Genesis - Jacob

  Genesis

Jacob (Genesis 25:19-50:13)
● Pulling a Fast One
 The life of Jacob is especially interesting to us today because Jacob was a wheeler and a dealer. God gave Jacob promises, made these promises to the whole family, but Jacob thought God might need some help to get those things He promised done.
 In Jacob we see much of the same faithlessness that we may feel from time to time. Jacob is very similar to the figure Shakespeare's Macbeth, as we find a character who is given a supernatural prophecy and then works to fulfill it himself rather than let it play out and simply consider the road that is immediately before him.
 Part of what we will see in Jacobs life is similar to what we saw in Abraham's life. Trying to do God's will for Him, especially in ways and at times that go against His Spirit and natural ways, will always end in pain, suffering, sadness and a cheapened blessing.
● Guaranteed at Birth (Genesis 25:19-32)
 Jacob life started in conflict. His mother felt the two twins within her grappling with each other and did not know what to do. The fact that the Bible teaches that the life and struggle of this man started in the womb is yet further evidence for the fact that a baby is alive and moving even in the earliest stages of pregnancy.
 When she asked the Lord he told her: “Two nations are in your womb; and two peoples shall be separated from your body; And one people shall be stronger than the other; And the older shall serve the younger.”
 In this culture it was the firstborn son who inherited the bulk of, if not all of, the blessings and inheritance. It was the eldest son that would take on the role of head of the household when his father had passed away, so this was shocking and upsetting stuff.
 Here once again we see God choosing the unexpected choice, the underdog, the unlikely customer. However, as we will see, God specializes in doing that which is absurd and impossible, with people who will have to, at the end of their lives say, “God did it, I had nothing to do with it. He is faithful and all that is left is for me to praise Him!”
 The first instance of deception in Jacob's life was when he traded Esau's birthright for some soup. The fault is really on Esau for trading his Birthright that gave him precedence over his brothers as well as his double portion of his inheritance to satisfy some physical appetite! However this was Jacob's first move to fulfill God's prophecy for Him, and it is probably where the seeds of resentment began to be sown between Jacob and his brother.
● A Stolen Blessing (Genesis 27)
 Isaac was getting very old and losing his sight so he called Esau into his chambers and told him to go catch some wild game. Once he got the food prepared Isaac planned to bless him.
 Rebekah, however, liked Jacob more and wanted Jacob to get the blessing so she prepared some good food from some of the livestock they had in the camp and told Jacob to go and pretend to be his older brother and get the blessing.
 Jacob protested but ultimately agreed that it was best to go ahead and do it. So he stuck animal fur on himself and tried to disguise himself however he could to look more like his manly older brother.
 In this process Jacob even lied from his own lips saying when he was asked: “Are you really my son Esau?” and he said, “I am.” So there is all kind of deceit and intrigue going on in this situation. The results of this is that Jacob never knows a life without deceit and never is given any real and lasting peace with his family.
 It also brings us to the point of Machiavelli. Machiavelli once wrote, “The end justifies the means.” Meaning if you are doing something good, then anything you do to get there must be considered as just fine, even if what you have to do to get there is completely ungodly or unethical. God does not work in this way. You will never have to do anything unethical to complete God's purpose. The temptation will come in all of our lives to take the shortcut and cheat in order to do something that we know God fancies to be good. But in so doing we take the pleasure out of it. God cannot make back-alley treaties with the devil. Even when we are unfaithful, God is faithful to His promises, however trying to “do it ourself” or “do it our own way” very often causes pain both on the way and when we arrive.
 As a result of this deception Jacob is put above his brother, but Esau decides to kill him as soon as Isaac dies. Getting wind of this Rachel sends Jacob off (first getting permission from Isaac) to find a wife among her brother's house which is far away.
● Deception follows Jacob
 Jacob is fleeing from his brother when he has a dream of angels going up and down a ladder (really “staircase” would be a better translation) and at the top he sees the Lord standing at the top of the ladder. We know from Exodus that no one can see God, because he is not relegated to any physical form, so we can safely assume that the one Jacob beheld was the pre-incarnate Christ. It is also amazing to note that the word that is translated “LORD” in Genesis 28:13 is YHWH. This is the proper name of God. For any other creature but God to claim to be YHWH (sometimes transliterated incorrectly as “Jehovah” but more likely “Yahweh”) would be an ultimate blasphemy. Thus, if God tells Moses that he is unable to show himself before human eyes (Genesis 33:18-23) we can safely assume that this is not God the Father that is appearing before Jacob here.
 In Genesis 28:13-15 God reassures Jacob that he is going to deliver on His promises, even if Jacobs behavior hasn't been excellent, nothing can nullify God's faithfulness, and his inability to lie (Titus 2:2)
■ So Jacob goes to His uncle's house and falls in love with Rachel, Laban's younger daughter. He enders into an arrangement to marry Rachel and serves Laban for seven years in order to win her hand.
■ However, when the time comes, Laban tricks Jacob into marrying his older daughter Leah. 
■ Though he is upset and has been deceived he agrees to serve Laban another seven years for the hand of Rachel who can now marry since her older sister has married.
■ Once he has done this more strife begins. Laban begins to deal dishonestly with him and his wages, and there starts to grow major strife in the household as there is much bitterness and resentment between the two sisters who are Jacob's wives. Rachel, the wife that Jacob loves, is unable to have children, but Leah, who is unloved is given the ability to have children. So the hatred and discord goes deeper. It is difficult when there is strife in the house, how much more so this deep abiding resentment because of a deception that never should have happened.
● Homeward Bound (Genesis 31)
 In a daring escape Jacob finally collects everything that is his and runs away from Laban, who is growing to hate him more and more for his success. 
 Laban catches up, but God warns him not to touch Jacob, but to let him go. 
 Jacob makes up with Esau and begins to settle down with His family.
● Family Trouble
 Eventually Rachel dies, having given Jacob only two children by natural birth: Jacob and Benjamin.
 Jacob commits a deep and powerful error by favoring Jacob above all of the other children, even giving him a special coat and giving him special treatment.
 As a result of this his other sons band together and sell Jacob into slavery and deceive Jacob about what had happened, saying that he was killed by a wild animal.
 God also uses this event as we will learn when we study the life of Joseph next week. However we can be very well assured that this loss was nearly too much for Jacob to bear.

Take Home
We find that if God has promised something then we can trust Him to deliver on those promises. There are a number of promises in the Bible that we can either choose to take on faith, or we can try to make them happen for ourselves. 

And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus. 
Philippians 4:19
We can either trust God to supply our needs or work and worry, stress and tress to do it ourselves. Which do you think is trusting in God's promise?

Knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin.
Romans 6:6-7

We can either go around trying to “crucify our flesh” and doing everything we can make ourselves holy in our flesh, being hard and judgmental trying to earn our salvation, or we can accept that Christ has already crucified our old man with Christ on the cross and all that we need to do is reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive to Christ in order to have true victory: the victory that Christ has won for us!

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
Ephesians 2:8-10

We can either go through life trying to prove our salvation by our works, or worse yet earn it, and thus missing out on all the benefits of the Cross and knowing Christ. Or we can trust in his Word and realize that the good works that we do will naturally flow out of our union with Him and begin to treat the real issue rather than the symptoms.

But it's up to you!