Quiet Thoughts

My Scripture readings this morning took me to Genesis Chapters 26-30 (catching up a little from a missed day).  These chapters begin with Isaac blessing Jacob and end with Jacob leaving Laban to return home.  This has always bugged me - how could God allow Jacob to be blessed after he stole the birthright from his brother, Esau.  Yes, yes, I know that Esau sold it to Jacob in Chapter 25 for a bowl of stew, but still.

In digging into the hows and the whys, I found this:

Why did God let Isaac give the blessing to Jacob?
BECAUSE HE CAME IN THE NAME OF HIS ELDER BROTHER whose right it was to receive the blessing.
Because he came in the name of his elder brother.

We have an Elder Brother, Jesus of Nazareth. It is in His name that we receive the blessing of the Father. "Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers." Hebrews 2:11 NIV

"Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under Heaven given among men whereby we must be saved." Acts 4:12

Who was Jacob? Jacob is you and Jacob is me. Like him, we have been born with a perverse, self-centered nature. Yet the Second Person of the Godhead is not ashamed to call us brethren if we come to the Father in His name, whose right it is to receive the blessing.

Are we worthy of the blessing? No, but because He is worthy, and because we come in His name, the Father gives us the blessing. Humanity's only hope is to come to the Father in the name of our Elder Brother, who is not ashamed to call us brethren.


Digging deeper, I found this:

…[It was] in order that God’s elective plan might continue, not by works but by his call–she was told, “The older shall serve the younger.” (ROM 9:12)

The older and undeserving child, Esau, gave away his birthright on a whim,  to the younger, just as undeserving child, Jacob.

But the whole messed up affair was also a foreshadowing of what would happen more than 1000 years later…

as the Israelites…
the older child…
who had forgotten that the original Jew, Abraham, was saved by faith…
and not by obedience to any “law”…
and began a new way on their own…
getting to get to God, by way of “works of the law”…
a “law” to which was added a multitude of new “laws”…
and the twisting and disregard of the spirit of so many of the original “laws”…
gave away their birthright.
So the new way…
which is the original, and forgotten way of Abraham…
the way of grace bestowed by means of imperfect faith…
takes precedent over the law of Moses.
“The older shall serve the younger.”
“Works of the law” still have their place…
but Grace is the master of any and all “works”.

Hmmm.....

That's a lot to chew on - all from a story I have read and heard so many times and never quite "got."