DBG - January 10 - Genesis 27-28

This chapter contains the story of how Jacob received the birthright over his brother Esau.

vs. 1-2 – Isaac believes that his days are growing short, though he will live on for about another fifty years (35:28-29)

vs. 3-4 – Isaac desires to officially pronounce the birthright blessing upon his eldest son Esau but first asks him to go and hunt for the meat he loved to eat.

vs. 6-10 – Rebekah hatches a plan to secure the birthright for Jacob by deceiving Isaac into thinking he was Esau.  She has taken it upon herself to do what God surely would have done without the trickery.  However, God works through this anyway.  In reality, every person involved in this story bears some fault in their actions.  Isaac should have been more careful, Rebekah should not have schemes, Jacob should not have acted, and Esau should not have claimed the birthright he had so frivolously traded away.

vs. 11-13 – Highlighted here is the great risk in their actions.  If this plan fails, Jacob would certainly be cast out for his impudence.

vs. 15 – The clothes would smell like Esau. Since Isaac’s eyes were failing there was little chance of him actually recognizing Jacob by sight.

vs. 16 – The goat hide placed on Jacob’s hands and neck were to convince Isaac by touch that he was the hairy Esau . This begs the question: Just how hairy was Esau???

vs. 17 – The meat prepared by Rebekah in the same style as prepared by Esau was the final piece of the deception.

vs. 18 – Some have pointed out that Jacob would not have lied if he had only said he was “the firstborn” and not specifically “Esau the firstborn”.  But since he is wearing Esau’s clothes and disguised to feel hairier and came bearing the meal requested of Esau, I think we may be splitting hairs here.  Everything Jacob is doing is to pass himself off as Esau by deceit.

vs. 19-27 – Isaac is suspicious but is convinced by the deception that this was truly Esau.

vs. 27-29 – The beautiful blessing of Isaac is recorded here.  It is a prayer for prosperity and authority that goes alongside the bestowing of the birthright.

vs. 30-35 – The deception is uncovered as Esau returns.

vs. 36-40 – The blessing of Esau differs from that of Jacob’s in many ways.  Both are prophetic in nature.  Esau would prosper, but his home would be in the rugged wilderness.  Albert Barnes gives the best summary the future of Esau’s people that is prophesied here: “The history of Edom was a perpetual struggle against the supremacy of Israel. Conquered by Saul, subdued by David, repressed by Solomon, restrained after a revolt by Amaziah, they recovered their independence in the time of Ahab. They were incorporated into the Jewish state, and furnished it with the dynasty of princes beginning with Antipater [father of Herod the Great].”

vs. 41 – Esau plots to seek revenge upon Jacob by killing him.

vs. 42-46 – Rebekah intervenes by sending Jacob away to her family in Haran.  The primary reason for this was to save his life from Esau’s anger, but the secondary reason is that he may find a suitable wife there.

In this chapter Jacob begins his journey to Haran and has an unexpected encounter with God along the way.

vs. 1-5 – Isaac blesses the plan to send Jacob to Haran.  Nothing is said about Esau’s anger, possibly because Isaac did not know about it.  Here Isaac recognizes that the promises of the covenant of Abraham were to flow through Jacob.

vs. 6-9 – Esau was well aware of his parent’s displeasure at the two Canaanite wives he took in 26:34.  Seeing that it pleased Isaac to send Jacob to Haran for a bride, he plans his own version of finding an acceptable bride.  Instead of going to his mother’s family through he goes to his uncle Ishmael’s family.  Matthew Poolw writes: “…he mends one fault by committing another, and taking a third wife when he had one too many before, and her too he unwisely fetcheth out of that stock which was begotten to bondage, and was utterly uncapable of the inheritance.”

vs. 11 – Jacob arrives at this place not through planning but by Providence.  It was a humbling place to be, far from wealth and luxury he enjoyed at home.  No soft cushions are found to find rest and comfort.  He improvises with all that he has at hand, which were the rocks scattered about the place. How wonderful would it be if these were the same stones that Abraham had used for an altar in 12:8?

vs. 12 – B.H. Carroll writes: “That dream was God’s method of communicating with this lonely man. The ladder in that dream, according to John’s Gospel, represents Jesus Christ, the connecting stairway between earth and heaven, upon which angels descend to earth and ascend to heaven. In that dream Jacob saw a grand sight for any man. Earth and heaven had been separated by sin with earth’s inhabitants under a curse. By grace that chasm was spanned by the coming of the Redeemer. Upon that stairway angels come to earth and carry back their reports. Jesus said (John 1), ’Hereafter you shall see the angels of heaven ascending and descending upon the Son of man,’ showing that he fulfilled the type of Jacob’s ladder.”

vs. 13-15 – Isaac had told Jacob that the blessing of Abraham would go through him.  Here God tells makes the promise personally.

vs. 17 – Such is the proper response of awe that comes from an encounter with God.

vs. 18 – It would be fitting after such an encounter to build an altar and offer sacrifices to God.  Jacob is obviously travelling with few supplies and does not have an animal to sacrifice.  He instead marks the spot with a pillar that he pours oil over as a method of consecration.

vs. 19 – Bethel means “house of God”.

vs. 20-22 – This is the first vow made in Scripture.  The “if” of vs. 20 should not be interpreted as Jacob doubting God or the making of a bargain.  He is saying, “When God cares for me and I return I will honor God here and give him a tithe.”

I have thus far tried to not jump too far ahead into later portions of Scripture and the light they may shine on these passages.  I will make an exception here to address the Providential choice of Jacob over Esau.  There was far more at stake than just two brothers fighting over an inheritance.  God is preparing the nation of Israel and the line of the Messiah.  At such an early stage having a carnally minded man like Esau take the lead might prove disastrous.  We see the type of nation that Esau would foster in the history of his descendants, the Edomites.  God rightly chose the faithful, though rascally, Jacob to be in the line of patriarchs of the Jewish nation. 

B.H Carroll writes about this: “In one of the old prophets [Malachi 1:2] it is said, "Jacob have I loved and Esau have I hated." That refers not to the persons of Jacob and Esau, but to the nationalities. Esau was heathen, and Jacob was Israel. None of this work of election in any particular had anything to do with the character of either. None of it with the wishes of the father and mother. It was God’s sovereign disposition of the case and touched the descendants rather than the two persons. Hebrews 12:16 brings out the character of Esau a little more plainly: ‘Lest there be any fornicator or profane person, as Esau, who for one mess of meat sold his birthright. For ye know that when he afterward desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected; for he found no place for repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.’ That used to trouble me. It looked like Esau wanted to repent of his sin and God would not forgive him. I will read it to you according to the true rendering: ‘For he found no place for a change of mind in the father.’ It was not Esau’s repentance, but Isaac’s repentance. Don’t ever misapply that scripture.”

Our hymn today is the classic “Nearer, My God, to Thee”, written by Sarah Adams in 1841.  The complete five verses of the hymn are rarely published or sung, which hides the fact that it is largely based on Jacob’s experience at Bethel.  This song was famously played by the band on the Titanic as it sank into the icy waters.

Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee:
Ev'n though it be a cross
That raiseth me,
Still all my song shall be,
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee.

Tho' like a wanderer,
Daylight all gone,
Darkness be over me,
My rest a stone,
Yet in my dreams I'd be,
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee.

There let the way appear
Steps up to heaven;
All that thou sendest me
In mercy given,
Angels to beckon me,
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee.

Then with my waking thoughts,
Bright with thy praise,
Out of my stony griefs,
Bethel I'll raise;
So by my woes to be
Nearer, my God, to thee.
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee.

Or if on joyful wing,
Cleaving the sky,
Sun, moon, and stars forgot,
Upward I fly,
Still all my song shall be
Nearer, my God, to thee;
Nearer, my God, to thee,
Nearer to thee.