Audio restored with Diffio. Diffio processed the original archive recording to reduce noise and produce a cleaner listening version; the original stays available.
Speech quality score (model-estimated, SCOREQ): before 2.11 → restored 4.56
Use the player's Original switch to compare.How Diffio restores old speech recordings
Now to the fifth major part of the book of Genesis. It begins at verse, uh, chapter twenty five and verse twelve. Firm family and tribal structure and in process of becoming. Now these are the generations of Ishmael, Abram's son, From the book of Genesis. whom Hagar the Egyptian Sarah's handmaid bear unto Abraham. To try and cover And the generations follow for a few verses and cease in verse eighteen. Then comes the major, uh, section of this fifth part. These are the generations of Isaac, Abraham's son.
Abraham begat Isaac, and Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah, the daughter of Bethel, the Syrian of Paddan Aram, the sister of Laban the Syrian to be his wife. What follows now in this fifth part of the book of Genesis is told from Isaac's point of view. These are the generations of Isaac, and you'll see when it comes to its end in chapter thirty five. In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth, and the earth It says at that point, and Isaac gave up the ghost and died and was gathered unto his people, old and full of days, and Esau and Jacob, his sons, buried him.
This is the historian doing what he tells you he's going to do. This is Isaac's story. Jacob figures much more prominently in these chapters than does Isaac. But at this time, it was Isaac who was the patriarch. Just in the previous section, it was Abram that was the patriarch and Isaac the promisee. Now, in this part, the fifth part, it's Isaac who's the patriarch and Jacob is the promisee. When we come to the final part of Genesis, the sixth part, I shall have grave difficulty in convincing you, and most of you will go home unconvinced, that the final part of Genesis is Jacob's story.
And people will say it cannot be because Joseph i- is the one who's most prominent, and we like Joseph, we don't like Jacob anyway, and it's got to be Joseph's story. Well, all right, you believe so. But the writer to the of Genesis will have it his way in the end. It is told from Jacob's point of view, because in the last part of the book, Jacob is now the patriarch, and the promised seed are his twelve sons, and Joseph in particular. This then is going to be the story of Isaac, and of course eventually we shall start with him, and the birth of his two sons, Esau and Jacob.
Jacob will figure predominantly in the chapters that follow, but truth to tell, many believers have found the story of Jacob here more difficult to interpret than the favorite story of Abraham and Isaac. After all, Abraham was justified by faith, and that is a foundational doctrine for us nowadays, is it not? And Abraham's experience was quoted in the New Testament. We learn from the New Testament its importance. Abraham was justified by works. Gives us an example that we eventually must be justified by works too, and thus demonstrate our faith is genuine.
What should we make of Jacob? What on earth lessons does he teach, if any? And if we try somehow to make Jacob teach the same lessons of Abraham, we get it all in a muddle and tied round our necks and nearly strangle ourselves, you see. Because truth to tell, Jacob is not just a ditto repeato story of Abraham. It has a different message to tell us. Of the four promises that were made to Abraham, promise of the land, promise of the seed, promise of blessing, and promise that in him and his seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed.
The first two were fulfilled under Abram's patriarchate. He received the covenant giving him title deeds to the land. He received the promised seed towards the end of his life. In Isaac's story, in which Jacob predominates, the fulfillment of the third part is seen. I will bless you. It will raise the whole question of what God means by this term blessing. And sure enough, Jacob need to be taught it, for he had some funny ideas about God's blessing to start off with, and had to be disciplined and trained by experience to learn what God's blessing is.
One easy way, however, to understand the story, uh, stories about Jacob in this fifth part of the book is to use the hint of a phrase in the New Testament. Hebrews eleven says that Abraham looked for the city that hath the foundations, whose builder and maker is God. So says the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter eleven. When John, in the book of the Revelation, was taken by the hand by an angel to see the Lamb's wife, and he took John and showed him the great eternal city, tabernacle of God as its one function, bride of the Lamb as its second function.
He saw this city and was impressed, among other things, by the foundations of the walls of the city, mighty foundations on the na- the names of the apostles of the Lamb. Abram looked forward to the city, says Hebrews, that hath their foundations. And in the life of Abraham and Sarah, we are taught twin foundational doctrines of all the great community of the redeemed, the Jerusalem that is above, the mother of us all. The twin foundations of justification by faith and justification by works.
But when John was shown the city, it had not only twelve foundations, but twelve gates. Way in and way out, of course. But then, in an ancient city in the time of Jacob, the gate of a city was not merely the place by which you entered. The gate of the city was a place where the elders sat to administer the city and all its affairs. And in Israel, you will find the remains of ancient cities, and there in some of them you will see the gate.
It is a large structure enclosing a square or other piece of ground, and round the walls are the seats, the ledges upon which the elders of the city would sit in order to govern the affairs of the city. When we therefore think of a gate of a city in the Old Testament and in the symbolic use that is made of cities in, uh, the New Testament, the gate speaks not merely of the way in to the city, it speaks of the government and administration of the city. Now it is the fact that when John was given to see these gates, on the gates were written the names of the tribes of Israel.
And in this section of Genesis, we shall get the story of how those tribes got their names. The names were given to the boys by Jacob's two wives and then the two handmaids. That's a very interesting part of history, this is. Don't know whether their mothers, Leah and Rachel and the twin, uh, the other girls, knew what they were doing. When their children were born and they named them, just think of it, their names shall be inscribed on the gates of the eternal city forever. And when those mothers named those children, in many a case, they named them very carefully for the matter of the conception of the children and their birth, and the family relationships, sometimes very difficult.
They took them to God in prayer and felt they saw the answer of God to their prayers in the birth of their children and the education of their children and in their relationships to their husbands. And the experience of God they encapsulated in the names that they gave their children. That experience is going to be built into the government of heaven, eternally. For if Abraham teaches us, Abraham and Sarah, the foundations upon which that eternal community are built, justification by faith and justification by works.
Jacob and his wives will prove an example to us how God is training his people to reign with Christ. That is spectacularly wonderful, isn't it? Know you not that the church shall judge angels, the church shall judge the world? Know you not that we shall reign with him, if in fact we suffer with him? Being trained and prepared to take over the administration of the universe with Christ. What lessons are they that we must learn if we shall be prepared to reign with the Lord Jesus?
Our Lord himself pointed to them and said, he that is faithful in the least shall be entrusted by that which is the greater. This is the training ground. And according to our faithfulness, so will be the measure of responsibility that will be given us in the coming government of Go- of Christ. Exciting lesson. So let us begin with Isaac, because that is his story. Isaac in the land, and overlook for the moment the story of the birth of his twin children, Esau and Jacob, and come to chapter twenty six where God says to Isaac, verse one: there was a famine in the land beside the first famine that was in the days of Abraham, and Isaac went unto Abimelech, king of the Philistines, unto Gerar.
And the Lord appeared to him and said, go not into Egypt, dwell in the land which I shall tell thee of, sojourn in this land, and I will be with thee and will bless thee, for unto thee and to thy seed I will give all these lands, and I will establish the oath which I swear unto Abram, thy father. And I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and will give unto thee thy, give unto thy seed all these lands, and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. Because Abram obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws, and Isaac dwelt in Gerar with the renewed promise of the blessing.
Difficult though. Ah. Abraham was such a spiritual giant, wasn't he? Tremendous. Little Isaac grew up under the shadow of the big oak tree that was Abraham. It was Abraham that had all the experiences of God. What a giant he was. Sometimes for the next generation, it's a bit difficult to grow up under fathers that have been such spiritual giants. Because when all is said and done, they don't try to be, but they become the dominant personality in the home, don't they? What oh they do. And sometimes the sons feel that they'll never be as good as their fathers and become a little backward in coming forward, if you see what I mean.
And not having the vivid experiences of dad, find when dad is gone, it's difficult to stand for the position that dad occupied and carry on the tradition. Isaac, who seems to be, you know, a little retiring fellow, you never read of any marvelous great exploits he did when he became patriarch, you'll see, asked to stay in the land because of the vision given to Abram that God would one day give them the land, but not just yet, and you had to maintain that tradition and stay in the land. Jolly difficult when there was a famine, because, you know, the promises of God for future blessing, they're marvelous, but that is future, isn't it?
And uh, and you have to have bread and butter, to be honest, to live, because if you don't live, you can't hold the promise, can you? You know, you can't, you can't go to heaven without eating porridge. Well, equivalent thereof, cornflakes, if you like, can you? You have to start here on earth, and to survive on earth long enough, you have to eat your porridge, you see. You have to be down to earth. You first have to live here and then go to heaven. And staying in the land where there was a famine, with the promise of blessing in the future, was practically difficult, you see. And more than that, when Isaac dug wells, here came the powerful Philistines living in cities, modern, her servants came and mocked them up like the big combines do the corner shops.
Difficult. And they drove them away, you see, so, uh, poor old Isaac had to dig other wells because water was number one necessity in those days. And, uh, you see, Isaac removed from thence, says verse twenty two, and digged another well, and for that they strove not, and he called the name of it Rehoboth, and he said, for now the Lord hath made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land. And the Lord, uh, appeared to him at the well of the oath the same night and said, I am God of Abram, thy father. Fear thou not, for I am with thee and will bless thee, and multiply thy seed for Abram, my servant's sake.
And he built an altar there, in his way, vivid and genuine experience of the provision of God in the workaday world of getting a living, so that he could stay in a- in a- in Canaan and maintain the vision in hope. Well, then the Philistines made a covenant with him. And now they said, verse twenty eight: let there be now an oath betwixt us, even betwixt us and thee, and let us make a covenant with thee that thou will do us no hurt as we have not touched thee, and as we have done unto thee nothing but good. That's how the combines speak. And have sent thee away in peace. Thou art now the blessed of the Lord.
And he made them a feast, and they did eat and drink, and went their way. The blessing of the Lord in the affairs of daily life and business and maintaining the patriarchal family in a hostile world. Very good. And the next chapter? Now Isaac old and responsible as patriarch to pass on the blessing. In Eastern world, much more significant than father just saying, I wish you every success, my boy. The somewhat religious ceremony in which the patriarch would impart to the chief son and heir the blessing, including, of course, a lot of material blessing, property, goods, cattle, and so forth, and pass the bigger amount to the son of his choice, passing on the blessing in the name of God.
So, feeling the weight of his responsibility, Isaac sought to put himself in the right frame of mind, uh, to pass on the blessing, you see. You, you can't just do it told, can you? I mean, blessing of God, uh, you want to feel the blessing and be in the right mood to, to pass on the blessing. So... he decided he was going to bless Esau. Well, that was a little difficult for Rachel, because when she was with child and there were twins within her, she consulted the Lord, and the Lord said that the elder should serve the younger.
The younger was God's choice for carrying on the line of Israel, not Esau. That privilege to be given to the younger son, Jacob. And Rachel loved Jacob. Isaac loved Esau. Well, Esau was a manly kind of a fellow, all hairy on the arms and chest, and he used to go out, you see, and get the venison and do the hunting. Oh, he was a real man. And Jacob, he kept to term, and he made porridge. Okay, nothing wrong in making porridge, but, you know, that was somewhat, in in Rachel's eyes, a lesser job for a man to do.
But she loved her. She she loved, uh, Jacob. Isaac loved Esau. I don't know whether Rachel has ever told Isaac what God had told her, that it was Jacob that was to be the son to receive the blessing and the preeminence and the privilege of carrying on the line of Abraham that should lead eventually to the promised seed, Messiah. But if she had told him, he seems to have forgotten it, for he proposed to bless Esau. How would he do it? Says he to Esau, my boy, I'm getting old and I shall soon pass on, and I have to bless you, my son.
Now go out and get some venison and make some beautiful venison meal, such as my soul loveth. You'll see. He was going to eat this venison, which was of the field that the Lord had blessed, and ingesting the venison and its beautiful taste and the gravy and the sauces and all that, he would then be in the right mood, feeling very blessed to hand on the blessing of the Lord. He saw, you see, that's what he felt. As you detected, his idea of blessing was a little limited, you'll see. And then what happened next? That was a story of deceit, of course.
Uh, for Abram decided who to bless by being guided by his senses. He had five, like most of us do. Sight, hearing, uh, touch, taste, smell, and taste. Five senses. Well, his sight was now dim, so the sight, which was the best of the lot, couldn't help much. So he trusted his other senses, his hearing, his smell, his touch, and his taste.
And all of them, in turn, deceived him. And thereby stands a big lesson. How would you determine what blessing is? What is blessing? How would you judge if you got any? If you went home and told your friends that you were blessed by the Lord at this conference, what would the blessing be? What do you mean by blessing? We had a blessed time, my brother. What is blessing? Here we have to be very, very. We ought to study, perhaps a little bit, our human psychology.
You see, sometimes when people who have been outright sinners get saved, they hear the word of the Lord, your sins are forgiven you, and in repentance and faith they receive the word of the Lord and know themselves forgiven. And then as a reaction, they feel tremendous relief in their hearts and joy coming, you see. And sometimes the feeling and the emotion leads to very physical feelings, and lo and behold, they even shed tears for joy. Tears are funny things, aren't they? Sometimes we shed tears in sorrow, and sometimes we shed tears for sheer joy.
It's a funny thing, tears, aren't they? Bit ambivalent. You'll see. Though some people, to be sure, like crying. They like a good cry. You'll see. Ha ha. But you notice the order, don't you? First, the word of God that brings the blessing, a spiritual blessing, your sins are forgiven you. Then the feeling in the heart, the emotions, then the sensations. Joy, perhaps even tears of joy. Sometimes after that experience, as the years go by, naturally the feelings depart a bit, and the sensations. And you find people hankering after the feelings.
Where is the blessedness I felt when first I knew the Lord? And they can't bring themselves to weep at every gospel message they hear, and all those lovely sensations. And because they lack the sensations and the emotions, they think they've lost the blessing. That wouldn't be true, would it? And some dear believers, when they want to get blessing for the Lord, think the way to go about it is not to have too much of the Bible, because that can, like undigested meat, uh, depress the spirits. They work up the emotions, you see. Have a marvelous emotional time, and they feel that's a blessing. Oh, but let Isaac tell you, be careful about measuring blessing by your sensations, or even by your emotions.
How does the blessing come? It comes from God, of course. It comes through his word and by his spirit. And as the Holy Spirit makes the word of God true in our hearts and our experience, it leads to that deep experience, and the emotions are sometimes moved. And sometimes the sensations follow, but the main thing is God's word applied by his spirit with a spiritual blessing. We are in danger if we confuse blessing with psychological sensations. See what happened to Isaac as he asked Esau to go and get the venison and cook it so that he might eat it and, oh, enjoy the the venison such as my soul loveth, is he.
For Rachel heard of this and quickly instructed East, uh, Jacob, and you know the story. As she cooked a goat or something or a lamb and titivated it up like the Chinese restaurant do, and, and made it taste like venison, you'll see, and she dressed old Jacob up with the skin of the goat on the nape of his neck and on his arms and forearms, and sent him in to Isaac with his supposed venison, you see. And Isaac, being dim in the eyes, he said, who are you? And he said, I'm Esau. You don't sound much like Esau, says, says Isaac. Are you sure you're Esau? Yes, I'm sure I'm Esau, says he.
But yeah, uh, Isaac eyesight wasn't too good. So he had to depend on his hearing. Well, he said, yeah, but you don't sound like Esau. You sure of Esau? Oh, I'm sure, he said. That's funny, he said, that, uh, voice is like Jacob's. Never mind. So his hearing deceived him. Come near, he said, so I can feel you. So here came Jacob, supposed Esau, and held out his arms. Isaac got hold of them. They seemed solid enough, these arms, real solid things they were, full of hairs.
And being convinced now by the touch and the sensation of touching, well, he says, that seems like Esau. Wasn't gonna, touch was deceiving him. Funny that. So he had another, uh, uh, uh, test up his sleeve. Come near, he said, and let me smell you. Well, that's not a sense I would have thought of using. The smell of somebody who's been out hunting wouldn't have convinced me of the blessing of God too quickly. But anyway, come near, said he, that I may smell you. He said, your smell is the smell of the field that the Lord has blessed. So he took the venison. Oh, it tasted real good. But the taste deceived him. It wasn't venison, it was chicken or something.
Tricked out by venison. Deceived by his senses all the way down the line. And he blessed Jacob. All right, you say that it was in God's foreordained will. Yes, but Jacob isn't res- uh, but God isn't responsible for the way Jacob went about it, nor Is- nor Isaac either. You don't have to deceive people to get God's blessing. Do you now? The lesson, when it comes to blessing, yes, God blesses us in material things like he blessed Isaac.
But the essence of blessing is the word of the Lord, his gracious promise made real in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. Spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus, made real through the word of God. Let the emotions follow if they will, but if they don't, never mind. Let the sensations come. Don't be afraid to weep for joy if you have to. But let us not put our faith in the emotions, still less in the sensations. Let our faith be rooted in God and his word applied and his promise applied by the Holy Spirit.
Bless him. And with that, the story goes on to draw our attention to Jacob. He was the twin of Esau, and the children struggled before birth in the womb, the struggle for power. And, uh, the Lord said that Jacob should be the greater of the two. Two nations, said he, are in thy womb, and the elder of the nation shall serve the younger. Now, Esau as an individual never served Jacob, not all his life through he didn't.
The nation of Eden that descended from, uh, Esau eventually served David, king of Judah, until eventually in the, under the successive monarchs, Edom revolted. But Jacob was the chosen vessel to carry on the line through which Messiah would eventually come. And to get the blessing, his mother thought she had to steal it by deceit, and got the blessing. The Jacob did another thing. For now, as you enter his story, you will find his life is all about not necessarily singing hymns, but business deals and marriage contracts and trade secrets and commerce and rearing sheep and other such things.
These are, of course, the basic lessons of life, aren't they? Being prepared to reign with Christ. Yes, we are being trained in our day-to-day affairs. That's what the Lord Jesus said, as I can understand him. When you go to work, says he, don't you do as the Gentiles do when they go to work? Oh, really? How do the Gentiles go to work then? Well, they go seeking for food and clothes. Don't you be like that? You seek first the rule of God in your life and his righteousness.
What does that mean? When I was young, I thought that meant that when you go to work, first you ought to give out a few tracts or something and put the Lord's work first and then your own career second. That's not quite what the Lord meant, did he? He's talking about what our attitude should be to our daily work. The Gentiles' attitude is they go to work, their prime motivation and their prime dividend is food and clothes. Don't you be like that? You say half a minute, Lord. What on earth would you go to work for if you didn't have to get food and clothes? Is that your prime motivation?
Surely not. When you go to work, says our Lord Jesus, let your prime motivation be to seek the kingdom, that is the kingly rule of God, in your life. And making that your first motivation for going to work and living in daily work according to the rules of the Lord's kingdom. It will build into you his righteousness. That is a righteous character. That's where Christian character is formed for the most part. In the home, looking after the children, cooking the dinner for the husband, in the business, in the office, at the old computer, teaching at school, or whatever.
There let our first motivation be that we're seeking God's rule in our lives. I needed to be taught patience. Still need to be taught it, you know. Soon get frustrated. And I learned in the Bible that you should be patient. There's no good just reading it in the Bible. You don't become patient by reading it in the Bible. You should be patient, do you now? Some Bible scholars I know are the most impatient souls under the sun. How do you learn patience? Well, first of all, you learn you have to be patient. In my case, the Lord sent me to teach students in the university. That will teach you patience, or try it somehow or other.
I tell you it would. Some of them, of course, most of them are noble people, but there are some. Valuable experience, you'll see. Because as we try to carry out the Lord's rules and principles of living in our daily work, it's not only the means of providing food and clothes. The Lord knows you are in need of those things. Of course he does. That's a normal way of providing them. But daily work is about more than that. It's about developing a Christian character. We need it, good Christian friend. We're being trained to rule with Christ, and along with him to put into practice the rules of the kingdom of God.
How shall we be in a position to impose them if we've not learned to keep them ourselves? I was at dinner in a home far from here, with a good Christian man, now retired, who told me his story. In his professional life, he was a company secretary, a mix between accountant and solicitor, and therefore had to be present at the board meetings of the directors. And on this occasion, the income tax people had become worried about certain practices that the board of directors had been following in order to cheat the income tax inspectors.
The inspector demanded a meeting with the directors, and my good friend, the company secretary, had to attend. The question was eventually put by the income tax inspectors, and the chairman of the board asked my friend to give the answer. Said, my friend, I knew in that moment that if I told the truth, that would be the end of my job. He had a wife and family and a house and a mortgage and children. What would you do? If his prime motivation in being in business was to get food and clothes, he'd have told a lie along with the directors, wouldn't he?
And kept his job. Noble man, by God's grace, he saw that the reason God sent him into business was that he might have practice in keeping the rules of the kingdom of God, and thus building into his life the sound character. And he answered with the truth and lost his job. But there you are, you see, had he told the lie, he'd have kept the goods, wouldn't he, in the job, but had lost the very thing for which God sent him to work, the prime thing. Jacob's life is full of all sorts of bargains and business deals.
You have to do them to live in the commercial world. Question of principle upon which they're done is absolutely vital, isn't it? He was cooking this pottage stuff one morning when Esau came in from the hunting, you'll see, and he was, uh, very hungry. Ready to die, said he, with that typical exaggeration of men in the Wild West with cowboy hats. You'll say, give me of that pottage, says he, I'm about to die. But Jacob was a businessman, wasn't he? Well, yes, he said, Esau, but you see, the price of pottage has gone up very considerably, and, uh, there is such a demand.
Of course, I would have to charge you quite a bit for it. Well, I don't care what you ask, says Esau, I'll give it. Well, he said, I tell you what, Esau, what about your birthright? Now, the birthright came to the elder son and was, of course, worth a tremendous amount of money. He got a double portion of the inheritance, the elder son, worth a colossal sum of money, and you could sell the birthright for cash, you see, or half of the birthright for cash. And asked what the price of the pottage was, says Jacob, well, give me your birthright then. And Esau, silly chap, counted a full stomach worth more than all the promises of God for the future.
And he sold his birthright for a bowl of pottage. You say, well, that's a good business deal, Jacob, my boy, you did very well. What would you say as a Christian about that? Suppose you had a friend who was much given to alcohol, business friend. He got himself into sore difficulties through his drinking and was nearly bankrupt, and was hard up for ten thousand dollars. And he came to you and said, old chap, um, I'd like ten thousand dollars, if you wouldn't mind. You say, well, yes, the money market's grown tight, uh-huh, you see.
What could you give me in the place? Well, I say, I don't know, I haven't got any cash. Well, he said, just tell me, what about that painting on the wall? And you happen to know it's a Rembrandt. And you say, well, old chap, I'll tell you what, I'll give you ten thousand for that, that painting on the wall, funny old dog thing anyway. And the chap, because he's desperate, sells you a Rembrandt for ten thousand dollars, when it's worth about, uh, fifty million or something. And because he's in desperate straits, you offer him just ten thousand for the Rembrandt. Is that right? It's legal. These are exceedingly practical questions, aren't they?
You say our, our preacher today is obviously not a businessman. You've got it right. I remember the words of the Lord, seek you first, the rule of God. Is it fair and just to drive bargains like that? Well, in the end, Jacob had to run off because Esau was threatening to murder him. So he went off in order to seek his living, you'll see. First time away from home, he was pretty old, but he first time away from home. And now he'd gone out to find himself a job.
Get a wife, perhaps. Settle down. And he journeyed and came across a certain place, and because he's very tired and he couldn't scheme anymore, he took a stone for his pillow and laid down to rest and dream. And he dreamed. And look there, there was a stairway. Now notice how it is described. The bottom of it on earth, and the top reached unto heaven. It wasn't let down from heaven and the bottom nearly reaching earth. It was the other way round. It was the bottom here on earth and the top reaching towards heaven. And he saw the angels of God ascending, because they were going out from the divine presence, and descending, coming back to the divine presence.
And God was standing not on top of the ladder, as some translations have it, but beside the ladder at the bottom, as you see from what Jacob said when he woke up. He said, surely God is in... not in heaven. Jacob believed that a long while. God was way up there in heaven, which was very convenient when he was pushing a hard bargain with Jacob, with Esau, to think that God was a long way off. Woke up to the fact that God was in this place. Right by my elbow. God is in this place, and I didn't know it, says he. This is the house of God.
This is the gate of heaven. And Jacob wasn't thinking that this was the way into heaven. He didn't want to go to heaven just yet. He hadn't married yet. He wanted to get married before he went to heaven. A lot of people do, uh, you'll see, don't want to go to heaven just yet. And he wasn't intending to go to heaven. What he was seeing was the house of God, the administrative center of God's government, with all the armies of the heavenly civil service going out from the presence of God and coming down to God as they fulfilled their tasks. This is the gate of heaven, where is situated the center of God's government.
Is J- Jacob being trained? The name of his boys would one day go on the gates of the eternal city. Experience of the government of God in his daily life. And when Jacob woke up, businessman still, he said, well, Lord, this is marvelous. I heard what you said in my vision, that you'll be with me and you'll bless me and you'll multiply me. Now, Lord, if you'll really do that and bless me where I go and bring me again in peace, then God shall be my God, and I'll give you a ten percent on it all, he said. Businessman to the last. Well, I'm glad he took God seriously, aren't you? Yes.
So God in partnership in his business. Good. And so he went to, uh, now down to these relatives in Aram, and you know the love story that followed. He saw this beautiful girl, you'll see, Rachel. Sorry, I said, did I say his mother's right, so it ought to have been Rebecca. Uh, sorry. I find these ladies a little difficult, the names, I mean, to get them separate, but, uh, you'll see. It was Rebecca, his mother, and Rachel, he saw, fell in love with the dear lady. Her elder sister wasn't quite so good looking. Good soul, but not quite so good looking. And he, uh, worked for Rachel for seven years, you'll see, as a business deal with Laban.
And when it came to the wedding night, woke up the next morning and found it wasn't Rachel after all, it was Leah. Oh, he went to Laban and he said, now this is downright, this is downright unethical. I worked for you for seven years to get Rachel, and you've deceived me and given me Leah. Oh, I don't know what you're fussed about, said Laban, but it is not our custom in our country to give the younger before the elder. Oof. Laban perhaps didn't know what he was saying, did he? What voice was that out of Jacob's past? Where Jacob the younger had stolen the blessing from his elder brother Esau and thought God was blessing him in the deed.
Now, to find out that the wheels of God grind slowly, but they grind exceeding. And what a man sows, he reaps. God now beginning to teach Jacob what blessing is. You don't get God's blessing by cheating. You don't need to cheat. And he had to have Leah, and then work seven years further for Rachel. Under the training of God. Then Jacob prospered, looking after Laban's, uh, flocks, you see.
Businessman still. He had a notion, a scheme. He went to Laban and said, I have a scheme, sir. Look here, it's not enough, you know, at my time of life to work for wages. Some people are content to work for wages, but you can't build up capital, you know, Laban, you know that from your experience. You can't build up capital if you just get wages. Now I've got a scheme to put before you. Look, um, uh, I'll, uh, take the purebred whites and look after them, and you separate all the speckled sheep right away, so there's no speckled sheep at all. And then, when I look after your herd of pure whites, you shall have all the produce from them that are pure white.
I shall keep the odd one or two that come out speckled. Laban rolled his eyes and couldn't believe his ears. On Jacob proposing a thing like that. Well, it seemed foolproof to him. He couldn't make it out. Of course, Jacob up his sleeve had what he thought were s- trade secrets. And whether they actually worked or whether it was the providence of God, who can say? But he had his trade secrets that Laban didn't know anything about. And if you've got trade secrets, shouldn't you use them? Well, he used them. And as a result, he got speckled sheep by the thousand. And any ones that weren't speckled, he put them aside so they shouldn't have a chance to breed anyway.
Until the vast majority was speckled and just a few stragglers were white. And by the time he'd finished, the most of Laban's capital was in his bank in his name. In fact, all the banks in the villages were Jacobson. And when his brothers-in-law saw this, their countenance fell, it says, and was not toward Jacob as before. And Jacob got so afraid, he had to run away. There's no justification for the Holocaust, is there? But sometimes Jewish traders in many countries have managed to get so much of the capital of the country into their hands, like they're doing in Russia at the moment.
But the Gentiles rise up against it, regarding it as having filched from them their capital. It ruined La- uh, Jacob's family relationships, didn't it? Spoiled the family relationship till he had to run away. What was it worth? All this getting of capital by such doubtful means. I think his wives knew better. There's the job of building a family, and as we said before, they brought these family matters to God in their prayers, and as their children were born, and they experienced the answers of God in family life, they encapsulated their experience of God in the names they gave the boys.
Whether they knew it or not, they were building character for eternity. Those boys' names will go on the government gates of the eternal city. Jacob was on his way back. There was no way to else to go. Where else could he go? But going back meant meeting Esau. What would he do? Esau now grown powerful, and he heard say that Esau was coming to meet him with a great strong of men. What should he do now? And Jacob... bethought himself he would appease Esau, brave man. So he sent across one of the w- wives with a whole herd of sheep and camels and cows and a mighty great batch.
That went across in front. And then, feeling that might be not enough, he sent another great herd across. Perhaps God was standing by his side and said, make sure, Jacob, oh boy, give send another batch. He sent four batches across. He sent such a vast batch of stuff, there were cows and horses and lot, lot by the thousand. And if Esau said, what are these, he was to say, they are a present. The word is the Hebrew word for blessing. They are a blessing. That's right, Jacob, says God, give it back. You stole the blessings from Esau, didn't you? And thought that was me blessing you when you got it by stealing it.
Give it back, Jacob. I have to steal from Esau to get my blessing, Jacob. Back they went. I don't need them, said Esau. Oh, but take them. It's a present. A blessing from me. That night, there wrestled with him a man. It was the Lord himself. And Jacob tried to wrestle with God and maneuver God into a position. Let me go, said the angel. I won't let you go till you bless me, says Jacob, trying to maneuver God into blessing him.
Do you know, my brothers, my sisters, you don't have to maneuver God to bless you? You don't have to twist God's arm to get him to bless you. It's his determination to bless you anyhow. And the angel touched his thigh, withered the muscle, so that the very leg and muscle necessary to wrestle was now gone, and all Jacob do was to hang in dependence upon the angel of the Lord. Bless me, he said. Said the angel, what is your name? Now it was no good dressing up in the goat skin or something, bringing some imitation venison and pretending to be Esau.
Held in the arms of God and dependent on God. Was the angel asking the question, who are you? I'm Jacob, he said. What a blessing is that when God takes us into his arms and we can't move, and God makes us face ourselves and own our shortcomings and our waywardness and learn the lesson of faith to depend on God. That night, God blessed him, not with great herds of cattle, but blessed him with a supreme blessing of changing the man's character.
Jacob, so far, you shall be called Israel. A prince with God, on the way to producing the nation that would bring in the Messiah. On the way to producing the son through whom all the nations of the earth would be blessed. The Joseph of Egypt, and eventually the Messiah. Jacob now beginning to be a ruler for God. That is blessing. When he got back to the land, there were difficulties enough and scandals that his sons perpetrated in the name of religion.
There were trials to come of bitterness that he had never anticipated, yet to come. Before Jacob went home, he learned what God's blessing on him was and what it God had al- always intended it should be. Before he died, he saw such unimaginable blessing that nearly broke his heart by the very wealth of it. What that experience of, uh, was of, we shall have to leave to our final voluntary session. Be assured that I wish it to say it in all sincerity. Those of you who need to go, please go.
You won't embarrass me. I admire your stickability that you put up with me for so long, and i- i- if you wish to go, please go. Those of you who wish to stay, we shall have a short session, not a long one, just a half an hour at most, to consider the final stage of the book, which will be told from Jacob's angle and will be the story of the real blessing into which God brought Jacob.
