The Bible Recap - Day 021 (Genesis 27-29)

Episode Date: January 21, 2023

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Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble and I'm your host for the Bible recap. Yesterday, Isaac and Rebecca had twin sons and God made an unusual promise to bless the younger one, Jacob, instead of the older one, Esau. We saw God's plan unfolding when older brother Esau sold Jacob the rights to his inheritance in exchange for lentil stew. And today, we'll take a few more steps in that direction

when the sins of both Rebecca and Isaac also play a role in this. Rebecca tricks her husband into giving his blessing to her favorite son, Jacob. And in his heart, Isaac goes against the words of God by intending to bestow his blessing on the child God had not chosen for it. Both parents' sins were warring against each other. Though it's worth noting that we can't be 100% sure Rebecca had communicated God's

words to Isaac. Jacob isn't sinless here either. Not only that, but in the course of receiving his blessing, he refers to Yahweh as Isaac's God, but not his own. By the way, a blessing is different than an inheritance. It carries a lot more of a spiritual significance than just a financial one. It's a very big deal. And once it's given, it's irrevocable. When Isaac was accidentally giving the blessing to Jacob instead of Esau, he uses some of the very same phrases and ideas that God did in 25-23. Isaac said, Be Lord over your brothers and may your mother's sons bow down to you.

Decades earlier, God had said, the older shall serve the younger. Esau, of course, the older shall serve the younger. Esau, of course, hates this, and he hates Jacob. But before you feel too sorry for Esau, pay attention to his attitude of entitlement when he denies responsibility for selling his birthright. He never quite understood the weight of it all.

On top of that, he threatens to kill Jacob. So Rebecca sends Jacob away to go live with her brother, Leiban, in Heron, the Canaanite land where we first met her. As she's sending him off, Isaac warns him, don't marry a Canaanite woman, you have to marry one of the people in God's family. On his 500-mile journey to Heron, Jacob stops for the night and has a crazy dream where God has connected himself to Earth via a ladder. One interesting thing about this is that in John 151, Jesus refers to this scenario and

describes Himself as the ladder, a ladder where God descended to Earth, not one man climbed to heaven. That's a crucial distinction. In this dream, God reiterates His promise to give this particular plot of land to Jacob's family. Now, remember, this is still the land of their enemies at the time. For the most part, they have lived their peaceably amidst the Canaanites, but it's not their place of origin.

God also reiterates the prophecy of Jesus here when he says, In you and your offspring, shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Jesus is the blessing. And he would be born thousands of years later, extending his saving love to people from among every nation, not just from this particular family. Through this one family, all families would be blessed. Jacob wasn't even married yet,

but God promised him offspring. Again, because at this point, Jacob is the singular option for carrying out the lineage of God's promise. First of all, that's what God said would happen, but second of all, Esau has already married pagan women outside of God's family, so Jacob is all we've got to work with. He's not perfect by any means. Meanwhile, we see Esau being belligerent and rebellious. He marries his first cousin on his half-uncle Ishmael's side, continuing to marry outside of the lineage of God's promise.

After Jacob's dream, he erected a pillar on that spot. This is important later, but for now, I just want to point out that pillars in those days were typically pagan structures. This is something the Canaanites did, not the people of God. Jacob also makes a big if-then statement at the end of his ceremony, basically saying, if God keeps his promises,

then I will yield to him. Moving on, Jacob finally makes it to the edges of Heron. And like any smart man looking for a wife, he goes to the well. Maybe he was also thirsty, but whatever. While he's at the well, Rachel appears. She was a shepherdus.

And by the way, some Jewish historians say this wasn't an uncommon job for a girl. In fact, just a quick sidebar, many of them say that the shepherds that the angels appeared to on the night of Christ's birth could have been females. You won't see that in your standard nativity. Just another way Renaissance paintings have possibly misled us. Anyway, Jacob is really excited to find out that this beautiful woman

named Rachel is related to him, his first cousin actually, because he knows he has to marry within his family. He asks her father, Leibnett, if he can marry her, and Leibn agrees to, if Jacob will work for him for seven years. This seems like a good deal to Jacob, except one tiny thing goes wrong. Jacob gets tricked by a false identity, just like he had tricked someone with the false identity. Because of the ancient marriage practices in place at the time and the fact that the consummation happened at night, in a time that predated electricity, Jacob didn't discover the deception until after that already consummated the marriage, so there was no turning back, kind of like with the blessing he'd received.

So in another strange turn of events, Jacob bargains for a second wife and another seven years of labor. He's not keen on being tricked, and in fact, it didn't work out well for Leah either. Chapter 29 tells us he hated her. The Hebrew word here can also just mean unloved, but it's often used in Scripture to describe a mortal enemy someone you're at war with. But as we've talked about before, God seems to have a special affinity for those who were overlooked. He's generous and attentive to Leah even when Jacob wasn't. She became pregnant with a series of sons, for to be exact. The name she gives them, signal how much striving was in her heart, how very much she just wanted to be loved by Jacob. But by the time we reach the fourth son,

it seems like she's beginning to learn that God is enough. His name means praise. Like most of us, Leah will have to relearn this lesson, so this is not exactly the pretty bow on top that it seems like it might be. Where did you see God's character today? What was your God shot? For me, it was God's sovereignty over the sins of man. We've already noted his sovereignty over the evil of the enemy back when we were in Job, but here we see a new layer of his sovereignty over evil, the evil of our own hearts and actions. Ultimately, Rebecca's manipulation was a tool in God's hands to accomplish his desired

outcome. This continues to reveal to us that even sin bends to God's will. It does not thwart his plan. It's not stronger than God. We've seen this since day one in the garden, and Romans 8.28 tells us that even things that aren't good are still used for our good and for his glory. So if you think you've trained wrecked your life by some sin you've committed that you can't forgive yourself for, let me set your heart at peace. Then you've committed that you can't forgive yourself for, let me set your heart at peace. Your father God is outside of time.

He knew all the things you'd do wrong as a human, a parent, a spouse, a friend, and he knows all the sins you haven't even committed yet. Take heart. He's with you, he's working it all out, and he's where the joy is. Okay Bible readers, it's time for our weekly check-in. How are you doing?

What have you learned so far? If you're off schedule, there's no such thing as being behind. You read your Bible today. That's amazing. Just ask God to carve out time for himself in your day again tomorrow, and then the next day. Ask him to wake you before you're alarm. Ask him to give you the desire to read if you don't have it. He wants time with you, and he has good things to show you.

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