Scripture Daily

Context No. 1680 of 4322 · Genesis

Context · Reflection

Genesis 27:1-10: in context

1When Isaac was old, and his eyes were dim, so that he could not see, he called Esau his elder son, and said to him, “My son?” He said to him, “Here I am.” 2He said, “See now, I am old. I don’t know the day of my death. 3Now therefore, please take your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field, and get me venison. 4Make me savory food, such as I love, and bring it to me, that I may eat, and that my soul may bless you before I die.” 5Rebekah heard when Isaac spoke to Esau his son. Esau went to the field to hunt for venison, and to bring it. 6Rebekah spoke to Jacob her son, saying, “Behold, I heard your father speak to Esau your brother, saying, 7‘Bring me venison, and make me savory food, that I may eat, and bless you before the LORD before my death.’ 8Now therefore, my son, obey my voice according to that which I command you. 9Go now to the flock and get me two good young goats from there. I will make them savory food for your father, such as he loves. 10You shall bring it to your father, that he may eat, so that he may bless you before his death.”

Isaac has grown old and blind, and feels his death may be near. He calls his elder son Esau and asks him to hunt game and prepare the savory food he loves, so that he may eat and give Esau his blessing before he dies. But Rebekah is listening. As soon as Esau goes out to hunt, she calls Jacob, her favorite, and lays out a plan: fetch two young goats, and she will prepare the dish Isaac loves, so that Jacob can carry it in, deceive his blind father, and steal the blessing meant for his brother.

Behind Rebekah's scheme lies something worth pondering. God had already told her, before the twins were born, that the older would serve the younger; the blessing, in God's purpose, was meant for Jacob. Rebekah knew this. And yet, rather than trust God to bring his own promise to pass, she resorts to deception, manipulation, a plot to trick her blind husband and rob her other son. She takes the securing of God's promise into her own hands, as though God's word needed her lie to come true. There is a deep and common temptation exposed here. Even when we believe God has promised something, we are tempted to grasp it by our own scheming rather than wait and trust him to give it. Rebekah did not doubt the promise; she doubted, it seems, that God could bring it about without her manipulation, and so she engineered by deceit what God had pledged to give freely. And the cost was terrible: the deception fractured the family, drove Jacob into years of exile, and set brother against brother. What God had promised to give, Rebekah seized by fraud, and the seizing brought grief for all its apparent success. The lesson is not that God's promise failed, it did not, but that we do not need to lie and manipulate to secure what God has pledged to give. When we grasp by scheming what we could have waited to receive from God's hand, we often get it, and a harvest of trouble with it. Trusting God to fulfill his own word, in his own way and time, spares us the bitter fruit of the manipulations we think are necessary and are not.

When I believe God has promised me something, am I tempted, like Rebekah, to secure it by my own scheming and manipulation rather than trust him to bring his word to pass, and can I wait to receive from his hand what he has pledged, rather than seizing it by means that bear a bitter harvest?

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