The God of Jacob 1

Jacobs early life

Many times in scripture God is given the title or specifically refered to as the God of Jacob. Why is this? Who is Jacob and what did he do that was so important that from then on we refer to our God as the God of Jacob? That is what we are going to be thinking about through this series as we look at the life of Jacob to determine why we God is the God of Jacob and what that tells us about God and ourselves. Go ahead and turn with me to Genesis twenty-five. We will be in this series for a couple of weeks but I am not quite sure yet how long it will take me to go through His whole life and break down all of what we can learn from Jacob. For tonight we are going to begin with his earliest mentions in scripture to see how his story begins. Let’s look now at verse twenty-one

Genesis 25:21–22 “Now Isaac pleaded with the Lord for his wife, because she was barren; and the Lord granted his plea, and Rebekah his wife conceived. But the children struggled together within her; and she said, “If all is well, why am I like this?” So she went to inquire of the Lord.”

Just so we can get our timeline and order of events right here we had Abraham who God called out to create His nation from and set aside to be His people. Abraham had one legitimate son named Isaac which many of you have heard of from the story of God calling Abraham to sacrifice Isaac but stopping Him before he went through with it to teach him a lesson on faith. This is now the same Issac who is now aging without any children of his own much like his father before him and so he begs God here to bless them with a child. We need to think about the difference we see between Abraham and Isaac for just a minute before we get to Jacob. Abraham doubted the Lords ability to bring a son to his barren wife so he had a son with another woman. Even though Isaac is in a similar situation as his father had been Isaac learned from his fathers mistakes and his own life was proof that God had the power to breath life into what was though to be barren. Looking at those who came before us can be a valuable lesson for us to learn. Isaac learned faith through his fathers past and we can learn from those who come before us as well. That is exactly what we are doing now. Notice how much of the Old Testament is stories of God’s people and how they handled various situations. We have such a vast wealth of knowledge to learn from the past mistakes and failures of the people of God so that we can serve Him as a better people. Not only that but we can also learn from those we know personally. This church is filled with a multitude of individuals who have years of experience and can offer invaluable advice on walking with Christ. You most definetly have someone in your life who you could turn to and learn from their past experiences in order to walk closer to the Lord.

Notice that Isaac having learned this lesson from his father and trusted in the Lord was then blessed with not one child but two children. God literally doubled the blessing because Isaac sought help from the Lord first. Now it says the children struggled within her. We don’t know exactly what is meant by that but we can assume there was some serious pain and discomfort going on during the pregnancy. Which for my literature people should strike you as a bit of foreshadowing with the wording that God chose here. So, with this discomfort Rebekah goes to God in prayer and asks Him what is going on.

Genesis 25:23 “And the Lord said to her: “Two nations are in your womb, Two peoples shall be separated from your body; One people shall be stronger than the other, And the older shall serve the younger.””

Now with this being what God tells Rebekah we need to ask the question, how does God know this? God very often tells people in the Old Testament especially what will happen in the future. How does God know this? Essentially the question is how is it possible that God is omniscient? Does God simply know what everyone will do and the choices that they make or is it something else? Lets look at Romans

Romans 9:10–13 “And not only this, but when Rebecca also had conceived by one man, even by our father Isaac (for the children not yet being born, nor having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works but of Him who calls), it was said to her, “The older shall serve the younger.” As it is written, “Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated.””

Paul is very clear here that God’s declaration in Genesis is not on the basis of works. It is not that God knew that Jacob would be the better leader so He declared the older would serve the younger. It is solely according to the election of God. By this Paul is meaning it is only based on the choice of God according to His purpose. God chose to have the older serve the younger not because of any righteous work of the younger in the past future or present, but only based on the fact that God would be further glorified by allowing the younger to be more successful. Why does that matter for us? The story of Jacobs election to being one of the fathers of the nation of Israel is the exact same story every believer has for our own salvation. It is God’s choice alone not by the will of man that anyone is saved according to His purpose of glorifying Himself. In a practical sense this means two things. One we should honor and praise God thanking Him even more because it is not our own righteousness that saved us but the righteousness of Christ and the election of God that has saved us. We can praise God that He did not leave it all up to us to choose Him because we as sinners dead to our sin would have never made that choice on our own and come into His grace. The second thing is that we have been saved according to His purpose meaning that God saved you for a reason and that reason is to glorify Him. How are you doing on that? Are you acting in a way that brings glory to Christ? When others look at our daily lives would they step back from it saying wow this guy really loves the Lord or would they be unimpressed? Each and every day of our life should be dedicated to glorifying God. Not just being a decent person but truly bringing glory and honor to God pointing all of our successes towards Him and remembering His grace towards us even in our failures.

Now lets actually get to the birth of these twins.

Genesis 25:24–28 “So when her days were fulfilled for her to give birth, indeed there were twins in her womb. And the first came out red. He was like a hairy garment all over; so they called his name Esau. Afterward his brother came out, and his hand took hold of Esau’s heel; so his name was called Jacob. Isaac was sixty years old when she bore them. So the boys grew. And Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field; but Jacob was a mild man, dwelling in tents. And Isaac loved Esau because he ate of his game, but Rebekah loved Jacob.”

We are finally introduced here to our two characters Jacob and Esau with Jacob being the youngest one and the one to rule as told by God. Lets see what we can tell about our two characters from the beginning just by their birth and early developement. Esau it says was very hairy and a hunter and worker. Esau was what we would call a mans man. In the stories of old Esau would be what we would typically assume is the hero of our story. Esau is strong and manly and most people around looked to him as the clear leader and more dependable person. Now think of Jacob. Jacob in birth it said he clung to his brothers heel. From the beginning we see some symbolism for Jacob holding people back and being the type of person to drag others down. Jacob then is described as a mild man who prefered dwelling in tents than working outside. What it is saying is that Jacob was considered to be the weaker of the two. Jacob was not very manly and in that day would not have even been considered for any kind of leadership. He was a mamas boy essentially while Esau was more of a manly guy who like to work with his dad. So if Esau is more fit for leadership why then did God choose Jacob?

Think also about God’s prophecy to begin with. God tells here that these two children will both be the founders of nations but that one nation shall be stronger than the other and the older child will serve the younger. There are a couple of things that we need to note based on this passage. One is that God tells her that the older will serve the younger. This is extremely out of the ordinary for that time. In nearly all of history it is the eldest who rules. It is the eldest who inherits the largest portion of land and it is the youngest who is there to serve yet God flips that and tells Rebekah that her youngest will rule over the eldest and that from her youngest will come the more powerful of the two nations that are formed. Why is that so important? Why does God tell her this? Because God often likes to subvert our expectations. All through scripture we see God choosing the lowest of people the most unexpected heroes the people everyone else overlooked to be his people. God loves an underdog. He loves to choose the guy that no one else would dare choose. Why does He do this? Like we said last week Soli Deo Gloria, To the Glory of God Alone. God chooses the underdog so that He is that much more glorified when his champion wins. It would not be proof of His power if the most successful people, the ones who already have it all just keep winning and keep ruling. Those people would not give glory to God as often because they would feel as though they had done it themselves and it would not be clear to others who did the work. Instead God chooses the lowest of the low so that when they succeed it is clear they could not have done this alone. God chooses the underdog because without Him the underdog would never win. The underdog is then more likely to glorify the Lord and the world is more likely to see His glory through the underdog’s life.