Conspiracy Number One - Isaac & Esau (1-4)

I said last week that these stories really show very clearly how from the time God chose to bless Abraham, the father of all those who have faith, his salvation was on the basis of sheer grace, total undeserved mercy. Abraham, his son Isaac, and now his grandson Jacob all display behaviour that could hardly be described as saintly. They were chosen by God and made his people and heirs of the promises given to Abraham, solely by God's undeserved mercy on them and not because of their goodness.

Today's story continues to proclaim that truth of the eternal gospel of grace. That we are saved purely by trusting God's promises and not by our own works. We see Jacob here really living up to his name, which means 'deceiver'. But before we consider Jacob, we need to remember what God has already said to this family. Because what people often fail to notice is that there are two conspiracies happening here, not just one. When we first read this story, perhaps our initial response is to think that Isaac and Esau get the raw end of the deal, and that Esau is right when he complains that Jacob has tricked him. But it’s not quite as simple as that, because there are actually two conspiracies in this passage, not just one. The first conspiracy takes place between Isaac and his elder son Esau.

Now it is beyond belief that Isaac did not know the prophecy God had given to Rebekah when her twins were still in the womb. God quite clearly declared that although both would become the father of a people, the younger twin would actually be the one to have priority. He said to Rebekah that “the younger shall serve the older.” It is also very unlikely that Isaac did not know about the incident recorded earlier, when Esau sold his birthright as the older child to Jacob. When Esau complains later about what Jacob has done, he speaks to Isaac as though it were common knowledge. But Esau was Isaac’s favourite son, and he seems to be unwilling to accept that this means God’s primary blessing was to go to Jacob. That it was to be him, and not Esau, through whom God’s promises to Abraham would come true. And so we read how he sends for Esau and asks him to prepare him the kind of delicious food he likes so that he may give him his blessing before he dies, since he is now getting on in years.

In fact, Isaac is about one hundred when this story takes place, and the twins are about forty. Isaac lived to one hundred and eighty, so when he says here that he does not know the day of his death, he’s quite right, and it shows that what he does here is not an act of faith. Later when Jacob and Joseph bless their children, it is immediately before they die, and the Lord has revealed to them that they will die soon. Not so with Isaac. He does not wait for the Lord to instruct him about the blessing, but takes things into his own hands. Perhaps also he is wishing to die before his time, because he has become almost blind and does not enjoy life so much anymore. In any case, he is not trusting God and seeking His will, but rather seeking to foist his will upon God by blessing the son that God has not said will be the one to inherit the promise to Abraham.

Incidentally, remember how last week we saw how Jacob’s sneakiness and deceit came not just from his mother, but also from Isaac who followed in his father Abraham’s sin of passing off his wife as his sister in order to avoid danger? Well this week’s story shows Isaac passed on his faults and foibles, not just Jacob, but also Esau, who shared his father’s fondness for food. Remember what Esau sold his birthright to Jacob for? A pot of stew, exactly like the one here that Isaac asks Esau to make for him. Isaac calls it “delicious food, such as I love...” You can almost hear the relish and anticipation in his voice. It seems that both Isaac and Esau shared a certain gastronomic sensuality for this dish! Like his son Esau, Isaac allowed his taste buds to govern his heart. In fact even his love for Esau was partly because of this. In chapter 25 verse 28 we have already been told “Isaac loved Esau because he ate of his game.”

Dare I say it, there is such delicious irony here, because their love of tasty food is the downfall of both of them with regard to Esau’s birthright. If Esau had not regarded his love for goat stew above his concern for spiritual things like God’s promises, he would not have sold his birthright to Jacob back in chapter 25. And if Isaac had not insisted that his son Esau should in a sense buy the blessing that belonged to the firstborn with this dish of food, he would have blessed him straight away, not giving Rebekah the opportunity she had to subvert his plans. How’s that for irony? A pot of stew cost Esau the birthright and now it costs him the blessing that goes with the birthright.

Now normally the blessing of children by the patriarch would be a public affair, with all the family around, as in Genesis 49, when Jacob blesses each of his children. But Isaac and Esau conspire to do it secretly, just amongst themselves.

Conspiracy Number Two - Rebekah & Jacob (5-17)

But Rebekah overhears what they are up to. And in response to Isaac’s plan, Rebekah hatches one of her own. It’s sad to think that a wonderful love story has come to this, where the man and his wife are conspiring against one another. Think back to when we first met Rebekah in chapter 24. Remember the faith and the romance. In faith she left her home far away, despite her family’s reticence, because she believed the promises God gave to Abraham and was willing to join herself by marriage to those promises. And on Isaac’s part we read there “Then Isaac brought her into the tent of Sarah his mother, and she became his wife, and he loved her.” Contrast that with his actions here, when he conspires with Esau to do something secretly that he knew Rebekah would not have approved.

For all of us who have been married many years, perhaps there is a warning here to examine whether our love for our life partner has grown and deepened, or whether we have grown apart like Isaac and Rebekah seem to have done. Part of the reason for that was that they chose different children as their favourites. There will always be personality differences with families, but we mustn’t let those differences dictate family dynamics so that divisions like this occur.

I’m not going to go over the details of the plan that Jacob and Rebekah hatch and implement. But if you have any questions about verses 5 to 17, you can ask me later or come along Wednesday night to bible study. But I want to go on to consider the blessing that Isaac gives in verses 18 to 29.

The Blessing Given (18-29)

Isaac says “May God give you of heaven’s dew and of earth’s richness, an abundance of grain and new wine.” Now can you see what is odd about either Esau or Jacob being blessed with grain and new wine? Why is this strange? [field answers] ...yes, because Esau is a hunter and Jacob is a nomadic herdsman.

So this blessing is tied up with the still unfulfilled promises to Abraham. It is a prophecy looking forward in history to the time when the promised seed of Abraham will own and occupy the land of Canaan. At the time Isaac prophesies, the only part of the land they own is the burial plot where Abraham and Sarah lie, having died in faith seeing the promise only from far off.

The blessing continues: “May nations serve you and peoples bow down to you. Be Lord over your brothers, and may the sons of your mother bow down to you. May those who curse you be cursed and those who bless you be blessed.”

Again there is a clear reference to the covenant promise to Abraham. Through him will come one who will rule over the nations and through whom the nations will be blessed. But Isaac is acting simultaneously in faith and in disobedience here, because if he truly believes it is Esau he is blessing, he is going completely against the Lord’s word to Rebekah when he said that the elder would serve the younger. It would be Jacob and his descendants who would rule over Esau and the land of Edom that would come from him, not the other way round.

Esau gets the Leftovers (30-40)

Now in verses 30 to 40 we see Esau coming back to a bitter disappointment. And in verse 36 he puts the blame squarely on Jacob, saying “Isn’t he rightly named Jacob, he has deceived me these two times. He took my birthright and now he’s taken my blessing!”

But hang on a minute. Esau is acting with that typical human trait we all exhibit at times of blaming others for what is fundamentally our own doing. Did Jacob trick him out of his birthright back in chapter 25? Did he take it from him by force or by deceit? NO. Esau gave it to Jacob merely in order to satisfy his taste for game! Esau may have been stupid and nearsighted. He may have not appreciated the fact that the birthright and the blessing were connected. And Jacob may have taken advantage of his stupidity, but it was Esau’s choice and Esau’s fault that it turned out the way it did. Esau had been nurturing this grudge for sixty years, and that’s what happens when people do that. After so many years of telling yourself how hardly done by you are, you begin to believe your own biased account of what happened. Are you harbouring any grudges against someone for something they did in the dim dark past? Do you allow that to colour the way you regard them even today? This is such a common situation in families isn’t it, and none of us are immune from its effects.

Now Isaac in his leftover blessing on Esau, which is a bit like a back-handed compliment, shows that he had finally accepted God’s word and resigned himself to the fact that it is not his favourite macho son who is the apple of God’s eye, but the quiet mummy’s boy Jacob. He seems to know immediately what has happened, and straight away he says of the deceitful Jacob, “I blessed him, and indeed he will be blessed.” He knows that his attempt to thwart the Lord’s purposes has failed and was doomed from the start. God will bring about what he has promised. Jacob not Esau is the heir of promise. And when Esau asks if there is not an equivalent blessing left for him, Isaac answers “I have made Jacob lord over you and made all his relatives his servants, and I have sustained him with grain and new wine. So what can I possibly do for you, my son?” Yet he does give a blessing of a kind. And this also becomes prophetic. We read in the later history of Israel, how most of the time the kingdom of Israel dominated the kingdom of Edom. But every now and then Edom would throw off the shackles of the kings of Israel and Judah and rebel, in accordance with Isaac’s words “when you grow restless, you will throw his yoke from off your neck.”

Lessons from this story

There is a warning to us here not to act in the way that these people acted, thinking to bring about God’s promises by dubious and deceitful means. We must not be like those evangelists who think they can con people into the kingdom of God by trickery and playing on their emotions. We ought never to think that the end justifies the means or that God needs our special way of hurrying things along.

Everyone in this story acted dubiously, and yet, apart from Esau, though their faith was imperfect, it was still faith. Remarkably, Hebrews 11 says this about Isaac: “by faith Isaac invoked future blessings on Jacob and Esau.” You see, even though Isaac differed with God over which son should inherit the blessing, he still had no doubt whatsoever that God would bless, in accordance with his unshakeable promise to Abraham. And even though they used ungodly means to secure the blessing for Jacob, Rebekah did so because she knew that God had promised that the younger son would be the one through whom God’s rule would come. So in an ironic sort of way they were acting faithlessly yet in faith at the same time. Because of their faith, God used them to bring about his purposes and he blessed them and their offspring with His saving presence among them. But they also had to bear the earthly consequences of their sin. Every relationship in the family suffered irretrievable loss, and for the next eighty years they reaped what they had sown. Rebekah especially had to pay a heavy price for her deceitful conspiracy with Jacob, as we will see next week.

Do not be like Esau – Hebrews 12:12-17

But the one who did not act in faith the whole way through this sorry saga, and the real loser in the story, is Esau. He and his father Isaac both put their carnal desires above spiritual considerations. They were sensual rather than spiritual. Isaac trusted in his senses and they let him down. But Esau was even more profane, deliberately giving up his right to God’s precious promises because the immediate concerns of this world were more important to him. And the New Testament warns us against taking the path that he did. Listen as I read from Hebrews chapter twelve and verse twelve:

“Therefore, lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed. Strive for peace with everyone, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. 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.”

What really matters to you in life? Satisfying your earthly desires is not what should motivate us. All that matters in the end is the kingdom of God. The pot of stew Esau exchanged his birthright and blessing for was sewerage the next day. Things that we think are so important: careers, houses, wealth and security, better homes and gardens, are ours for a fleeting moment compared to eternity. One act of faith in the name of Christ will count for more than all the wealth of this world and all the recognition and status and satisfaction you can amass. An hour spent in the company of God’s people pursuing the things of eternity is worth a year spent in the pursuits of the world. Coming to church or bible study or a prayer meeting to encourage your brothers and sisters in Christ is worth more than being anywhere else to satisfy your worldly ambitions, because its effects are lasting in the lives of God’s people. Speaking up and opening your mouth to tell the gospel to someone who needs to hear is worth far more than remaining silent in order to retain worldly credibility. It’s a matter of priorities. Esau’s were all in the wrong place – his stomach.

But that passage from Hebrews is not just a word of warning and rebuke. It is fundamentally a word of encouragement to us. It says lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed. And it speaks of how we may as a church do that for one another, seeing to it that there is no bitterness or division, but encouraging peace and harmony. And we do so, like Isaac and Jacob did, trusting implicitly in God’s promises to bless his inheritance. We are the inheritance of the Lord, the offspring of Abraham. He will grow his church, and we ought never to be discouraged by the temporary setbacks we sometimes experience, but go on in faith, because he who promised is infinitely more faithful than we.