“Trouble brewing”

By Rev. Michael Stonhouse

Meditation – Sunday, July 16, 2023

Genesis 25:19-34 (Forward, p. 79) CEV p. 24

Novels, movies and soap operas abound with stories of sibling rivalry, and many of us are quite familiar with it just from our own experience. In today’s Biblical account, it had its origins very early on—and continued on, unabated, all through life.

As I said, it had its origins very early on—from before birth actually. The two boys’ mother, Rebekah, discovered, while still pregnant, much to her dismay, that not only was she bearing twins but that they were ‘at war with each other’ even in her womb. When it came time for their birth, Esau emerged first, but Jacob soon after, clutching his brother’s heel. It would be a strong premonition, for that would be how it remained all the rest of their lives. Jacob would always be clutching for whatever Esau had!

Now, of course, it didn’t help on iota that the two boys not only looked different but that they had different skills and personalities, which, sadly and unfortunately, played into their parents’ preferences. Esau was a hairy fellow, a rough and tumble guy, an outdoorsman, and a fine hunter to boot. He used to bring home wild game for his doting father, which was much to his father’s delight. Jacob, on the other hand, was more of a homebody, more sedentary lifestyle, preferring to stay at home and look after the family’s flocks. As a result, some gross and unhealthy favouritism grew up. Esau became his father’s favourite, while Jacob was his mother’s. And, unfortunately, Jacob and his mother were not content just to let things be and played into it. Jacob’s earliest pattern as someone who clutched or grasped after what was rightfully his elder brother’s continued all through life. Today’s passage gives the first of two instances of this.

Esau had just come in from hunting and was famished. Jacob was busily cooking some sort of red stew and so Esau asked for some of it. Jacob immediately seized on the opportunity and said that he’d trade some of his stew for the elder son’s privileges as the older sibling, the so-called birthright. Esau, not thinking down the road at all, not thinking of the future consequences of this action, readily agreed. “What use is it to me later if I die of starvation right now?” he said. How he would regret this later on, because not only did he thereby surrender his right to be head or leader of

the family after his father’s death, but also the larger share (twice as much as his brother) of the estate.

And then, later on in their lives together, just as their father Isaac was on his ‘last legs’, on his deathbed as it were, Jacob compounded the insult—with the active help and connivance of his mother—to swindle his older brother out of his father’s blessing as well. As you might guess, this did not engender warm, cozy feelings between the two, but just inflated the festering sibling rivalry that was already there, just below the surface. As a result, Esau resolved to kill his brother Jacob just as soon as his father was no longer around. (This sad and unfortunate development is recounted in Genesis 27).

Interestingly, the Scriptures tell us that this had unfolded exactly as God had planned. The two boys, Jacob and Esau, would become separate nations, Israel and Edom, the two nations would be at enmity, and Israel would indeed rule over Edom for much of the future. Edom’s destiny would be tied to the desert lands east of the Jordan and his descendants would be a wild and vicious lot, ‘living by the power of the sword’, and while they would be sometimes subservient and subject to Israel, they would eventually break free.

Well might we wonder at God’s plan in all this, for none of this family comes out looking very good or noble. The two parents emerge as befuddled and unwise in their favoritism and the two boys come out as conflicted and hopelessly mixed up in their priorities. Yet future writers of Scripture would take this story as a vivid example of how God’s sovereign choice is not to the deserving—here, the first-born, the elder brother Esau—but to the undeserving, younger, grasping ‘brat’: an eloquent example of how the grace of God plays out. None of us deserve it. All of us are ‘brats’ in our own ways, and yet God still bestows His love upon us when we don’t deserve it in the least. Thanks be to God for such an incredible and gracious love. Amen.

Forward notes: “Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank, and rose and went his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright” (verse 34)

“In ancient Israel, birthright gave the oldest male child rights of inheritance along with many other benefits. In his hunger for food, Esau gave those rights away.

“I once knew a young girl who was born into the church. She was faithful and active in the congregation—a very happy person. Her good grades allowed her to start working toward a college degree. Yet a young man came into her life, and she began to distance herself from all those good things. She left the church, dropped out of college, and is estranged from her family. Today, she is struggling, unemployed, and a victim of spousal abuse.

“This friend was seduced by the lure of fleeting pleasures. Sadly, in the process, she lost a treasure: a life full of peace and love in Christ.”

MOVING FORWARD: “Do you need to reorganize the priorities in your life? Take some time to reassess.”