Read the Selected Scriptures from Gen. 28-31

·       28:13-14: At Bethel #1 God blesses Jacob.  It was long before his growth in mature faith, of course.  That’s the way it is with us.  The word of the gospel has been announced by the Lord.  We are called to believe.  So Jacob was called to believe.  The promise from God is an encouragement for Jacob to trust God.

·       28:20: “If” is a specific Hebrew word, not just the “mood” or “tense” or even the “context” of the passage.  The first use of the word was in Gen. 4:7 when God set out the “if” condition for Cain: if you do well.  Here, Jacob is setting out a condition for the LORD.  To me, this is not an expression of faith but the conditional promise of faith in the future, if God meets the condition.

·       29:2: We should never forget what a great place a “well” is in the Bible.  Being there provides a great opportunity to connect with people, of course.  And if it is near a field, shepherds will come to care for the sheep, and for Jacob that’s a good thing because that’s his “profession.”  It also turns out to be a “God thing.”

·       29:4: “My brethren.”  Jacob, the “shmoozer.” Or "schemer."

·       29:31-38: For three boys Leah hoped Jacob would love her.  Then with Judah, she resigned herself to just thanking God. 

·       30:6,8: Rachel is competing with Leah for honor.  Leah is competing for Jacob’s love.  Rachel doesn’t understand.  God’s blessings are for us, to us, not our surrogates.  I can hear Rachel arguing with people: “these two are from me.”  It was an empty argument.  Furthermore, Leah can do the same thing, give Jacob her handmaid.  But in the end, Leah’s life is also empty.  In 30:16 she “hires” her husband to sleep with her.  In 30:18,20 it is clear that she is still trying to buy Jacob’s love.  As for Jacob, what do we have?  Fourteen years with lots of sex (29:31-30:24).  Now he becomes wealthy (30:25-43).  But what of his relationship with God?  Laban believed God was blessing Jacob (30:27).  Did Jacob think this or did he just say this in 30:30?  The three people (Jacob, Leah, Rachel) illustrate the emptiness of life apart from a relationship with the Creator.

·       31:1-13: To be honest, it is hard to tell if Jacob is being honest here.  It seems more likely that 30:25-43 is an accurate account while 31:4-13 is exaggerated.  Certainly, 31:1-3 was true.  But Jacob lies because he wants his wives to be convinced.  Even v11-13 is questionable.  It could be he wanted a “miracle story” like his dad and granddad.  In what follows, he is still struggling, literally, to trust God.

o     This is not meant to criticize Jacob.  His struggles are a perfect picture of the struggles of the flesh and the Spirit (Gal. 5:17).  Jacob is typical for us as we seek to come to faith and to mature in faith.

Read the Selected Scriptures from Gen. 27-28

·       27:2: It turns out it was still quite a while from Isaac's day of death.  But this was a wise thing to do. And it fit God’s plan for the maturing of Jacob.  We don’t know the day of our death.  It is wise to deal with it’s eventuality, but not to become obsessed with it.  And certainly, not to fear it.

·       27:7: Thus, what Isaac did, was a very spiritual thing.  He wanted to bless Esau “in the presence of the LORD.”  The LORD is the eternal One.  Isaac’s blessing on his sons would depend on the LORD for fulfillment.  Likewise, what we long for and pray for in our children and grandchildren will not be fulfilled at the time of our passing.

Father, help me to leave a blessing for my children and my children’s children.

·       27:20: Jacob used the LORD’s name in vain.  Remember that grandma Sarah had done the some before the LORD became real to her.  Using trhe LORD’s name in vain is not always what we consider a “swear word.”  Sometimes we speak of the “good Lord this” and the “good Lord that,.”  We may think we are acknowledging Him but if it is not from a heart of worship it can be “in vain.”

·       27:33:  Things did not go as Isaac thought.  But he did understand that what happened was the LORD’s doing.  Thus the writer of Hebrews can say, Isaac by faith blessed Jacob and Esau (Heb. 11:20).  Oh that I would remember that God is ALWAYS at work in me to produce the desire and the ability to do His good pleasure (Phil. 2:12-13).

·       27:36: Esau saw 2 different things: the birthright and the blessing.  But Isaac’s blessing included both.  Here are a few passages that help us get the big picture of what happened here.

o   Mal. 1:2-4/Rom. 9:10-13: God’s choice of Jacob instead of Esau it how God can say “Jacob I have loved, Esau I have hated.”  God chose Jacob to be the one through whom Christ would come.  That is not the same as saying that Esau could not be saved, that he could not submit himself to God’s plan.

o   Heb. 12:16-17: Esau was “profane.”  He allowed a “root of bitterness” to exist and to control him.  He was rejected “for” (Greek gar, assigning a reason) “he found no place for repentance, though he sought it diligently with tears.”  He was in tears as he pled with Isaac to bless him.  But afterwards he intentionally dissed his father and mother when he took his third wife from the line of Ishmael, having found out that they preferred a wife from the family.

·       28:1-5: Isaac again, knowingly, blessed Jacob.  This blessing invoked the God of the fathers, El Shaddai, God almighty.  It included the blessing God had promised to Abraham and his descendants.  And it included sending Jacob off to Padan Aram to find a wife from the family.

Read the Selected Scriptures from Gen. 25-26

·       25:22: A child in the womb is already developing into the child who will be born.  It may be unusual to see such a thing as with Jacob and Esau, but it is normal.  What is in the womb is alive!  I’m not being political but Biblical.

·       25:34: The thing is, the birthright really was not Esau’s to sell.  It was Isaac’s to recognize and honor. 

·       26:2: Unlike Christ (Mt. 2:15) Isaac was not called out of Egypt.

·       26:1-5: This is not Isaac’s inheritance.  It is God’s promise to Abraham fulfilled and made to Isaac.  At this point, Abraham had not “received the promise” (as Hebrews puts it) and God had told him there would be a 400 year wait.  Now, what was promised to Abraham was promised to Isaac, and it is the same situation: Isaac died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them, embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth (Heb. 11:13-16).

·       26:13-22: And the Philistines envied him.  This was the Philistine problem, and is the Palestinian problem, the world problem.  God blesses His people, even in the “times of the Gentiles” which we are still in, and people become jealous.  Others want the land that Israel, with God’s help, have made abundantly productive.  Others want to take it from them.  Israel’s neighbors, and especially Edom, wanted to take the land when they were evicted for 70 years by the Babylonians.  When they returned, there were people who wanted to keep them from rebuilding.  It’s all envy.  In Scripture, OT and NT alike, envy is the chief instigator of strife.

·       26:22-25: The LORD promised to bless the Patriarchs wherever they went.  Isaac lives out of that promise.  He recognizes that it was the LORD who made “room for us” in the Philistine area.  Now, moving back to Beersheba, God reminds him that He will bless him there also.  Unconditional promises like the Abrahamic Covenant, and the New Covenant promises under which we live, are like that: they do not have geographical limitations.

·       26:26-33: Earlier in the passage Abimelech had lied about the wells.  But now that Isaac had moved away, and Abimelech had an opportunity to see things properly, and that Isaac still had water despite the Philistines taking wells from him, the king wants to make a treaty.  Isaac makes the treaty.  Not because he depends on Abimelech but because he depends on God.  He knows God will keep His promise and the Philistines cannot do anything about it.

·       26:34-35: Esau took wives from the Canaanites.  It was his doing.  He did not seek the counsel of Isaac and thus, did not have his father’s blessing.  This is a big deal in the context of the covenant God has made with Abraham and now Isaac.