "... that God's purpose in election might stand: not by works but by him who calls" (9:11) "It does not ... depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy" (9:16).

This is a hard pill for us to swallow, that God is in ultimate control and we can't do anything about it. We don't like anyone taking away our control of our destiny, do we? Not even God.

Did God really love Jacob and hate Esau? No. God loved them both, but for his plan of redemption he preferred Jacob over Esau, and decided to bring the blessings of Abraham to the entire world through the offspring of Jacob rather than Esau. "Love" and "hate" are used hyperbolically in place of "prefer" or "show favor" in order to make a point.

It's pretty obvious that neither Jacob nor Esau had a sterling character. God didn't chose Jacob over Esau because Jacob was more righteous. God had a plan in spite of Jacob's character. Oh, God works on Jacob's character and changes it, as we'll see in successive weeks, but his plan and purpose for Jacob is not dependent upon Jacob's goodness and worthiness, but on God's grace and plan.

Conclusion

And all this time you thought the Old Testament had nothing to say!

While we haven't got all our questions answered, this passage which contrasts Jacob and Esau has given us lots to think about, and good grist for character insight and personal growth for us. We've seen that there's hope for people as flawed as we are. We've seen that God's choice to bless us is based on His own purposes, not us. And that should give us hope. For surely, God has made clear in the New Testament that he intends to bless us in spite of ourselves, in spite of our flawed character. He is faithful to us, not for our sakes alone, but for the sake of Jesus who died for us to redeem us.

In the next lessons, we find, however, that God isn't passing over our character, but has very definite plans to help us clean up our act. Someone once said, "God catches his fish before he cleans them." Certainly, God has "caught" Jacob. Now let's see what he will do with him.