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I invite you to open your Bible with me now to Genesis chapter 27.

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As we think today about getting what you want, getting what you want, I meet bi-weekly with

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an accountability partner and have done that now for a number of months.

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In our meetings we ask ourselves questions, we ask each other questions.

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And one of the questions that we deal with is, are there any unresolved conflicts in

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your life?

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That is an important question.

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Unresolved conflicts are like submarines.

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They submerge only to surface again in new circumstances.

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The longer that we have unresolved conflicts in our lives, the more danger we are in.

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Unresolved conflicts is one way to describe the home of Isaac and Rebecca.

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In the chapter we're going to look at today, there are some human elements in this conflict

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that I want us to note.

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Let me draw some of them out for you.

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First of all, we have here a father and mother who have each chosen their favorite son of

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the two boys.

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One of them has chosen to favor Esau and the other to favor Jacob.

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We have a father and mother who are not living on the same page.

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They're not conducting their lives in their homes with the same values, the same goals.

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But I would remind you that this is not a newly married couple we're talking about.

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They've been married almost a hundred years and they still are not on the same page in

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their marriage.

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We have a father who is a believer but whose faith is somehow so weak it does not touch

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the lives of his two sons.

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We have in this chapter a resourceful and willful mother who knows God's purpose for

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the twins but who it seems cannot trust God to bring that purpose to pass without her

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help.

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And therefore she manipulates the situation to help out God.

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We have two brothers who are just worlds apart in their character, in their outlook, and

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in their values.

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And in fact they are working against one another.

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We see in this chapter past conflicts come to the surface again.

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The conflicts have not been resolved and as a result of that there's bitterness and there's

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distrust that is now years old.

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We are talking about twin brothers who are not kids.

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They are in their upper 70s.

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That's right.

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They are in their upper 70s when this takes place in this chapter.

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The past conflict is still eating away between them.

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And we note at the end of chapter 26 that Esau when he was 40, which is about 37 years

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ago now, married two Hittite women, two Canaanite women from the land around them.

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And as it says in verse 35, they brought grief to Isaac and Rebekah.

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So you think your home has problems.

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Listen to what we have here in this home that is ridden with conflict that is unresolved.

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In fact, sad to say this home sounds a lot like homes of the 90s, doesn't it?

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With all kinds of problems and conflicts and intrigue built into it.

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And it is that intrigue that I want us to look at first today.

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There is a suspenseful plot in this chapter with detail enough to keep the reader's interest

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right to the end.

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It is a sordid family conspiracy that is going on.

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And in fact it is so electric with energy that if it were happening today it would probably

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be made into a successful television movie.

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It is that kind of a story.

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It begins to unfold in this chapter at least with the defiance of a father.

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And we notice in the first few verses that Isaac, although he knows the purpose of God

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to exalt Jacob and to give him the blessing, yet Isaac chooses to try to give that blessing

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to Esau.

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We begin reading in verse 1.

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It came about when Isaac was old and his eyes were too dim to see.

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Isaac, by the way, is about 137 years old at this point.

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I think that qualifies as old.

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I shouldn't offend anybody here.

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And he called his older son Esau and said to him, my son, and he said to him, here I

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am.

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But Isaac said, behold now, I am old and I do not know the day of my death.

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Now we could all say that, couldn't we?

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Not necessarily that we are old, but that we don't know the day of our death.

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It seems as though Isaac has some sort of premonition here that he is about to die.

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Or it could be that Isaac is manipulating Esau a bit saying, I may die today.

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Would you go fix me some of that special stew that I like?

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I would say this, that if Isaac had a premonition that he was going to die, he had very bad

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premonition because he's going to live another 43 years after this.

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So he's not really about to die at all.

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He says, please take your gear, your quiver, your bow, and go out to the field and hunt

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game for me and prepare a savory dish for me such as I love and bring it to me that

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I may eat so that my soul may bless you before I die.

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Here we have the defiance of a father.

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Isaac knows that God's purpose is to exalt Jacob, but he wants to give that blessing

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to Esau.

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He seems to be more interested here at least in his appetite than he was in spiritual things.

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Sadly, we note that Isaac is not the man that he might have been, nor is he the man that

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he perhaps once was.

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Having said that about Isaac, though, I want to put this footnote in.

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It is not easy to be the son of a great man.

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How many sons of great men have blown it in their own lives?

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You start with the secular political leaders of our country.

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You go to the religious leaders of our country, and you find that time after time, a son who

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feels overshadowed by his father struggles.

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Isaac is a man of faith, but he's in the shadow of Abraham.

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Isaac is a bridge man.

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His generation is a bridge generation from a great father and a great son, but here he

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is in the middle.

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He is not in an envious position, but here we see that even though he's in that tough

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position, he does not make the most of it.

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He is defying God's purpose in what he attempts to do.

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As he says this to his son, there are some ears listening in the tent wall.

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It's the ears of his mother.

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Rebekah was listening while Isaac spoke to his son Esau.

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So when Esau went to the field to hunt for game to bring home, Rebekah said to her son,

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Jacob, behold, I heard your father speak to your brother Esau, saying, bring me some game

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and prepare a savory dish for me that I may eat, and bless you in the presence of the

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Lord before my death.

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Now therefore, my son, listen to me as I command you.

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Go now to the flock and bring to me two choice kids from there, that I may prepare them as

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a savory dish for your father such as he loves, and then you shall bring it to your father

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that he may eat so that he may bless you before his death.

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And so we see the deceit of a mother as this drama continues to unfold.

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The deceit of a mother.

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We understand that her motive may have been righteous, but her method was wrong.

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It was a good thing that Jacob should get the blessing.

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He deserved it.

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He had the birthright, and it was God's purpose that he should have it.

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So her motive may have been right, but she went about it in entirely the wrong way.

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W.A. Griffith Thomas has said, we may account for it, that is, her actions, but we cannot

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justify it.

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We can understand why she did what she did, but it's impossible for us to excuse it as

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though it's okay, because it is not.

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She is being deceptive.

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And Jacob at first recognizes this, and he says to his mother, behold, he saw my brothers

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a hairy man, and I'm a smooth man.

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Perhaps my father will feel me, and then I shall be as a deceiver in his sight, and I

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shall bring upon myself a curse and not a blessing.

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He was concerned when he heard this plot.

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But his mother said to him, your curse be upon me.

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Boy, that is a serious statement.

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She means it.

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She says, your curse be upon me, my son.

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Only obey my voice and go and get them for me.

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So he went and got them and brought them to his mother.

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He relented.

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He agreed.

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He went along with it.

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And so his mother made the savory food, such as his father loved, and then Rebekah took

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the best garments of Esau, her elder son, which were with her in the house, and put

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them on Jacob, her younger son.

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And she put the skins of the kids on the backs on his hands and the smooth part of his neck.

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She also gave the savory food and the bread which she had made to her son Jacob.

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And so the plot is put into motion.

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Isaac is unsure at first, and then he accepts the food and he goes along with it.

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He came to his father and said, my father, and he said, here I am.

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Who are you, my son?

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And Jacob said to his father, I am Esau, your firstborn.

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He begins to lie here.

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I've done, as you've told me, get up, please.

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Sit and eat of the game that you may bless me.

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Isaac isn't sure.

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He says to his son, how is it that you have done it so quickly, my son?

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Jacob's response is, because the Lord your God caused it to happen to me.

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He's digging this hole deeper, isn't he?

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Now he's bringing God into his plot, into the scheme.

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He says, God has blessed me, so I was able to get the game and come quickly with the

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meal.

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Isaac said to Jacob, please, come close, that I may feel you, my son, whether you are

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really my son Esau or not.

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So Jacob came close to Isaac, his father, and he felt him and said, the voice is the

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voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.

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And he did not recognize him because his hands were hairy like his brother Esau's hands,

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so he blessed him.

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And he said, are you really my son Esau?

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He said, I am.

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There's another spade full of dirt out of the hole he's digging.

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So he said, bring it to me and I will eat my son's game, that I may bless you.

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And he brought it to him and he ate.

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He also brought him wine and he drank.

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And then his father Isaac said to him, please, come close and kiss me, my son.

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And so he came close and kissed him.

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And when he smelled the smell of his garments, this time out for a moment here, got to remember

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there wasn't wash and wear clothes in those days.

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And Esau was the kind of a man who was an outdoorsman.

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He liked to be out in the field.

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And so there was a certain aroma, shall we say, about his clothing.

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And so Isaac smells the clothing.

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This is his final test.

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He wants to see if what's happening here passes the smell test.

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And as far as he's concerned, it does.

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And he blessed him and said, see, the smell of my son is like the smell of a field which

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the Lord has blessed.

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So there was this scent of wild game.

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It sounds like a nice cologne, doesn't it?

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There was the scent of the open field that God had blessed.

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He says, now, may God give you of the dew of heaven and of the fatness of the earth

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and an abundance of grain and new wine.

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So he blesses him with prosperity.

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Many nations, may nations rather, serve you and nations bow down to you.

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Be master of your brothers, and may your mother's sons bow down to you.

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And so he blesses him, secondly, with power.

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Cursed be those who curse you and blessed be those who bless you.

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And so he blesses him with protection.

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By the way, you will recall that that last sentence comes directly out of Genesis chapter

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12 in the promise of God to Abraham.

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And so Isaac is weaving in the covenant and the promise and the blessing to his father,

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Abraham, to this blessing that he is giving to his son.

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And so the deed is done.

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Through the deception of a mother and a son, we see that the blessing is given to the right

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one.

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That's interesting, isn't it?

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How God super intends even the sins of Rebecca and Jacob to accomplish what he wanted accomplished.

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Well, we come next to the third movement in this drama, the third chapters that were,

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the third scene.

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After the blessing is given, Jacob departs.

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And no sooner had he left the presence of his father than Esau, his brother, came in

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from hunting.

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You see the two almost passing in the hallway.

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And he made also a savory food and brought it to his father, verse 31.

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And he said to his father, Let my father arise and eat of his son's game, that you may bless

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me.

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And Isaac, his father, said to him, Who are you?

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And he said, I'm your son, your firstborn.

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Esau.

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Isaac trembled violently and said, Who is he then that hunted game and brought it to

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me so that I ate of it, all of it, before you came?

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And blessed him.

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Yes, and he shall be blessed.

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And when Esau heard the words of his father, he cried out with an exceedingly great and

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bitter cry and said to his father, Bless me, even me also, oh my father.

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And he said, Your brother came deceitfully and has taken away your blessing.

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Well, there's truth and there's falsehood in that statement.

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The blessing didn't really belong to Esau in the first place.

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And he said, Is he not rightly named Jacob?

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For he has supplanted me these two times.

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Had he really?

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You look back at that text we studied last week and you see that Jacob hadn't deceived

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Esau when he got the birthright.

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He bargained for it.

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Now, it was a clever plot to get it.

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But Esau knew exactly what he was doing.

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He had not valued the birthright.

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But you see, here is a man who perhaps 25 or 30 years later is still bitter about what

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happened and this is how he sees it.

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And he says, He has deceived me these two times.

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He took away my birthright and behold, now he's taken away my blessing.

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And he said, Have you not reserved a blessing for me?

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This is pitiful.

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But Isaac answered and said to Esau, Behold, I have made him your master and all his relatives

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I've given to him as servants.

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And with grain and new wine I've sustained him.

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Now, it's for you then.

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What can I do, my son?

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You see, Isaac recognizes the irretrievability of the blessing.

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He has given it.

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It's gone.

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Esau said to his father, Do you have only one blessing, my father?

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Bless me, even me also, oh my father.

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And so Esau lifted his voice and wept.

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I tell you, this is high drama.

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And your heart cannot help but be touched by the tears of this man.

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What happens here is what the writer of Hebrews is talking about when he writes these words.

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Just there be no immoral or godless person among you like Esau who sold his own birthright

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for a single meal.

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For you know that even afterwards, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected,

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for he found no place for repentance, though he sought for it with tears.

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That is, he sought for the blessing with tears, pleading for his father to bless him.

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But in his heart, there was no real repentance.

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There was no change in his life.

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Esau still had the same values, the same character, only he missed out now on the blessing and

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he had only himself to blame for what had taken place.

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But of course, he blamed Jacob, his brother, because of Jacob's deception of his father.

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Isaac his father answered and said to him, Behold, away from the fertility of the earth

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shall be your dwelling, and away from the dew of heaven from above.

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And by your sword you shall live, and your brother you shall serve.

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But it shall come about when you become restless, that you shall break his yoke from your neck.

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Well, this is a backhanded blessing, isn't it?

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At best it's a secondary blessing, but it's all that Esau, or rather, Isaac felt he could

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give to Esau was this kind of a blessing.

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And the last part of it probably speaks toward the conflict that carried on for generations

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between the descendants of Jacob, the Jews, the Israelites, and the descendants of Esau,

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the Edomites.

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The desperation of a brother.

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He desperately wants the blessing, but it's too late.

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He seeks it with tears.

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He is desperate for it, but it's gone.

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It's gone.

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It's irretrievable.

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That brings us to the last part of our text, and that is this fourth unfolding of the drama.

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And we see here the demolition of a family.

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Believe me, the dynamite has been in place for decades, but the fuse is now lit and the

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family blows up.

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Esau bore a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing with which his father had blessed

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him.

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And Esau said to himself, the days of mourning for my father are near.

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Then I will kill my brother, Jacob.

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And when the words of her elder son, Esau, were reported to Rebekah, she sent and called

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her younger son Jacob and said to him, Behold, your brother Esau is consoling himself concerning

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you by planning to kill you.

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This lady had ears everywhere, didn't she?

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Now she hears about this plot on the part of Esau.

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She says to Jacob, Now therefore my son obey my voice, arise, flee to Heron, to my brother

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Laban, and stay with him a few days until your brother's fury subsides.

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Until your brother's anger against you subsides and he forgets what you did to him, then I

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shall send and get you from there.

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Forget what you did to him?

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Isn't she overlooking somebody who suggested this scheme?

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Why should I be bereaved of you both in one day?

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And Rebekah said to Isaac, I'm tired of living because of the daughters of Heth.

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Those are the two wives that Esau had married 37 years before.

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She says, I'm worn out with these women.

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She says, If Jacob takes a wife from the daughters of Heth like these, from the daughters of

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the land, what good will my life be to me?

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She says, I would rather die than have daughters-in-law like that.

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And of course, neither of the sons should have married women from the land.

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So Isaac called Jacob and blessed him and charged him and said to him, You shall not

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take a wife from the daughters of Canaan.

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Arise and go to Padinarum to the house of Bethuel, your mother's father.

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And from there take to yourself a wife from the daughters of Laban, your mother's brother.

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And may God Almighty bless you and make you fruitful and multiply you that you may become

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a company of peoples.

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You see the blessing he's giving here again, restating it in different words.

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May He also give you the blessing of Abraham to you and to your descendants with you, that

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you may possess the land of your sojournings which God gave to Abraham.

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So Isaac, though reluctant to give the blessing to Jacob, now sees it's his nonetheless,

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expands it, gives it to him fully before he leaves.

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And Isaac sent Jacob away and he went.

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And he saw all of this happening and that Jacob had obeyed his father and his mother

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and had gone.

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And so his scheme now is evaporating.

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Notice what he does, verse 8.

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He saw that the daughters of Canaan, that is his present wives, despised his father,

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displeased rather his father Isaac, and he saw went to Ishmael and married.

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Besides the wives that he had, Mahaleth the daughter of Ishmael, Abram's son, the sister

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of Nebeoth.

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So what did he do?

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Well people interpret this differently.

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Some say that he went out and married another person outside of the family.

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But if you think about it, what he may have done is this.

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Instead of going to his mother's side of the family, he decided to go to his father's side

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of the family, to Ishmael's descendants.

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He married their cousin.

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And he may have done this, this is speculation, but he may have done this to yet try to please

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his father.

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Now this is like a good serial drama.

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We're just going to stop it at this point and say well to be continued because the story

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goes right on, but we're going to take a break from the narrative this week.

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What we see here though is a story about some people who wanted to get something and then

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how they went about to get it.

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What they wanted was good, but how they went about getting it was bad.

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Beyond the human drama of the story, there is a divine perspective that I want to point

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out to you.

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And we see this in Hebrews again, the 11th chapter this time if you want to look at it,

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verse 20, which is the only verse that really speaks to the life of Isaac in this chapter

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regarding faith.

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It says Hebrews 11, 20, by faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau even regarding things to come.

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Now just think about that verse for a moment with this story in your mind.

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How do you put that together?

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By faith, Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau regarding things to come.

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If you were writing that chapter, would you have said something different?

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I probably would have, but the Holy Spirit writes it just that way.

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Why?

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Why does God leave out all of this other stuff that we read about this morning?

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I believe because God wants to illustrate for us who think about this, the abundance

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of His grace.

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We sang this morning about the wonderful grace of Jesus, the marvelous grace of our loving

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Lord.

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I believe that's what we see here in Scripture.

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Because you see, God chooses to overlook all of the unseemly things that happened in this

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incident.

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And even though Isaac had a different purpose in mind when he began and was a man who was

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apparently somewhat weak in faith, not very aggressive, God says nonetheless to His credit

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that it was by faith that He blessed both Jacob and Esau.

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Only one got the blessing regarding the promise of God through Abraham and his descendants,

360
00:28:02,200 --> 00:28:03,640
and that was Jacob.

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The other, Esau, got a blessing as well with a promise regarding a future to come.

362
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And so Isaac in that sense was blessing by faith, which is the assurance of things hoped

363
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for and the evidence of things not seen, Hebrews 11.1.

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So he was looking ahead, he was looking into the future of his sons and gave them both

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a blessing.

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And in that sense, it was by faith.

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I want to say that to encourage some of you who as you listen to this chapter this morning

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says, you know, this sounds too much like my home.

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This sounds too much like my marriage.

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This sounds too much like my own life circumstances.

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Because of that, you pour upon yourself guilt and shame and the feeling of failure.

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And you probably see yourself this morning as though God somehow has said, well, you

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have blown it so much, I'm just going to put you aside and I'll see you in heaven.

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And that isn't what the Scriptures tell us.

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God is so full of grace that He is able to take even the failures and the disappointments

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00:29:29,080 --> 00:29:38,240
and the sins in the dynamics of your family and your marriage and your life, and He is

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able to make something positive come out of it.

378
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That's a good thing about God.

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00:29:45,280 --> 00:29:51,800
We have a wonderful God who is able to take our lives when we have blown it and still

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find something good there to build on.

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So let Him build in your life where He wants to, will you?

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I just want to close with three quick statements of instruction that I see regarding this text

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00:30:06,320 --> 00:30:07,320
in our lives.

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Some insights to keep in mind when you want to get something real bad, like Jacob and

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00:30:15,880 --> 00:30:16,880
Rebecca.

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First of all, nothing, nothing is worth the price of your character.

387
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We see the character of these two being exposed.

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They are frustrated.

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They think that what is right, what is good, what ought to happen is not going to.

390
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And so they take matters into their own hands.

391
00:30:37,760 --> 00:30:44,720
They lie, they deceive, they concoct a plot, all of which was really unnecessary because

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00:30:44,720 --> 00:30:48,480
God had already determined who was going to be blessed.

393
00:30:48,480 --> 00:30:55,080
You see their character is exposed in this.

394
00:30:55,080 --> 00:31:02,020
And so it is when the goals that you and I sometimes see before us are frustrated.

395
00:31:02,020 --> 00:31:07,200
Even our character is exposed in that time as well, but nothing is worth the price of

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00:31:07,200 --> 00:31:10,960
compromising your character.

397
00:31:10,960 --> 00:31:22,440
Why did God choose somebody like Jacob, a supplanter, a clever man, a deceiver, because

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00:31:22,440 --> 00:31:26,120
of his grace?

399
00:31:26,120 --> 00:31:34,720
Because I'll tell you something, Jacob is not a whole lot different than you and me.

400
00:31:34,720 --> 00:31:39,480
And the only reason that we're here today and call ourselves the children of God is

401
00:31:39,480 --> 00:31:45,120
because of the grace of God, not because there's something in us that causes God to feel good

402
00:31:45,120 --> 00:31:48,200
about us.

403
00:31:48,200 --> 00:31:51,760
It's His grace that is at work.

404
00:31:51,760 --> 00:31:56,440
Here's a second insight and that is trying to get what you want in the wrong way may

405
00:31:56,440 --> 00:31:59,080
cost you more than you think.

406
00:31:59,080 --> 00:32:03,040
I'll tell you this family came apart as a result of this.

407
00:32:03,040 --> 00:32:08,320
Jacob had a deep rift with his brother that had already lasted now for decades and it

408
00:32:08,320 --> 00:32:11,800
was going to go on for 20 more years.

409
00:32:11,800 --> 00:32:13,200
He is leaving home.

410
00:32:13,200 --> 00:32:17,240
He's leaving his father and his mother and traveling to a distant land where he's not

411
00:32:17,240 --> 00:32:18,240
been.

412
00:32:18,240 --> 00:32:21,480
It's a price to pay.

413
00:32:21,480 --> 00:32:28,280
Rebecca, probably she destroyed her relationship with Esau.

414
00:32:28,280 --> 00:32:35,400
What was her relationship to Isaac like after this?

415
00:32:35,400 --> 00:32:38,040
And to top it off, her favorite son was Jacob.

416
00:32:38,040 --> 00:32:45,260
She here schemes to send him away to protect his life and folks, she never sees him again.

417
00:32:45,260 --> 00:32:51,080
She dies before he comes back home.

418
00:32:51,080 --> 00:32:58,320
You see, trying to get what you want in the wrong way may cost you more than you think.

419
00:32:58,320 --> 00:33:07,460
And finally, this exhortation, allow God to purify your wants and your ways.

420
00:33:07,460 --> 00:33:11,160
That is the ways that you get what you want.

421
00:33:11,160 --> 00:33:16,080
Will you ask God just to search out your wants today, the things that you're dreaming about,

422
00:33:16,080 --> 00:33:26,920
the things that you've set your mind on, your goals, will you let God purify those?

423
00:33:26,920 --> 00:33:32,200
And then will you allow him to purify the ways by which you will go about getting those

424
00:33:32,200 --> 00:33:35,120
goals?

425
00:33:35,120 --> 00:33:41,520
Because it is so easy for us to fall into the same trap of this mother and son and to

426
00:33:41,520 --> 00:33:49,600
say, what I want is a good thing and therefore whatever I do to get it is justified.

427
00:33:49,600 --> 00:33:53,680
But that's not the case.

428
00:33:53,680 --> 00:33:56,520
That's not the case.

429
00:33:56,520 --> 00:34:03,080
And so let's let God search our hearts, let's allow him to purify the dreams that we have

430
00:34:03,080 --> 00:34:12,280
in life, even the good things, and then let's let him direct our steps to get there.

431
00:34:12,280 --> 00:34:15,300
Trust in the Lord with all your heart.

432
00:34:15,300 --> 00:34:21,800
Lean not to your own understanding and all your ways acknowledge him and he will make

433
00:34:21,800 --> 00:34:24,680
your path straight.

434
00:34:24,680 --> 00:34:28,600
Let's pray.

435
00:34:28,600 --> 00:34:34,280
Father God, I pray this morning that you will search the hearts of every one of us.

436
00:34:34,280 --> 00:34:43,840
And even where we have good dreams and goals, may we gladly allow you to search them out,

437
00:34:43,840 --> 00:34:45,680
to test them.

438
00:34:45,680 --> 00:34:53,840
For sometimes what we think is good is not what you think is good.

439
00:34:53,840 --> 00:35:04,440
And then in the course that we have chartered in our lives to get there to what we want,

440
00:35:04,440 --> 00:35:09,520
we choose today to trust you and not our own schemes.

441
00:35:09,520 --> 00:35:17,160
We choose to lean not upon our understanding, but to know you, to commune with you in all

442
00:35:17,160 --> 00:35:29,280
of our ways so that then you can make our paths straight.

443
00:35:29,280 --> 00:35:36,720
Will you make that your own purpose and your own prayer this morning before we go?

444
00:35:36,720 --> 00:35:43,720
Giving your goals and your wants to God.

445
00:35:43,720 --> 00:35:50,740
And now Father as we go from here, I pray that we will go with an attitude of surrender

446
00:35:50,740 --> 00:36:00,240
and yieldedness and find great joy in that because there is joy in knowing you in all

447
00:36:00,240 --> 00:36:02,640
of our ways.

448
00:36:02,640 --> 00:36:10,160
We pray that you will form the desires of our hearts as we delight in you and then bring

449
00:36:10,160 --> 00:36:14,560
them to pass in your time and in your way.

450
00:36:14,560 --> 00:36:15,560
Amen.

451
00:36:15,560 --> 00:36:16,560
God bless you.

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00:36:16,560 --> 00:36:40,960
We're dismissed.