Back in Genesis again to start week 7.
Today’s notes:
Genesis 25:29-33 (NIV)
29Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished. 30He said to Jacob, “Quick, let me have some of that red stew! I’m famished!” (That is why he was also called Edom.)31Jacob replied, “First sell me your birthright.”
32“Look, I am about to die,” Esau said. “What good is the birthright to me?”
33But Jacob said, “Swear to me first.” So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.
Genesis 26:7-9 (NIV)
7When the men of that place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” because he was afraid to say, “She is my wife.” He thought, “The men of this place might kill me on account of Rebekah, because she is beautiful.”8When Isaac had been there a long time, Abimelech king of the Philistines looked down from a window and saw Isaac caressing his wife Rebekah. 9So Abimelech summoned Isaac and said, “She is really your wife! Why did you say, ‘She is my sister’?”
Isaac answered him, “Because I thought I might lose my life on account of her.”
Genesis 27:30-35 (NIV)
30After Isaac finished blessing him and Jacob had scarcely left his father’s presence, his brother Esau came in from hunting. 31He too prepared some tasty food and brought it to his father. Then he said to him, “My father, sit up and eat some of my game, so that you may give me your blessing.”32His father Isaac asked him, “Who are you?”
“I am your son,” he answered, “your firstborn, Esau.”
33Isaac trembled violently and said, “Who was it, then, that hunted game and brought it to me? I ate it just before you came and I blessed him — and indeed he will be blessed!”
34When Esau heard his father’s words, he burst out with a loud and bitter cry and said to his father, “Bless me — me too, my father!”
35But he said, “Your brother came deceitfully and took your blessing.”
Today’s reading was very interesting to me. People God chose to use… all doing things most of us would consider less than honorable, if not sin.
Jacob, stealing his brother’s birthright. Isaac, scared for his life to the point he’d claim his wife as his sister. Rebekah and Jacob, conspiring to steal Isaac’s blessing of Esau.
I have a hard time believing God condoned all of this, but I do find it encouraging to know that people He chooses to bless and use don’t have to be perfect.
I find great comfort in John Piper’s messages about God being God-centered. I don’t understand it but the Creator has the right to do what He wishes to do. I’m just super grateful that I’m part of a plan of His that brings me joy in it.