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Jacob and Esau - 6/18/2008 5:17:58 AM
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twhxiang
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Anyone has any ideas why God let Jacob get away with dceiving his father Issac? And what about Esau? I agree that he was foolish to sell his birthright for such as insignificant thing as soup. But do you think he deserved he treatment? 
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RE: Jacob and Esau - 6/18/2008 7:04:17 AM
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GrahamCracker
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Joined: 4/11/2005
From: Dallas, TX
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quote:
ORIGINAL: twhxiang
Anyone has any ideas why God let Jacob get away with dceiving his father Issac? And what about Esau? I agree that he was foolish to sell his birthright for such as insignificant thing as soup. But do you think he deserved he treatment?
We are dealing with several separate issues here.
1) The sale of the birthright from Esau to Jacob.
2) The "Blessing" which Isaac gave Jacob instead of Esau.
3) The punishment of Jacob for his deception.
The first was a legitimate sale which the Bible says that Esau "despised," meaning he did not consider the seriousness of its value. The "Blessing" was not not Esau's to sale or to give. God had decided that it was Jacob's before Jacob and Esau were born. Since it was never Esau's to begin with, it was never "stole" from Esau.
God did bless Esau with immense material blessings. At their meeting later on, Jacob offered gifts to appease Esau but Esau turned him down. Esau had enough material wealth that Jacob's he didn't need Jacob's gifts. And, apparently, Esau had forgiven Jacob. In a sense, Jacob was "punished" because his father in law had deceived Jacob many many times in the sale of his daughters to Jacob. So it came back to haunt Jacob again.
_____________________________
Larry
Sure we're under the law, everybody knows that!
When He said, "A new covenant," He has made the first obsolete. But whatever is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to disappear. (Heb 10:13)
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RE: Jacob and Esau - 6/18/2008 8:56:51 PM
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HisFish
Posts: 626
Joined: 8/3/2005
From: Rocky mountain way
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Well, to quote rich mullins, "God is a wildman", He has His own agenda that for the most part leaves us scratching our heads. God's will be done for His own good pleasure. Why did He choose any one of us?, since all we ever deserved was to be on hot rails to hell. dont get me wrong, your question is a good one, but "why" is one of those questions He almost never answers.
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The theology of the present aims at the deification of man, but the truth of all time
magnifies God . C. H. Spurgeon
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RE: Jacob and Esau - 6/18/2008 10:30:06 PM
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SpongeBlog
Posts: 980
Joined: 12/9/2006
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quote:
ORIGINAL: twhxiang
Anyone has any ideas why God let Jacob get away with dceiving his father Issac? And what about Esau? I agree that he was foolish to sell his birthright for such as insignificant thing as soup. But do you think he deserved he treatment?
I think God has the greater message for us in the fact that Esau was deceived, not so much that Jacob did the deceiving.
I don't think you'll get too much out of the story of Jacob and Esau without mining out the deeper messages God has in it for us. And it is rich in these deeper meanings. The NT gives us two of those.
"See that no one is sexually immoral, or is godless like Esau, who for a single meal sold his inheritance rights as the oldest son. Afterward, as you know, when he wanted to inherit this blessing, he was rejected. He could bring about no change of mind, though he sought the blessing with tears. (Hebrews 12:16)
Esau represents the man who forfeits the inheritance in favor of worldly appetites.
And by all outward appearances it does seems Esau was indeed unjustly deceived through no fault of his own. But God uses the story to illustrate this matter of election, and how the first born son does not, and will not, receive the blessing that by all tradition and expectation goes to the one born first. And so we get another rich message from the story from God about the matter of election.
"...Rebekah's children had one and the same father, our father Isaac. Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God's purpose in election might stand: not by works but by him who calls—she was told, "The older will serve the younger." Just as it is written: "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated." (Romans 9:10-13)
God has forever established the unchanging fact that it is the man who is born later of the Spirit that will inherit the blessing, not the natural man born first. This grates against every natural expectation and hope we all start out with of inheriting the blessing of God in our natural selves. But God says it is the spiritual man born second that will inherit the blessing, not the natural man born first. Don't be deceived!
Many, many people will continue in the deceit of their natural expectation that they will inherit the blessing in their natural selves. And when it's too late they too will come to the harsh and regretable reality of having been deceived, and they will see that it is the man who is born of the Spirit later who in fact inherits the blessing. But like Esau it will be too late. And similiar to Esau who plead for the blessing with tears to no avail, these people...
"...will try to enter and will not be able to. Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, 'Sir, open the door for us.' "But he will answer, 'I don't know you or where you come from.'
(Luke 13:24-25)
_____________________________
"For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, because anyone who serves Christ in this way is pleasing to God and approved by men." (Romans 14:17,18)
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