The Stolen Blessing

Genesis 27:1-46¹

July 2, 2006

Today’s message is from Genesis 27:1-46. It’s about Rebekah’s use of trickery to obtain God’s blessing for Jacob. As we’ve been doing most of the time in Genesis, we’ll read the passage in sections as we go along, and I’ll talk about each section.

Remember, as always, that it’s the word of God. It was inspired—breathed—by God and recorded for our instruction and encouragement so that we may have hope. (1 Tim. 3:15, Rom. 15:4) That hope is the hope we have of the resurrection of the dead and that truth and peace and righteousness will prevail, and that we will be pure and holy and righteous—that we will be just like Jesus. And remember that in the Bible, hope is not something vague, but it is the absolute assurance that what we hope for will happen.

So, also as always, I exhort you to read your Bibles every day. Read the whole Bible, not just parts of it. And read it over and over again. Ask God to give you understanding through the Holy Spirit and then make every effort to understand what he is telling you. The word of God is alive and powerful. It gives life! (I say these things every week so that you will remember them—so that I will remember them too.)

Before I go on to today’s passage, I want to review just a little bit. You remember that Abraham, before he died, sent his servant, the one to whom he entrusted his entire household, to his relatives that he had left behind when he came to the land of Canaan, to get a wife for his son Isaac. Abraham told the servant that Isaac must not marry a Canaanite woman, but someone from his own family. The servant brought back Rebekah, Isaac’s first cousin once removed. (I said I wouldn’t remember those relationships more than a day or two, and sure enough, I had to look it up in the dictionary again.) Isaac married Rebekah.

Rebekah was barren, just as Isaac’s mother Sarah had been. She and Isaac didn’t have any children for 20 years. But God’s promise and blessing to Abraham, through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, was to come through Isaac. So when Isaac prayed—God wants us to always pray—Rebekah became pregnant with twins.

But before the children were even born, they were fighting with each other. Rebekah wondered what was happening to her, so she went to the Lord and asked him. Here’s what he said (this is from Genesis 25:23):

Two nations are in your womb;

two peoples will come from you and be separated.

One people will be stronger than the other,

and the older will serve the younger.

(Genesis 25:23)

According to the rules of the culture, the firstborn son would normally inherit the leadership of the family when his father died. He would also receive a double share of the material inheritance. But God was telling Rebekah that the older would serve the younger, not the other way around. The younger would have the position of leadership and the double share. And God was also telling Rebekah that two nations would come from the two children that were fighting in her womb—that they would be separate nations. A more natural thing would have been for the children to stay together as a family and then have families that would stay together. But from these two children, two completely distinct nations would descend. Rebekah gave birth to Esau and Jacob, Esau first, and then Jacob. But the Lord would give the birthright to Jacob, not Esau. All this was in last week’s passage.

Now there was something else that was in last week’s passage. Do you remember what happened to Esau’s birthright? This is what happened to it. He sold it to his brother Jacob for some stew—for one single meal when he was hungry. He said, “What good is a birthright to me when I’m about to die.”

Esau was not about to die and could certainly have found some food somewhere else. And later, as we will see in today’s passage, when Jacob cheated Esau out of his father Isaac’s blessing, a blessing that would have naturally gone with the rights of the firstborn, he was very grieved and angry enough with his brother to kill him. He really did consider his birthright to be worth more than a single meal of stew. But at the time, he foolishly sold it for a single meal. And one point I want to make from today’s passage is how foolish we are when we make decisions based on some immediate momentary need or desire instead of taking into account what is really of lasting importance. How foolish we are when we make decisions based on some immediate momentary need or desire instead of taking into account what is really of lasting importance. That’s the point I want to make.

Now let’s look at verses 1 through 17 in today’s passage. Listen while I read them:

^{1When Isaac was old and his eyes were so weak that he could not see, he called his older son Esau and said to him, “My son.”
And he answered, “Here I am.”
^{2He said, “Look, I am old and do not know the day of my death. ³Take your hunting gear, your quiver and bow, and go out in the field to hunt some game for me. ⁴Then make me the delicious food that I love and bring it to me to eat, so that I can bless you before I die.”
^{5Now Rebekah was listening to what Isaac said to his son Esau. So while Esau went to the field to hunt some game to bring in, ⁶Rebekah said to her son Jacob, “Listen! I heard your father talking with your brother Esau. He said, ⁷‘Bring me some game and make some delicious food for me to eat so that I can bless you in the Lord’s presence before I die.’ ⁸Now obey every order I give you, my son. ⁹Go to the flock and bring me two choice young goats, and I will make them into a delicious meal for your father—the kind he loves. ¹⁰Then take it to your father to eat so that he may bless you before he dies.”
^{11Jacob answered Rebekah his mother, “Look, my brother Esau is a hairy man, but I am a man with smooth skin. ¹²Suppose my father touches me. Then I will seem to be deceiving him, and I will bring a curse rather than a blessing on myself.”
^{13His mother said to him, “Your curse be on me, my son. Just obey me and go get them for me.”
^{14So he went and got them and brought them to his mother, and his mother made the delicious food his father loved. ¹⁵Then Rebekah took the best clothes of her older son Esau, which were there at the house, and had her younger son Jacob wear them. ¹⁶She put the goatskins on his hands and the smooth part of his neck. ¹⁷Then she handed the delicious food and the bread she had made to her son Jacob. (Genesis 27:1-17)

Isaac especially loved Esau because of the delicious food he liked to prepare. Rebekah loved Jacob. It says so in chapter 25, last week’s passage. Isaac wanted to eat Esau’s food that he loved and be ‘inspired’ to give him the blessing. Esau was his favorite son. It isn’t clear whether or not Isaac knew of God’s prophecy, the older would serve the younger, but if he did, he was certainly ignoring it. (We will see that part of the blessing was for the one who received it, Jacob as it turned out, to be master over his brothers and for them to bow down and serve him—the older will serve the younger.)

Rebekah overheard the exchange between Isaac and Esau and decided to try to get the blessing for Jacob. Jacob was her favorite son. She really would not have had to do anything, because she was the one to whom the Lord had given the prophecy, the older will serve the younger, and she should have known that. Nevertheless, she came up with a scheme. Isaac’s eyesight was failing and he wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between Jacob and Esau visually. She would prepare some food, two young goats, and Jacob would bring it to his father Isaac and say that he was Esau back from the field with the food. Isaac would eat the food and bless Jacob with the blessing he had intended to give to Esau. Rebekah told Jacob to obey every order she gave him.

Jacob objected. He told Rebekah that Isaac would be able to tell he was Jacob and not Esau because Esau was hairy and his skin was smooth. What if Isaac touched him? Then he might be cursed instead of blessed. Rebekah had an answer for that. She said, “Let the curse be on me.” That was a pretty rash statement! But I don’t think she believed there was any danger of it happening. She told Jacob, “Just obey me.” In any case, she took some of the skins from the goats and put them on his hands and the smooth part of his neck so that he would seem to be hairy if Isaac touched him. (Esau must have really been hairy.) She also gave Jacob some of Esau’s clothes to wear.

Deceit is evil! It’s the weapon that Satan uses to destroy God’s creation. He deceived Eve in the Garden by telling her she would not die by disobeying God and eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Satan “was a murderer from the beginning and has not stood in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells a lie, he speaks from his own nature, because he is a liar and the father of liars.” (John 8:44) “But the cowards, unbelievers, vile, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars—their share will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.” (Rev. 21:8) “But let your word ‘yes’ be ‘yes,’ and your ‘no’ be ‘no.’ Anything more than this is from the evil one.” (Matt. 5:37) Lying and deceit belong to Satan!

You know, I’m not sure there is anyone who would really take the scripture I quoted absolutely literally and never lie no matter what the circumstances might be. Many people who would otherwise not lie might lie to save someone’s life who was in danger of being unjustly killed or to save someone from some kind of persecution. Does anyone have the faith to always tell the truth and to trust God to bring good out of it? But even the Law of Moses says, “Do not lie.” (You must not act deceptively or lie to one another. –Lev. 19:11) And that’s not the same as the ninth commandment, “Do not give false testimony against your neighbor.” It’s much broader than that. It says simply, do not lie or use deceit.

Rebekah didn’t trust God. I don’t know whether it’s too broad to say that all sin comes from not trusting God, but Rebekah’s sin did and so did Eve’s when the serpent deceived her. Nevertheless, God can and does use what people intend for evil to bring about good—and we will see that he did that in a very spectacular way in the lives of Jacob and Jacob’s own sons later on in Genesis.

Now, did you notice what Jacob said when Rebekah gave him her orders to try to get the blessing? Did he say, “No, I can’t do it. It would be dishonest. It would be like stealing.” (The HCSB give this passage the title The Stolen Blessing.) No, Jacob didn’t say he couldn’t do it because it would be stealing. He said he might get caught!

The Lord chose Jacob as the one through whom he would fulfill his promise of a nation and of a savior, but he still had a lot of work to do on Jacob. We will see what happens to him as we go on through Genesis.

Now let’s look at verses 18 through 29. This is where Jacob brings the food to Isaac and receives the blessing. Listen while I read it:

^{18When he came to his father, he said, “My father.”
And he answered, “Here I am. Who are you, my son?”
^{19Jacob replied to his father, “I am Esau, your firstborn. I have done as you told me. Please sit up and eat some of my game so that you may bless me.”
^{20But Isaac said to his son, “How did you ever find it so quickly, my son?”
He replied, “Because the Lord your God worked it out for me.”
^{21Then Isaac said to Jacob, “Please come closer so I can touch you, my son. Are you really my son Esau, or not?”
^{22So Jacob came closer to his father Isaac. When he touched him, he said, “The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.” ²³He did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy like those of his brother Esau; so he blessed him. ²⁴Again he asked, “Are you really my son Esau?”
And he replied, “I am.”
^{25Then he said, “Serve me, and let me eat some of my son’s game so that I can bless you.” Jacob brought it to him, and he ate; he brought him wine, and he drank.
^{26Then his father Isaac said to him, “Please come closer and kiss me, my son.” ²⁷So he came closer and kissed him. When Isaac smelled his clothes, he blessed him and said:

Ah, the smell of my son
is like the smell of a field
that the Lord has blessed.
^{28 May God give to you—
from the dew of the sky
and from the richness of the land—
an abundance of grain and new wine.
^{29 May peoples serve you
and nations bow down to you.
Be master over your brothers;
may your mother’s sons bow down to you.
Those who curse you will be cursed,
and those who bless you will be blessed.
(Genesis 27:18-29)

Jacob succeeded in getting the blessing, both the material blessings and the power authority over his brothers, but he didn’t really succeed in fooling Isaac. I think what actually happened is that Isaac fooled himself.

Look at the questions Isaac asked Jacob. First, “Who are you?” Jacob lied: “I am Esau, your firstborn.” Isaac knew something was wrong: “How did you ever find the food so quickly?” Jacob lied: “The Lord your God worked it out for me.”

Then Isaac asked Jacob to come closer so he could touch him. He said, “Are you really my son Esau or not?” He recognized Jacob’s voice, but when he felt the hairy goatskins on Jacob’s hands, he said, “The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.” Then he asked Jacob again if he was really Esau. Jacob lied again and said that he really was Esau.

Now here’s my paraphrase of Isaac’s response. This is the “Dean Svoboda” paraphrase. Here’s what he said: “That’s good enough. Bring on the food!”

Have you ever been so intent on getting something or having something, maybe something selfish, that you ignore all the warning signs that you are making a mistake, and proceed anyway? I think that’s just what Isaac did. Isaac’s mind was telling him he was being deceived and was making a serious mistake, but his stomach was telling him to go ahead anyway. His stomach won out in the end. I’ll say more about this after we get to the end of the passage.

Now let’s look at verses 30 through 40. I’ll read them:

^{30As soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob and Jacob had left the presence of his father Isaac, his brother Esau arrived from the hunt. ³¹He had also made some delicious food and brought it to his father. Then he said to his father, “Let my father get up and eat some of his son’s game, so that you may bless me.”
^{32But his father Isaac said to him, “Who are you?”
He answered, “I am Esau your firstborn son.”
^{33Isaac began to tremble uncontrollably. “Who was it then,” he said, “who hunted game and brought it to me? I ate it all before you came in, and I blessed him. Indeed, he will be blessed!”
^{34When Esau heard his father’s words, he cried out with a loud and bitter cry and said to his father, “Bless me—me too, my father!”
^{35But he replied, “Your brother came deceitfully and took your blessing.”
^{36So he said, “Isn’t he rightly named Jacob? For he has cheated me twice now. He took my birthright, and look, now he has taken my blessing.” Then he asked, “Haven’t you saved a blessing for me?”
^{37But Isaac answered Esau: “Look, I have made him a master over you, have given him all of his relatives as his servants, and have sustained him with grain and new wine. What then can I do for you, my son?”
^{38Esau said to his father, “Do you only have one blessing, my father? Bless me—me too, my father!” And Esau wept loudly.
^{39Then his father Isaac answered him:

Look, your dwelling place will be
away from the richness of the land,
away from the dew of the sky above.
^{40 You will live by your sword,
and you will serve your brother.
But when you rebel,
you will break his yoke from your neck.

When the real Esau came back from the hunt and brought Isaac the food, when Isaac realized what he had done, that he had blessed Jacob instead of Esau, he began to tremble violently. For practically the same reason Esau had sold his birthright for a meal of stew, Isaac had given away the blessing to (in his view, anyway) the wrong person. And it was not reversible. It couldn’t be undone: “Who hunted game and brought it to me? I ate it all before you came in, and I blessed him. Indeed, he will be blessed!” Jacob had no blessing left for Esau. How did he know that? I believe God’s Holy Spirit made it plain to him. Esau cried out to Isaac with a loud and bitter cry, “Bless me—me too, my father!” But there was no blessing left! Esau wept and cried out for a blessing, but all Isaac could do is give a prophesy: “Your dwelling place will be away from the richness of the land, away from the dew of the sky above. You will live by your sword, and you will serve your brother. But when you rebel, you will break his yoke from your neck.”

Now let’s look at verses 41 through 46, the last six verses. I’ll read them:

Esau’s Anger
^{41Esau held a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing his father had given him. And Esau determined in his heart: “The days of mourning for my father are approaching; then I will kill my brother Jacob.”
^{42When the words of her older son Esau were reported to Rebekah, she summoned her younger son Jacob and said to him, “Listen, your brother Esau is consoling himself by planning to kill you. ⁴³So now, my son, listen to me. Flee at once to my brother Laban in Haran, ⁴⁴and stay with him for a few days until your brother’s anger subsides— ⁴⁵until your brother’s rage turns away from you and he forgets what you have done to him. Then I will send for you and bring you back from there. Why should I lose you both in one day?”
^{46So Rebekah said to Isaac, “I’m sick of my life because of these Hittite women. If Jacob marries a Hittite woman like one of them, what good is my life?” (Genesis 27:41-46)

Esau didn’t expect Isaac to live much longer and was consoling himself with the thought of killing Jacob after his father died. We know that nothing like that could have happened because God had determined to fulfill his promise through Jacob. Rebekah knew that too. Nevertheless, she did what we probably would have done too, she told Jacob he would have to go away until Esau cooled off.

And did you notice what she told Isaac? “I’m sick of my life because of these Hittite women. If Jacob marries a Hittite woman like one of them, what good is my life?” She was still not on the up and up. Manipulation. She knew that Isaac would approve of sending Jacob to her brother Laban to get a wife, but didn’t want to tell him that Esau was thinking of killing Jacob. She said, “Stay with him for a few days until your brother’s anger subsides—until your brother’s rage turns away from you and he forgets what you have done to him.” Jacob stayed with Laban 20 years. Let me read what J. Vernon McGee has to say:

Here again we see Rebekah taking things into her own hands. She tells Jacob, “You are going to have to leave home.” Little did she know that she would pay for her part in this, her sin. She never saw this boy again. She said she would send him over there for a little while, but it was a long while and she died before he got back.
We must remember that Jacob is her favorite. She wants Jacob to go to her brother, Laban, and there is where she will send him. This is where Jacob is going to learn his lesson. This is where the chickens will come home to roost. Old Uncle Laban is going to put him through school and teach him a few things. Jacob thought he was clever, but Uncle Laban is an expert at cleverness. Poor Jacob will find that he is just an amateur, and he is going to cry out to God in desperation before it is all over.²

That’s it for the passage. But there is still one point I wanted to emphasize: How foolish we are when we make decisions based on some immediate momentary need or desire instead of taking into account what is really of lasting importance. Esau did it when he sold his birthright for some stew. Isaac did it when he blessed the wrong person (in his view, that is, not the Lord’s), and I think even Rebekah did it when she sent Jacob to Uncle Laban. But God worked his good and perfect will through all of it.

Who hasn’t done these kinds of things? Who hasn’t ignored all the evidence that he is making a serious mistake because of some immediate desire? Who hasn’t let himself be fooled? Who hasn’t known about but ignored the long term consequences of a decision just because those consequences seemed to be in the distant future? Who hasn’t “stored up treasure on earth where moth and rust destroy and thieves break in and steal,” rather than storing up treasure in heaven, where it lasts forever. It seems to be our nature that when we make a decision, the further away the result of that decision appears to be in time, the less weight we give to it. And the more immediate the result appears to be, the more weight we give to it. Even psychologists have determined this is true. Esau was hungry. He sold his birthright for some food. He was hungry, not starving, yet he sold his birthright.

People put off accepting God’s offer of salvation because they think the consequences are a long way off. I hope that is not true of anyone here; but if it is, don’t delay. Do something about it immediately. Remember Jonathan Edwards’ message, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. You are only kept from falling into hell by God’s patience. You don’t know when the time will be when it will be too late. It could be in the next day or the next hour or even less.

But for all of us who have taken hold of God’s grace, we still seem to have the problem (and I certainly have it too). What should we do? Here’s what the word of God says: “Let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Heb. 12:1,2 – NIV) Let us fix our eyes on Jesus and follow him! His joy was to save us from our sins—to lead many brothers (and sisters) to glory. And he sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. And we will sit down with him and reign with him also.

Jesus says don’t try to save your own life, but give it up for him and for the gospel. So don’t sacrifice your reward in heaven—don’t sacrifice heaven itself—for some immediate transitory satisfaction in this present life!

^{3And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. ⁴He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” ⁵He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
^{6He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life.
⁷He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son. (Revelation 21:3-7 – NIV)

We have to think about these things day in and day out and talk about them in our prayers, or they will fade into the distant future and will have little weight in our day-to-day decisions. There is nothing, no trouble, no blessing, absolutely nothing, in this present life and present age that outweighs what God has prepared us in heaven. “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him.” (1 Cor. 2:9 –NIV) Do you love Jesus? Do you love God?

[Prayer]

END NOTES
^{1 Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holman Christian Standard Bible ®, Copyright © 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. Holman Christian Standard Bible ®, Holman CSB ® and HCSB ® are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers.
^{2 Thru the Bible With J. Vernon McGee –Volume 1: page 115}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}