Sermon Tone Analysis

3-29-98 \\ \\ WHAT IS YOUR BIRTH RIGHT WORTH?

\\ GENESIS 25:21-34 \\ \\ The birthright was a significant thing in the culture of the patriarchs.

The encounter between the two brothers Jacob \\ and Esau over the birthright is not a trivial matter.

\\ In that culture ordinarily the birthright passed from father to the oldest son.

With the birthright there came a position \\ of leadership in the family.

It also would have distinct advantages when the father died because the oldest son with \\ the birthright would get a double portion.

The birthright also designated its bearer as being the spiritual leader in \\ the family.

In the case of the family of Isaac it meant that the representative place in the covenant of God would \\ accompany the birthright.

\\ \\ In our own setting those things that we sometimes value very little would be represented by the birthright.

A place in \\ our family, our spiritual opportunities to serve God, our opportunities to bless others would be the kind of things that \\ would be in a spiritual birthright in our day.

\\ \\ The difference in character of these two brothers began to manifest itself before they were born.

They were of a \\ contrary mind even in their mother’s womb.

When Esau came forth from the womb first, his brother Jacob was \\ holding on to his heel.

Even then there was a struggle going on to determine who would have the place of \\ leadership in the family.

\\ \\ On this particular day when the young man, Esau, returned from an extended hunt and was extremely hungry, Jacob \\ seized it as an opportunity to take advantage of him.

Esau found Jacob preparing a pot of pottage, something like \\ stew.

It was filled with lentils or a bean like vegetable that was common in that area.

As it cooked it would become \\ reddish in color in the pot.

When Esau saw and smelled the appetizing stew in the pot, he begged Jacob for a bowl \\ of it.

Jacob responded by requiring the birthright if he was to receive a bowl of stew.

Esau shrugged his shoulders \\ and said, “What good is a birthright if I die?

I am starving to death.”

But even then Jacob required a solemn oath \\ from his brother before he would feed him.

After giving Jacob the oath Esau received his bowl of pottage.

When he \\ had filled himself with the stew, he went his own way.

The writer of Genesis indicates that he went his own way, \\ “despising his birthright.”

He counted the birthright as something of a little value.

\\ \\ This raises the question concerning the worth of spiritual things in life.

What are they worth to you?

What receives \\ the priority in your life – the physical or the spiritual?

The sensual or the things of God?

In the eyes of Esau the \\ things of earth were much more important to him than the things of eternity.

He despised his birthright.

\\ \\ How do you determine the worth of a birthright?

Let us look at the birthright from three different angles to see if we \\ might be able to gain some insight into the value of the spiritual.

\\ \\ I.  WHAT THE OWNER SAYS IT IS WORTH \\ There seems to be a false assumption on the part of both of these twins.

They seemed to have operated on the \\ assumption that the birthright was theirs to buy or sell.

Actually neither of them had ownership of the birthright.

\\ What was involved in the birthright in their situation was something only God could give.

\\ \\ It is probable that these young men were both aware of the word that had come to Rebekah before they were born.

\\ When she felt these two unborn babies struggling in her womb, she made their struggle a matter of prayer.

She \\ went to make an inquiry of the Lord about the meaning of this struggle.

The Lord responded by saying to her, “Two \\ nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated; one people will be stronger than the \\ other and the older will serve the younger.”

This indicates that even before they were born God had already \\ determined that ultimately the birthright would belong to the younger or to Jacob.

If they both knew this, they were \\ ignoring it as they bartered back and forth concerning the birthright.

\\ \\ It is obvious that the birthright in the case of these two was a thing of supreme value in the eyes of the owner.

God \\ himself had chosen Abraham and Isaac and had determined that His redemptive purposes would be carried on \\ through the descendents of Isaac.

Indeed, He had already made this a matter of covenant with Isaac.

So to whom \\ ever the birthright was given, there went with it the supreme privilege of being a part of God’s continuing redemptive \\ purpose in history.

The Messiah, the Savior of the world would come into the world through the descendents of the \\ one with the birthright.

So the things of eternity were involved in the possession of the birthright.

\\ \\ Important and serious things are still involved in the birthright.

The spiritual privileges that belong to you have \\ eternal significance.

To barter them away as though they were cheap and trivial is a tragic mistake.

The Giver of \\ those privileges that come to you, the Giver of the spiritual opportunities of life, intends for them to be handled as \\ things of great value.

He intends for us to seek first his kingdom and then to worry about whether or not we have a \\ bowl of stew to eat.

\\ \\ So in determining the value of your birthright, it is good to begin with the Owner and the Giver of the birthright.

\\ What kind of value does He place on it?

\\ \\ II.

WHAT THE SELLER WANTS FOR IT \\ The focus on Esau in this passage is very helpful.

It gives us insight into the character of the man.

We have \\ already learned about Esau in this Genesis record that he was temperamentally given to the outdoors and the wild.

\\ It says that he “became a skillful hunter, a man of the open country.”

In the vernacular of our day he would probably \\ be described as “a man’s man!”  However there was in this “man’s man” a fatal flaw.

The lower side of his nature \\ controlled his life.

The physical appetites dominated him.

There seems to be evidence that this domination of the \\ physical appetites extended its way into every area of life.

\\ \\ In this confrontation with his brother Jacob, it became obvious that a bowl of stew was worth more to him than the \\ spiritual privileges that went with the birthright.

With a bowl of stew he could satisfy his hunger for the moment.

He \\ was more concerned about satisfaction now than he was satisfaction in the future.

So in order to satisfy a physical \\ hunger that would return in a little while and demand to be satisfied again, he was willing to sell his spiritual birthright \\ for a satisfying bowl of stew.

\\ \\ It is obvious that Esau made a terrible bargain.

He made a foolish blunder!

Long after the bowl of stew had been \\ forgotten, the spiritual privileges that went with the birthright would still be blessing the life.

\\ \\ This is a very illuminating text for the young among us.

Many in their youthful years make such bad bargains.

I \\ know young men who have traded their spiritual birthright for an automobile.

They found themselves with such \\ hunger to own a car and to enjoy the supposed freedoms that a car would bring with it, that they were willing to give \\ up their opportunity to get a good education, they were willing to give up their faithful participation in the life of the \\ church, they were willing to give up all opportunities to do something in service of the Lord.

They have been like \\ Esau – they wanted a car and they wanted it now.

They were not willing to wait for the time that God would give \\ them a car.

Obviously just like the bowl of stew, the car is not a bad thing.

It is a very useful thing when put into its \\ proper place, but it is surely not the most important thing in life.

\\ \\ I have also known young women and men who have traded their spiritual birthright for a night of sensual, sexual \\ satisfaction.

The sexual hunger was so intense that they thought they would die if they could not satisfy that \\ hunger.

So, they gave up the hopes of being chaste and clean when they came to the marriage altar, they put in \\ jeopardy their chances of having a good and successful marriage, they put in jeopardy the approval and blessing of \\ parents, they put in jeopardy a good name and all that it is worth for just a brief sexual encounter that would bring a \\ momentary satisfaction.

But after a while that sexual hunger that was satisfied by the encounter would be there \\ again.

Oh, what a bad bargain!

What a foolish blunder on the part of the young!

\\ Let me add a crude word for our young people concerning this bowl of stew.

Some of the brazen discussions of the \\ alleged sexual practices of our president have questioned what actually constitutes a sexual encounter.

Does \\ mutual masturbation constitute a sexual relationship?

Does oral sex constitute a sexual encounter?

The answer is \\ yes.

Either practice is trading for a bowl of stew at the expense of your birthright.

\\ Others among the young have traded away their spiritual birthright for an experience with drugs.

Their peers kept \\ telling them how much sensual pleasure the smoking of the marijuana cigarette or the sniffing of the coke or the \\ injecting of the cocaine could bring to them.

They put everything in jeopardy, everything of value, everything of \\ eternal significance for a momentary pleasure that a dose of drugs could bring.

What a terrible bargain!

When the \\ brief pleasure of the drug has run its course, it leaves behind a life destroying addiction.

\\ \\ How much is birthright worth?