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The sermon this morning comes from Genesis 25, starting with verse 19. Now, these are the records of the generations of Isaac, Abraham's son. Abraham became the father of Isaac, and Isaac was 40 years old when he took Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel, the Aramean, of Paddam Aram, the sister of Laban, the Aramean, to be his wife. Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was barren. And the Lord answered him. And Rebekah, his wife, conceived. But the children struggled to gather within her. And she said, If it is so, why then am I this way? So she went to inquire of the Lord. The Lord said to her, Two nations are in your womb. and two peoples will be separated from your body and one people shall be stronger than the other and the older shall serve the younger when her days to be delivered were fulfilled behold there were twins in her womb now the first came forth red all over like a hairy garment and they named him Esau afterward his brother came forth with his hand holding on to Esau's heel so his name was called Jacob and Isaac was 60 years old when she gave birth to them when the boys grew up Esau became a skillful hunter a man of the field but Jacob was a peaceful man living in tents now Isaac loved Esau because he had a taste for game but Rebecca loved Jacob when Jacob had cooked stew Esau came in from the field and he was famished And Esau said to Jacob, Please let me have a swallow of that red stuff there, for I am famished. Therefore his name was called Edom. But Jacob said, First sell me your birthright. Esau said, Behold, I am about to die. So of what use then is the birthright to me? And Jacob said, First swear to me. So he swore to him, and sold his birthright to Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank and rose and went on his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright. Pray with me. Our Father, we look here at a story that is unfamiliar to us in our culture. Stories of a man covered in red hair since the time he was born. Story of birthrights. Story of cruelty. We ask now, Father, that you would give us understanding of exactly what's happening here. Give us understanding, Father, of exactly what you're doing here. Father, show us how to respond. It is in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. When I was a younger man, I saw a movie called The Untouchables. This movie was about a man named Elliot Ness, and I loved this movie. This man went and he fought against all the illegal bars. He went and fought against all the illegal breweries, because it was illegal to drink at that time, and illegal to serve alcohol at that time. And I loved this guy, Elliot Ness. He seemed like such a hero, and he seemed like such a champion. And then I came to Eastvale. In Eastville, I told a certain man about Elliot Ness and what I thought of him, and he said, huh, Elliot Ness died a drunk. Which kind of blew me away, so I had to go and look so this testimony could be established by more than one witness, and it was true. Elliot Ness died at age 54, a drunk. A man that I thought was fantastic, a man that I thought was incredible, a man that was dubbed untouchable, sadly fell short and sadly fell grossly short. But as we look at the narrative in Genesis and look at what was going on here, we see God grabs Abraham and he calls him out. He calls him to make him his prince, to make him his king. And he promises him that kings will come from his loins. And we look forward to these children being born and we look forward to God doing these great things. And we see he has Isaac And Isaac, we see, doesn't do so hot. And then we see that he has these two sons, and one of them, one of them is the child of promise. From him, we may look for great things. From him, we may expect these wonderful things. But here we look, and we see a man who's named Israel, a surplanter, a stealer, a thief. And we see here yet another man that falls short. A man who is the child of promise from whom the Christ will come. And we see a man just like you and me. A man who is weak. A man who deceives. A man who falls short. In my family worship yesterday we were reading through the book of Acts and where we were it made reference to David and one of my sons kind of disgruntled with the whole system says, well who is David's son again? I said, Solomon. Was he a good king? No. No, Solomon was the wisest man that ever lived but he was still really stupid. Solomon was the wisest man that ever lived. It had the laws that don't have many wives. And he had 700 wives. Solomon was the wisest man who ever lived. And God said, don't get a bunch of gold. And Solomon went and got a bunch of gold. Solomon was the wisest man that ever lived. And God said, don't get a lot of horses for yourself and stables. And Solomon went and got a lot of horses and stables. My son said, how about the next king? Was he a good king? No. He was probably worse. And we went on and on and on talking about these kings. And he said, was there ever a good king? I said, well, there were kings that did a lot of good stuff. But they all fell short. And he looked disgruntled again. Then I described, though, that that king had a son. And that king had a son. And that king had a son. And it went down and down through the line of Judah. And there was a man named Joseph. and that man had a son and his name was Jesus Christ and he is our good and our perfect king and in him all of the law and the prophets are fulfilled you see as we look and as man after man after man fall short and as you look at yourself and as you fall short and you fall short and you fall short we have one good king we have one answer and that is Jesus Christ the answer for Isaac was Jesus Christ the answer for Jacob was Jesus Christ as we see here that as Jacob fell grossly short he needed to rely on grace alone He had to look forward to a Savior to redeem him. And so must you. You must look for a Savior to redeem you. You must rely on grace alone. Now look with me at verse 23. The Lord said to her, are in your womb, and two peoples will be separated from your body. I want to tell you that there are only two nations in this world. There are only two great kingdoms in this world. When you look at scripture and it talks about a nation, it can also mean a family. It can mean a country. And in this world, although when you, I looked it up online, how many nations are there? How many countries are there in the world? Well, it depends on what you count as a country, but the answer boils down to between 189 and 195 independent countries. And I will submit to you that everyone, in every one of those nations, boils down to, and they are only in one kingdom or another, They all boil down to one kingdom or another. As we sit in this room, each one of you as individuals boils down to one kingdom or another. Everyone you meet boils down to one kingdom or another. We see these families established in Genesis chapter 3. When God had already made everything, and made everything good, and then man rebelled against God, joining the side of Satan. Joining that team. Joining that family. Joining that nation. And then God pronounces this curse in Genesis 3, 14 and 15. The Lord said to the serpent, that is Satan, because you have done this, cursed are you more than all the cattle, And more than every beast of the field, on your belly you will go, and dust you will eat all the days of your life." Then God makes this statement, I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed, that is your family. I will put enmity between your family and her seed, that is her family. And she shall bruise your head, and she shall bruise you on the head and you shall bruise him on the heel. So God is saying at that point, in Genesis, there's now two kingdoms. There are now two families on the planet. And God says, and Satan, there's going to be this battle, there's going to be this struggle between the family of the woman, that is the people who will love me and trust me, and your family. He also says, and Satan, you're gonna lose. your head is going to be crushed at the end of this battle. These are the two kingdoms, and you read through scripture. If you try to read from front to back, you're going to bog down in these genealogies. And this person had this person, and this person had this person, and this person had this person. Why? Why does God give us all of that? Because God traces the two families all through the Old Testament. because He's showing how His Word will be accomplished. How Satan will be crushed and the seed of a woman will do it. And that is Christ. So as you consider all of this, as you strive to recognize these two nations, these two families, as you consider how you must be saved by grace and rely on grace, you must recognize these two families. You must learn and understand how to distinguish between them. You see, Satan's lie is, you are good enough. You can be good enough to save yourself. The truth of the family of Christ is, we blow it. The truth is, we fall short and we need Christ to save us. We need His sacrifice. So how do we say that our God is higher than every other God? We say that because the truth is, no God can save you other than Christ. We say that because it displays our need for Him. It displays our need for salvation. So if you love Christ, you are a separate kingdom from those who don't. If you love Christ, you are a separate family. from the rest of the world that says we can be good enough next look with me at verses 29-33 when Jacob had cooked stew Esau came in from the field and he was famished Esau said to Jacob please let me have a swallow of that red stuff there for I am famished therefore his name was called Edom But Jacob said, First, sell me your birthright. Esau said, Behold, I am about to die. So what use then is the birthright to me? And Jacob said, First, swear to me. So he swore to him and sold his birthright to Jacob. I want you to look at this and I want you to look and see Esau's guilt. See Esau's guilt before God. And this is a look at the guilt of all of those who are the seed of the serpent. And that is everyone who is not embracing Christ alone for their sacrifice for salvation. Someone recently showed me Young's literal translation of the Bible again. I had enjoyed this a great deal in seminary. But as we look at verse 34 here, from Young's literal translation that says, and Jacob hath given to Esau bread and pottage of lentils, and he eateth, and drinketh, and riseth, and goeth. And Esau despiseth the birthright. As we look at this, it reveals the stupidity of Esau. It reveals what kind of man that he is. He takes, he takes, he takes, he goes, and he hated. He threw off his birthright. Now, what was the birthright, some of you may be wondering? The birthright is the first child that was born got all of this dignity and all of this stuff. But it was a bit more than that. The birthright gave Esau dignity and authority over his brethren. It gave him a double portion of the inheritance. It gave him a special blessing from his father. And it also gave him a priesthood and chief government in the affairs of the church. Because that was the church at that time. The family of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob was the church at the time. And he was set up as the picture of Christ in it. As the one who proclaimed the word. But what did that mean to him? What did that mean to him? To be this picture of Christ meant nothing more than a bowl of soup. And he threw it off. He threw off the birthright and despised it. I want you to see that all of us are created in the image of God. All mankind is created in the image of God. And as we are looking at these passages, we'll be dealing a bit with the idea that God chooses some for salvation. And those are the ones who are rescued. Those are the ones who are saved. And those that He does not choose are the ones that will be condemned. But the truth is, everyone deserves this condemnation. Everyone that goes to the fires of hell should go to the fires of hell. And everyone who goes to heaven should go to hell. Everyone who goes to heaven deserves hell. The firstborn was the special type of Christ. But he threw off that idea and he embraced Satan rather than Christ. We see here that Esau preferred the momentary satisfaction instead of the glory of future privileges. We see here that his love reached no further than the here and now. And we see in Hebrews 12, 16 that because of this, he's called a profane person. You see, the seed of the serpent is guilty and deserving of hell. Look with me now at verses 29 through 33 when Jacob had cooked stew Esau came in from the field and he was famished and Esau said to Jacob please let me have a swallow of that red stuff there for I am famished therefore his name was called Edom but Jacob said first sell me your birthright Esau said, Behold, I am about to die, so what use then is the birthright to me? Jacob said, First, swear to me. I want you to see how this falls short. I want you to see how Jacob here falls short of the glory of God. As the Father has told us that if we love someone, if we love Him, we're going to care for the needy. The idea here that Esau is famished, he is famished. He's been out. We don't know how hungry he was. We don't know how beat up he might have been from being out in the field. But the idea was, Scripture says, that he was literally famished. And this man coming in his need, his brother sitting, already having the food ready, it wouldn't have cost him anything to give him a bowl. He says, first, Give me every good promise that you would ever receive from Father or God. And we see here, Jacob enticed his brother to give up the dignity and the authority. Jacob enticed his brother to give up the double portion. Jacob enticed his brother to give up the special blessing from his Father. Jacob enticed his brother to give up the priesthood and give up being that picture to look forward to Christ. Luke 17, starting with verse 1, Jesus said to his disciples, it is inevitable that stumbling blocks come, but woe to him through whom they come. It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea, than that he would cause one of these little ones to stumble. You see, even the seed of a woman deserved to have a millstone tied around his neck and thrown into the sea. So in light of this, I'm going to call upon you to confess mankind's guilt and your own. To confess mankind's guilt in your own. James 2.10 says, for whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. This last week in Frontier Club we were looking and we were dealing with the law with these children and we were telling them how they all fall short and how they have all broken one of the commandments. And one of the little boys in fourth grade says, I've never committed adultery. And one of our helpers said, you know, you have. He said, what? And we pointed him to James 2.10, whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point has become guilty of all. We said, look, you have committed adultery. You have broken the whole law. And he sat there and he squirmed. And he said, yuck. As disgusting as that was to Him, all of our sin should be that disgusting to us. All of our sin should be that disgusting to us. You see that every sin, that's the greatest commandment, and all the Law and the Prophets are summed up in loving God and loving one another. Every one of our sins is hating one another, or hating God. Every one of our sins, we become Esau, despising our birthright. Every one of our sins display that we should be the seed of the serpent. Every one of our sins show that we are Satan's child. That we hate God. That we hate God, we hate one another. So in light of this, In light of this, I call upon you to rely completely on grace and the redemption that is found in Christ. Ephesians 1, 5-6 He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. See, if you are in Christ, if you are in Christ, if you love Him, if you trust Him alone for your salvation, God has drawn you. God has given you a new heart. You deserve to be called a child of hell. You deserve to be called seed of the serpent. But instead, you have the adoption as sons through Christ Jesus and His sacrifice. Now, if you have never put your trust in Christ, if you have never put your trust in Christ, if you have never confessed that you are a guilty sinner deserving of hell, you need to see that now. You are a guilty sinner deserving of hell. But God, in His mercy, sent Christ Jesus to die on the cross to take the punishment that you deserve. You have this sense of dread now that you deserve hell. God is drawing you to put your trust in Christ. To have this rest. To have this peace. I call on every one of you now to trust in grace alone. Trust in Christ alone. From this place you have this great inheritance. From this place you are sons and daughters of the Most High. From this place you have this great portioned forevermore. And you look forward to glory. You look forward to glory, the glory that Christ has purchased. From this place we each move forward in righteousness. From this place we throw off the sinful ways of the past Many of you, I imagine, you cling to some bowl of porridge. You cling to some bowl of red stuff. What is that? As Jacob, or as Esau rather, would take this bowl of food and trade for eternal glory, what is it that you cling to? What is it that you would cling to more than eternal glory? What are you trying to sell for your birthright? Throw it off. Throw it off. Deal with a half hour of hunger in exchange for eternal glory. You as believers, how are you a stumbling block to others in your hypocrisy? As Jacob was a stumbling block to his brother. What there must you throw off? What do we have to do to love more? To love more perfectly one another and express our love for God. I call upon you each. I call upon you each to rely on grace alone. To press forward in the love of Christ. Pray with me. God in heaven, we thank you for this picture that you have given us in your Word. How you show us the family of Satan and his sin. Father, and even how you show us the family of Christ and the sin that still remains in us. And we thank you, Father, that you have saved us by your grace. Father, I continue to Lift up those among us who do not truly trust in Your Son alone for salvation. I lift up those among us, Father, who think they are good enough to pull it off. Father, may we together as a family ask for You to reveal their sin to them, to reveal their need. We ask for you, Father, to draw them to yourself according to the kind intention of your will, and to be glorified in their salvation. It is in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Rely on Grace Alone
Sermon ID | 1120101757595 |
Duration | 29:40 |
Date | |
Category | Sunday Service |
Bible Text | Genesis 25:19-34 |
Language | English |
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