Note: Like Isaac, Jacob’s is born contrary to human expectation. His mother Rebekah, like Sarah before her, is barren. The birth of Jacob is seen as God’s special action in response to Isaac’s prayer (Genesis 25:21).
However, Jacob is a twin, and the younger twin at that. We saw in Abraham’s family sibling rivalry and family conflict. Ishmael and Isaac were rival recipients of the promise, and their mothers saw this. However, that struggle was confined and quickly dealt with. The conflict and struggle in which Jacob is involved, first as a son in Isaac’s family with his brother Esau, then with his uncle Laban, is long, drawn out, protracted, and all encompassing. Sibling conflict spreads throughout the family of which Jacob is the head, first to his two wives, and then to their children, leading ultimately to Joseph’s brothers selling him into slavery.
However, though Jacob doesn’t enjoy harmonious family relationships, he is blessed in spite of and even through the jealousies into which he plunges himself and others impose upon him. For not human effort, but YHWH’s choice, is thus ultimate cause of Jacob’s blessing. We also observe throughout the narrative Jacob’s growth in his relationship with YHWH.
Discussion starter
Think of a time when you experienced a time of conflict, relationship stress with friends or family, or people pressures in your education or work. What was the thing that was so difficult to deal with? What was the good thing that came out of that experience?
Read Genesis 25:19-34.
What are the differences between the two twins?
What is the significance of each of their names?
Do you think YHWH’s prophecy about the twins in verse 23 is fair? Why or why not? (You should also read Romans 9:10-16)
How did the conflict between Jacob and Esau manifest itself?
How do you think both Esau and Jacob behaved in the selling of the birthright?
Note: Jacob’s name, meaning ‘heel’ or ‘heel-grabber’, is a reminder not only of how he wanted to be first out, but also has the idea of ‘leg puller’ (v26). In English, to pull someone’s leg is to trick them and not to tell them the truth. Jacob is characterized as someone cunning, who tricks, deceives, and seeks to supplant Esau and indeed others, to get the blessing. This will become very obvious in the next scene (cf 27:35-36).
Read Genesis 27:1-41.
How have Isaac and Rebekah become embroiled in their sons’ ongoing fight? (cf 25:27-28 with this passage)
What were the sins of each person in this story?
Isaac
Esau
Rebekah
Jacob
Is there any justice in Esau being excluded from the blessing? (A tricky question: for hints, see verses 26:34 and 27:46-28:9. See also, more obscurely, verses 1,5,37)
Note: Jacob’s desire to be blessed (at his brother’s expense) ironically results in him fleeing empty handed from his family and land. However, he has kept himself from marrying Canaanites, unlike Esau. In Genesis, the intermarriage and close association of the Semites with the Canaanites is frowned upon (see for eg Genesis 15:16; 19:12-14; 24:3-4; chapter 34). To both preserve his life and to obtain a suitable wife, Isaac sends Jacob to Laban. At that point, Jacob receives the blessing of which Isaac wanted to deprive him: ‘May God Almighty bless you and make you fruitful and increase your numbers until you become a community of peoples. May he give you and your descendants the blessing given to Abraham, so that you may take possession of the land where you now live as an alien, the land God gave to Abraham.’ (Genesis 28:3-4).
Jacob with live an unsettled life from now on. He will continue to move around, showing that he is not yet owner of the land. See the diagram below.
In Ch 35, Isaac dies at Bethlehem. On the way, Rachel dies, and Reuben commits incest. In Ch 37, Joseph is sold into slavery by his brothers. Jacob (130yrs old) is reunited with Joseph in Egypt. In chs 49-50 Jacob blesses his sons and dies in Egypt. His sons bury him in the land of Canaan in the tomb Abraham bought.
Jacob had life changing encounters with YHWH, which we will now look at in greater depth.
Read Genesis 28:10-22. Bethel.
How does Jacob’s dream relate to the crisis which led to the building of the tower of Babel in chapter 11? (verses 12, 14, 17)
Given Jacob’s desperate desire to inherit, Isaac’s attempt at preventing him receiving Abraham’s blessings, and Isaac’s situation at the time of the vision, what is the significance of God’s message to Jacob in verses 13 to 15?
What is the significance of Jacob’s vow in verses 20-22? What does the form of the vow (‘if…then’) tell us about Jacob at this point?
Read Genesis 32:6-12, 22-32. The wrestle at Jabok stream.
In verses 6-12, Why does Jacob pray? Why is it a good model of prayer?
With whom did Jacob wrestle? Give evidence for your answer?
Note: Remember that the name Jacob meant ‘heel grabber’, and figuratively, ‘deceiver’, very appropriate. But now he is renamed Israel, meaning literally, ‘God fights’. Jacob has struggled with God, with his brother, father, and uncle, to win God’s blessings. The blessing he now wins is that God will wrestle not just with him, but for him. For the God who wrestled him was really on his side. With his left hand YHWH was fighting him, but with his right hand YHWH was upholding him.
Read Genesis 35:1-15. Bethel again.
Why does Jacob have to command his children to rid themselves of idols? What does this say about YHWH?
What does God promise Jacob? What is the significance of this?
Note: Jacob is pre-eminently the blessed man. But God’s blessing doesn’t mean his life was easy. He suffers in many ways:
Jacob buries his favourite wife, Rachel (Gen 35:19);
He is deprived of his favourite son Joseph for many years;
He buries his father Isaac (Gen 35:28);
His other ten sons become either murderers or slave traders;
His daughter, Dinah, is raped (Gen 34);
His son Reuben commits incest with his wife Bilhah (35:22).
Jacob must endure the famine that engulfs the world.
Jacob is truly blessed, but in the midst of real dangers, sadness and struggles that characterise a fallen world. So Jacob says, ‘The years of my pilgrimage are a hundred and thirty. My years have been few and difficult, and they do not equal the years of the pilgrimage of my fathers.’ (Genesis 47:9 NIV). Thus, he, along with Abraham and Isaac, looked forward not to the land of Canaan (which they would never receive), but to a better country, a heavenly one (Hebrews 11:13-16,21).
We have come to expect growth and progress. Everything now is bigger and better than 10 years ago. Everything in 10 years will be bigger and better than it is now. That is what we expect. Take population growth. If humans are good at anything, it is reproducing. Let me take you through some figures.
Source: United Nations Population Division: The World at Six Billion, p8. Check out also http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/img/worldpop.gif.
At zero AD, when Jesus was born, global population is estimated to have been about one third of a billion. It took 1500 years to reach half a billion. Then it took another 300 years to reach 1 billion, in 1804. It reached 2 billion in 1927, 123 years later. 33 years later, it reached 3 billion in 1960 14 years later, in 1974, it reached 4 billion It hit 5 billion in 1987, 13 years later. 6 billion in 1999, 12 years later. Every year, we add 78 million to the world population. We will probably reach 7 billion in a few years.
World population has grown and will continue to grow astronomically. This is despite two world wars, influenza, AIDs, all of those things. And from the bible’s point of view, this is a great thing. God said, at the beginning of creation, go forth and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it.
Even in Australia, where people don’t really want to have children, our population is still increasing. After taking all the deaths into account, and factoring in births and immigration, a new Australian is produced every 1 minute and 45 seconds.
I cite these realities to show how humanity has prospered. It has all happened according to YHWH’s blessing. Genesis 1:28 tells us:
God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground. (NIV)
And so humanity has prospered, and teemed, and filled the earth, and no doubt will continue to increase. And moreover, has learnt how to generate wealth from the earth, so that our earth can sustain and feed and look after all these precious people made in God’s image.
Friends, the word in Genesis used to describe this production and reproduction is ‘blessing’. We might call it ‘prosperity’ or ‘growth’. God said, ‘Humans, reproduce and teem and flourish; earth, grow and develop and produce’. And those words carry with them enabling power. In blessing his creation, God commands it to fulfil the latent potential for growth, production, and reproduction that God himself placed within it.
And the story of Jacob is primarily a story of blessing. Jacob is the man promised blessing, steals blessing, receives blessing as a gift, and finally gives blessing. Jacob is first and foremost the man of blessing.
As we follow the Genesis account, God chooses a particular human to be the channel of his blessings. That is, Abraham. YHWH says to Abraham.
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…(Genesis 22:17-18 NIV)
Pre-Natal Sibling Rivalry (v. 22)
And God says the promise will be fulfilled through Abraham’s son, Isaac. And yet, the promise seems at risk. For Rebekah, Isaac’s wife, cannot fall pregnant (cf Gen 25:20 and 26). And when she does, she wishes she hadn’t. For her womb has become a World Championship Wrestling Ring. So that Rebekah wonders whether life is worth living[1].
The Prophecy: The Older Will Serve The Younger (v. 23)
So in days before ultrasounds, Rebekah went to YHWH for an explanation.
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 older will serve the younger." 24 When the time came for her to give birth, there were twin boys in her womb. (Genesis 22:23-24 NIV)
And this twin’s ongoing conflict is made worse by the parent’s favouritism. Isaac loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob. However, we know who will win the battle. YHWH has already said Jacob will win, for the older will serve the younger.
Esau Supplanted: The Birthright (vv. 29-34)
The first way Jacob gets the better of Esau is by getting Esau’s birthright. Jacob certainly lacks brotherly kindness, exploiting his brother. But Esau is presented as a fool. He wants immediate gratification. For a bowl of lentils, he sacrifices his God-given birthright. Thus despising both God and his birthright.
We also learn Esau married ‘Hittite women’. He couldn’t wait to marry a godly wife, he took the ungodly Hittites. God told Abraham they would be punished for their sin (Gen 15:16-20). But Esau rushes to marry them. And I think we are meant to see that this makes Esau an unworthy recipient of God’s blessing.
There’s something dodgy about what Isaac is trying to do. Usually when a dying patriarch wanted to bless his sons, he called them all in. And all of them get a blessing. But this is not what is happening here.
Isaac is acting secretly, sneakily. He’s not invited Jacob or Rebekah. It seems Isaac wants to give God’s blessing to his favourite son Esau, and he wants to cut out Jacob. In spite of Esau’s bad character, his ungodly wives. And YHWH’s prophecy that chose Jacob and rejected Esau.
But Isaac is not the only sinner in this event. Rebekah, for her part, gets Jacob to lie to his father. Jacob lies to Isaac, takes God’s name in vain, and steals Esau’s blessing. And Esau’s determination to kill Jacob shows he is like the arch-sinner, Cain. But while each of them were doing evil, God meant it for good. For it was YHWH’s intention to fulfil his promises to Abraham through Jacob.
Eventually, Isaac does give his blessing freely to Jacob. Isaac does this when he sends Jacob to find a godly wife. Chapter 28 verses 1 to 4:
So Isaac called for Jacob and blessed him and commanded him: "Do not marry a Canaanite woman. Go at once to Paddan Aram, to the house of your mother's father Bethuel. Take a wife for yourself there, from among the daughters of Laban, your mother's brother. May God Almighty bless you and make you fruitful and increase your numbers until you become a community of peoples. May he give you and your descendants the blessing given to Abraham, so that you may take possession of the land where you now live as an alien, the land God gave to Abraham." (Genesis 28:1-4 NIV)
Jacob should have received this blessing from the start. Jacob should never have had to trick Isaac to give it to him. But now he must flee, because of Esau’s vendetta.
Jacob’s Increase (Gen 27:41-33:20)
This blessing marks the start of Jacob’s long journeys. Jacob’s life thereafter is unsettled and nomadic. You get a feel of this in diagram in your sermon outline. But during these journeys, YHWH will reveal himself to him and reaffirm his promises to Abraham.
Jacob First Encounters Yahweh (Gen 28:12-22)
Jacob’s first encounter with YHWH is while he is fleeing Esau. That is point 2 on the diagram of Jacob’s movements. YHWH appears to him in a dream at Bethel. And Jacob sees a stairway to heaven, and angels hovering over it, and YHWH himself at the top. YHWH makes it clear to Jacob. The promises given to Abraham are for him. They will be fulfilled through him. YHWH is with him. No longer is Jacob merely following his dad’s God, the family religion. Now Jacob comes of age, and owns the promises. Jacob himself has vowed to serve YHWH. This is Jacob’s confirmation, if you like!
Up until now, Jacob has been wrestling with his brother. But now Jacob begins his long wrestle with God.
Finding The Right Wife ... Or Four! (Gen 29:1-31:24)
Jacob moves North East in search of his relative’s house. This is point 3 of the diagram. Now, where do you go when you want to find a wife? You know this. A well.
And that’s where Jacob sets eye on Rachel. She’s from the right family So Jacob meets her father Laban, and stays with his family. And their relationship starts off warm and friendly. But, Laban was a wiley operator, very much like Jacob himself.
So when Jacob offers seven years labour for Rachel, he readily accepts it. But on the wedding night, Laban swaps his older daughter, Leah. Bait and switch! Here is poetic justice. The deceiver Jacob has met his match in dodgy Laban. Previously Jacob tricked his father into thinking Jacob was his firstborn. Now Jacob’s father-in-law tricks Jacob with his firstborn. Moreover, Jacob has to give his father-in-law another 7 years hard labour. And now he has two wives – the sisters, Rachel and Leah.
Looking for an argument against polygamy? Here it is. Jacob’s family life is now one long fight and struggle. Jacob’s used to struggle with his brother, Now his wives struggle with each other. The sisters compete. Leah desperately seeks Jacob’s love, but Jacob doesn’t love her. He loves Rachel. But Leah is good at having children And God, adding fuel to the fire, gives Leah children but not Rachel. So Rachel’s struggle is now not just with Leah, but with God also. She wants children. And God hasn’t given them. And so the sister’s fight over Jacob. And they throw in their maid servants for good measure. So Jacob, who only wanted one wife, Rachel, ends up with 4! And competitiveness and favouritism spreads throughout the family. No wonder God later gave this law to Israel:
Do not take your wife's sister as a rival wife and have sexual relations with her while your wife is living. (Leviticus 18:18 NIV)
The rationale is found in the destructive conflict between Rachel and Leah.
Isaac’s deception failed to bless his firstborn Esau, So too, Laban’s. Laban’s deception failed to bless his firstborn, Leah. The younger sister prevailed over the firstborn. Just as Jacob the younger son prevailed over the firstborn brother. Rachel, like Jacob, will struggle with God and her sibling, and overcome. Rachel will always be Jacob’s favourite.
But through this sibling rivalry, Jacob’s family increases. Through family disharmony, Jacob becomes a community of people’s. And this is what YHWH promised. Through the family feud, YHWH fulfils his promise.
Moreover, despite Laban’s stinginess, Jacob grows very wealthy. Laban squeezes 13 extra years of hard labour out of Jacob. And Laban wants to profit as much as he can from Jacob. But in the end, Jacob triumphes over his uncle. For YHWH was with him, at work, enabling Jacob to grow wealthy. Laban is like Pharaoh in the book of Exodus, who enslaves the Israelites. But just as Israel plundered the Egyptians, so Jacob will leave and take with him his uncle’s wealth.
Jacob’s Return To The Promised Land (Genesis 31-33)
So Jacob run’s away from Laban. On the diagram this is point 4. And Jacob is vulnerable, because of his family and all his possessions. Behind him, an angry Laban pursues. Before him, Esau waits to settle a 20 year old score with 400 men.
But YHWH is with Jacob, just as he promised. Struggles lie behind and before. But Jacob will be blessed and protected. For YHWH and his angels guard their way[2].
YHWH saves Jacob from Laban’s hot pursuit. YHWH vindicates Jacob (31:42), and Laban departs in peace.
And YHWH saves Jacob from Esau’s vengeance. Jacob gives him a very generous gift from his possessions. He is paying back Esau for stealing Esau’s blessing. And Esau, for his part, drops his vendetta. He warmly welcomes his brother. And by so doing, Esau will realise that he will only get YHWH’s blessing through Jacob. Because Jacob is God’s chosen channel of blessing.
So on his journey home, Jacob is reconciled with Esau, with whom he struggled for his first 40 years. And Laban, with whom he struggled for his next 20 years.
Struggles With God (Gen 32:22-32)
But there is another struggle that Jacob is involved in. A more important struggle. Jacob’s ongoing struggle with YHWH his God. Wedged between the accounts of his reconciliation with Laban and Esau is the story of a fight. Let me read it for you.
That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two maidservants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions. So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob's hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, "Let me go, for it is daybreak." But Jacob replied, "I will not let you go unless you bless me." The man asked him, "What is your name?" "Jacob," he answered. Then the man said, "Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome." Jacob said, "Please tell me your name." But he replied, "Why do you ask my name?" Then he blessed him there. So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, "It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared." (Genesis 32:22-30 NIV)
Jacob is no longer the soft mummy’s boy who liked the indoor life. The 20 years of hard labour has toughened Jacob up. The unnamed man does not overpower him.
We don’t learn this mystery wrestler’s name. But we do learn some things about him. First, he has superhuman strength. He dislocates Jacob’s hip. He’s not wrestling with all his strength. Like when I play handball left handed with my kids.
And this points to something else. Even though Jacob holds his own, this man is greater than Jacob. That’s why he doesn’t tell Jacob his name. That’s why Jacob asks him for his blessing. For the greater blesses the lesser. And that’s why he changes Jacob’s name.
Jacob meant ‘deceiver’. When Jacob says his name, he is also confessing his sins. It’s as if Jacob says: ‘You ask me who I am? I’m a liar and a cheat.’
But no more with this be Jacob’s name. Jacob is renamed Israel. This name means literally, ‘God fights’. That is who Jacob fought that night: God. He met God in the form of a man. It’s not the first time God has taken human form. And it won’t be the last.
But the name Israel also points to this. Jacob struggles with God to win the blessing God has promised.
What is the blessing? I think it is this. God will wrestle not just with him, but for him. For the God who was wrestling him was really on his side. With his left hand YHWH was fighting him, but with his right hand YHWH was upholding him.
And so it is with us who have put our faith in Christ. God wrestles with us, but as a father does, with only one hand. With the other hand God catches us when we fall, picks us up, dusts us off, supports us. That is how it was with Israel the man. That is how it was with Israel the nation. And that is how it still is with the Israel of God, the church.
It is God who in love wrestles with us. No difficulty, trial, test, or hardship, has come to us without him sending it. Because he loves us, he wrestles with us. But as a father with his children, only just as much as we can handle. For he wants us to ask him for a blessing. And just as Epaphras wrestled with God in prayer for the Philippian Christians, so we are called to wrestle with God, and overcome.
Note that God’s blessing doesn’t mean that Jacob’s life is easy. The very fact of God wrestling Jacob suggests that the blessed life is not one of ease and comfort. As we follow the Jacob story, we see that he suffers. Jacob loses his favourite wife, Rachel (Genesis 35:19) He loses his favourite son Joseph for many years. He buries his father Isaac (Genesis 35:28). His other sons become either murderers or slave traders. His daughter, Dinah is raped. He has to deal with his son Reuben incest with his wife Bilhah. Jacob, too, is not spared the famine that engulfs the world.
Yes, Jacob is truly blessed. But he is blessed in a fallen world, in the midst of real dangers, sadness and struggles that characterise a fallen world. When he summarises his life he says:
"The years of my pilgrimage are a hundred and thirty. My years have been few and difficult, and they do not equal the years of the pilgrimage of my fathers." (Genesis 47:9 NIV)
But the promise is that in the end, after Jacob’s nasty, brutish and short life, he will see the blessing of God.
Toward the end of his life, famine drives Jacob out of the land. Jacob dies outside the promised land. There is a real sense that he didn’t receive everything God promised him. This is what the author to the Hebrews tells us:
All these people [including Jacob] were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. (Hebrews 11:13-16 NIV)
These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised. God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect. (Hebrews 11:39-40 NIV)
All the blessings Jacob did receive were merely tastes and samples and pointers to the greater blessings that he hoped for but didn’t enjoy during his life.
The main emphasis of the story according to Hebrews is this. That Jacob did not receive everything he was promised. Because this world was not Jacob’s world. Jacob waited for a better place.
And we too need to be content with having the things we need. We need to learn to rejoice in suffering. Just as Jacob did, whose years were few and difficult. Then we will learn that for now, godliness with contentment is great gain.
[1] Note Wenham’s translation, ‘The children smashed each other inside her, so that she said: ‘If it is like this, why am I here?’ (25:22). In other words, is it worth going on living: Wenham: 2:175
[2]Compare Gen 32:2
In Genesis 28:12, by “ladder” in the ESV (Heb. סֻלָּם sullām, OT hapax; LXX, κλίμαξ), we should not think of a tradesman’s or house ladder, with uprights and rungs, but instead a “stairway”, an ascent by successive steps. It probably was a something like a ziggurat, the stairway towers that served as Babylonian and Assyrian temples, where the shrine was located at the summit. Josephus (Jewish Wars, Book 2, chapter 10, paragraph 2) described the town of Ptolemais (Acre) located on a plain which was bounded by mountains (Carmel to the south, Galilee on the east, and to the north, the ladder of Tyre: 1 Macc 11:59), the projecting sides and the flight of stairs cut into the rock leading down to the city were termed a “ladder” though they were only a flight of steps cut in the side of the rock (Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary).
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