Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #2 of Genesis, chapter 27, and we will read Genesis 27:6-17:

And Rebekah spake unto Jacob her son, saying, Behold, I heard thy father speak unto Esau thy brother, saying, Bring me venison, and make me savoury meat, that I may eat, and bless thee before JEHOVAH before my death. ow therefore, my son, obey my voice according to that which I command thee. Go now to the flock, and fetch me from thence two good kids of the goats; and I will make them savoury meat for thy father, such as he loveth: And thou shalt bring it to thy father, that he may eat, and that he may bless thee before his death. And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, Behold, Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth man: My father peradventure will feel me, and I shall seem to him as a deceiver; and I shall bring a curse upon me, and not a blessing. And his mother said unto him, Upon me be thy curse, my son: only obey my voice, and go fetch me them. And he went, and fetched, and brought them to his mother: and his mother made savoury meat, such as his father loved. And Rebekah took goodly raiment of her eldest son Esau, which were with her in the house, and put them upon Jacob her younger son: And she put the skins of the kids of the goats upon his hands, and upon the smooth of his neck: And she gave the savoury meat and the bread, which she had prepared, into the hand of her son Jacob.

I will stop reading there.  We are now reading of this fateful day many thousands of years ago.  And that is one of the wonders of the Bible, because we know everything in the Bible is true and faithful.  Whenever God tells us of history, it is true history – it is exactly what happened.

And we know that Jacob and Esau were 40, but now they are 60 years old.  It may not seem that way when Rebekah is constantly calling him, “my son.”  When I read this account years and years ago before I was very familiar with the Bible, I assumed that Jacob was a very young man.  But we know from the last couple of verses in the previous chapter, he was at least 40.  And based on the other information that he will be fleeing shortly to Haran (and we will lay out that timeline later for his stay in Haran), and his stay there was 40 years, and he left Haran at age 100. 

So, here, he is 60 years old.  He is not a young child.  He is not a teenager.  He is not even a young man.  I guess since Isaac is 120, and he will die at 180, we could say that Jacob could be approaching middle age.  And, yet, there is no excuse for Jacob being under the influence of his mother.  He is 60 years old, and he is responsible for his actions and what he did.  Yes – his mother was coaching him and encouraging him, and when he raised the objection, “and I shall bring a curse upon me, and not a blessing,” she responded, “Upon me be thy curse, my son: only obey my voice.”  She wants to make sure Jacob does this.  She is urgent about it.  It is the time of the blessing, and the blessing was going to be given.  It meant a lot to that family at that time, but, spiritually, as I mentioned in the last study, Isaac’s age of 120 points to the end of time, the complete fulness of time to the year 1988, the 13,000^th year of earth’s history and the time of the end of the world.  And it is at the time of the end that God would separate the wheat from the tares, and He made it known, to a degree, which are His people, and which are not.  And that is what it means to be “blessed” or “cursed.”  If you are God’s people, you are blessed.  If you are not, you are cursed. 

Also, in the Day of Judgment, we read in Matthew 25 how blessing and cursing has everything to do with this time period that we are presently in, as it says in Matthew 25:31:

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory:

The “holy angels” can be translated “saintly messengers,” the elect.  We have been learning that Judgment Day is the time when Christ rules as King of the earth, and the throne is the judgment throne.

Then it goes on to say in Matthew 25:32-34:

And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats: And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left. Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world:

On the other hand, we read in Matthew 25:41:

Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:

There is “blessing” and “cursing.”  It is the time to either receive the blessing or the curse.  It is Judgment Day, and God makes it known as He bestows the blessing upon His elect.  It is always what the blessing has to do with, as it says in one of the “Psalms of Degrees,” in Psalm 133, where God defines what it means to be blessed of the Lord, in Psalm 133:3:

As the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion: for there JEHOVAH commanded the blessing, even life for evermore.

Again, it said in Matthew 25:34: “Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”  It is eternal life.  You are blessed as God’s chosen people, spiritual Israel, and you enter into the joy of the Lord.  On the other hand, if you are cursed, you will experience the fires of hell and destruction, and you will be destroyed and annihilated, and you will cease to exist for evermore.  That is, ultimately, the curse of God upon the sinful rebels that had no substitute, no Saviour, and no covering for their sin, and they must pay the penalty themselves.  They have to make the payment.

And that is what is underlying this whole account between Jacob and Esau, and the blessing that only one of them will receive.  And the blessing was fully intended to be given to the eldest, Esau, and not to Jacob, because Esau was born first, and he had the birthright.  But he sold the birthright, did he not?  We went over that a couple of chapters earlier in Genesis 25.  He sold his birthright for the porridge or soup, and he sold it to Jacob, and God acknowledged that.  Of course, God was observant, and He would make sure, as a result, that Esau would not get the birthright.  The selling of the birthright by Esau points to mankind, as we spent a little time discussing.  Esau is a figure of mankind, especially with the name given to him of “Edom,” because he was “red,” and that had to do with the pottage itself, if we go back to Genesis 25:29-30:

And Jacob sod pottage: and Esau came from the field, and he was faint: And Esau said to Jacob, Feed me, I pray thee, with that same red pottage; for I am faint: therefore was his name called Edom.

The word “Edom” is Strong’s #123, and “red” is Strong’s #122.  I mentioned how the word “Adam” and “man” are also closely related in the concordance.  They all have the same consonants.  So Esau represents “man,” and man was created by God first.  That is, in man’s original condition he was created by God to be good, and he was good, and, therefore, he was the son of God who was in line for the blessing of God, the rich and abundant blessings that a sound relationship with God would bring.  He would have lived forever, and he would have had dominion over the earth forever.  He would have had all the joy and wonderful gifts that God could shower upon him.  This was his future.  This was his inheritance, and all of his line would receive the same. 

And that was Esau’s position in his birth.  He came out first, just as God created the natural man first, and it was only because the natural man fell into sin, and that fall into sin was just as terrible as Esau selling his birthright.  Mankind sold his birthright to this wonderful relationship (with God) and the life he could have lived forever in a blessed condition.  Man sold that for the cheap price of taking a bite of a piece of fruit.  That is far worse than what Esau did, but that is what the Lord is picturing with Esau, the one who by the Law should get the blessing.  The Law of God says the firstborn son is the one to receive the inheritance, but he lost it.  He lost it.

You see, Rebekah was aware of this, based on what God had told her in Genesis 25, after she had conceived, and it says in Genesis 25:22-23:

And the children struggled together within her; and she said, If it be so, why am I thus? And she went to enquire of JEHOVAH. And JEHOVAH said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger.

We spent a fair amount of time going over this, and we saw how this is God’s salvation program.  This is the salvation message of the whole Bible.  It is summarized and illustrated in the life of these twin boys – two sons born almost at the same time.  The one that came out first was Esau, and the other was grabbing onto his heel, Joseph, the supplanter.  And God said they were “two nations.”  Jacob was of “the nations of them that are saved,” and Esau was of the nations of the world, and they struggled and fought with one another, and that represents the whole history of the spiritual war that has taken place over the course of history, down through the centuries of time as the kingdom of God went forth in the spiritual realm, conquering and to conquer, while Satan and his evil forces resisted and attempted to confound and destroy those that God would save.  But God always won and, finally, He won completely by saving the last of the elect.  That is where we find ourselves now (in history), and that battle has ceased to rage.  There is “peace” in that area in the world at this time.

But this is the backdrop for Genesis 27 because Rebekah had received divine revelation from God concerning her twin sons, and God pointed out to her that the elder shall serve the younger, so she had always known this, even before they were born.  And that is what it says in Romans 9:10-12:

And not only this; but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac; (For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;) It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger.

Now God will further add, in Romans 9:13:

As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.

This was the intent, and this is the meaning behind the statement, “The elder shall serve the younger.”  God’s favor was on the younger, not on the elder.  God’s love was on the younger, and not on the elder.  So, yes, it was Rebekah that was taking the action, and we cannot justify her actions because they were sinful.  She deceived her husband.  She actively worked with her son to make him look and smell like his brother by finding Esau’s clothes and taking a skin of the goats and putting it on the smooth parts of his arms and hands, because Jacob was a smooth man, and Esau was a hairy man.  And, Isaac, who was practically blind, if not totally blind, did feel that.  He already suspected it was Jacob because of the voice.  Of course, if you put yourself in Isaac’s situation, he had told Esau to go get him venison and, as far as he knew, only Esau was present when he told him that.  And, of course, Jacob may have sounded a little like Esau, but not quite, as the father knew there was something “off.” But why would Jacob come with venison when he had told Esau to get it?  So he did not just say, “You are trying to fool me – you are Jacob.”  How would Jacob know?  We can how Isaac might think, “Let me do a test.  I know Jacob is a smooth man and Esau is a hairy man, so come close.”  Then he felt his arms, and they were hairy.  You know, Esau must have really been a hairy man for the skin of a got to give the same kind of feeling, but it was sufficient, and Isaac was fooled.  He was deceived, by both Rebekah and Jacob.  And that is sin.  That is sin.    You know the Bible warns against deception.  What is mankind’s biggest problem since the fall?  It is the fact that he has a desperately wicked and deceitful heart, and man has a tendency to lie and to deceive when it comes to the things of God. 

So there is no excuse.  However, that is not to say that God did not set up the whole thing in the sense that He revealed to Rebekah that the “elder shall serve the younger,” so she always had her eye on Jacob as the one receiving the blessing, and not Esau.  But now it seems Isaac is going to give the blessing to the elder, so she acts. 

In acting to arrange these things, like making the venison and dressing up Jacob to feel like his brother, on one hand, she was involved in sin, but on the other hand, she was accomplishing the purpose of God.  This was the purpose of God before they were born, and even further back, because it goes back to the foundation of the world, as Romans tells us, “that the purpose of election might stand.”  And when we read the Bible, we know that God predestinated a people to obtain the blessing before the foundation of the world.  That is what the Bible tells us.  Let us turn to Ephesians 1:3-4:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,

According to His having chosen.  That is what the selection and choosing of Jacob over Esau points to.  God had favored one man over the other, and the reason is that it was God’s salvation plan when He chose the few out of the whole of mankind.  These are His elect, His chosen people, and Jacob typifies the elect and is a representative for them. 

You know, this is one reason we can see why God would allow Jacob to receive the blessing in this manner, even though it was not done in a good way.  He was not doing any “good works,” was he?   He put on his brother’s clothes, and he had the skin of the goat put on his arms and hands and around the smooth of his neck, and he had his mother make the venison.  And he was a 60-year-old man.  Were any of these good works?  No – not at all.  They are the opposite – they are evil works.  They were sins, and that helps us to see that he is not going to receive the blessing for anything he had done or for anything his mother had done.  He was going to receive the blessing because of God’s good pleasure, and because God had chosen him before either had done any good or evil. 

So this is an outworking of the choice of God.  As Jesus said, “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you.”  That is the whole problem with free will gospels.  They have it completely backwards.  They tell people, “Choose Christ.  Accept the Lord.”  And the Bible says that you cannot choose God: “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,” if we are one of these elect whose names were recorded in the Lamb’s Book of Life before the world was.   And that is the true order that the Bible presents.  The choice is always with God.  It is His salvation plan, and He will have mercy on whom He will have mercy, and He will save the ones whom He will save.  And for the rest, He has no such obligation for those that Esau represents.  He has no obligation to them. 

So by allowing these circumstances…you know, as we read this, we are almost shocked that this is how this man of God obtained the blessing of his father, which typified the blessing of God.  Through deception?  Well, yes, but keep in mind that this reinforces that not one of us has received this magnificent salvation of God because of our good works.  Just think back.  How many evil deeds, thoughts, works and actions have you and I taken over the course of God’s drawing us and bringing us to Himself and saving us?  Were we not often deceitful in our lives as that was happening?  And, yet, God continued the drawing and continued bringing us to Himself unto the point where He did apply the washing away of our sins.  And even after we are saved, we still have bodies of flesh and we cannot say that we are without sin.  So it has never – even momentarily – been our good works that saved us.  It has always been the work and faith of the Lord Jesus Christ.

In this account, God is making that very obvious that it was not anything (good) that Jacob had done, but it was the fact that this was the will of God for him.