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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Connect with Skip Heizig. We're glad you've joined
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(00:22):
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(00:42):
Skip Heitzig.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
So Jacob went near to Isaac knees. We're shaking, I'm sure,
and as he felt him, and he said, the voice
is Jacob's voice. You know, I probably tried to do
an imitation of his brother, but the vocal cords and
allow it. But the hands are the hands of Esau.
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And he did not recognize him because his hands were
hairy like his brother. Esau's hands, and so he blessed him.
Now listen very carefully. Isaac was old. His senses were
failing him. He reached out to feel, and what he
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felt deceived him. But there was one thing that gave
away his son, Jacob, that he should have trusted. And
there's only one thing that didn't fail, and it was
the word that he heard when he heard Jacob speak,
his words said, that's Jacob's voice. It's the words that
I hear that make me think of Jacob. But my
(01:49):
feelings are betraying me. You know, a lot of times
our feelings betray us, our senses fail us, and if
we're not absolutely one hundred percent using the revealed word
of God as our guide, we can be deceived. You
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don't know how many people over the years I've watched
get into all sorts of tangents, the things like, well,
I went to this meeting, and I know there's nothing
really about it in the Bible. The word doesn't say
what they practiced was right. But I felt the presence
of God. You're being deceived. You're simply saying the criteria
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for truth and error is how I feel about it
at the moment. It's the word that he heard that
didn't deceive him, his feelings betrayed him. And so what
we do when it comes to is this thing a
biblical thing that we practice? We ask this, especially as
New Testament believers. Did Jesus mention it in any of
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the four Gospels? Number two? Was it amplified in the
Book of Acts and practiced by the church as it
was birth? And number three? Was it elucidated and amplified
in the epistolatory literature written by Paul, John, Peter, etcetera.
So example, the Lord's Supper, did Jesus speak about it? Yes?
(03:18):
Or no? Yes? Was it practice in the Book of Acts? Yes?
Was it amplified in the epistolatory literature? Yes? Baptism did
Jesus mention it? Yes? Was it practice in the Book
of Acts? Yes? And it was as spoken of and
written about by the Yes in the epistle being slain
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in the spirit that is falling over. Oh, if the
presidents have got boom, you have catchers catch you. Did
Jesus mention it? Nope? Was it practice in the Book
of Acts? Never? Was it ever talked about or amplified
in the epistles? Never? Or the notion of Christians having
demons cast out of them. Did Jesus ever predict that? Nope?
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Practice in the Book of Acts, Nope, in the Epistles, nope.
Oh but I felt so what you felt was wrong.
What you need to trust is the word that you heard,
not the feelings that you feel, because they can be deceptive.
So that is the ultimate criteria. This is a classic
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example of that, verse twenty four. And he said, are
you really my son Esa? See he's still suspicious. Are
you you really my son, Esau? And he said I am.
And he said, bring it near to me, and I
will eat my son's game, so that my soul may
bless you. And so he brought it near to him,
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and he ate, and he brought him wine and he drank.
Then his father, Isaac said to him, come near now
and kiss me. My son probably still suspicious. He wants
to smell him. Is the idea? Come here? Let me
give you. You know, it's an affectionate kiss. The father
would give a son come here that I might kiss you.
(05:07):
And he came near and kissed him, and he smelled
the smell of his clothing, and he blessed him and said,
surely the smell of my son is like the smell
of a field which the Lord had blessed. So he
brought him close, and he thought, pew, yep, your esa,
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take the blessing and get out of here. Go out
to the field. Here's the blessing, verse twenty eight twenty nine. Therefore,
may God give you of thedow of heaven, of the
fatness of the earth, and plenty of the grain and wine.
Let people serve you, and nations bow down to you.
Be master over your brethren, and let your mother's sons
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bow down to you. Cursed be everyone who curses you,
and blessed be those who bless you. Can you read
into that shades of the blessing that God gave to Abraham,
and that Abraham gave to Isaac, and now Isaac is
giving to Jacob. Many of the elements are the same.
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I'll bless those that bless you, curse those that curse you,
I'll give you the land, etc. Now there was the law.
Do you remember the law we talked about a couple
of weeks ago, The law promigeniture, the law of the
first born. The firstborn son of a family always got
the blessing, the inheritance, the birthright, he would take over
and be the head of the family, take over the
father's agenda, be in charge of the family. He got
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a double portion of all of the goods that were
left over. But it meant he was the successor in
the lineage to his father. And I explained to you
that's why Elisha, the prophet said to Elijah, give me
a double portion. What that means is I want to
be your successor as the prophet of Israel, as the
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ambassador of God for this people. That was the law promigeniture.
God said he would reverse it here. Now it happened
as soon as Isaac had finished blessing and Jacob had
scarcely gone out from the presence of Isaac his father
that esaw his brother came in from his hunting. So
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exit Jacob with the blessing in hand. His father gave
him his blessing. He spoke it verbally, and in those days,
a verbal oral blessing was as binding as a legal
written contract. Did you know that it was irrevocable. A
blessing of a father to his son spoken orally was irrevocable.
So enter Esau, fresh off the field. Can't wait for
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the blessing to come his way. He also made savory
food and brought it to his father and said to
his father, let my father arise and eat of his
son's game, that your soul may bless me. And his
father Isaac said to him, who who are you? He said,
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I am your son. You're firstborn Esau. Then Isaac trembled
exceedingly and said, who where is the one who hunted
game and brought it to me? I ate all of
it before you came, and I have blessed him, and watch,
and indeed he shall be blessed. It dawned on him
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and he realized now that he had blessed the wrong boy.
Actually he blessed the right boy. That was God's promise,
but in his mind, it's not what I wanted. I
blessed the wrong boy. And the reason he trembled is
he's under conviction. I believe he's under conviction. It's like,
you know what, I was trying to pull a fast
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one on God, and he beat me at my own game.
And it's this conviction of God. God is doing his
will even though it's against my will. Now, this is
what I want you to pick up on. I find
this fascinating when you get to the New Testament. The
New Testament treats Isaac very kindly. Did you know that?
(09:15):
Did you know that? When it talks about Isaac in
the Hall of Faith in Hebrews chapter eleven, it says
this one little sentence, by faith, Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau. Really,
I would say by trickery he blessed his son. By subterfuge,
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he blessed his son. But it doesn't say by trickery.
It doesn't say by subterfuge. It says he did it
by faith. I believe it was at this moment that
faith was birthed. Is when he found out that he
had been had found out beat at his own game
by God, and he realized God is doing what he
said he would do, even though I tried to prevent it,
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and he believed, and by faith he said, I blessed him,
and indeed he shall be blessed. I believe that's when
faith was birthed, at this very moment. Indeed he shall
be blessed. There's a great proverb that I marked. I
want to read it to you in Proverbs nineteen. It's
(10:17):
in verse twenty one. Listen to this. There are many
plans in a man's heart. Nevertheless, the lord's counsel that
will stand. That is a proverb that sums up the
sovereignty of God. God does what he does, and you
might have a dysfunctional family, but you have a functional
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God who does what he wants. In the midst of
a dysfunctional family. You're going to be blessed. God said it.
It's happening, even though I try to prevent it. That's
the idea behind it. Verse thirty four. When Esau heard
the words of his father, he cried with an exceedingly
great and bitter cry and said to his father, bless
me me also, my father. Now here's manly Esau, men
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of the field, wailing and crying like a baby. No, no,
I want the blessing. But he said, your brother came
and with deceit he has taken away your blessing. And
Esau said, is he not rightly named Jacob? Be careful now, Esaw,
because the blessing was whoever curses Jacob is going to
(11:27):
be cursed.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
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for more of today's teaching.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
Is he not rightly named Jacob? For he has supplanted
or tripped me these two times he took away my birthright.
And now look he has taken away my blessing. And
he said, have you not reserved a blessing for me?
Was heesa correct? Was he right? About Jacob. Yes and no.
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He was right that his brother was a cheat, a manipulator,
a deceiver. But it's not like he stole the birthright. Right.
There was a deal. He goes, tell you what I'll
make you that red chili stew. But I want the birthright.
Who cares about my birthright? You gonna have it. I
don't want it. He despised it, and the deal was made.
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Now he's saying it was all a trick. Here's the
bottom line. Esau never cared about spiritual things. Never did.
He was a natural man the New Testament First Corinthians
would call him the natural man. The natural man, it says,
does not understand things of the spirit. They're spiritually discerned.
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A natural man. The Greek word sukikas means one governed
by the flesh, one governed by the appetites of the flesh.
The body dominated by the flesh, doesn't really care about
spiritual things, but cares a lot about the flesh physical things.
He was a natural man. Nothing wrong with food, nothing
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wrong with you're hungry. But he despised his birthright. He
despised spiritual things. That's the average worldly person. They despise
spiritual things. Jacob appreciated spiritual things, but he's going about
getting them the wrong way. We would call him a
carnal believer, not a spiritual man, not a natural man,
(14:15):
but a carnal man. He's going to use fleshly means
to arrive at a spiritual end. And hence the battle.
And Isaac answered and said to he saw, indeed, I
have made him your master. Imagine how he felt as
he heard that. Isaac felt, and all his brethren I
have given to him as servants with grain and wine.
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I have sustained him. What shall I do now for you,
my son? Esau said to his father, have you only
one blessing? My father? Bless me me also, oh my father.
And Esau lifted up his voice and he wept. He wept,
it was sincere weeping. But he still got by the flesh,
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and he'll lapse right back into that very very shortly.
Esau would have lived by the motto, eat, drink for
tomorrow we die. Have fun. Now, get all you can do.
Everybody's doing it. Life's all about the now, all about you,
you know, make your own way. That was his whole philosophy.
He was completely hedonistic, but he wanted also the double
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portion of his father's goods the blessing that would come
along with that. And Isaac's father said An answered and
said to him, behold, verse thirty nine. Behold, your dwellings
shall be of the fatness of the earth and of
the dew of heaven from above. That is, you're going
to live out in the open spaces. You're going to
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live out in the desert, the deserted spaces, of the
dew of heaven from above. By your sword you shall live.
You're gonna have to fight for everything you get, and
you shall serve your brother. And it shall come to pass,
and you become restless, that you shall break his yoke
from your neck. The children of Israel, the Jews, will
(16:10):
come from Jacob from Esau will arise the descendants known
as the Edomites. The Edomites will settle to the east
southeast of the Dead Sea, out in modern day Jordan.
The history of the people of the Moabites is very interesting.
(16:31):
Over time, there was this consistent battle between Israel and
this people. For instance, in First Samuel chapter fourteen, King
Saul subjugated them. A few chapters later he made them
a vassal state They rebelled against King Solomon later on,
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but to no avail. He put a tighter squeeze on
them and exacted taxes from them. As time went on,
they successfully rebelled against King Joram, but under King Amaziah
they were once again subjugated. So back and forth, always
under the thumb of the children of Israel, these descendants
(17:15):
of Esau. But notice what it says, It shall come
to pass when you become restless, that you shall break
his yoke from your neck, the descendants of Esau in
that area southeast of the Dead Sea. After several years,
the Nabataeans. Just keep that name in mind. Will refer
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to them later on. The Nabataeans. In fact, the whole
book of Obadiah is about the Nabataeans in this area.
In Edom, they pushed out these Edomites. They pushed them
out of the land, and so the Edomites settled in
Judah once again under Jewish rule. They lived in Judah,
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they were forced to convert to Judaism, forced to keep
Jewish law by a Maccabean ruler named John Hircanis, forced
them to live like Jewish people, even though they still
had the lineage of Esau still under the thumb of
the Jewish people until one guy by the name of
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Antipater his full name Herod Antipater got favor with Rome
and territory was given to him to rule over. And
it was his son called Herod the Great, who was
called the King of the Jews by the Roman government.
So it was Herod the Great that killed all the
(18:43):
babies in Bethlehem trying to kill Christ, who is now
in rulership in New Testament times, at one time subjugated
by the Jews, but now risen to authority and rulership
and is in charge. And that's the idea. I think
at the end of that verse, that is the prediction,
and it came to pass. By the way, Please be
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careful how you interpret scripture. I take it very literally.
Sometimes there's obvious figurative applications to it, and yet a
literal lesson is drawn from the figure. But whenever you
read a prophecy and it literally is fulfilled, it then
doesn't make any sense years later to say, well, I
don't believe in the literal interpretation of the Bible. I
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really can't take it word for word. I go, why
you have plenty of precedent to do that. I'll get
off that soapbox. Our time is about out. Verse forty one.
Look at this so Esa hated Jacob. You don't have
to turn to it, but listen to this Malachi chapter one.
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You know what it says. The Lord says Jacob, I
have loved Esa, I have hated. And God didn't even
explain himself as to you know why he does that.
Now that bothers a lot of people that God would
say Jacob, I have loved Esau, I have hated. That
bothers them. And you know what it bothers me. It
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doesn't bother me because he hated Esau. It bothers me
because he loved Jacob, knowing he was such a cheat
and a canniver, and yet he would make that declaration,
and he did so according to scripture, before they were born.
He made that declaration and preferred one over the other.
That was God's sovereign choice in predestination. But here it
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says Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which
his father blessed him. And Esau said in his heart,
the days of mourning for my father are at hand,
and I will kill my brother Jacob. And the words
of Esau, her older son, were told her Rebecca. So
he sent and called Jacob, or younger son, and said
to him, surely your brother Esau comforts himself concerning you,
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intending to kill you. Now, therefore, my son, Sonny, seventy
seven year old Sonny boy, come here, Sonny, listen to me,
obey my voice, arise, flee to my brother lay ben. Oh, yeah,
he's really a winner in heron and stay with him
a few days until your brother's fury turns away. Until
your brother turns away from you and forgets what you
(21:20):
have done to him, and I will send and bring
you from there. Why should I be bereaved also of
you both in one day? Go away for a few days,
you know what? A few days turned into two decades,
twenty years, and she will die without ever seeing her
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son again. This is called your plan backfiring, your fleshly energy, backfiring.
You are not wanting to wait on God. Backfiring your
carnal nature, backfiring. And I can only think that the
last years of her life were miserable, lonely years as
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she was thinking about all the paces she put her
family and her sons through twenty years, and when he
comes back, his mom will be long gone. Sad mothers.
I know you love your children, be careful about the
battles you fight, and I know you'd like to just
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make it all better for them. And so what do
you do when there's this problem in the family you
want to fix it? Fight the battle on your knees,
not with your hands or your mouth. Fight it on
your knees. Pray for them. That's where the battles are won.
And Rebecca said to Isaac, look at this closing comment,
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I am weary of my life. I would be too
because of the Daughters of Health. Now, her Sonny saw
I'm married a couple of Canaanite pagan girls drove her nuts.
Thought they were a bad influence. If Jacob takes a
wife of the Daughters of Heath like these, who are
the daughters of the land, what good will my life
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be to me? As she thought, you know, these people
around here have such poor values. I need to get
him around my family, such wonderful values, honest, salt of
the earth kind of people like me and my brother Laban.
Jacob does not even know what he's in for. This
guy Laban has master deceit better than anybody. He's like
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a PhD in it. This guy here's a neophyte. He's
about to go to school for twenty years. And what
happens with Jacob in the deceit backfires against him. He
deceived his dad. He will be deceived. Jacob will be
deceived by Laban. He'll have to work fourteen years for
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his wife, the one he loved, because Laban will deceive him.
Number two, his own sons will deceive Jacob in selling
Joseph to the Midianites as they go down to Egypt,
and then lie and say, oh, he got killed by
an animal. Here's his blood in this hippie coat that
you gave him. You will reap what you saw. Jacob
(24:16):
will reap what he's sown. This woman will reap what
she has sown. You've heard the old saying like father,
like son. It's also true, like mother, like son or daughter.
The influence of a parent, in example through a life
will mark a child's destiny for years to come.
Speaker 1 (24:35):
We're glad you joined us today. Before you go, remember
that when you give fifty dollars or more to help
reach more people with the Gospel. Through connect with Skip Heitzig,
We'll send you God Speaks Biblical Answers for Today's Issues,
which contain six of Pastor Skip's booklets to help you
understand what the Bible says about big issues like racism,
the importance of truth, suicide, and Heaven and Hell. To
(24:59):
request copy of God Speaks Biblical Answers for Today's Issues,
call eight hundred nine two two eighteen eighty eight. That's
eight hundred nine two two eighteen eighty eight or visit
connect with Skip dot com slash donate for more from Skip.
Be sure to check out the many resources available at
connectwiskip dot com slash store. Come back next time for
(25:23):
more verse by verse teaching of God's Word. Here on
connect with skip Heidzig.
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