40 Minutes In The Old Testament - 40 Minutes In The Old Testament: Episode 39

Episode Date: January 28, 2016

Chad and Daniel talk about how much Esau's mother hates him and how she justifies it. Jacob seeing a ladder from heaven and what it says about Christ. And Daniel tries to think like a sinner. Have a listen!

welcome to 40 minutes in the old testament episode 39 this is christ told fast which is a project of 1517 legacy now so go over to 1517legacy.com and check out all the things they have going on there also at a time that this comes out it'll be it'll be around the three week mark for you to get registered for the christ old fast conference and you can still do that at a christ old fast.org slash conference you can go over there and register and you can come hang out with me and chad and brandon i am not hanging out with brandon right now uh instead uh i am just hanging out with chad how's it going chad it's good it's good yeah yeah brandon has disappeared on us so just the two of us today just the two of us i happen to know i happen to know he was

in new york and he drove straight through oh so he's probably asleep right now yeah that's that's quite that's quite a journey it is quite a journey i can't see i blame him yeah so uh so it's gonna be me and you but uh where are we at in the genesis saga well we finished most of chapter 27 last time it's the uh it's the whole story of uh jacob's uh acquisition of the blessing from his father isaac while uh esau is out hunting so we we got we got most of the way through that we're kind of a i don't know sort of around there's 41 42 of that chapter so we'll wrap it up and then we will jump into chapter 28 and uh at least get uh partially into the uh dream that jacob had about the ladder extending from earth to heaven so that's

that's the forecast we'll see how far we get today all right sounds good all right so uh as you uh as you remember from last time uh esau has every every right to be uh to be upset because he's been tricked by his brother. And even though he's the firstborn, his brother has received the blessing of the firstborn from his father, Isaac, through the deception that his mom came up with and that he played along with. He dressed himself up as his brother, made himself feel like his brother and smell like his brother and brought the food for his father, Isaac, that his brother would make so he he totally assumes the part of esau and as a result of that isaac who was who was almost blind and couldn't tell that it was jacob instead of esau gave the blessing to

esau and as we i think we wrapped up as we concluded last time this this blessing that the father spoke could not be undone because once a blessing is spoken it cannot be taken away There's no unblessing of the firstborn. And so Esau is angry. He's bearing a grudge against Jacob because of this blessing, and he plans to kill his brother. He, in fact, even says to himself, this is in verse 41, the days of mourning for my father are near.

Then I will kill my brother Jacob. So he's plotting. He's going to wait till his father's old and he assumes he's going to die soon. So he says, after that, I'm going to take my brother's life in revenge. Well, his mom catches wind of this. She hears about this and she knows that she's going to have to do something about it. So she comes to her son, to Jacob, and says, listen, we've got to do something because your brother's angry. He's going to kill you.

So here's what I want you to do. This is the second plan that the mom has come up with. The first plan was to deceive the father. And now this plan is to send her son, Jacob, packing for a while. She says that she wants him to go stay with her relatives back in the home country for a few days, as she says, until your brother's fury subsides. Now we know that these few days turned into two decades. And Jacob was gone to Paddan Aram for 20 years. And when he comes back, he comes back with two wives, two maidservants, and a whole bunch of kids.

So the few days were much longer than that. But anyway, that's the plan. Go stay with relatives, and that way you're going to be safe. and once the anger of your brother calms down, I will send and I will bring you back. Now, none of that ever happened. Her first plan worked out pretty well for her, but the second plan did not.

And that kind of wraps up that story. That takes us to about verse 40, 45. That's like the busiest couple of days ever, right? Yeah, yeah, there was a lot going on. I expect this all went down in a hurry. The announcement of the Father that I'm going to give the blessing and then the whole deception and then Esau is angry and Jacob now has to pack his bags and and tuck tail and run as fast as he can now interestingly

and I think this is a this kind of gives us an insight into kind of what's going on behind the scenes here this whole story is bookended by by by two verses or two sections which talk about the wives of Esau. The very end of chapter 26 tells us that Esau married a couple of Hittite women and that these daughters-in-law of Rebecca and of Isaac, they brought grief to those parents. So Isaac and Rebecca are not happy that Esau has married these Hittite women. So that's the way chapter 26 ends and then we have this whole story of the deception and the uh the blessing of the firstborn then at the very end of that story we have another reference to these two wives this is the closing verse of 40 of chapter uh chapter 27 rebecca says to isaac i am tired of

living she's exasperated i am tired of living because of the daughters of heth if jacob takes a wife from the daughters of heth like these from the daughters of the land what good will my life be to me that's dramatic that's yeah that is very dramatic so she is sick of living she just can't stand it anymore because of her daughters-in-law these two wives of esau now the reason i think this is this is uh this is insightful or gives us an insight is because like i say this is the framework for this whole story and i can't help but say to myself you know this is this is part of what prompted rebecca to do what she did she is angry at the wives of esau she's angry at esau for marrying these two women it says they brought grief to isaac and rebecca and she says here i'm

tired of living my life's no good to me uh because of these women so uh if we were to look at this kind of from a psychological angle, I suspect that part of what's prompted Rebecca to do what she did was actually the fact that she's sick of these wives that her oldest

son chose. And so she gravitated toward the younger son. That's the end of chapter 27. Obviously, Rebecca kind of prefers Jacob out the gate, right? Right. But

but also so so it seems like esau basically has some ground to make up and uh taking these hit that tight wives does the opposite yeah makes it worse of that she doesn't she doesn't need like another reason to prefer jacob over esau but when he does this sort of thing yeah i'm sure this is just the way this i'm just thinking like a sinner which is extraordinarily difficult is that difficult yeah i'm trying desperately to put myself in that position let me put my place put myself in the place of a sinner and think like a sinner trying it might not be perfect but uh it seems to me that i would then use that to say and that's why this whole blessing swap is justified because i've known all along that this guy

over here this other son he's horrible makes terrible decisions this is awful uh so you gotta justify it in your mind and then and then you just become uh consumed with that to the point that you're like i mean look at her two sons here and she's literally saying of esau this kid makes me want to die and you're like no no your other son is lousy like i what are you even what are you talking about like she's like no no no esau just i mean i'm gonna kill myself like over this this guy i mean and you're like it doesn't it's a strange thing man jacob can do no wrong and esau can do no right by her yeah marries the wrong women god this is like this guy and you're like you you colluded to steal this guy's birthright like like you know you can't you

can't be upset with him yeah yeah she she thinks to herself uh yeah the self-justification is obvious here if he can't be trusted to choose even the right women to marry certainly cannot be trusted with this blessing of the firstborn therefore we are justified in going to any extremes necessary even if it means lying and deceiving and stealing in order to make sure that he does not end up with a blessing of the firstborn and like how how much do you think like this sort of knowing so i mean obviously this is this does fulfill certain things but we do this all the time like we take the word of the lord and we twist it to justify something there's there's no doubt that she takes the word of the lord to her that you know

the older were served the younger and she's like lord wills it i mean you know that's happening Oh, big time. We all do that. But there's no word of the Lord to say, all right, this is going to happen, and you should sort of help that along. It's not like God says, the older shall serve the younger.

Therefore, what I want you to do is to sin against your husband, involve your son in the lies and the deception and the cover-up and the theft in order that my word might be fulfilled. It doesn't work that way. No, but like, yeah, I mean, we'd all do that, I'm sure. But you know, it's like, I got this word from the Lord, so I got a word.

It'd be the equivalent of saying, you know, God desires to forgive us of our sins. And so I'm going to go out today. I'm going to sin as much as possible so that God will be able to accomplish his will for my life. God just glories in the forgiveness of sins, which is why I'm so adept at sinning and so consumed with the glory of God. Yes, yes. That's how I live my life. When the old man becomes a theologian, he is able to twist any good word of God to suit his own self-interest. Well, he does exactly what the devil does in the wilderness to Jesus with the word of God.

we that's just what that's that's what we do that's how it's how we roll uh we're like you know the word you know it is written and then we quote we i mean like how i mean dude we do that all we all the time we're like it's written this this this and this you know that's why that's why i judge and hate people because you know it's written yeah god said he would send his angels to protect you so it's probably you know god promised and uh therefore give him an opportunity to fulfill his promise jump off the the top of the temple here dude every person that has ever like passed around some snakes in a church service prefaces that with it is written you know what i mean like they do that's that's what we do we might we might actually have too

much fear of snakes to actually go to go do that but we do it in other ways yeah we pass we pass other snakes around that we think are a little less venomous yeah the uh the old man never feels more secure in his sin than when he can use the word of god to justify it the twisted word of god to justify it or the old eve as we have here in the case of uh case of rebecca so uh yeah that's kind of what happened. That's an interesting story there in chapter 27. And it's not over quite

yet. In some ways, verse 46, that closing verse of chapter 27 belongs with the next chapter. We've seen this happen before with kind of strange divisions in the Bible because it really leads into what's coming next. So, Rebecca says to Isaac, you know, she's sick of living because

of these daughters, these Hittite daughter-in-laws. is so isaac uh isaac decides that uh this is what should happen so he he summons jacob he blesses him and says you shall not take a wife from the daughters of canaan arise go to padana ram to the house of bethuel your mother's father and from there take to yourself a wife from the daughters of laban your mother's brother so in other words jacob is doing exactly what his dad did for him except abraham sent a servant to get a wife rebecca for uh for isaac in this case isaac is sending his son on a uh a matrimonial mission if you will to uh get get a wife for himself

so they're both going to get a wife from the same from the same family it works out better when you send a servant yeah that's what i was thinking i guess if uh if there wasn't a a death threat lodged against jacob then it would have been a lot better to send a servant you know what i would have done if i was just trying to think like a sinner again but uh if i was isaac i've been like oh no i've got the perfect solution to this jacob you're not going to take a wife you're not going to take one of them philistine hittite wives you're going to take a wife at the well from the family the way we do it but but don't worry i'm sending esau to go find her for you that would be perfect justice esau go get a wife for your brother

that that's that's how that would that's how that would have went down yeah yeah that would have been a my tent deceive me i got a little something for you that would have been sweet justice oh love would have loved to have seen the look on jacob's face when esau showed up with a wife that he'd picked out for him yes instead though instead jacob's gonna go and god's gonna there's gonna be a little justice or it's either way yeah yeah god is god is gonna have his way of teaching uh teaching jacob a few things about uh what it feels like to be deceived yes like when he wakes up the morning after his wedding day yeah so uh anyway isaac uh isaac pronounces a blessing upon jacob uh more or less says may all the promises that god gave

to abraham be yours you know may god bless you make you fruitful multiply and may he give you the blessing of abraham to you and to your descendants with you that you may possess the land of your sojournings which god gave to abraham so he sends him he sends him on his way for a quote few days now what happens next i find very interesting because there's a there's a brief parentheses here before we get back to jacob okay so we we know what all what what all happened with Esau and we also know that his mom especially I guess his mom and his dad were upset about the the first choice of wives that he had made so we have a beginning in verse six Esau's a plan to kind of maybe regain their their affections at least his mom's it says Esau saw that Isaac had

blessed Jacob and sent him away and told him you shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan and Esau saw that Jacob had obeyed his father and mother and had gone on this uh the search for a wife so Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan were not pleasing to his father Isaac so what does he do? Well, he decides that he's going to get another wife. He goes to Ishmael and married, besides the two wives that he already had, Mahalot, the daughter of Ishmael, Abram's son, the sister of Naviot. So I think this is kind of what Esau is thinking. I think that he still is holding out hope that he will somehow be able to gain a blessing. And this is the way that he's going to try and repair the relationship with his parents. So he sees that his brother has been sent

to get a wife from his mom's side, from his mother's brother. And so Esau goes to get a wife from his father's brother so there he's he's thinking to himself okay i messed up the first time i married these two women i shouldn't have because my parents can't stand them my mom would rather die than see my brother take wives who are from the same family of uh of peoples that my wives are from so here's what i'll do i'll make it all up to him by getting a third wife and this one will be kind of from the family uh from my dad's side anyway because of course uh isaac and ishmael were half brothers and so he goes and he takes a third wife from uh the tribe of ishmael now that where that's kind of where it leaves us because we're not told how well this worked out

for esau but at least anyway that seems to be his plan of action plan b to try and uh repair the damage that had been done by his first marriages yeah and it seems like it makes sense to go to go dad's side there too and since the blessings what i'm after and that comes from dad all uh jacob might go marry someone from mom's side but i'll go marry someone from dad's side and that will that'll maybe get me get me in yeah yeah you know what now that you say that i think there's even a indication of that here because verse 8 says so esau saw the daughters of canaan displeased his father isaac it doesn't say he saw that they displeased his father and his mother it just says his father isaac yeah and so he goes to get a wife from uh the tribe of ishmael yeah i

think you're right i mean he uh he probably is by now he's figured out what happened that his mother was behind this all and so he figures hey there's there's no reason to try and curry favor with her because it's that's a lost cause but i can try and at least uh make my dad happy and who knows you know who knows what might happen and his dad and his dad always kind of liked him anyway yeah his dad liked him anyway and you know you don't know though you know a lot of things can happen to a traveler uh his brother might not uh might not come back alive so best to try and smooth things out because uh the future might uh might be hopeful for uh for esau so that that wraps up uh esau's part in the story for a long time actually we're not going to hear

from esau for a few more chapters he stays home of course and uh the entire focus of the story is now going to shift to Jacob and everything that happens to him in his exile, which is really what this is. You might say this is the beginning of the second exodus in the Bible. The first exodus being the exodus that Abraham and Sarah went on when they were in Egypt because of the famine and they were brought back, so they had an exile, then they had a repatriation, coming home. And this is sort of the second of these exiles or exoduses in the scripture, of which there are many.

So Jacob is going in the opposite direction. So Abraham and Sarah, they go kind of southwestward to Egypt, but Jacob is going to go northeastward to Paddan Aram. and it really has it has all the characteristics that we see in various exiles uh where the uh the exiled person leaves and they don't have a lot but when they come back they do have a lot they uh it happened with abraham and sarah of course when they go down into egypt they come out and they're rich and when jacob leaves he doesn't have anything i mean he has i guess whatever he can carry but that's not much uh when he comes back he's got you know this whole company

of people with him all these possessions of flocks and herds two wives four if you count the maid servants he's got uh 11 children 11 sons by then so uh that's that's a theme that we see very often in the scriptures where the one who is exiled comes back laden with uh laden with the blessings of god and the the reason this is so significant is because this pattern of exile and return ultimately provides a pattern for christ himself because he speaks in his transfiguration he speaks of he is his exodus that he's going to accomplish at jerusalem so what he does in his act of salvation for us his death and resurrection are really an exile and a return he's exiled he cries on the cross my god my god why have you forsaken me and his resurrection is a repatriation

is a is a is a is a bringing back a return and what he brings back is uh all the blessings all the blessings of god for us so this exile and return that we see with abraham and sarah with jacob that we're going to see with israel in the the book of exodus we'll see again with israel and their exile to babylon all of this comes to its uh its acne it's its pinnacle in the life of christ who is exiled and then returns in his resurrection with all the riches of god for us so let's uh let's jump into this story this is a verse 10 of chapter 28 so jacob departed from Beersheba and went toward Haran and he came to a certain place and spent the night there because the sun had set and he took one of the stones of the place and put it under his head and lay down

in that place so this kind of sets the stage uh interestingly when it says that Jacob came to a certain place the Hebrew there is is hamakom and uh that particular noun makom very often in the scriptures designates a not just like a place like a plot of ground but a sacred place some sort of holy place so there's already sort of a as you're reading the hebrew anyway there's already sort of a a wink if you will that something significant is about to to transpire this isn't just you know a plot of ground where jacob spends the night but this is a Makom. This is a sacred place, even though Jacob, of course, doesn't realize it at the time. He's just looking for a place to spend the night. So the sun goes down, and he takes one of the

stones and uses it for a pillow, and he lays down. That stone, of course, is going to become important as the story goes on. And in the night, he has a dream. And behold, a ladder was set on the earth with its top reaching to heaven and behold the angels of god were ascending and descending on it and behold the lord stood beside him and said i am the lord the god of your father abraham and the god of isaac the land on which you lie i will give it to you and to your descendants then he goes on but let's stop there let's stop there for a minute So this 12th verse, he has this dream. He sees this ladder that's set on the earth with its top reaching to heaven

and these angels going up, up and down on it. That doesn't remind you of anything from the Gospel of John, does it? It does. End of chapter one, right? You will see greater things than these, Jesus says to his disciples. You will see the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man. i've always loved the connection between the story of jacob's dream and the and the ladder that he sees there and what and what jesus says and in john chapter one because what happens to

jacob becomes a foreshadowing of who christ is so you think about what jacob sees here he's on earth of course and he sees this ladder which joins heaven to earth a ladder or a stairway however you want to translate that hebrew that hebrew word it's a it's the means by which heaven and earth are connected it's the means by which the angels of god go up and go down so you've got a connection here between earth and heaven you have a a means of of of a journeying from one to the other you have a means of communication so this this ladder becomes that which binds heaven to earth it's that which joins god and man it's that which is really the means by which god comes to man and man meets and man meets god this ladder is is all of that

Now, when you think about that in connection with what Jesus says at the end of John chapter one, it shows what Christ is or who Christ is, that he is the one who joins heaven to earth in himself, that he is the means of communication between God and man because he is God and man and he is the word of God incarnate. so he is the bridge between the father and us he's the one that joins the father to us he's the one that the angels of god ascend and descend on and their protection of us he is everything that this ladder that jacob saw in symbolism everything that ladder was symbolism is everything that christ is in reality yeah man it's interesting when And that all ties into John, too, just as you have all the way that John starts his gospel and talking about sort of this descending God, right? Mm-hmm. The Word made flesh, that sort of thing.

And so there is very much this. There isn't this, you're going to, here's a ladder. so ascend and descend on this thing uh instead uh salvation and the work of god is the work of god descending to us that christ humbles himself lowers himself and stoops down and comes to us uh and then and then ascends back up right and then we'll descend again and take us with him And this is the language you have Jesus using over and over again also in the Gospel of John, where he talks about going to prepare a place for you. And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will most certainly come for you. I won't leave you as orphans, says that, but I will return for you.

And so even post-cross and for us post-baptism, there's still not this ascending to God, but we wait for him to descend again to come and get us. We're not going to, Jesus says over and over again, you can't go where I'm going, first speaking of the cross, and then secondary speaking to you can't go ascend to the Father like I'm going to. So I'll leave you a helper, the Holy Spirit, until I descend again. But there's no encouragement of like, and so you guys, once I ascend, you get busy about the work of trying to follow me where I went. And you get up that ladder and I'll meet you halfway or something like that. We wait for God to descend once again and to then ascend with us, to take us in him where he is now. Yeah, the descending and ascending is always in God that that takes place. Everything that you said is in direct contradiction to what people commonly think about the whole ladder of divine ascent.

this idea that uh it's just common among the mystics this idea that we work our way up work our way up to god the biblical model is the exact opposite we don't climb a wrong at a time through prayer and good works and meditation to eventually work our way up to god it's it's the exact opposite god comes down to us and as luther one of my favorite luther quotes is from his commentary on the magnificat where he says that god can only look down there's no one above him there's no one beside him he can only look down and the farther are the farther we are beneath god the more clearly does he see us so it's this idea that god is most intimately connected with those things which are which are below him which are which are lowly and that's i mean

And Jacob is a perfect example of that. Whatever you may think of him as a person, he is beloved of God and is chosen by God and has the blessing of God. And here he is, even though he's been given all these promises, in reality, in possession, he has none of it. I mean, he's fleeing for his life. he's going into exile which in the ancient world was one of the greatest curses that a person could really endure

he's frightened and in the midst of this worry and loss and danger and everything else so at this moment of extreme need is when God comes to him

and not brings Jacob up but he goes down to him in fact uh there's i do want to make one one comment here about english translation a lot of your english translations at the beginning of verse 13 says the lord stood above it meaning the ladder that uh is a weak translation in my opinion i would translate the hebrew there literally behold the lord stood beside him it could mean above but usually it means beside. So the image that you need in your mind is not, here's Jacob on the ground, and here's this ladder, and way up in the sky at the top of the ladder, God stands.

Rather, God has come down the ladder, and God is standing right there beside Jacob, or above him, if you will, in the sense that God is standing and Jacob is lying down asleep. But either way, don't get in your head the image of god who is way up there at the top of the ladder and jacob is way down here rather god has descended and has come down and is right there is right there with jacob yeah that's that god is the as the uh the descending god that's how he wants to be known is luther that says uh i know no other god than one who was placed in a manger and on a cross yeah that's that's the only god that's the only god i know that's god in his state of humility which is which is how he wants to be seen he wants to be seen in the manger and on the cross

like that's that's that's the revealed god that we have that that comes low that lowers himself that's lowly in heart and has a heart for the lowly yeah that's how he that's how he reveals himself reveals himself to us and and that's the only as you say that's the only god that uh that he wants us to know it's the only god that we that we need to know as paul says all the fullness of the godhead dwelt in him bodily so it's not as if you go looking outside the body of jesus for god somewhere all of god is in christ bodily yeah so everything that and this this lowly body this body that was willing to be the servant of all, to be in the manger, to be

crucified, to bear our sins and iniquities. It's that body that is the revelation of the Father to us. When Jesus says that he's the way, the truth and the life, he certainly is saying that this humility,

that God in his humbled state, that is the way to God. And he's saying that he's the truth as in he's the totality of what you are to know about God. He's what's given to you to know. If you want to know what God is like,

then you look at Christ. He's the truth about God. You don't need to go beyond that and go try to peer behind a curtain somewhere and see what's going on in the secret decrees and wills of God. You want to know what God's like. You want to know what his heart's like, what his disposition is.

You look at Christ. That's the truth about God. And your entire life with God then is wrapped up in that man. And so, so often what we want to, we want to try to look at, look at parts of God or aspects of God that aren't revealed. And so we go into the realm of speculation and we make, we speculate about what God is like. Like, you know, because we're sinners, we're not content with the revelation of God in Jesus and Jesus alone. Because that one's a little bit harsh to take in because it's so gritty and so human. it's this poor man

of no reputation born in a manger going to a cross beaten and naked and dying it's not exactly the God we want but it's exactly the God we need perfect amen

hey our 40 minutes are up that was a great way to end there it is we're done well thank you for joining us we will come back next time and uh are we are we are we talking about wives and wells is that where is that where we're gonna be probably wives and wells seems to come up quite a bit in this story yeah all right we'll find out what jacob what happens to jacob when he gets uh when he gets to where he's going okay all right

we'll see you guys then Thanks for watching!