Don't Despise Despise Your Inheritance

Introduction

As Peter was encouraging the exiles of the Dispersion in 1 Peter he says in chapter 1 verse 3-5:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, 5 who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), 1 Pe 1:3–5.

I want you all to underline that word inheritance. For that will be the topic of the day.

You and me have a heavenly inheritance, and we must understand that it is not anything like this world, it is imperishable meaning it can’t go bad, it never gets old, it is undefiled meaning it is pure, and it is unfading, which means it will never pass away, it is forever and ever.

Notice also what the scripture says in verse 3 that this inheritance was a result of being born again through Christ’s death and resurrection, so it could also be looked at as a birthright. As a child of God born again by the Spirit of the Living God, you have a heavenly birthright that was freely given and prepared for you to receive when Christ returns!

Focus on that. Rejoice in that. Chew on it and allow the Spirit to speak to you, for that is the centerpiece of our discussion today.

On the other hand I want us to look at a distraction common to all of us that seeks to undermine and steal this inheritance, that distraction being worldliness.

Worldliness is defined as being the sinful tendency to conform to the world by following it’s desires and rewards instead of God’s. It often times appears in forms of materialism where physical possessions and physical comfort become more important that the things of God.

In today’s message we will look at the life of Jacob and Esau and through their lives see how sacred and valuable the inheritance of God is to each of our lives. But also how dangerous and costly worldliness is to our lives as well.

My hope in this message is that God would bless it and use it to provoke each one of us to a deeper level of communion and commitment to Him.

The Text:

Genesis 25:27–34 ESV

When the boys grew up, Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field, while Jacob was a quiet man, dwelling in tents. Isaac loved Esau because he ate of his game, but Rebekah loved Jacob. Once when Jacob was cooking stew, Esau came in from the field, and he was exhausted. And Esau said to Jacob, “Let me eat some of that red stew, for I am exhausted!” (Therefore his name was called Edom.) Jacob said, “Sell me your birthright now.” Esau said, “I am about to die; of what use is a birthright to me?” Jacob said, “Swear to me now.” So he swore to him and sold his birthright to Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank and rose and went his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright.

Context:

Earlier in the text in V. 21 we see that Issac’s wife Rebekah was barren, meaning she could not conceive a child. This is a crucial point to understand because without Issac having a child, God’s promise of Abraham’s family receiving there inheritance of being a mighty nation would never come to pass.

We see that Issac prays to God for His wife to conceive and God graciously opens her womb. *Again proving to us and His people it is Him who will always perform His promise.

In V. 22 The Word stated that when she conceived that the children within her “struggled”.

The Hebrew word for struggled as used here is ratsats which means to “crack in pieces or to crush”

Uniquely the only time this Hebrew word is translated as struggled throughout the entire OT is here.

Before Jacob and Esau were even born they had a rivalry, they were at war with one another even in there mother’s womb.

Rebekah asks God why her children were jostling so much with her and we see that in V. 23 God said that the reason behind this was prophetic:

Genesis 25 23 “And the Lord said to her, “Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you shall be divided; the one shall be stronger than the other, the older shall serve the younger.””

So ahead of time God was telling Rebekah that basically her two sons were not going to get along and that they would be very different from one another.

2 Nations, 2 peoples divided:

Through the struggling and Prophetic Word of God it is clear that God was explaining to her that her two sons were not going to get along and in fact were going to be future enemies of one another. Basically that this struggling she was experiencing is just a precursor to how her sons were going to get along.

But also God is saying that these two men will not be apart of the same kingdom, they will both be princes but not of the same kingdom.

As we look at the text we will see that one recieved the inheritance of carrying the Kingdom God promised to Abraham and one would only found a Worldly Kingdom.

Moreover God also told her that the older son would serve the younger.

Given Jewish tradition at the time this was unheard of. The firstborn was always held in a higher regard and in fact he recieved a double portion of the inheritance, this was commonly known as the “birthright”. This is the very thing that we see Esau gave to his younger brother.

Preaching the Text:

Esau was exhausted and He desired the red stew

Esau had just came inside from hunting.

Esau was a skillful hunter, a hairy man one might say he appeared to be a true man, living off the land. While Jacob on the other hand was “quiet” and he dwelled in tents, which could mean he was more of an insider. It appears that Jacob was weaker than his brother.

Genesis 25: 29-34 “Once when Jacob was cooking stew, Esau came in from the field, and he was exhausted. And Esau said to Jacob, “Let me eat some of that red stew, for I am exhausted!” (Therefore his name was called Edom.)

Exhausted:

Based on Esau’s physical strength at the time, it made him be in a desperate state. How you feel can often times if you let it make you feel desperate or feel like you need something you really don’t.

*Notice the desperation in his voice.

Jacob said, “Sell me your birthright now.” Esau said, “I am about to die; of what use is a birthright to me?” Jacob said, “Swear to me now.” So he swore to him and sold his birthright to Jacob.

Esau allowed what he was feeling in the moment to lead him into making a life altering decision.

When Esau sold his birthright to Jacob he was giving up the double portion of his father’s inheritance. Now instead of getting double, Esau wouldn’t be getting anything.

He would have rather quickly satisfied his temporary suffering, than toughing it out a little longer and saving his inheritance.

*there is more than one way to skin a cat.

*I don’t know about ya’ll but if my double portion inheritance is on the line I believe I would find another way to fill my stomach.

Oh how often do we trade the things of God for the things of this world. Sometimes unknowingly.

For Esau it was food. For us it could be money, our job, our status, sports, you name it.

As long as we are in this world we will be in the flesh.... and the flesh is weak.

*Our flesh is connected to the world, but our Spirits are connected to God.

So to not fall prey to the world’s ideals we must “walk in the spirit” because if you walk in the Spirit you will not fulfil the desires of the flesh, and if you aren’t fulfiling the desires of the flesh then you aren’t fulfilling the desires of the world.

How do we do that?

*Sensitivity

Church, everyday we must remain consistent in being sensitive to the voice of the Holy Spirit. Because He is speaking and He is leading us, sometimes in our minds WE are too loud, or our Situation is too loud and we can’t hear Him because WE are allowing our attention to remain fixated on those things.

Worldliness often times creeps into our thinking:

The World thinks differently than the Kingdom of God.

The world will tell you that intimidation is a strength and you should use it to your advantage. However The Word tells us to be meek. (Matt 5:5)

The world will tell you that a successful life consists of how wealthy you are or how many followers you have on social media. The Word of God says that being successful is dependent on your faithfulness to God and His Word (Josh 1:8)

2 Cor 6:17 “Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you,”

Church we must remain dedicated to being different from the world. Remember that we are called to be a light in the darkness and those two are exact opposites, there is not a single amount of darkness inside of light, light is completely independent, so therefore we mustn’t allow this dark world to infiltrate our clean consciences.

We must be independent from the world. In reality we are above the world because Christ overcame the world, so essentially the world should be coming to us with their problems, not finding its problems within us!

In Summary: Esau allowed a temporary worldly problem rob him of his birthright. So I want us to be aware of possible sins in our lives or worldly distractions that could cause us to either lose or reduce our inheritance.

2. Esau Despised His Birthright:

Genesis 25:34 “Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank and rose and went his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright.”

The Hebrew word for despise means to “regard with contempt” which simply means that Esau had a lack of respect or reverence for the birthright that he had.

Notice the Word says that it wasn’t his brother that he despised but it was his birthright.

Esau simply didn’t care about it. It wasn’t that he was so desperate that he had no other choice but to give it up, but it was because there was no reverence for it in the first place.

It may be easy for us to judge Esau, “Why would someone not care about their birthright?”

When we choose the things of this world essentially that is what we are doing church. We are replacing the respect and the reverence on the things of God with the things of this world. In essence we are doing exactly what Esau did.

Friends I would like to remind all of us that we have a heavenly inheritance.

YOU have a heavenly birthright, given to you by God.

If we are Bible believing christians then we know that the Bible teaches this world IS NOT our home.

We are to “lay up our treasures in heaven” not on the earth.” Matt 6:20

Furthermore we know that everything we work for in this life will soon be dissolved, so we ought to live our lives as the apostle Paul says in “holiness and godliness” 2 Peter 3:9

Notice how the word says that Esau simply ate, drank, rose and WENT HIS WAY.

The connotation given by this section seems to suggest that this was a casual process for Esau.

This is the question I would ask each one of us How often do we casually trade time with God, opportunities to serve God to do our own thing?

we MUST place the kingdom of God at the forefront of our lives. ESPECIALLY in today’s times.

3. Jacob wanted the birthright:

On the surface it may appear that Jacob cheap shotted Esau, but you see that isn’t what happened at all. Based on the Text, Esau didn’t care anything about His birthright anyway, he didn’t care about the responsibility, But Jacob did. Jacob saw what Esau didn’t.

We may try to put the blame on Jacob but let’s be honest, how many of us are this diligent in chasing after our inheritance: The Kingdom of God.

The Kingdom of God is our inheritance. There is coming a day when Revelations 20:6 says we will “be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years.”

A time when Christ will Jesus will “seize the dragon, that ancient serpent, the devil and bind him for a thousand years”(Rev 20:2)

A time when “The Lord Himself will descend from Heaven with cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.” (1 Thess 4:17)

A time when our savior Jesus Christ will “transform our lowly body to be like His glorious body.” (Phil 3:21)

So we have an inheritance that is out of this world greater than anything this world could ever produce.

So we mustn’t be like Esau and focus on the now on the things of this world, lets be like Jacob and look toward our future in the Kingdom of God:

I may be tired, exhausted, weak in my body, But I am gonna “press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God” on my life. (Phil 3:14)

I may be broke, I may be struggling, but I will not lose faith because I know that if I will “seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, all these things will be added unto me” (Matthew 6:33)

I may be sick in my body, but I will choose to stand on the Word of God and believe and declare that “By His Stripes I am healed” (Is 53:5) and I “will live and not die but declare the works of God” (Psalms 118:17)

This is the attitude we must have church.

WE WILL HAVE TRIBULATION

Jesus said it:

John 16 33 “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.””

May we all dedicate ourselves to not allowing what the world throws at us to shift our focus off of our Lord and Savior.

Like Jacob did lets faithfully seek after the Kingdom of God.

Conclusion

1. In my closing remarks I would like to speak to my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ:

me and you have a great cost that comes with living worldly:

Matt 24:37-39 “For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man.”

In the days of Noah, the people were preoccupied with the things of this world, and because of that they faced the flood.

Although these things within themselves are not sinful, it is when we become focused on them rather than being focused on the Kingdom of God, that is what we must be cautious of.

2. To anyone who does not know the Lord, I want you to know:

That you have a savior who loves you more than anything, and He has much greater things in store for you than anything this world could ever off you.

You have an inheritance waiting for you to receive, however you will only receive it when you come to His feet, when you humbly submit your life and devotion to Him.

Jesus said that unless a man be born again he will never inherit the Kingdom of God, you may ask what does that mean? How can one be born again?

Jesus was not talking about a physical birth, but He was speaking of a spiritual birth. Inside of you is a spirit that is dead, it is not connected to God, it is sinful, and it cannot produce the righteous fruit that God destined for you to produce, by believing and committing your life to following Jesus, He promises to impart to you His Holy Spirit, the same Spirit that He had when He walked on this earth, which means you will have a pure, undefiled, righteous Spirit where you can connect directly with God and sense His direction, and also have the strength and power to overcome sin.