It was the great theologian and sometimes tennis player Martina Navratilova who once said that the difference between involvement and commitment is like ham and eggs. In ham and eggs the chicken is involved but the pig is committed.
In the life of every Christian it is important to move on from being involved with God to being committed to God. And the life of the Patriarch Jacob gives us a picture of how this can happen in practice.
We have seen God at work in Jacob’s life. To begin with Jacob was rebelling against the God of his grandfather Abraham and his father Isaac. Cheating his brother Esau out of his birthright. Lying to his father to obtain the special blessing of the firstborn son. But then God revealed himself to Jacob in a dream of a stairway to heaven and opened Jacob’s heart to faith. Jacob recognised that God exists and that God was with him and he took a first step towards commitment.
Genesis 28 20 Then Jacob made a vow, saying, ‘If God will be with me and will watch over me on this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear 21 so that I return safely to my father’s household, then the LORD will be my God 22 and this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house, and of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.’
Jacob acknowledged that the God of Abraham and Isaac would be his God too. In the years that followed God revealed himself to Jacob several times in dreams. And last week we saw God break into Jacob’s life in a very dramatic way as they wrestled together. Jacob wrestled with God in human form, and would not let go until God blessed him.
Genesis 32 26 Then the man said, ‘Let me go, for it is daybreak.’
But Jacob replied, ‘I will not let you go unless you bless me.’
27 The man asked him, ‘What is your name?’
‘Jacob,’ he answered.
28 Then the man said, ‘Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.’
…. 30 Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, ‘It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.’

We might see this as Jacob’s moment of conversion. After years of rebelling against God, Jacob had been drawn closer and closer by God’s grace. But this is the point when God gives Jacob a new name, a new identity, a new character. He will be Israel, the father of all the children of Israel and the tribes of Israel, God’s chosen people.
But this dramatic event was not the end of Jacob’s life of faith. In a way it was only the end of the beginning. And the beginning of God’s relationship with Israel the Patriarch. Becoming a Christian is not the end of our relationship with God but only the end of the beginning. What follows will be a life-long process of moving on from being involved with God to being committed to God. And in Jacob’s life from Genesis chapter 35 we can see at least three steps in this road to complete commitment.
Step 1 – Purification
35:1 Then God said to Jacob, ‘Go up to Bethel and settle there, and build an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you were fleeing from your brother Esau.’
2 So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, ‘Get rid of the foreign gods you have with you, and purify yourselves and change your clothes. 3 Then come, let us go up to Bethel, where I will build an altar to God, who answered me in the day of my distress and who has been with me wherever I have gone.’ 4 So they gave Jacob all the foreign gods they had and the rings in their ears, and Jacob buried them under the oak at Shechem.
In those days, perhaps 1800 years before the birth of Jesus, the tribes in the Ancient Near East worshipped many different gods. They had all kinds of appalling practices, including sacrificing children in the fire. But Jacob had realised that the God of Abraham and Isaac was the only true god. So Jacob commanded his household to purify themselves from anything associated with the pagan gods of the surrounding tribes. Any idols or objects used in pagan worship had to be destroyed. God’s chosen people had to belong to God alone.
And the same is true for God’s people in every age. An important step in moving from involvement to commitment is to turn our backs on all of the false gods of this age. To reject any influence of money, sex or power. To free ourselves from the grip of entertainment and celebrity and any of the false gods of the occult in its different forms. The only true God, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, calls us to worship him and serve him alone
We saw this in our Tuesday Bible Study last week from Paul’s letter to the Colossians
Colossians 3 5 Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. 7 You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. 8 But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9 Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.
Here is a vital step towards Christian commitment – purifying ourselves from anything which would distract us and hold us back from following Jesus. Committing ourselves to becoming holy as God is holy.
1 Peter 1 14 As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. 15 But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; 16 for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I am holy.’
Then in Jacob’s life we see a second step to commitment
Step 2 – Seeking after God
For Jacob that meant obeying God’s command and building an altar to the one true God.
3 Then come, let us go up to Bethel, where I will build an altar to God, who answered me in the day of my distress and who has been with me wherever I have gone.’ ….
6 Jacob and all the people with him came to Luz (that is, Bethel) in the land of Canaan. 7 There he built an altar, and he called the place El Bethel, because it was there that God revealed himself to him when he was fleeing from his brother.
Up until now time after time we have seen God taking the lead, revealing himself to Jacob. God making promises and making covenants with Jacob. Now more and more we see Jacob seeking after God on his own initiative. Here we see Jacob actually wanting to meet with God and setting aside a special place to do so. Jacob was not meeting with God because he wanted or needed something. He was meeting with God because he actually wanted to worship. For Jacob that involved a special place and an altar. But for Christians it is different. We know we can meet with God anywhere at any time. But we still need to make the effort to seek after God. There are different ways we can do this.
Setting aside time for worship. Being with the Lord’s people in the Lord’s house on the Lord’s day. Meeting with other Christians for Bible study and prayer and fellowship and encouragement midweek.
Hebrews 10 24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on towards love and good deeds, 25 not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
Spending time alone with God in prayer every day. Reading Christian books or blogs, watching Christian TV and DVDs.
God wants us to seek after him and spend time with him. Indeed it is a indication of how committed we are to God just how much of our lives we dedicate to seeking God. Pressing on to get to know God better and better.
“Day by day, may I see you more clearly, love you more dearly and follow you more nearly.”
Jacob was richly rewarded when he did so!
9 After Jacob returned from Paddan Aram, God appeared to him again and blessed him. 10 God said to him, ‘Your name is Jacob, but you will no longer be called Jacob; your name will be Israel.’ So he named him Israel.
11 And God said to him, ‘I am God Almighty; be fruitful and increase in number. A nation and a community of nations will come from you, and kings will be among your descendants. 12 The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac I also give to you, and I will give this land to your descendants after you.’
So the covenant God had made with Abraham and repeated with Isaac is made again with Jacob, the father of the children of Israel. And then we see another step Jacob takes in his commitment to God.

Step 3 – Giving Offerings to God
Genesis 35 14 Jacob set up a stone pillar at the place where God had talked with him, and he poured out a drink offering on it; he also poured oil on it. 15 Jacob called the place where God had talked with him Bethel.

Jacob made an offering to God pouring out drink and oil. This simple offering was a symbol of Jacob offering not only his worship but also his life and all his possessions to God. Remember also the vow that Jacob had made in Genesis 28:22. As well as promising that the God of his fathers would be his God, and that he would set up an altar in that place, Jacob had also promised, of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.’
When we commit our lives to God, that means we are giving everything to God. Everything we own. Everything we have. Everything all comes from God in the first place anyway – we are simply giving back to him that which belongs to him. In the simple parable of the king going to war, Jesus calls us all to count the cost of following him.
Luke 14 31 ‘Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Won’t he first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? 32 If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace. 33 In the same way, those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples.
Jesus invites us to commit our lives to him. He is not looking for just involvement – but for commitment. Giving up everything we have to be his disciples. To give up our lives to worship him and serve him. To tell others about him and freely give everything to him. By purifying ourselves. By seeking after God. And by offering ourselves to Him. Commitment is signing your name at the bottom of a blank sheet of paper and leaving God fill in whatever he chooses above it.
Romans 12:1 Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. 2 Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
Living sacrifices. Involvement or commitment? The great opera singer Luciano Pavarotti explained commitment like this.
“When I was a boy, my father, a baker, introduced me to the wonders of song,” he said. “He urged me to work very hard to develop my voice. A professional tenor took me as a pupil but I also enrolled in a teachers college. When I graduated I asked my father, ‘Shall I be a teacher or a singer?’
“‘Luciano,’ my father replied, ‘if you try to sit on two chairs, you will fall between them. For life, you must choose one chair.’ Now I think whether it’s laying bricks, writing a book—whatever we choose—we should give ourselves to it. Commitment, that’s the key. Choose one chair.”
Steps to commitment. Purifying ourselves. Seeking God with all our heart. Giving ourselves to God. It’s the difference between ham and eggs. Are we involved? Or are we committed?

Think about who Jacob had been

We saw in Genesis 25 how Jacob had cheated his older brother Esau out of his birthright of the family name, and the special blessing for the oldest, and the double portion of the inheritance which goes with that.

Genesis 25 29 Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished. 30 He said to Jacob, ‘Quick, let me have some of that red stew! I’m famished!’ (That is why he was also called Edom.)
31 Jacob replied, ‘First sell me your birthright.’
32 ‘Look, I am about to die,’ Esau said. ‘What good is the birthright to me?’
33 But Jacob said, ‘Swear to me first.’ So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.
34 Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew. He ate and drank, and then got up and left.
So Esau despised his birthright.

Then we saw in Genesis 27 how Jacob impersonated his brother Esau by dressing up in goatskins and then lied to his father Isaac to obtain that special blessing.

19 Jacob said to his father, ‘I am Esau your firstborn. I have done as you told me. Please sit up and eat some of my game, so that you may give me your blessing.’
20 Isaac asked his son, ‘How did you find it so quickly, my son?’
‘The LORD your God gave me success,’ he replied.
21 Then Isaac said to Jacob, ‘Come near so I can touch you, my son, to know whether you really are my son Esau or not.’
22 Jacob went close to his father Isaac, who touched him and said, ‘The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.’ 23 He did not recognise him, for his hands were hairy like those of his brother Esau; so he proceeded to bless him. 24 ‘Are you really my son Esau?’ he asked.
‘I am,’ he replied.
25 Then he said, ‘My son, bring me some of your game to eat, so that I may give you my blessing.’
Disguise, lies, even breaking the yet to be revealed Third Commandment and misusing the Name of the LORD.

Who Jacob would become.

We saw the start of the change in Jacob’s life came when God revealed himself to him in a dream of a stairway leading to heaven.

Genesis 28 11 When (Jacob) reached a certain place, he stopped for the night because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones there, he put it under his head and lay down to sleep. 12 He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.

Despite all Jacob’s sins, God had promised that he would still bless him in the ways he had promised to his grandfather Abraham, the friend of God, who believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.

13 There above it stood the LORD, and he said: ‘I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying. 14 Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring. 15 I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.’

There at that certain place Jacob began to recognise that the Lord, the God of his grandfather Abraham and his father Isaac was also his God.

16 When Jacob awoke from his sleep, he thought, ‘Surely the LORD is in this place, and I was not aware of it.’ 17 He was afraid and said, ‘How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven.’
18 Early the next morning Jacob took the stone he had placed under his head and set it up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it. 19 He called that place Bethel, though the city used to be called Luz.
20 Then Jacob made a vow, saying, ‘If God will be with me and will watch over me on this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear 21 so that I return safely to my father’s household, then the LORD will be my God 22 and this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house, and of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.’

So Jacob committed his life to God at Bethel. We saw evidence that Jacob the cheating scumbag was beginning to change in the way he worked for Laban for fourteen years, between the ages of 77 and 91, to be allowed to marry Rachel, the love of his life. Signs of devotion and integrity we would never have expected from the younger Jacob. Two weeks ago we saw how Jacob recognised that God’s activity was interweaved into his live over all those years. The God of Abraham and Isaac had indeed become the God of Jacob. God revealed himself to Jacob again at different times in the years to follow.

And Jacob would come to call on God in prayer for help. In today’s story in Genesis 32, Jacob was on his way back to the home of his father Isaac with his wives and his 12 sons and one daughter and with all his flocks. But he knew his brother Esau had sworn to kill him when he saw him again. Jacob was understandably afraid to go back. So he prayed.

Genesis 32 9 Then Jacob prayed, ‘O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, LORD, you who said to me, “Go back to your country and your relatives, and I will make you prosper,” 10 I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness you have shown your servant. I had only my staff when I crossed this Jordan, but now I have become two camps. 11 Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children. 12 But you have said, “I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.” ’

We can tell how scared Jacob was because, as well as praying, he also prepared a very generous gift to give to Esau. Very generous.

14 two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, 15 thirty female camels with their young, forty cows and ten bulls, and twenty female donkeys and ten male donkeys.

That’s one way to try to bury the hatchet. But it is a significant sign that Jacob had changed that he even cared about making peace with his estranged brother.

And it was that night before Jacob met Esau that God revealed himself to Jacob once again. Everything that God had been doing in Jacob’s life so far had been preparing him for a life-changing encounter which had an importance far beyond Jacob’s life in God’s masterplan of salvation.

Genesis 32 22 That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two female servants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. 23 After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions. 24 So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak.

Jacob wrestled with God. Everywhere in Genesis, when God meets with people in a dream we are told that it is in a dream. This was not a dream. Jacob met with God and wrestled with God who appeared to him in human form.

Jacob wrestled with God and would not let go of God until he blessed him! And God did indeed bless Jacob more wonderfully than he could possibly imagine.

26 Then the man said, ‘Let me go, for it is daybreak.’
But Jacob replied, ‘I will not let you go unless you bless me.’
27 The man asked him, ‘What is your name?’
‘Jacob,’ he answered.
28 Then the man said, ‘Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.’

The name of Israel probably means “he who struggles with God”. God blesses Jacob with a new name, the name which would belong to the people of God throughout the generations. They would be the children of Israel. Jacob’s sons would give their names to the Twelve Tribes of Israel. From now on, he would no longer be Jacob the cheat, the scumbag. Instead he would be Jacob the Patriarch, Jacob renamed Israel. Not only a new name but a new nature! A new personality. For Jacob the blessings were definitely worth the struggle!

29 Jacob said, ‘Please tell me your name.’
But he replied, ‘Why do you ask my name?’ Then he blessed him there.
30 So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, ‘It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.’

Jacob met with God face to face! This encounter with God was historically unique. Jacob is the only person in the Bible who wrestled with God in human form. That event has a unique place in the God’s masterplan of salvation and the history of God’s chosen people Israel.

But at the same time Jacob’s encounter with God has similarities to the experience of every Christian. Whatever the starting point, everybody who God has drawn to himself has gone through a process of being drawn closer and close to God, sometimes over years or decades. And even if we cannot put a date or a time on the event, we have all had a point in our lives when we have met with God in a very personal way. Maybe we have even been wrestling with God in our hearts and minds. And then God has blessed us. He has given us a new name so that we can call ourselves Christians, believers, disciples of Jesus. And from that point we have enjoyed all the blessings of salvation, the new life which God gives to all who put our trust in Jesus.

Jacob wrestled with God, and God blessed him. And sometimes if we want God to bless us, we will have some wrestling to do. Wrestling in prayer. Clinging on to God’s promises until they are fulfilled in our lives.

In the Bible there are other people who struggled with God for his blessing.
In our Tuesday morning Bible study we have read Paul’s testimony in Colossians 1.
Colossians 1 28 (Christ) is the one we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ. 29 To this end I strenuously contend with all the energy Christ so powerfully works in me.
Paul was strenuously contending – not least in prayer. Later in Colossians Paul talks about Epaphras who was in prison with Paul for his faith.
Colossians 4:12 Epaphras , who is one of you and a servant of Christ Jesus, sends greetings. He is always wrestling in prayer for you, that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured.

If we want God to answer our prayers – if we want God to bless us and our families and our church and our community – we need be ready to wrestle with God.

Daniel wrestled in prayer with God for THREE WEEKS. Abraham prayed like that interceding with God for Sodom and Gomorrah. Moses prayed like that. So did David. So did Ezra and Nehemiah. The Early Church prayed like that when they experienced persecution, and God filled them afresh with the Holy Spirit. They prayed when Peter was imprisoned, and God worked miracles so that Peter would be released and continue to preach the gospel. We need to learn to wrestle with God in prayer for his blessings.

The trouble is we live in an age of instant everything. Instant food. Instant information. We are used to picking up our phone or going online and having anything we can imagine delivered to our door. And we expect instant blessings. Some people think that all Christians need to do is go to church, or say a quick prayer, and God’s blessings will come to us without us needing to do anything else.

In this age of instant everything, many people have forgotten what it is to work for things. To take time to make things with our hands. To take years to understand deep and complicated issues – everything is oversimplified. We have forgotten that truly understanding the Bible will take us a lifetime. And equally we are not prepared for the fact that prayer can be hard work!

We need to learn to persevere! It is said that Beethoven rewrote each bar of his music at least a dozen times. No wonder it’s so good! Michelangelo’s “Last Judgment,” is one of the greatest paintings ever. That’s because not just because he was talented, but because he produced more than 2,000 sketches during the eight years it took him to complete that masterpiece.

Today’s world expects instant blessings! The reality is that if we want God to bless us, we have to fight for it. We have to really want it and be prepared to work for it! As Jacob did wrestling with God.
Jeremiah 29:12 Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
There is the challenge! To seek God with ALL our hearts. To wrestle with God in prayer until He gives His blessing. To wrestle with God until those we love are saved and healed. To wrestle with God until He changes us like he changed Jacob into people He can use for His glory. To wrestle with God in prayer until His blessing floods down on us, and on this church, and on our town, and on our nation. Jacob wrestled with God and God blessed Him. And God is longing to bless us too!

The Book of Genesis takes twelve chapters to tell the story of how God changed Jacob the cheating scumbag into the third of the Patriarchs and the Father of the twelve Tribes of Israel. We have seen how Jacob cheated Esau out of his birthright as the older brother for the price of a bowl of lentil stew. And then how Jacob impersonated Esau and lied to his father Isaac to get that special blessing. But then we saw how God met with Jacob in a dream of a stairway to heaven and repeated to him the promises he had made to the first of the Patriarchs, Jacob’s grandfather Abraham, who was called the friend of God, who believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Promises of descendants as numerous as the dust of the earth. Promises of a land of his own, a land of peace and security and blessing. Promises of God’s presence and protection. Promises that through Jacob’s descendants, all the peoples of the world will be blessed.
Last time we saw the trickster get tricked. Jacob loved Laban’s daughter Rachel so much that he worked for seven years to marry her. Only to find that at their marriage Laban tricked him into marrying her older sister Leah instead. The conman gets conned. The cheat gets cheated. But God had begun to change Jacob’s heart and we saw Jacob work another seven years for Rachel. Fourteen years labour for the love of his life. God was changing Jacob, just as the transforming power of God continues to change Christians to be more like Jesus.
So what happens next in Jacob’s story? Well to be honest – not a lot. From the end of Genesis chapter 29 until the middle of chapter 30 Jacob has children. Quite a lot of children actually. Then Jacob cuts a rather shady deal with his father Laban which means that Jacob’s flocks grow at the expense of the flocks owned by Laban and his sons. As a result Laban gets cross. Jacob runs away with Leah and Rachel and their children and all their flocks with Laban and his sons in hot pursuit. But it all ends well by the end of Genesis chapter 31 as Jacob and Laban take oaths to be friends. Nothing very exciting really for the life of a Patriarch. We’ll read the highlights, such as they are, as we go along.
I was struggling to know what to say about these chapters until I noticed something very significant. There are 103 verses from the final paragraph of chapter 29 to the end of chapter 31. And in those 103 verses God is mentioned 23 times. The LORD, Yahweh is named another 9 times. And another unusual name for God is used twice. 34 references to God or the LORD. In these very unexciting chapters, one in three verses mentions God. God is involved in every aspect of our lives. Even the everyday sometimes boring bits. God is there at work, protecting us, guiding us. God is always there.
Let’s start with Jacob’s children. All 13 of them. One thing I didn’t mention last time about Jacob when he arrived at Haran and saw Rachel, the daughter of Laban, was how old Jacob was. The best guess is that Jacob was 77 years old when he first saw Rachel, and at that time she was 14 years old. So Jacob was 84 years old when he married first Leah and then Rachel who by then was 31. So Jacob was 91 years old when he finished his next seven years working for Rachel. Ninety-one! Adding everything up, having been unmarried until the fine age of 84, Jacob then fathered thirteen children in the next seven years.13 children – with four mothers.
First Jacob had four sons by his first wife Leah: Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Judah. Then because Rachel was not having any children, Jacob fathered two sons Dan and Naphtali by Rachel’s maidservant Bilhah. Because that’s how they did things in those days. Then he fathered two more sons Gad and Asher through Leah’s maidservant Zilpah. Then two more named Issachar and Zebulun by his first wife Leah. Leah also had a daughter called Dinah, who one day will have her own story but not her own tribe. Then finally by his second wife Rachel, who he loved more than Leah, Jacob had two more sons called Joseph and Benjamin. 13 children in 7 years, while Jacob was between the ages of 84 and 91.
The names of each of the sons have meanings, but we won’t think about those today. The Bible is very interested in Jacob’s twelve sons for the simple reason that these would be the fathers of the twelve tribes of Israel. And in the 29 verses which tell the story of the birth of Jacob’s children, God is mentioned seven times and the LORD is named five times. That’s a curious symmetry of a dozen references to God or to the LORD for the twelve sons. But that makes one simple point. God was very much involved in the birth of those children.
Genesis 29 31 When the LORD saw that Leah was not loved, he enabled her to conceive, but Rachel remained childless. 32 Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Reuben, for she said, ‘It is because the LORD has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now.’
33 She conceived again, and when she gave birth to a son she said, ‘Because the LORD heard that I am not loved, he gave me this one too.’ So she named him Simeon.
Next Levi. After that
35 She conceived again, and when she gave birth to a son she said, ‘This time I will praise the LORD.’ So she named him Judah. Then she stopped having children.
When Rachel’s maidservant Bilhah gave birth to a son,
30 6 Then Rachel said, ‘God has vindicated me; he has listened to my plea and given me a son.’ Because of this she named him Dan.
And so on. In due course
20 Then Leah said, ‘God has presented me with a precious gift. This time my husband will treat me with honour, because I have borne him six sons.’ So she named him Zebulun. ….
22 Then God remembered Rachel; he listened to her and enabled her to conceive. 23 She became pregnant and gave birth to a son and said, ‘God has taken away my disgrace.’ 24 She named him Joseph, and said, ‘May the LORD add to me another son.’
God was at work enabling Jacob from the age of 84 and his wives and maidservants to have those 13 children. A dozen mentions in 29 verses. And God is just as much at work in all of our lives. All the time. We may not recognise his hand, but God is there with us, protecting us, guarding us with his divine presence and guiding our steps. Just as he had promised to be with Jacob, God is with us, always. Every step of Jacob’s journey was touched by the Sovereign activity of Almighty God.
God was also with Jacob blessing his flocks as we read in the next bit of the story.
25 After Rachel gave birth to Joseph, Jacob said to Laban, ‘Send me on my way so that I can go back to my own homeland. 26 Give me my wives and children, for whom I have served you, and I will be on my way. You know how much work I’ve done for you.’
27 But Laban said to him, ‘If I have found favour in your eyes, please stay. I have learned by divination that the LORD has blessed me because of you.’ 28 He added, ‘Name your wages, and I will pay them.’
29 Jacob said to him, ‘You know how I have worked for you and how your livestock has fared under my care. 30 The little you had before I came has increased greatly, and the LORD has blessed you wherever I have been. But now, when may I do something for my own household?’
31 ‘What shall I give you?’ he asked.
‘Don’t give me anything,’ Jacob replied. ‘But if you will do this one thing for me, I will go on tending your flocks and watching over them: 32 let me go through all your flocks today and remove from them every speckled or spotted sheep, every dark-coloured lamb and every spotted or speckled goat. They will be my wages. 33 And my honesty will testify for me in the future, whenever you check on the wages you have paid me. Any goat in my possession that is not speckled or spotted, or any lamb that is not dark-coloured, will be considered stolen.’
34 ‘Agreed,’ said Laban. ‘Let it be as you have said.’ 35 That same day he removed all the male goats that were streaked or spotted, and all the speckled or spotted female goats (all that had white on them) and all the dark-coloured lambs, and he placed them in the care of his sons. 36 Then he put a three-day journey between himself and Jacob, while Jacob continued to tend the rest of Laban’s flocks.
So Jacob struck this deal with Laban. But Laban cheated him again, this time by taking out all the sheep and goats which should have belonged to Jacob. Nevertheless God prospered Jacob and his flocks. Which did not go down well with Laban’s sons.
31:1 Jacob heard that Laban’s sons were saying, ‘Jacob has taken everything our father owned and has gained all this wealth from what belonged to our father.’ 2 And Jacob noticed that Laban’s attitude towards him was not what it had been.
3 Then the LORD said to Jacob, ‘Go back to the land of your fathers and to your relatives, and I will be with you.’
Things were not going well for Jacob, but God stepped in to guide him directly. And Jacob later told of another occasion where God had spoken to him in a dream
31 10 ‘In the breeding season I once had a dream in which I looked up and saw that the male goats mating with the flock were streaked, speckled or spotted. 11 The angel of God said to me in the dream, “Jacob.” I answered, “Here I am.” 12 And he said, “Look up and see that all the male goats mating with the flock are streaked, speckled or spotted, for I have seen all that Laban has been doing to you. 13 I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar and where you made a vow to me. Now leave this land at once and go back to your native land.” ’
When we first heard of Jacob he had no time for Yahweh, the God of his father Isaac. In one of his lies to Isaac, Jacob had even broken the yet to be revealed third commandment and misused the name of Yahweh when he said, “the LORD YOUR God gave me success” in his hunting for food. But now we see God speaking to Jacob and Jacob listening and obeying. We need to be open to God speaking to us, listening for his voice guiding us. And when God does speak to us, just like Jacob did we need to obey him and do whatever he tells us.
Jacob obeyed and took his wives and children and flocks and headed back to his old home, even though he knew Esau would be there waiting for him and had vowed to kill him. Laban and his sons chased after them and caught up with them. But God was still watching over Jacob and taking care of him. God did not want Jacob and Laban to be enemies but to be reconciled. After all, Laban was his father in law and the grandfather of his children,
22 On the third day Laban was told that Jacob had fled. 23 Taking his relatives with him, he pursued Jacob for seven days and caught up with him in the hill country of Gilead. 24 Then God came to Laban the Aramean in a dream at night and said to him, ‘Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.’
God revealed himself in dreams not only to Jacob but also to Laban. God protected Jacob by speaking to Laban, Laban confronted Jacob, and Jacob’s reply revealed that he fully recognised that God had been protecting him all along.
41 I worked for you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks, and you changed my wages ten times. 42 If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not been with me, you would surely have sent me away empty-handed. But God has seen my hardship and the toil of my hands, and last night he rebuked you.’
God was protecting Jacob and his family. But in the midst of this, did you notice that Jacob used a new name for God, “the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac.” Jacob was acknowledging that his father’s God was his God as well. We read in verse 53, So Jacob took an oath in the name of the Fear of his father Isaac.
God cares about families. It was important to God that Jacob and Laban part on good terms. God softened Laban’s heart, so
43 Laban answered Jacob, …. 44 Come now, let’s make a covenant, you and I, and let it serve as a witness between us.’
45 So Jacob took a stone and set it up as a pillar. 46 He said to his relatives, ‘Gather some stones.’ So they took stones and piled them in a heap …
48 Laban said, ‘This heap is a witness between you and me today.’ … 49 It was … called Mizpah, because he said, ‘May the LORD keep watch between you and me when we are away from each other. 50 If you ill-treat my daughters or if you take any wives besides my daughters, even though no one is with us, remember that God is a witness between you and me.’
So Laban and Jacob took oaths in the name of the LORD, Yahweh, and in this curious name of the Fear of Isaac. But Laban also took his oath in another name.
51 Laban also said to Jacob, ‘Here is this heap, and here is this pillar I have set up between you and me. 52 This heap is a witness, and this pillar is a witness, that I will not go past this heap to your side to harm you and that you will not go past this heap and pillar to my side to harm me. 53 May the God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.’
The God of Abraham and the God of Nahor. Who on earth was Nahor? Well, he was Abraham’s brother. More than that, Nahor was Laban’s grandfather! Laban was not just related to Jacob because he was the father of Leah and Rachel, Jacob’s wives. And so Laban was grandfather to Jacob’s children. At the same time, Laban was also the brother of Jacob’s mother Rebekah, so Laban was also Jacob’s uncle. But more than that. Just as Jacob’s grandfather was Abraham, so Laban’s grandfather was Abraham’s brother Nahor. Jacob and Laban were blood relatives in a number of ways. God cares about families. God is sad when families argue and fall out and are at war because of trivial things.
But there was another even deeper connection between these two men.
53 May the God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.’
Abraham and his brother Nahor had set out together on the journey to the Promised Land. Although he didn’t finish the journey, Nahor had started out following the same LORD Yahweh. The Lord was the God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father.
For at least three generations, Laban and Jacob’s families had been worshipping the same God. In a world full of pagan worship, with the surrounding tribes even offered child sacrifices, it was important that Jacob and Laban be reconciled. They weren’t just family. They were also both followers of Yahweh the One True God.
3154 (Jacob) offered a sacrifice there in the hill country and invited his relatives to a meal. After they had eaten, they spent the night there. 55 Early the next morning Laban kissed his grandchildren and his daughters and blessed them. Then he left and returned home.
God cares about families and he also cares about the family of faith. In today’s world which is running faster and faster away from God, it is important that trivial issues do not cause splits in the Church of God, the Body of Christ, God’s forever family.
34 mentions of God or the LORD or the Fear of Isaac, in just 103 verses. The story of Jacob’s life is interweaved with the activity of the Sovereign Lord God. How much is God interweaved into your life? God was at work in Jacob and his families, giving him the children who would be the fathers of the Twelve Tribes of Israel. God kept on speaking to Jacob in dreams and visions, guiding him and blessing him and assuring him of His presence. And God was at work, bringing Jacob and Laban back together after they had fallen out. Because God cares about families and he cares about the unity of His chosen people. God is involved in every aspect of our lives. Even the everyday sometimes boring bits. God is there at work, protecting us, guiding us. God is always there.
Look back at last week. How much was God involved in your life? In the week to come, what part will God play in your life?

My object all sublime
I shall achieve in time —
To let the punishment fit the crime —
The punishment fit the crime;
And make each prisoner pent
Unwillingly represent
A source of innocent merriment!
Of innocent merriment!

I was going to sing those words from Gilbert and Sullivan’s Mikado to you this morning – but my spaniels wouldn’t let me They say I will only be allowed to sing at the International Evening on 9th November, and then only if nobody else offers to sing instead. So unless you want an evening filled with me singing all the hits from the Spaniel of the Opera we urgently need some offers of entertainment for the International Evening.

But back to the Mikado – whose object all sublime was always to let the punishment fit the crime, the punishment fit the crime. That’s what we find here in the story of how Jacob the cheat, the liar, the trickster, himself gets tricked.

You will remember how Jacob had tricked his brother Esau out of the blessing which was his birthright at the older twin. Jacob had tricked his father Isaac into giving him that blessing by disguising himself and pretending to be Esau – “a hairy man”. So Jacob was on the run, going to hide with his uncle Laban and at the same time to try to find himself a wife. But while he was on his way something amazing had happened to Jacob. We saw last time ago how God appeared to Jacob in a dream at Bethel – the stairway to heaven!

Genesis 28 11 When (Jacob) reached a certain place, he stopped for the night because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones there, he put it under his head and lay down to sleep. 12 He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. 13 There above it stood the LORD, and he said: ‘I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac.

We saw last time how in that dream God renewed to Jacob the promises he had first made to his grandfather Abraham, the Friend of God, who had believed God and God had credited it to him as righteousness. We saw how God reminded Jacob of his promises of provision and presence and protection. Promises of descendants as abundant as the dust of the earth, of a Land to possess as his own. Promises that God will bring blessings to the whole of the earth through Jacob’s descendants.

Through that dream Jacob had realised that God was with him when he didn’t even know it. He discovered that the LORD, Yahweh, the God of Abraham and Isaac was HIS God as well. We saw how that encounter with God caused Jacob to turn his life around – to begin to worship and to commit his life to God.
20 Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me and will watch over me on this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear 21 so that I return safely to my father’s house, then the LORD will be my God 22 and this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house, and of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.”

That stairway to heaven turned Jacob’s life around. But God still had lessons to teach Jacob, to refine him and purify him and equip him for his role as the third of the Patriarchs, the father of all the children of Israel. And for Jacob that meant the trickster gets tricked, the conman gets conned! Let’s see how the story turns out for Jacob.

13 As soon as Laban heard the news about Jacob, his sister’s son, he hurried to meet him. He embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his home, and there Jacob told him all these things. 14 Then Laban said to him, ‘You are my own flesh and blood.’
After Jacob had stayed with him for a whole month, 15 Laban said to him, ‘Just because you are a relative of mine, should you work for me for nothing? Tell me what your wages should be.’
16 Now Laban had two daughters; the name of the elder one was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. 17 Leah had weak eyes, but Rachel had a lovely figure and was beautiful. 18 Jacob was in love with Rachel and said, ‘I’ll work for you seven years in return for your younger daughter Rachel.’
19 Laban said, ‘It’s better that I give her to you than to some other man. Stay here with me.’ 20 So Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her.

Jacob worked for Laban for seven years. SEVEN YEARS! Not for wages but for the promise that he would be allowed to marry Laban’s daughter Rachel.
’ 20 So Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her.

Jacob must have loved Rachel very, very much! Here is a side to Jacob the cheat we have never seen before. The man to whom family meant absolutely nothing. The lying rat who had cheated his older brother out of his birthright and his special blessing for a bowl of stew. The man who impersonated his brother and lied to his father and even misused the Name of the Lord to steal the blessing. But that meeting with God at the stairway to heaven had changed Jacob. He had been a scumbag, through and through. But now Jacob had become a man who was capable of falling in love. A man who was prepared to work hard for seven years to win the girl of his dreams.

God had begun to change Jacob. But had he really changed deep down inside? Jacob would face a cruel test of his love and his dedication.

21 Then Jacob said to Laban, ‘Give me my wife. My time is completed, and I want to make love to her.’
22 So Laban brought together all the people of the place and gave a feast. 23 But when evening came, he took his daughter Leah and brought her to Jacob, and Jacob made love to her. 24 And Laban gave his servant Zilpah to his daughter as her attendant.
25 When morning came, there was Leah! So Jacob said to Laban, ‘What is this you have done to me? I served you for Rachel, didn’t I? Why have you deceived me?’

What wonderful irony. Surely it was poetic justice when Jacob worked for Laban for seven years to be allowed to marry his younger daughter Rachel whom he loved, only to tricked and end up with the older daughter Leah and another seven years hard labour!
The trickster gets tricked! The cheat gets cheated! The conman gets conned! The hustler gets hustled! The punishment perfectly fits the crime. The first seven years of work followed by Laban’s deception are God’s punishment perfectly fitting the crime for all Jacob’s lies and cons in the past.

Here was the test. How would Jacob react when he was the target of the con? Would he just take Rachel anyway and abandon Leah? That would have been true to form for Jacob the cheating scumbag. But that is not what Jacob did. God was truly changing him

25 When morning came, there was Leah! So Jacob said to Laban, ‘What is this you have done to me? I served you for Rachel, didn’t I? Why have you deceived me?’
26 Laban replied, ‘It is not our custom here to give the younger daughter in marriage before the elder one. 27 Finish this daughter’s bridal week; then we will give you the younger one also, in return for another seven years of work.’
28 And Jacob did so. He finished the week with Leah, and then Laban gave him his daughter Rachel to be his wife.

So Jacob married Rachel just a week after he married Leah. We won’t spend any time talking about the fact that this was polygamy. Just to say that that is how it was in those days. Abraham had more than one wife. So did Isaac. So did Jacob. And in those days God seemed to be alright about that although since Jesus’s time God’s people have been called to monogamy – just one wife for just one husband in lifelong faithfulness. We haven’t time to unwrap the theology of marriage this morning. We simply note that Jacob finally got to marry the daughter he actually loved, who was Rachel.

But what would Jacob do now? Now that he had Rachel as his wife, would he keep his side of the bargain. Or would Jacob head for the tall timber, leaving Leah behind? That’s what we would expect the cheat to do. But no. Perhaps even more amazing than Jacob working for those first seven years, we read this.
30 Jacob made love to Rachel also, and his love for Rachel was greater than his love for Leah. And he worked for Laban another seven years.

Those seven extra years of hard work were God’s test to see if Jacob had really changed his ways. Even after Laban and Leah had tricked him, Jacob kept his part of the bargain. No tricks. No cheating. No lying. He worked for Laban another seven years. FOURTEEN years of hard work for the woman he loved. Jacob must have really loved Rachel!
God had met with Jacob. Now God was working in Jacob’s heart to change him from the cheating scumbag into the man of faith so that all generations, even four thousand years later, would speak of the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob.

Christians are people who have met with God in Jesus Christ. We have heard the Good News about Jesus. We know Jesus died on the cross so that we could be forgiven. We know God raised Jesus from the dead and invites us to share his resurrection life, life in all its fulness, eternal life which not even death can take away.

And we have repented. We have confessed our sins and turned to God, promising to stop living life our way and instead to live life God’s way. So we have been born again. God has put the Holy Spirit inside us to give us a brand new life.

2 Corinthians 5 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: the old has gone, the new is here!

When anybody becomes a Christian they become a brand new person inside. They are not the same any more. A new life has begun.

But that is not the end of our journey of faith. It is only the beginning. Just as God was changing Jacob from the cheat into the Patriarch, God is working in the life of every Christian, to change us to be more like Jesus.

The wonderful truth is that God loves us so much that he accepts us just the way we are. Although perhaps it would be more accurate to say that God loves us so much that he accepts us DESPITE the way we are. Either way, God loves us too much to leave us as we are. His love breaks in and works to change us into the people he wants us to be, the people we ought to be, the people we want to be! We will be thinking more about this subject tonight, looking at a couple of verses from 2 Corinthians chapter 3.

2 Corinthians 3 17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18 And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

If we are Christians, God the Holy Spirit is at work in our lives changing us to be more like Jesus. We will be thinking more tonight about the transforming power of Christ, the power which can save from the guttermost to the uttermost. Jesus transformed the lives of all kinds of people. Changing ordinary fishermen like Peter and Andrew and James and John into the leaders of the Early Church. Transforming that feared enemy of Christians, the Pharisee Saul into Paul, the Apostle to the Gentiles by his encounter with the Risen Jesus on the Damascus Road. Jesus changed all kinds of people from respectable Pharisees like Nicodemus to prostitutes like Mary Magdalene and professional thieves (sorry, tax collectors) like Matthew and Zaccheus. Prodigals who were throwing their lives away, returning home and being transformed into children of God! “My Son was lost but now is found – was dead but now is alive again!” Sinners transformed into saints.

Becoming a Christian is not the end of the journey of faith, but only the beginning. God wants to change our lives to make us more like Jesus. A.W. Tozer wrote, “The essence of repentance is to move across from one sort of person to another is: the liar becomes truthful; the thief, honest; the lewd, pure; the proud, humble.”

God changed Jacob, and he wants to change us too. How is that going for you. Are you letting God make you more like Jesus. More loving? More forgiving. More holy?

JESUS, YOU ARE CHANGING ME,
By Your Spirit You’re making me like You.
Jesus, You’re transforming me,
That Your loveliness may be seen in all I do.
You are the potter and I am the clay,
Help me to be willing to let You have Your way.
Jesus, You are changing me,
As I let You reign supreme within my heart. (Marilyn Baker)

There’s a lady who’s sure all that glitters is gold
And she’s buying a stairway to heaven
And when she gets there she knows if the stores are closed
With a word she can get what she came for
“Stairway to heaven” by Jimmy Page and Robert Plant recorded by Led Zeppelin is widely regarded as one of the greatest rock songs of all time. It has also been recorded by dozens of other singers and groups. There are theories that the words found their roots in the legends of the elves in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. The one thing we can say for sure is that the idea of a stairway to heaven actually comes originally from the story of Jacob at Bethel in Genesis 28.

We find Jacob on the run. No surprise- the name Jacob means usurper, deceiver, cheat.
First off, Jacob had cheated his older twin brother Esau out of his birthright of the double blessing and the family name, just for a bowl of stew. Then Jacob had deceived his father Isaac into giving him Esau’s blessing by disguising himself as Esau, taking advantage of Isaac’s old age and blindness, lying to him and even breaking the yet to be given Third Commandment, misusing the Name of the Lord, in the process.

Two weeks ago we saw that Jacob the cheat was a scumbag, through and through.
With the result – no surprise – Esau his brother was angry and jealous and wanted to kill Jacob!
Gen 27:41 ¶ Esau held a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing his father had given him. He said to himself, “The days of mourning for my father are near; then I will kill my brother Jacob.”
42 When Rebekah (their mother)was told what her older son Esau had said, she sent for her younger son Jacob and said to him, “Your brother Esau is consoling himself with the thought of killing you. 43 Now then, my son, do what I say: Flee at once to my brother Laban in Haran. 44 Stay with him for a while until your brother’s fury subsides.

So Jacob is on the run from his brother. He’s also on the run from his past and the things he has done wrong! He’s on the run from himself and the person that he is. Alone, scared, tired after a journey of around 70 miles, there was Jacob on his way to Haran when he came to “a certain place”. Not a special place, up until that point the place didn’t even have a name –it was just “a certain place”. Definitely not a place where people customarily went to meet with God. Just an ordinary nondescript place. But as often happens, even though Jacob was not looking to meet with God, God was looking to meet with Jacob!

And it is no coincidence that this was a time and a place which were not comfortable for Jacob. He was on the run! He was living rough! He didn’t seek out hospitality in the city near that “certain place”. Instead he pulled up a stone for a pillow and slept under the stars. This was a hard place, a low point in Jacob’s low life! But it is so true that it is often at such places that people meet with God. When things are going well, many people haven’t any time for God. For many people it is only at the low points, the hard places, that God can break in and reveal His glory. In this hard and unfamiliar and uncomfortable place, Jacob would meet with God in a way he never could have if he had remained surrounded with all the comforts of home.

Gen 28: 11 When he reached a certain place, he stopped for the night because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones there, he put it under his head and lay down to sleep.12 He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. 13 There above it stood the LORD, and he said: “I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying. 14 Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring.

What an amazing dream! Of course God often speaks to his people in dreams. Abraham. Joseph. Daniel. Joseph when he was engaged to Mary. Perhaps God has spoken to you in dreams, or visions, or pictures or even in a still small voice of calm. God speaks to us in these ways more often than we hear Him!

God revealed Himself to Jacob in a dream. And that dream impacted on Jacob’s life in at least THREE ways.
1. For Jacob – a reminder of God’s promises

13 … I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying. 14 Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring. 15 I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.”

Promises of God’s provision – descendants like the dust of the earth, filling the Land first promised to Abraham and then to Isaac.
Promises of God’ blessing flowing through Jacob and his descendants to all peoples on earth.
Promises of God’s presence – I am with you, I will not leave you
Promises of God’s protection – I will watch over you

Jacob the cheat had messed up big time! His brother was out to kill him. But this vision in a dream and the words of the Lord God Himself reminded Jacob that God’s promises still held firm. God wasn’t going to abandon him or reject him even though he had cheated his brother and deceived his father! Because God’s promises are forever! God is the God who keeps his promises. However much we fail Him, He NEVER fails us!
God’s provision, God’s presence, God’s protection are OURS – whatever we do – however fast and however far we try to run away from God His promises still hold true!

WHAT ABOUT US TODAY?

We also have received so many PROMISES from God. Hear the word of God as He speaks these promises to YOU again this morning.

Promises of God’s provision – descendants like the dust of the earth, filling the Land first promised to Abraham and then to Isaac.

These are the promises God made to the Patriarchs – to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. These are God’s promises to His chosen people Israel. And these are the promises which are fulfilled spiritually in God’s chosen people, the Church. We are included in the descendants of Abraham, who believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Promises of hope and peace. Promises of eternal life which even death cannot take away. Promises of glory and heaven! All the blessings of the unsearchable riches of Christ and EVERY spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms!

1 Peter 1:3 ¶ Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade- kept in heaven for you,

Promises of God’ blessing flowing through Jacob and his descendants to all peoples on earth.

The church is God’s ark of salvation. God’s desire and purpose is save the whole world through us Christians and the gospel we proclaim.

Promises of God’s presence – I am with you, I will not leave you

Jesus – I will be with you always, to the end of the age Matt 28:20

Promises of God’s protection – I will watch over you

Psalm 121:1 I lift up my eyes to the hills- where does my help come from?
2 My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.
3 He will not let your foot slip- he who watches over you will not slumber;
4 indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
5 The LORD watches over you- the LORD is your shade at your right hand;
6 the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night.
7 The LORD will keep you from all harm- he will watch over your life;
8 the LORD will watch over your coming and going both now and for evermore.

Hear these promises from Scripture – they are God’s promises to YOU today!

2. For Jacob – a reminder of God’s presence

15 I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.”

It’s one thing to know in theory that God is with us everywhere we go. It is quite another thing to have an encounter with God, an experience of God’s presence, which shows us without any trace of doubt that God is INDEED with us, right here, right now.

16 ¶ When Jacob awoke from his sleep, he thought, “Surely the LORD is in this place, and I was not aware of it.” 17 He was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven.”

Lots of people go through life without knowing that God is there and that God cares for them. Too many Christians go through life without realising that God is with US, every moment of every day. We forget God. Sometimes we even carry on with life as if God doesn’t exist at all.

But here, in this “certain place”, although Jacob had forgotten God, God hadn’t forgotten Jacob. And Jacob was made to recognise that God was right there with him. That God was ALWAYS with Him just as God is always with us.

WHAT ABOUT US TODAY?

A reminder of God’s PRESENCE. Not just in theory – but a real experience of the nearness of God! Maybe this reminder will come to us in a dream as it did to Jacob, Maybe we will experience God’s presence in a vision. Maybe some words of Scripture will speak powerfully to us. Perhaps God will speak to us through a friend. However this encouragement and assurance might come to us, may WE know God’s presence and God’s closeness today and in the week ahead.

Rom 8:35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Then that dream had a third effect on Jacob.
3. Jacob turned his life around

Of course it would be more accurate to say that God turned Jacob’s life around. Because this was the moment when God’s grace first broke into Jacob’s life and began to transform him from the lier and the cheat into the man of God, the third Patriarch. But the passage describes what God was doing in terms of what Jacob did – how Jacob responded to this wonderful revelation from God.

He began by worshipping: te turned that rock pillow into an altar. The symbol of his hardship became instead a symbol of worship.
18 Early the next morning Jacob took the stone he had placed under his head and set it up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it.

Then Jacob marked that “certain place” as a special place. Jacob didn’t want to forget that place where God had met with him. And he didn’t want future generations to forget either. So he gave the place a name, “Bethel” which means “the house of God”.
19 He called that place Bethel, though the city used to be called Luz.

Then Jacob committed his life to God
20 Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me and will watch over me on this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear 21 so that I return safely to my father’s house, then the LORD will be my God 22 and this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house, and of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.”

Jacob the cheat had never cared before about the God of his fathers, the God of Abraham and Isaac. The blessing he wanted from Isaac and the birthright he stole from Esau were just property and the riches. He wanted the family fortune, not the family faith. But that vision of God turned Jacob’s values upside down. Now what he wanted was God. God’s blessings. And so he makes this simple promise. Crude and selfish but nevertheless Jacob commits his life to God in solemn vows. He promises that “the LORD will be my God”. He promises to worship God, “this stone which I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house”. And perhaps just as important, of all the money and possessions that Jacob had cheated and lied to get hold of, “of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.”

Did you notice that God didn’t tell Jacob to do any of these things? Jacob was not obeying God’s command. He was just doing what his heart told him was right. There in Bethel Jacob had discovered that the God of his grandfather Abraham and his father Isaac was His own God too. Jacob had realised that God was there beside him even when Jacob had ignored God and was running away from God. Jacob knew now that despite his lying and cheating, God still loved him and had plans for him, even for Jacob the cheat! So the response Jacob made was not obedience to commands but rather his heart’s response to God’s grace revealed to him. If you have truly met with God, and experienced His presence, and received His grace and forgiveness and new life, you won’t need me or anybody else to tell you how to respond to God’s love. You will know in your heart the response of gratitude and love and worship which God deserves!

So Jacob makes solemn promises. The LORD is my God, so I will worship him, I will hand over my whole life to Him – and symbolise that by giving back to God one tenth of everything He gives to me.

Jacob had experienced in his own life the transforming power of God – power to save from the guttermost to the uttermost. Power to transform cheating lying Jacob into a man of God, the third Patriarch of God’s chosen people Israel. The power that would transform Saul the persecutor of the church into Paul the apostle to the Gentiles. The power that saved that woman caught in adultery to whom Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more. The transforming power of God had broken into Jacob’s life.

WHAT ABOUT US TODAY?

God turned Jacob’s life around. Has God turned your life around? Have you experienced the saving power of God? Have you met with God in a way which has transformed your life? This vision of God was not the end of Jacob’s journey of faith – it was only the beginning. Has there a beginning in your Christian life? How have you responded to the incredible amazing love God has for you?

“the LORD will be my God” Jacob declared. The God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Is he your God? Is Jesus your Lord?

“this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house,” said Jacob. Is worshipping God at the centre of your life? Gathering regularly where you know you will meet with God to worship and to pray and to learn and to enjoy fellowship? Being in the Lord’s House with the Lord’s People on the Lord’s Day?

And then Jacob said, “of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.” This is an important principle. Not one tenth as a fixed rule. But recognising that everything we possess and everything we earn comes from God and part of our worship will be to give back to God some of what belongs to him anyway. God did not tell Jacob to do these things. But these are the things Jacob decided he would do as a proper response to God’s love and faithfulness.

“the LORD will be my God and this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house, and of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.”

Think about everything Jesus has done for you. What response are you going to make to his amazing love?

The preacher Alexander Whyte wrote this about Jacob. “There was no Old Testament saint of them all who, first and last, saw more of the favour and forgiveness of God than Jacob. And yet, with all that, the great sins of Jacob’s youth and the great sinfulness of Jacob’s heart both found him out every day he lived down to the day of his death.”
My old Home Group leader, Barry, was a schoolteacher and so knew human nature better than most people. He had a word for people like Jacob. “Scumbag”. Jacob, he would say, was a scumbag through and through.
The stories about Jacob are an example of the Bible’s refreshing honesty. No cover ups. No spin. Just the true accounts of real people – many of them scumbags. Real people like Jacob whose lives teach us important lessons about human beings and God – about sin and mercy.
The story starts with ISAAC’s BLESSING
The Bible speaks about blessings more than 400 times. From Abraham onwards, the people of God have always known that “giving a blessing” and “receiving a blessing” carry real spiritual power. God gave Aaron’s descendants the priests the authority to declare blessings on his people.
Numbers 6 22 The LORD said to Moses, 23 ‘Tell Aaron and his sons, “This is how you are to bless the Israelites. Say to them:
24 ‘ “ ‘The LORD bless you and keep you;
25 the LORD make his face shine on you and be gracious to you;
26 the LORD turn his face towards you and give you peace.’ ”
27 ‘So they will put my name on the Israelites, and I will bless them.’

People brought their children to Jesus so that he could place his hands on them and bless them. The letters of the New Testament contain many examples of blessings.
2 Thessalonians 3 16 Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you.
We end all of our services with a blessing. Most often we declare,
“May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Love of God, and the Fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with us all, evermore AMEN”
These aren’t just empty words, a polite way of saying “The service is over. Thanks be to God”. We know God answers our prayers. But more than that the Bible teaches us that when we declare God’s blessing on somebody in accordance with God’s purposes, then our words will carry real spiritual power. In Luke 10 Jesus sent his disciples out to preach the gospel with these instructions.
6 “When you enter a house, first say, `Peace to this house.’ If a man of peace is there, your
peace will rest on him; if not, it will return to you. ….
People often expect Ministers to pray a blessing on them but actually EVERY Christian can declare God’s blessing on other people, and especially on each other. Blessings make a difference.
Which is why the story we heard last week is so significant.
Genesis 25 29 Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished. 30 He said to Jacob, ‘Quick, let me have some of that red stew! I’m famished!’ …
31 Jacob replied, ‘First sell me your birthright.’
32 ‘Look, I am about to die,’ Esau said. ‘What good is the birthright to me?’
33 But Jacob said, ‘Swear to me first.’ So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.
34 Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew. He ate and drank, and then got up and left.
So Esau despised his birthright.

Jacob tricked his brother and Esau threw away Isaac’s special blessing which was his birthright as the older brother, sold for a bowl of lentil stew. Esau despised his birthright as heir of the family name and heir of all God’s promises. The way Esau showed contempt for his birthright demonstrated that he was not a suitable person to be God’s chosen heir and the channel of God’s wonderful masterplan of salvation.
But Esau sinned against God in other ways as well. Remember the lengths Abraham went to to ensure that Isaac’s wife was not a Canaanite or Hittite, who worshipped foreign Gods. Esau had annoyed Isaac and Rebekah by marrying not just one but two wives from the local tribes, the Canaanites and the Hittites.
Genesis 35 34 When Esau was forty years old, he married Judith daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and also Basemath daughter of Elon the Hittite. 35 They were a source of grief to Isaac and Rebekah.
Even before Jacob and Esau were born, God had told Rebekah that his plan of blessing would come through Jacob and not Esau.
Genesis 25 22 The babies jostled each other within her, and she said, ‘Why is this happening to me?’ So she went to enquire of the LORD.
23 The LORD said to her,
‘Two nations are in your womb,
and two peoples from within you will be separated;
one people will be stronger than the other,
and the elder will serve the younger.’

The younger brother would take the prominence usually held by the older brther. God knew in advance that Esau would turn out not to be a suitable heir. But even though Esau was not God’s choice, everything that Jacob did to steal that special blessing was wrong. He should never have taken matters into his own hands. Jacob also was a scumbag through and through.
Let’s list JACOB’S SINS
Firstly Jacob tricked Esau out of his birthright with that deal over a bowl of stew. But then he got involved in a plot to trick Isaac into blessing him instead of his brother. He took advantage of his father’s old age and blindness to trick him. That is why the name Jacob came to mean a deceiver, or a cheat.
It is no excuse that the idea came from their mother Rebekah, who preferred Jacob over Esau. Although to be honest, I think the story shows that Rebekah herself was not the dream bride she had first appeared to be. But that’s beside the point.
Genesis 27 5 Now Rebekah was listening as Isaac spoke to his son Esau. When Esau left for the open country to hunt game and bring it back, 6 Rebekah said to her son Jacob, ‘Look, I overheard your father say to your brother Esau, 7 “Bring me some game and prepare me some tasty food to eat, so that I may give you my blessing in the presence of the LORD before I die.”8 Now, my son, listen carefully and do what I tell you: 9 go out to the flock and bring me two choice young goats, so that I can prepare some tasty food for your father, just the way he likes it. 10 Then take it to your father to eat, so that he may give you his blessing before he dies.’
Jacob knew very well what he was doing was wrong. Never mind that deal with the bowl of stew, Jacob was still not entitled to the special blessing reserved for the older son.
11 Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, ‘But my brother Esau is a hairy man while I have smooth skin. 12 What if my father touches me? I would appear to be tricking him and would bring down a curse on myself rather than a blessing.’
He knew it was wrong, but Jacob went in with a simple disguise, clearly doing his very best to deceive Isaac.
15 Then Rebekah took the best clothes of her elder son Esau, which she had in the house, and put them on her younger son Jacob. 16 She also covered his hands and the smooth part of his neck with the goatskins. 17 Then she handed to her son Jacob the tasty food and the bread she had made.
Jacob impersonates Esau, and he blatantly tells lies.
18 He went to his father and said, ‘My father.’
‘Yes, my son,’ he answered. ‘Who is it?’
19 Jacob said to his father, ‘I am Esau your firstborn. I have done as you told me. Please sit up and eat some of my game, so that you may give me your blessing.’

Isaac asks the direct question and Jacob lies again.
23 He did not recognise him, for his hands were hairy like those of his brother Esau; so he proceeded to bless him. 24 ‘Are you really my son Esau?’ he asked.
‘I am,’ he replied.
On top of his lies, in the middle of all this, did you notice that Jacob actually broke the Third Commandment (although of course the Commandments would not be given to Moses for hundreds of years). Do not misuse the name of the LORD?
20 Isaac asked his son, ‘How did you find it so quickly, my son?’
‘The LORD your God gave me success,’ he replied.
So blasphemy. Invoking the name of God in his evil scheme. Of course it had not been God that had provided the food so quickly, but Rebekah. Misusing the name of the LORD. Did you notice just how Jacob phrased his answer?
‘The LORD your God gave me success,’
The Lord YOUR God. Not OUR God. Or MY God. There was no faith here. But Rebekah’s plan and Jacob’s lies worked. Isaac was deceived and gave to Jacob the blessing of the firstborn son which Esau had thrown away.
28 May God give you heaven’s dew and earth’s richness—
an abundance of grain and new wine.
29 May nations serve you and peoples bow down to you.
Be lord over your brothers, and may the sons of your mother bow down to you.
May those who curse you be cursed and those who bless you be blessed.’

The blessings of the firstborn son – the family name, the inheritance of God’s blessings of innumerable descendants and possession of the Promised Land. All would come to Jacob and not to Esau. No wonder Esau was not a happy bunny!
Esau despised his birthright. He was certainly not a worthy heir to Abraham and Isaac. But was Jacob really any better? Deception. Manipulation. Lies. Blasphemy misusing the name of the LORD. Not a very promising character to become the third of the Patriarchs, the heir of all God’s promises and the Father of all the children of Israel. Jacob was a scumbag – through and through.
So how on earth does Jacob end up as the hero of faith, getting more mentions in the Bible than even his grandfather Abraham who was called God’s Friend? Two weeks and three chapters into Jacob’s story and there has been absolutely nothing in Jacob’s life which we could look to as a fine example we could imitate. It has been a catalogue of sins we should all avoid like the plague.
The story really points us to GOD’s MERCY.
The point is this. If God could forgive somebody like Jacob there is hope for all of us. If God could turn Jacob’s life around, then he can change anybody. If God’s grace could be sufficient for Jacob, then that grace would be sufficient for any of us, whatever our situation.
And in the weeks to come we shall see how God did forgive Jacob. God did change Jacob. God’s grace broke into Jacob’s life in such a powerful dramatic way that Israel and the church can still rightly talk about the God of the Bible as the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob.
Jacob’s life is like the life of Great King David who was a murderer and adulterer. If God could forgive David, as he forgave Jacob, he can even forgive you and me.
Jacob reminds us of Saul who became the apostle Paul.
1 Timothy 1 13 Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief. 14 The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.
15 Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. 16 But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his immense patience as an example for those who would believe in him and receive eternal life.

If God could forgive Saul and transform him into the apostle Paul, God can forgive and change ordinary people like you and me in the same way. Paul wrote this about the ordinary Christians in the church in Corinth.
1 Corinthians 6 9 Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
God is in the business of changing sinners into saints and atheists into missionaries. Starting with Jacob and all these other scumbags. God pours out his mercy and grace into our lives. Mercy is not getting the judgment and punishment we deserve for our sins. Grace is getting all God’s blessings we could never earn or deserve. Like the Corinthians, we are washed – our sins are washed away. We are sanctified – God is making us holy. We are justified – God has brought us into a right relationship with him: he has made it “just as if I’d” never sinned.
You may feel like a failure this morning. Conscious of sins in your life. Conscious of all the ways you have let God down this week. If we are honest, none of us are any better than Jacob. We’re all scumbags, through and through. We may feel we don’t deserve to be here in God’s presence – you’re right, we don’t. We may feel we don’t deserve God’s love and forgiveness and eternal life. We’re right – we don’t.
But today’s story reminds us that God can take even a scumbag like Jacob and use him in his wonderful plan of salvation and make him into a Patriarch. Our sins are great, but mercy of the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob is even greater! Praise God!

The God of the Old Testament, the God of the nation of Israel, is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Abraham who was called God’s friend, Isaac his son, and his son Jacob whose name God changed to Israel, were the Patriarchs. God’s covenant promises were made to Abraham and his descendants forever. And those promises were renewed to Isaac. Isaac would be blessed, because of Abraham’s faith.
When Abraham died, we read in Genesis 25:5 “Abraham left everything he owned to Isaac.” So Isaac was a very important and wealthy man. But more than that, he was the heir to all the wonderful promises God had made to Abraham
Genesis 26:1 Now there was a famine in the land—besides the previous famine in Abraham’s time—and Isaac went to Abimelek king of the Philistines in Gerar. 2 The LORD appeared to Isaac and said, ‘Do not go down to Egypt; live in the land where I tell you to live. 3 Stay in this land for a while, and I will be with you and will bless you. For to you and your descendants I will give all these lands and will confirm the oath I swore to your father Abraham. 4 I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and will give them all these lands, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, 5 because Abraham obeyed me and did everything I required of him, keeping my commands, my decrees and my instructions.’
Descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky. A land to possess. And all the nations of the earth would be blessed through Isaac’s offspring. So God’s promises were renewed to Isaac, and not just once but twice.
Genesis 26 23 From there (Isaac) went up to Beersheba. 24 That night the LORD appeared to him and said, ‘I am the God of your father Abraham. Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bless you and will increase the number of your descendants for the sake of my servant Abraham.’
Isaac the son of Abraham was very important and very rich. On top of that, Isaac was the heir to all of God’s promises. He gets mentioned 140 times in the Bible. Which may seem a lot until you realise that Abraham features 267 times and Jacob 415 times. Because the reality is that Isaac plays very little part in God’s wonderful masterplan of salvation. Isaac really only gets into the Bible for two reasons. He was the son of Abraham. And Isaac had two sons – one called Jacob and the other called Esau.
19 This is the account of the family line of Abraham’s son Isaac.
Abraham became the father of Isaac, 20 and Isaac was forty years old when he married Rebekah daughter of Bethuel the Aramean from Paddan Aram and sister of Laban the Aramean.
21 Isaac prayed to the LORD on behalf of his wife, because she was childless. The LORD answered his prayer, and his wife Rebekah became pregnant. 22 The babies jostled each other within her, and she said, ‘Why is this happening to me?’ So she went to enquire of the LORD.
23 The LORD said to her,
‘Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated;
one people will be stronger than the other, and the elder will serve the younger.’
24 When the time came for her to give birth, there were twin boys in her womb. 25 The first to come out was red, and his whole body was like a hairy garment; so they named him Esau. 26 After this, his brother came out, with his hand grasping Esau’s heel; so he was named Jacob. Isaac was sixty years old when Rebekah gave birth to them.
So Isaac had two sons. And that is pretty much all that he did. These two sons were very different characters.
27 The boys grew up, and Esau became a skilful hunter, a man of the open country, while Jacob was content to stay at home among the tents. 28 Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob.
As parents we shouldn’t have favourites between our children. But Isaac and Rebekah did, and maybe that was part of the problem. The boys grew up to be very different and there were obviously tensions between them. But one issue particularly would have caused jealousy and division. Although they were twins and born minutes apart, Esau was the older son. He was Isaac’s first-born. And that gave him a special advantage. When Issac died, Esau would inherit a double portion of everything their father had. Esau would inherit twice as much as Jacob of Isaac’s possessions and wealth and land. But more than that, Esau would inherit all the blessings God had promised to Abraham and then to Isaac. All God’s blessings would be channeled through Esau, and not through Jacob. That was Esau’s birthright. The double portion of the inheritance.
And Esau through all of that away for a bowl of lentil stew.

29 Once when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the open country, famished. 30 He said to Jacob, ‘Quick, let me have some of that red stew! I’m famished!’ (That is why he was also called Edom.)
31 Jacob replied, ‘First sell me your birthright.’
32 ‘Look, I am about to die,’ Esau said. ‘What good is the birthright to me?’
33 But Jacob said, ‘Swear to me first.’ So he swore an oath to him, selling his birthright to Jacob.
34 Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew. He ate and drank, and then got up and left.
So Esau despised his birthright.

Neither Esau nor Jacob come out of this story well. The name Jacob originally meant, “he grasps the heel” but that came also to mean “the deceiver” or “the supplanter”. Jacob was certainly scheming and devious and sly. But Esau (his name probably just means “hairy”) was foolish and shortsighted. To trade his double inheritance for one bowl of stew. His values were completely upside-down! “So Esau despised his birthright.” He showed contempt for his rights. The Message: “That’s how Esau shrugged off his rights as the firstborn.”
But in this action Esau gives us a vivid warning of very many people, and even some Christians, who despise our birthright and throw away their inheritance.
Esau’s Birthright.
The greatest blessing Esau would inherit of course was not the possessions or the wealth or the land. He would be the heir of all the promises God had made to Abraham and repeated to Isaac, guaranteed by God’s covenants. So Esau wasn’t just throwing away human riches. He was throwing away the infinitely greater spiritual riches of innumerable descendants and the promised land. He was throwing away his relationship with God and a unique place in God’s wonderful plan of salvation. All sold for the price of a bowl of stew! How could Esau have been so blind? How could he have thrown away such a fantastic inheritance?
But that’s very human isn’t it. To grab at things which are immediate and visible and throw away what is spiritual and eternal.
Our human birthright.
Remember Adam and Eve. Placed in Garden of Eden, in the middle of perfection. Walking with God in the Garden! And they threw all of that away, just for a bite of the fruit from the forbidden tree. Despising their inheritance. Their relationship with God spoiled forever by one moment of disobedience.
And that is how human beings have acted ever since. We are created in the image of God. Made to enjoy a relationship with God. But people still prefer to chase after this world’s passing pleasures rather than to discover the blessings God created us to enjoy. Time and again human beings trade in their spiritual birthright for bowls of stew. In Romans chapter 1 the apostle Paul chronicles this continual rejection of God.
Romans 1 18 But God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness.
21 Yes, they knew God, but they wouldn’t worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they began to think up foolish ideas of what God was like. As a result, their minds became dark and confused.
25 They traded the truth about God for a lie. So they worshiped and served the things God created instead of the Creator himself, who is worthy of eternal praise! Amen.
28 Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done. 29 Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip. 30 … They invent new ways of sinning, … 32 … Worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too.

Human beings, made in the image of God, but have rejected that birthright every time they have rejected God. When we think about Esau it is so obvious to us that he was stupid and shortsighted. He was nothing short of crazy to throw away all the blessings he would would inherit just for a bowl of stew. But that is just a picture of every human being who throws away the invitation of a relationship with the loving heavenly Father God and instead chases after the empty pleasures this world offers. All the riches of this world are worth absolutely nothing compared to all the spiritual blessings God offers to all human beings through His son Jesus Christ. As Jesus said,
Matthew 16 26 What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?
What kind of deal is it to get everything you want but lose yourself? What could you ever trade your soul for? (Message)
But so many people are still following Esau’s example by throwing away what is so very precious. Rejecting and despising and showing contempt for God’s blessing and choosing instead the devil’s bowls of stew. Crazy!
But let us not as Christians start feeling smug and self-satisfied and judgmental. Because Christians too can throw away our birthrights.
1 Peter 1 3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you.
As Christians we have received forgiveness of all our sins. God has given us new life in Christ, life in all its fulness which not even death can take away. God has made us his beloved children and He has put His Holy Spirit inside us as the first instalment and the guarantee of our glorious inheritance. All these fantastic blessings are just part of our birthright as Christians. Even more than that, Paul writes to the Ephesians.
Ephesians 1 3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.
EVERY spiritual blessing. Not just one or two. EVERY spiritual blessing in Christ. So the letter to the Hebrews spells out what we can learn from Esau’s dreadful mistake.
Hebrews 12 15 See to it that no one falls short of the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many. 16 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. 17 Afterwards, as you know, when he wanted to inherit this blessing, he was rejected. Even though he sought the blessing with tears, he could not change what he had done.
The history of Israel could have been very different. Generations could have spoken of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Esau. But Esau threw all that away.
There are all kinds of ways Christians can fall into Esau’s sin and despise our birthright. We can show contempt for God’s blessings through disobedience or neglect or willful sin. God has forgiven our sins. But we through that back in his face when we deliberately and willfully continue in sin now we are Christians.
God has given us a new life in Jesus. But Christians have an obligation to live out that new life and not just carry on in sin as we did before we were saved.
Ephesians 4 17 So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. 18 They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts.
22 You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24 and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

Our old life is like a set of old filthy shabby clothes. Our new life is a spotless clean suit. We should throw away the old clothes and put on the new suit and live a new life, which is our birthright in Christ.
5 Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. 6 Because of these, the wrath of God is coming. 7 You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. 8 But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9 … you have taken off your old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.

God has given us a new life to live. This is our birthright in Christ. We are obliged to live that new life, not throw it away for a bowl of stew.
Christians have the enormous privilege of prayer. We can bring all our concerns to our loving heavenly Father. We show contempt for our birthright when we can’t be bothered to pray.
God reveals himself and speaks to us through his word the Bible. We despise our birthright when we can’t be bothered to read our Bibles.
We have the glorious inheritance of heaven, but we really do trade that in for the devil’s bowls of stew when we put all our time and energy into collecting wealth on earth instead of treasures in heaven.
We despise our birthright when God gives us opportunities to talk about Jesus and instead we stay silent.
God has put his Holy Spirit inside us. But we quench the Spirit when we try to serve God in our own strength or neglect the spiritual gifts He has given us.
God has given Christians so many blessings. Let us make sure we don’t just throw them all away.
The missionary Jim Elliott was martyred in 1956 by the South American tribe he was trying to evangelise. Before he became a missionary, he wrote in his diary, “he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”
Esau threw away all the riches which were his birthright, and his place in God’s masterplan of salvation, for just one bowl of something he could not keep. None of us should make the same mistake. That would just be crazy!

“The camels are coming! The camels are coming!”
There is a passage I have been waiting to preach on for more than 40 years since I first heard a sermon on it. I can’t remember who the preacher was. The passage is Genesis chapter 24 and the only thing I can actually remember of that original sermon is the punchline from the end of the chapter in verse 63, as I heard it then in the old King James Version.
“And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at the eventide: and he lifted up his eyes, and saw, and, behold, the camels were coming.”
“The camels are coming!” That was the best sermon title I have ever heard, and the happy ending to the story which begins much earlier. The chapter is very long so I am going to read it as we go along.
GENESIS 24:1 Abraham was now very old, and the LORD had blessed him in every way. 2 He said to the senior servant in his household, the one in charge of all that he had, ‘Put your hand under my thigh. 3 I want you to swear by the LORD, the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you will not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I am living, 4 but will go to my country and my own relatives and get a wife for my son Isaac.’
5 The servant asked him, ‘What if the woman is unwilling to come back with me to this land? Shall I then take your son back to the country you came from?’
6 ‘Make sure that you do not take my son back there,’ Abraham said. 7 ‘The LORD, the God of heaven, who brought me out of my father’s household and my native land and who spoke to me and promised me on oath, saying, “To your offspring I will give this land”—he will send his angel before you so that you can get a wife for my son from there.
Abraham, the friend of God, was now very old. God had given him his miracle son Isaac and promised that all the blessings of the covenant to Abraham’s descendants and to the whole world would come through Isaac. But Abraham was worried that if Isaac married a Canaanite woman from the land they were living in, then Isaac and his family would be led away from following the one and only true God. And we know how wise Abraham was in that, when we remember what we learned before the summer about all the kings of Israel a thousand years later who married foreign wives who led them into worshipping the false pagan gods of the Canaanites, and all the trouble that caused.
So Abraham sent his most important servant, the manager of his household, on this most important mission, to find a suitable wife for Isaac, the heir to all God’s promises. The servant would take a couple of weeks to make the 500-mile journey from Beersheba to Paddan Aram to try to find one of Abraham’s relatives to marry Isaac.
Preachers through the ages have waxed eloquently on this story. Many have seen it as a form of allegory called typology. Some people understand many Old Testament narratives as foreshadowing New Testament events. The Old Testament story reveals a type, or a pattern, of the way God acts, which is fulfilled in the New Testament. We thought about this last week although we didn’t use the word typology then. Genesis 22 tells the story of God testing Abraham’s faith by calling him to sacrifice his beloved Son Isaac. And this gives us a picture of the love of God the Father being willing to sacrifice His Son Jesus for us. So Abraham is described as the “type” for the God the Father and Isaac is the “type” for the Son Jesus.
Some preachers look at Genesis 24 in the same way as a story about Abraham the Patriarch as a Type for God the Father and Isaac as a Type for his beloved Son Jesus Christ. And this story is understood to be fulfilled much later as the Father God sends his servant to find a Bride for his Son. So preachers see Isaac’s bride as a Type for the Bride of Christ which is the Church. And the servant Abraham sends is a Type for the Holy Spirit who God sends to find the church. So some preachers will use this whole story as an allegory for the work of the Holy Spirit drawing Christians into the wonderful Bride of Christ, the Church.
That has been the traditional way that very many preachers have understood Genesis 24. But I don’t buy it. Apart from anything else, the Old Testament is Scripture as much for the Jews as for the Christians. Abraham and Isaac are their Patriarchs. So this story must have things to say to Jews as much as to Christians about their God and our God. Which is why I want us to look at this Old Testament story in its own terms instead of leaping to Christianise and allegorise it. And for me it is a story about great faith. But not the faith of Abraham or of Isaac the great heroes of faith, but of a man so humble that we don’t even know his name. The man who left his place as the most important servant in Abraham’s household to obey his master’s wish.
10 Then the servant left, taking with him ten of his master’s camels loaded with all kinds of good things from his master. He set out for Aram Naharaim and made his way to the town of Nahor. 11 He made the camels kneel down near the well outside the town; it was towards evening, the time the women go out to draw water.
12 Then he prayed, ‘LORD, God of my master Abraham, make me successful today, and show kindness to my master Abraham. 13 See, I am standing beside this spring, and the daughters of the townspeople are coming out to draw water. 14 May it be that when I say to a young woman, “Please let down your jar that I may have a drink,” and she says, “Drink, and I’ll water your camels too”—let her be the one you have chosen for your servant Isaac. By this I will know that you have shown kindness to my master.’
This man was only a servant. But he had served Abraham long enough to share his master’s faith in the LORD, Yahweh, the God of Abraham. So he prays. He commits his search to God. He sets out in faith. The simple lesson from Genesis 24 for us four thousand years later is obvious. Whatever tasks we face this week, and every week, we also should approach them with faith. We also should pray. Whether the job seems large or small, we also should seek God’s strength and guidance and blessing on our endeavours.
Proverbs 3 5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;
6 in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.
Abraham’s servant committed his task to God and relied on God to guide him. We should do the same. And at the same time the servant created a simple “test”, if you like, to help him discover God’s will. A test involving camels.
15 Before he had finished praying, Rebekah came out with her jar on her shoulder. She was the daughter of Bethuel son of Milkah, who was the wife of Abraham’s brother Nahor. 16 The woman was very beautiful, a virgin; no man had ever slept with her. She went down to the spring, filled her jar and came up again.
17 The servant hurried to meet her and said, ‘Please give me a little water from your jar.’
18 ‘Drink, my lord,’ she said, and quickly lowered the jar to her hands and gave him a drink.
19 After she had given him a drink, she said, ‘I’ll draw water for your camels too, until they have had enough to drink.’ 20 So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough, ran back to the well to draw more water, and drew enough for all his camels. 21 Without saying a word, the man watched her closely to learn whether or not the LORD had made his journey successful.
The man had prayed. He had set a test by which God could reveal which woman should become Isaac’s bride. And Rebekah had passed the test. She not only gave the men a drink, but also watered the camels.
Many preachers spend a long time talking about Rebekah as Isaac’s future bride. She was a beautiful young woman and still a virgin, which those preachers tell us gives us a lovely picture of the holiness and purity of the Bride of Christ, the Church. Rebekah does get a dozen mentions in this chapter. But the focus of the chapter is elsewhere. There are others which are mentioned even more times. Indeed, out of their 62 appearances in the whole bible, SEVENTEEN of their occurrences are in Genesis chapter 24. I’m talking, of course, about the camels!
20 So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough, ran back to the well to draw more water, and drew enough for all his camels.
One of the things I had not really appreciated before our trip to Africa this summer is just how much hard work it is to draw a bucket of water up out of a well. Lifting 10 kilograms of water 20 or 30 feet up. And would you like to guess how many buckets of water a camel can drink at a sitting? A really thirsty camel can drink 30% of its bodyweight in just 3 minutes! 200 litres of water – 44 gallons! That is 20 buckets of water. For each camel. Did anybody happen to notice in verse 10 how many camels Abraham’s servant brought with him? TEN camels. TWENTY buckets of water each. That would be 200 buckets of water out of the well. 200 buckets is 2 tonnes of water! If it were possible to draw a bucket of water every minute, watering ten very thirsty camels would take 3 hours and 20 minutes. A bucket only every two minutes – seven hours. Lifting the combined weight of three camels out of that well! I’ll leave it as homework for you to calculate how much energy that would take and how much food a person would need to eat to do that much physical work of lifting. But I’ll give you a clue. That’s a lot of Mars Bars!
20 So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough, ran back to the well to draw more water, and drew enough for all his camels.
Perhaps I have overestimated. Perhaps the camels were not that thirsty. Perhaps they only drank half a dozen buckets each. That would only take an hour. Or two. But Abraham’s servant was no fool. The little test he had created to help him to identify Isaac’s future bride would not only reveal her generous and hospitable nature. It would not only show that she was a very healthy and very strong and very determined young lady. Drawing enough water for 10 camels would be a job for Samson, an almost superhuman, supernatural accomplishment. That is what the servant asked God for, and that was the “almost a miracle” which Rebekah delivered.
22 When the camels had finished drinking, the man took out a gold nose ring weighing a beka and two gold bracelets weighing ten shekels. 23 Then he asked, ‘Whose daughter are you? Please tell me, is there room in your father’s house for us to spend the night?’
24 She answered him, ‘I am the daughter of Bethuel, the son that Milkah bore to Nahor.’ 25 And she added, ‘We have plenty of straw and fodder, as well as room for you to spend the night.’
26 Then the man bowed down and worshipped the LORD, 27 saying, ‘Praise be to the LORD, the God of my master Abraham, who has not abandoned his kindness and faithfulness to my master. As for me, the LORD has led me on the journey to the house of my master’s relatives.’
There’s our second simple lesson for today. The servant had prayed. God had answered. So the man bowed down and worshipped the Lord. He praised God and gave thanks for God’s blessing. Not many Christians are good at praying and asking God’s help in the things we are doing. And even fewer of us are good at remembering to thank God and praise him when he does help us. Don’t forget to thank God when he answers your prayers!
Abraham’s servant man prayed, and then he gave thanks. For God had indeed led him quite remarkably to the household of Abraham’s brother and to Rebekah who was Abraham’s great niece. Actually her grandfather Nahor was Abraham’s brother but her grandmother Milkah was also the sister of Abraham’s wife Sarah so this was all very much in the family. Not only Abraham, but God Himself was evidently concerned that Isaac should marry the perfect wife.
28 The young woman ran and told her mother’s household about these things. 29 Now Rebekah had a brother named Laban, and he hurried out to the man at the spring. 30 As soon as he had seen the nose ring, and the bracelets on his sister’s arms, and had heard Rebekah tell what the man said to her, he went out to the man and found him standing by the camels near the spring. 31 ‘Come, you who are blessed by the LORD,’ he said. ‘Why are you standing out here? I have prepared the house and a place for the camels.’
32 So the man went to the house, and the camels were unloaded. Straw and fodder were brought for the camels, and water for him and his men to wash their feet. 33 Then food was set before him, but he said, ‘I will not eat until I have told you what I have to say.’
‘Then tell us,’ Laban said.
God had led Abraham’s servant to a very hospitable family. Opening their doors to a bunch of strangers, and not forgetting all those camels! But even after the long and exhausting journey, the servant’s mission was more urgent and important than dinner. There’s a lesson for some of us. When God gives you a job to do – get on and do it. Don’t flap around. Don’t prevaricate. Don’t delay. The work of God is important and urgent. Don’t get sidetracked!
34 So he said, ‘I am Abraham’s servant. 35 The LORD has blessed my master abundantly, and he has become wealthy. He has given him sheep and cattle, silver and gold, male and female servants, and camels and donkeys. 36 My master’s wife Sarah has borne him a son in her old age, and he has given him everything he owns. 37 And my master made me swear an oath, and said, “You must not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I live, 38 but go to my father’s family and to my own clan, and get a wife for my son.”
Everybody understood that finding the right bride was important, and family loyalty was important. But the servant made it very clear that the real reason Abraham wanted to find the best bride for Isaac was to honour God.
40 ‘(My Master) replied, “The LORD, before whom I have walked faithfully, will send his angel with you and make your journey a success, so that you can get a wife for my son from my own clan and from my father’s family.’
God had led the servant to find Rebekah. So he explains to the whole family the test he had created, and how Rebekah had revealed that she was God’s choice by offering to water the camels. All along he is testifying to the guidance of God. Our next lesson. Don’t be afraid to testify about what God has done in our lives. When some venture is successful, when things go well at work, when God blesses your family, remember to give God the praise and the glory by bearing witness to the good things God has done. Don’t keep the credit for yourself. Give the glory to God who answered your prayers and led you and gave you the strength.
‘Then I put the ring in her nose and the bracelets on her arms, 48 and I bowed down and worshipped the LORD. I praised the LORD, the God of my master Abraham, who had led me on the right road to get the granddaughter of my master’s brother for his son. 49 Now if you will show kindness and faithfulness to my master, tell me; and if not, tell me, so I may know which way to turn.’
50 Laban and Bethuel answered, ‘This is from the LORD; we can say nothing to you one way or the other. 51 Here is Rebekah; take her and go, and let her become the wife of your master’s son, as the LORD has directed.’
Rebekah’s family recognized the hand of God in what was happening. Of course Isaac as heir to Abraham’s riches would be a good catch. That was a lot of gold and silver jewellery! And a lot of camels! But the family also knew about the LORD, Yahweh, the God Abraham served. That is why they were very happy to follow God’s will.
52 When Abraham’s servant heard what they said, he bowed down to the ground before the LORD.
… When they got up the next morning, he said, ‘Send me on my way to my master.’
55 But her brother and her mother replied, ‘Let the young woman remain with us ten days or so; then you may go.’
s56 But he said to them, ‘Do not detain me, now that the LORD has granted success to my journey. Send me on my way so I may go to my master.’
It was understandable that Rebekah’s family would want to spend a bit of time with her before she left. But the servant of God knew his mission was urgent. Abraham was already very old – who could know if he would still be alive when they got back. The servant wanted to get on the road as soon as he could. It’s the same lesson a second time. Is there something God has been calling you to do? Some task in the church? Some act of service or witness in the world? If God has given you something to do – get on and do it! Don’t delay.
Normally in those days, the men would just have made the decision. But in this case her family actually wanted to know what Rebekah herself wanted.
57 Then they said, ‘Let’s call the young woman and ask her about it.’ 58 So they called Rebekah and asked her, ‘Will you go with this man?’
‘I will go,’ she said.
59 So they sent their sister Rebekah on her way, along with her nurse and Abraham’s servant and his men. 60 And they blessed Rebekah.
61 Then Rebekah and her attendants got ready and mounted the camels and went back with the man. So the servant took Rebekah and left.
And so we come to the happy ending of this romance.
62 Now Isaac had come from Beer Lahai Roi, for he was living in the Negev. 63 He went out to the field one evening to meditate, and as he looked up, he saw camels approaching.
“and he lifted up his eyes, and saw, and, behold, the camels were coming.” KJV
The camels are coming! The camels are coming!
66 Then the servant told Isaac all he had done. 67 Isaac brought her into the tent of his mother Sarah, and he married Rebekah. So she became his wife, and he loved her.
“And they all lived happily ever after.” Well, not really. But there is the story of how Isaac the Patriarch found his wonderful bride Rebekah. All because an un-named servant did his job. But not in his own strength. The servant prayed and followed God’s guidance and worshipped and gave thanks and praise when God blessed his venture. The servant would not let himself distracted from doing God’s will. And he wasn’t afraid to tell everybody about the great things God was doing in his life. A wonderful example of faith and obedience and of how all of us should all be serving and honouring God. The servant is the real hero of faith in this story.
And, of course, the camels

Has God ever put your faith to the test by asking you to give something up? Something so precious or so important to you that you don’t know how you would go on living without it?
Sometimes God takes such things away from us – but I’m not talking about that. Have you ever given anything up voluntarily, of your own choice, because God has commanded you to do so. If so you will know a little of how Abraham felt that day when he climbed up Mount Moriah with his only son Isaac.
GOD WAS TESTING ABRAHAM’S FAITH
Verses 1-2 Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, ‘Abraham!’
‘Here I am,’ he replied.
2 Then God said, ‘Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region ofMoriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain that I will show you.’

God sometimes calls us to give up the things we hold most dearly to show that we love and obey and trust Him.
A test of love –
v 2 – your son, your beloved, only son – v2
This was a test of loyalty, a test of priorities, to love God with all our heart and soul and strength and mind.
Luke 14:25-27
25 Large crowds were travelling with Jesus, and turning to them he said: 26 ‘If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple. 27 And whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.
Here is an agonising choice. Of course, Jesus is not actually calling his disciples to hate their families. This is hyperbole, a kind of language common in Hebrew and Aramaic which speaks in extremes to make a point. But the point is clear. If it is a choice between love for family and love for God, God must take the priority. If our families try to stop us from following Jesus, Jesus comes first. Jesus is most important.
A test of obedience
Vv 9-11
9 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the LORD called out to him from heaven, ‘Abraham! Abraham!’
‘Here I am,’ he replied.

It is unlikely to be anything as dramatic as the test Abraham faced. But there are times when we are called to obey God when we don’t understand what is going on. To obey God even when what he asks of us seems impossible, incredible, unacceptable.
James 2:20-24
20 You foolish person, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless?. 21 Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? 22 You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. 23 And the scripture was fulfilled that says, ‘Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,’ and he was called God’s friend. 24 You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone.
Our faith must show itself in obedient actions. It isn’t enough to believe the Bible – we have to obey the Bible.
This was a test of Abraham’s faith
Genesis 17:19-21 tells us that Isaac was the child of blessing, the heir of the promises God had made in his covenant with Abraham. Even though Abraham and his wife Sarah were far too old to have children, God promised that they would have a son together and God’s blessing would come through Isaac their miracle baby.
19 Then God said, ‘Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him. 20 And as for Ishmael, I have heard you: I will surely bless him; I will make him fruitful and will greatly increase his numbers. He will be the father of twelve rulers, and I will make him into a great nation. 21 But my covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you by this time next year.’
And Abraham believed God. Note the certainty of Abraham’s faith in chapter 22 verse 5 –
5 He said to his servants, ‘Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.’

“WE WILL come back.”
The catalogue of the great Old Testament heroes of faith in Hebrews chapter 11 celebrates Abraham’s faith. It makes clear to us that the whole experience was a test of Abraham’s faith. God never actually intended Abraham to kill his son. God was just wanting to find out how much Abraham trusted him or whether there were limits to his obedience.
Hebrews 11:17-19 17 By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, 18 even though God had said to him, ‘It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.’ 19 Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a manner of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.
God will sometimes test OUR love, OUR obedience, OUR faith. God will sometimes demand sacrifices from us too! Are there limits to our obedience or our faith? Are there things in our lives which come between us and God?
When we do come to times of testing we should remember
GOD WILL PROVIDE
Verses 7-8, 13-14
, 7 Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, ‘Father?’
‘Yes, my son?’ Abraham replied.
‘The fire and wood are here,’ Isaac said, ‘but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?’
8 Abraham answered, ‘God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.’ And the two of them went on together.

God will provide! Although he could not have known what God had planned in this test of faith, Abraham still trusted in God. And God did provide.

12 ‘Do not lay a hand on the boy,’ he said. ‘Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.’
13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. 14 So Abraham called that place The LORD Will Provide. And to this day it is said, ‘On the mountain of the LORD it will be provided.’

God is Jehovah Jireh, God the Provider.
God provided for Abraham v 13
13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son.
God provided a substitute, the ram in place of Isaac. Sometimes God DOES take away things we try so hard to cling on to – remember the story of Job. At other times God will let us keep such things so that we can use them for his glory. But God will always provide.
God provided for Abraham and God has provided for the world.
God himself will provide the Lamb John 1:29, 1 Peter 1:18-20
John 1 29 The next day John saw Jesus coming towards him and said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
1 Peter 1 18 For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. 20 He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.
God was only demanding from Abraham the same sacrifice He himself would give for the salvation of the world. Abraham was challenged to give up His only son Isaac. God the Father DID give up His only Son Jesus Christ for the sins of the world. Jesus was the substitute. Jesus died not only in the place of Barabbas but in the place of every sinner who truly repents and believes the gospel.
There is so much symbolism here. Abraham representing the Father willing to sacrifice up his only Son. Isaac representing Jesus the obedient son, the one would die as the perfect offering for sin. God has provided such a wonderful Saviour!
And God will continue to provide – even for us.
14 So Abraham called that place The LORD Will Provide. And to this day it is said, ‘On the mountain of the LORD it will be provided.’

Look at the history of the church. Look at the history of world mission, and the history of revivals, and the lives of the great missionaries and saints of God who put their trust in God for their food and shelter and their very lives. Each proved in their own experience, GOD WILL PROVIDE
Romans 8:31-32. 31 What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided – Great is thy Faithfulness Lord unto me! WE can all rely on the God who provides – whatever challenges lie ahead, whatever sacrifices God may call us to make, we can say “GOD WILL PROVIDE”.
And the consequences of Abraham’s obedience and faith?
BECAUSE YOU HAVE DONE THIS
Verses 15-18 15 The angel of the LORD called to Abraham from heaven a second time 16 and said, ‘I swear by myself, declares the LORD, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, 18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.’

Abraham’s love and obedience and faith released great blessings not only for him and his family but for the whole world. We can’t tell at the time the full significance of our service for God but I believe that often it has a much greater importance than we can imagine. Sometimes even OUR simple acts of sacrifice can have a COSMIC significance in God’s masterplan of redemption.
The blessings for Abraham were obvious. This experience built his character and deepened his relationship with God. It also brought Abraham blessings in the life to come. And any sacrifices WE might make in this life will bring blessings into eternity.
Matthew 19:27-28 28 Jesus said to them, ‘Truly I tell you, at the renewal of all things, when the Son of Man sits on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. 29 And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or fields for my sake will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit eternal life.
There were also Blessings for Isaac.
This was Isaac’s first encounter with Almighty God. Isaac learned his faith and obedience from Abraham. When we make sacrifices for God, there will be other people whose lives will be influenced by YOUR faith. Your obedience is a blessing to THEM. From the days before I was a minister I think of my vicar friend Dave who I met in our first days at university. I am humbled by the fact that he has said mant times that it was my witness which brought him to faith in Christ. I think of young people who I taught in school or in Crusaders who have gone on to serve the Lord. I rejoice over a number of people who have gone from churches I have served into full time Christian service as ministers or missionaries. Callum, Derrick, Andy, Steve, David, Laura, Lyn, James and Andrea. And I praise God for many more people whose lives have been moved in so many other ways too.
Who are the people who have been touched by YOUR faith and witness and example?
But then there would be blessings for the whole world
Verses 17-18
16 … ‘I swear by myself, declares the LORD, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, 18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.’

All nations of the world will be blessed! We cannot know what the effects and results of our service for God in these days might have in years to come. When our love and faith and obedience tested, we can expect blessings to follow if we simply trust and obey – whatever the sacrifice God commands of us. We can be completely confident that in our situation too, God will provide because this story gives us a wonderful picture of the sacrifice God was prepared to make for us and for our salvation. God called Abraham to be prepared to sacrifice his one and only son, Isaac, the heir to God’s promise. What has God called you to give up for him? How much has it cost you to follow Christ? The words we sometimes sing in a hymn are true.
“But we never can prove The delights of His love Until all on the altar we lay;
For the favour He shows, And the joy He bestows, Are for those who will trust and obey.”
Are there limits to our faith and our obedience? Because God asks from us nothing less than total surrender. Are we prepared to trust and obey? I heard that it was the great theologian Martina Navratilova who once said that the difference between involvement and commitment is the difference between eggs and bacon. In eggs and bacon the chicken is involved, but the pig is committed. Are we involved with God or committed to God? As Billy Graham said, “Salvation is free, but discipleship costs everything we have.”
We can trust that God will use our faith and obedience, not just to bless us but to bring blessings to other people as well. We just need to trust and obey.