back to indexBerean Community Church Sunday Service 1-17-2021
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11:20 Hebrews
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Oh my soul, oh my soul, worship His holy name. 00:00:11.000 |
Sing like never before, oh my soul, I worship Your holy name. 00:00:41.000 |
Whatever may pass and whatever lies before me, 00:00:58.000 |
Bless the Lord, oh my soul, oh my soul, worship His holy name. 00:01:13.000 |
Sing like never before, oh my soul, I worship Your holy name. 00:01:26.000 |
We're rich in love, we're rich in love, and we're slow to anger. 00:01:44.000 |
For all Your goodness I will keep on singing. 00:02:03.000 |
Bless the Lord, oh my soul, oh my soul, worship His holy name. 00:02:16.000 |
Sing like never before, oh my soul, I worship Your holy name. 00:02:31.000 |
And on that day, and on that day when my strength is failing, 00:02:47.000 |
Still my soul will sing Your praise unending. 00:03:07.000 |
Bless the Lord, oh my soul, oh my soul, worship His holy name. 00:03:19.000 |
Sing like never before, oh my soul, I worship Your holy name. 00:03:31.000 |
Bless the Lord, oh my soul, oh my soul, worship His holy name. 00:03:46.000 |
Sing like never before, oh my soul, I worship Your holy name. 00:04:06.000 |
Again, welcome to Berean Community Church, those of you who are here and online. 00:04:14.000 |
We have a few announcements before we get started. 00:04:16.000 |
First of all, our members meeting is happening today at 2.30pm. 00:04:20.000 |
So those of you who are members and those of you who are going to be introduced to membership today, 00:04:27.000 |
So if you didn't get a Zoom address to come in, 00:04:30.000 |
Pastor Mark Lim is going to give that to you. 00:04:32.000 |
So if you can't find it, please contact him ASAP. 00:04:35.000 |
And if you can't make it, please let him know also. 00:04:37.000 |
Today is the beginning of the year where we re-signed the covenant. 00:04:41.000 |
So you should have gotten an email asking you to go through and to evaluate the covenant 00:04:47.000 |
So if you haven't done so, we ask you to do that, hopefully, before you come to the meeting. 00:04:52.000 |
And so that, again, at 2.30 sharp, we're going to be able to do that 00:04:55.000 |
and expect to be in the room for about an hour. 00:04:58.000 |
Starting from this week, we said that watch and pray is going to be the theme of this year. 00:05:04.000 |
And so that's why we're implementing morning prayer to come a little bit early 00:05:09.000 |
and take some time to pray before the worship starts. 00:05:13.000 |
Starting from this Wednesday, the church is going to be open from 7.30 to 8.30 a.m. 00:05:17.000 |
So those of you who want to physically be here to participate in time of prayer, 00:05:21.000 |
the sanctuary is going to be open, and you can come and take some time to pray, 00:05:29.000 |
And then there will be other prayer meetings that are going on. 00:05:31.000 |
The Tuesday prayer meeting for the college students will also continue to go on. 00:05:36.000 |
There's going to be more opportunities for us to get together to take some time to pray. 00:05:40.000 |
So we don't want this to just be the theme that we have in the background, 00:05:44.000 |
but we want to actively pursue to build a church that really seeks God in prayer. 00:05:51.000 |
Along with that, on January 29th at 7.30 p.m., we are having a praise and prayer night. 00:05:58.000 |
Again, it will be indoor and outdoor in order to kind of distance ourselves. 00:06:02.000 |
And if you are planning to come, just go to the app and just kind of say that you're coming 00:06:06.000 |
so that we can know how many people are coming for that. 00:06:09.000 |
And then our second round, or for second Thessalonians Bible study, 00:06:14.000 |
it's going to be starting the first week of February. 00:06:18.000 |
And so people have been asking if we're going to be able to get together live. 00:06:21.000 |
And, again, considering all that's going on, we're going to probably just keep a status quo for now. 00:06:26.000 |
So if we look at the numbers and see what's going on around us and what the government is saying, 00:06:31.000 |
if it looks like we're able to, we may change that going forward. 00:06:34.000 |
But at least for the opening part of it, we're letting you know that we'll most likely continue what's going on. 00:06:39.000 |
We will be having it on Zoom and online, unless your small group is making specific accommodations for that group. 00:06:49.000 |
And I think that's it for the announcements for today. 00:06:52.000 |
All right, so we'll give a few minutes for us to take some time for our offering. 00:06:57.000 |
And then, again, if you have a physical offering, it will be in the back box over there. 00:07:06.000 |
Heavenly Father, we thank you so much for just watching over us, persevering with us. 00:07:11.000 |
Things that we are aware of and things that we are not aware of. 00:07:15.000 |
Lord, you are our God, and we want to worship you. 00:07:19.000 |
We want to worship you in spirit and in truth. 00:07:22.000 |
Lord, search us and know us and see if there's any hurtful ways in us. 00:07:27.000 |
If we've brought into this worship, Lord, anything that distracts us, 00:07:31.000 |
any entanglement that causes us, Lord God, to drift from you, 00:07:35.000 |
help us through this service to be reminded of who you are, 00:07:38.000 |
that our eyes may be opened again, that our hearts, Lord, may be softened again, 00:07:43.000 |
that we will continue to follow you and honor you with all our hearts. 00:07:48.000 |
So we pray that even in our giving, help us to give cheerfully, joyfully, abundantly, Lord, 00:08:48.000 |
Church family, let's all rise together as we sing before God. 00:09:22.000 |
The truth and light, the fire of a thousand burning suns 00:09:38.000 |
Who commands the nations, who commands the nations 00:10:32.000 |
You come to save us when we turn to Him as love. 00:22:09.000 |
If you can turn your Bibles to Hebrews chapter 11. 00:22:13.000 |
We're continuing on the series on the heroes of faith in Hebrews chapter 11. 00:22:20.000 |
I'm going to be reading from verse 20 through 22. 00:22:24.000 |
But my main text, we're just going to be on one verse today. 00:22:45.000 |
blessed each of the sons of Joseph and worshipped, 00:22:51.000 |
made mention of the exodus of the sons of Israel 00:23:03.000 |
We pray for your Holy Spirit to continue to speak to us. 00:23:07.000 |
Lord, we know that the exposition of your word, Lord, 00:23:11.000 |
will only allow us, Lord, to understand mentally 00:23:21.000 |
Search our hearts, our thoughts, our motives. 00:23:24.000 |
May it be surrendered to your word this morning. 00:23:43.000 |
covers the history in Genesis, almost 40 chapters. 00:23:47.000 |
And so I could just kind of skim over and say, 00:24:01.000 |
And I think it's beneficial for us to understand 00:24:04.000 |
the historical context in which this is going on. 00:24:09.000 |
it really is covering over about two and a half chapters. 00:24:12.000 |
And then the other two men that are mentioned, 00:24:16.000 |
they're going to be covering about 12 to 13 chapters each. 00:24:23.000 |
So when he says, "By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau," 00:24:30.000 |
So instead of just assuming you know the story, 00:24:32.000 |
I think it would be good for us to review it, 00:24:38.000 |
Right off the bat, we're looking at verse 20, 00:24:47.000 |
and you didn't ask any questions, that's enough, 00:24:59.000 |
it causes us to take a step back and question. 00:25:08.000 |
where the sacrifice and then saving him from that 00:25:15.000 |
through Abraham and the things that he was going through, 00:25:18.000 |
and all of that to point to us, to strike in us 00:25:21.000 |
about what God himself was going to do with his own son. 00:25:28.000 |
Most people think he could be as young as 14 or 15 00:25:35.000 |
So he wasn't a little kid where he didn't understand 00:25:49.000 |
and then he's able to do even greater things than Abraham 00:26:09.000 |
All of redemptive history happened like that? 00:26:13.000 |
And again, we'll review what is happening here, 00:26:22.000 |
especially in the Bible, that we don't fully understand 00:26:37.000 |
was going to come down, come through trickery, 00:27:24.000 |
what this actually means and try to uncover that. 00:27:26.000 |
And so I'm just going to tell you ahead of time. 00:27:28.000 |
We're going to spend our time in chapter 25-27 00:27:37.000 |
And then my main point is going to be at the end. 00:27:39.000 |
I'm going to try to summarize what's going on 00:27:46.000 |
Okay? So first part of it, we want to go over 00:27:54.000 |
He was just involved in probably the greatest 00:28:03.000 |
saying that God the Father is going to provide. 00:28:05.000 |
So again, you would think that the next event 00:28:20.000 |
It doesn't say anything, but he was just like 00:28:45.000 |
because you're so pretty, that they're going to come 00:29:14.000 |
believing that God can raise him from the dead. 00:30:05.000 |
The word "peaceful" is one of those Hebrew words 00:30:08.000 |
that you can't translate with one word into English. 00:30:39.000 |
That's a little bit different than "peaceful." 00:30:49.000 |
So all of these words are very specifically nuanced words 00:30:53.000 |
because you can't translate it with one word. 00:30:55.000 |
In fact, the literal understanding of that word 00:31:00.000 |
You can kind of see where that word comes from. 00:31:03.000 |
"Complete" meaning that you're not striving for anything. 00:31:08.000 |
So I think the best way to summarize all these words 00:31:16.000 |
He just lived in this tent, did what his mommy told him to do. 00:31:38.000 |
Verse 28, "Now Isaac loved Esau because he had a taste for game, 00:31:56.000 |
He's out there getting animals to come back and feed his family. 00:32:07.000 |
Esau came in from the field and he was famished. 00:32:09.000 |
And Esau said to Jacob, 'Please let me have a swallow of that red stuff there, 00:32:26.000 |
He said, "I'm hungry. Can you give me that stew?" 00:32:37.000 |
"Give me your birthright. I'll give you a little bit of stew. 00:32:43.000 |
I mean, he's not somebody that we would look at, 00:32:48.000 |
It's like, "Well, Jacob's not the type of guy that you'd want to be friends with." 00:32:54.000 |
And then Esau, you know, he's just being a man of the field, 00:33:13.000 |
So he swore to him and sold his birthright to Jacob. 00:33:18.000 |
I'll give you my birthright. What good is that to me? 00:33:22.000 |
Now, you have to understand what happens here in that text, 00:33:39.000 |
Edomites keep coming up in the prophets saying how Edomites are judged 00:33:43.000 |
because they gloated over the judgment of Israel. 00:33:46.000 |
They were always a stumbling block to the nation of Israel. 00:33:53.000 |
Because he was hungry, and he was overdramatic. 00:34:02.000 |
Jacob, on the other hand, he becomes--his name gets changed to Israel, 00:34:10.000 |
And God's redemptive plan comes through this line. 00:34:16.000 |
Instead of being generous and saying, "Man, you must be famished, 00:34:19.000 |
and you brought all this game for us to eat." 00:34:21.000 |
He said, "Well, if you want that, give me your birthright." 00:34:24.000 |
Maybe knowing his weakness, took advantage of his brother. 00:34:27.000 |
And that's how--that's how redemptive history-- 00:34:31.000 |
the redemptive nation of Israel is named after this guy 00:34:46.000 |
Why would such an important thing happen in this way and is allowed? 00:34:54.000 |
Well, you have to understand that the birthright here 00:34:57.000 |
is much more than an average family's birthright. 00:35:00.000 |
In verse 34, Jacob gave Esau the bread and lentil, 00:35:05.000 |
and he ate and drank and rose and went on his way. 00:35:08.000 |
He's like, "I'm satisfied. I gave my birthright." 00:35:10.000 |
It didn't cost him anything, at least not immediately. 00:35:13.000 |
But it says, "Thus Esau despised his birthright." 00:35:19.000 |
Now, typically, when a father passes away at that particular time, 00:35:24.000 |
the firstborn would get the double portion of whatever the other children would get. 00:35:33.000 |
That because he's the firstborn, he said, "What good is it to me? 00:35:36.000 |
I should have gotten $10,000. I'm going to get $5,000." 00:35:45.000 |
Remember, Isaac was the sacrifice that Abraham was supposed to give. 00:35:50.000 |
So Isaac, in redemptive history, represented the type of Christ. 00:35:55.000 |
His possible death and resurrection, coming back from the dead, 00:36:01.000 |
So Isaac, I can almost guarantee, knew full well why his father was doing that. 00:36:09.000 |
His father, he probably asked him, "What did you do that for?" 00:36:13.000 |
And I can guarantee, right, if Abraham left Ur of the Chaldeans, 00:36:20.000 |
he was already a pretty wealthy man when he left, 00:36:22.000 |
and he's wandering into desert or in areas where he's not safe. 00:36:26.000 |
Any human being would say, "Well, if we want to live a nice and comfortable life, 00:36:29.000 |
just go back to Ur of the Chaldeans. Why are we doing this?" 00:36:33.000 |
The only reason why he did it is because God said to go. 00:36:39.000 |
This covenant promise was the only reason why they did what they did, 00:36:42.000 |
because what Abraham did didn't make any sense. 00:36:46.000 |
So I don't think it's a stretch to think that Abraham took every opportunity 00:36:57.000 |
And I can guarantee that Isaac told Jacob and Esau about this blessing, 00:37:03.000 |
The greatest event that happened in Isaac's life was what happened at Mount Moriah, 00:37:12.000 |
So when Esau said, "Well, what good is my birthright when I'm hungry?" 00:37:17.000 |
He wasn't simply rejecting the double portion. 00:37:23.000 |
"What good is all of that when I'm hungry and I'm about to die?" 00:37:25.000 |
And that's why it says he despised his birthright. 00:37:30.000 |
In Genesis 26, 3-4, God reminds Isaac of this covenant. 00:38:05.000 |
This is exactly, almost verbatim, repeated in Genesis 12, 1, 2, and 3. 00:38:10.000 |
This is the covenant that God made with Abraham and his descendants. 00:38:14.000 |
And it's reminding Isaac, and again, I don't think it's a stretch to think that 00:38:23.000 |
And Esau just kind of, like, "What good is that? 00:38:29.000 |
What good is the covenant promise if I'm hungry and I'm going to die?" 00:38:36.000 |
You see, Esau would have been the better leader. 00:38:42.000 |
In fact, the Scripture says Isaac loved Esau. 00:38:46.000 |
Not only was, by law, was he obligated to bless his older son, 00:38:51.000 |
he wanted to bless his older son because that's the one that would make sense. 00:38:59.000 |
If you were to choose a leader for the covenant promise to lead the nation of 00:39:03.000 |
Israel, whenever God establishes that, whose line would you choose? 00:39:18.000 |
Or Jacob, smooth, plain, content, quiet, mama's boy, right? 00:39:35.000 |
If you were to put on paper who should lead, where the covenant should go to 00:39:40.000 |
fulfill this great promise, Jacob does not fit the mold. 00:39:48.000 |
And he said, on top of that, Esau was very hairy, which is going to come out later. 00:39:52.000 |
Everything that you would think about a testosterone-driven, manly man who's 00:39:56.000 |
going to lead this nation to conquer their enemies, Esau fit that description. 00:40:04.000 |
And yet, Rebekah hears about the plan that Isaac is about to bless his son, 00:40:14.000 |
She suggests to Jacob, your father at his old age, he doesn't see well, so I have 00:40:20.000 |
Instead of having Esau be blessed, I want you to be blessed, right? 00:40:24.000 |
And so he said, well, look how it's described in verse 11. 00:40:27.000 |
"Jacob answered his mother and said, 'Behold, Esau, my brother, is hairy man, 00:40:35.000 |
You know, the thing that pops out at me is Jacob doesn't say, that don't sound 00:40:49.000 |
He doesn't worry about, like, that's my older brother, I can't do that to him. 00:40:58.000 |
"Perhaps my father will feel me, then I will be a deceiver in his sight, and I 00:41:02.000 |
will bring upon myself a curse and not a blessing." 00:41:14.000 |
Verse 13, "But his mother said to him, 'Your curse be on me, my son. 00:41:18.000 |
Only obey my voice and go get them for me.'" So this guy didn't even have enough 00:41:25.000 |
What if this backfires, doesn't work, he's hairy and I'm not, you know? 00:41:29.000 |
And I know he's old and he's blind, but it's just too obvious. 00:41:32.000 |
He said, "Don't worry, any consequence, I'll take it. 00:41:34.000 |
You just do what I say." So he did what his mommy told him to do, right? 00:41:41.000 |
"So he went and got them and brought them to his mother, and his mother made 00:41:47.000 |
Then Rebecca took the best garments of Esau, her older son, which were with her 00:41:53.000 |
in the house, and put them on Jacob, her younger son, and put the skin of the 00:41:57.000 |
young goats on his hands and on the smooth part of his neck. 00:42:01.000 |
She also gave the savory food and the bread which she had made to her son, 00:42:05.000 |
Jacob." Doesn't this sound like a comedy skit? 00:42:10.000 |
This is the formation of Israel where Jesus is going to come through that line. 00:42:21.000 |
And the way that he gets the blessing is he puts on goat skin so that he can 00:42:28.000 |
And the first thing I think of is just how hairy was Esau that he was going to 00:42:47.000 |
In verse 21, "Then Isaac said to Jacob, 'Please come close that I may feel you, 00:42:51.000 |
my son, whether you are really my son Esau or not.' 00:42:54.000 |
So Jacob came close to Isaac his father, and he felt him and said, 00:42:58.000 |
'The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.'" 00:43:09.000 |
He said, "Oh, that sounds, you know, it sounds like Jacob, 00:43:21.000 |
God's covenant blessing is coming down through this, through this. 00:43:28.000 |
You know, there's a lot of strange things in the Bible that sometimes we read 00:43:31.000 |
and we're just kind of like, oh, it's hard to understand. 00:43:34.000 |
So, you know, a lot of times we treat Leviticus like that, right? 00:43:37.000 |
We come through Leviticus and it's like, what? 00:43:45.000 |
And you go through all that and say, oh, I don't understand. 00:43:48.000 |
There's something important going on, but you just kind of move up, right? 00:43:52.000 |
But some of the greatest treasures in the Bible are hidden in these things, right? 00:43:57.000 |
I mean, I remember the time when I was preaching through the Old Testament 00:44:01.000 |
And I came to Judges, and Judges is a constant cycle of Israel. 00:44:05.000 |
You know, everyone did what was right in their own eyes 00:44:07.000 |
because they didn't have a king, and they would continually fall into sin, 00:44:11.000 |
and then they would cry out to God when they're oppressed, 00:44:15.000 |
And there's a couple stories in there that just -- 00:44:17.000 |
I had such a hard time preaching because I didn't know what the point was. 00:44:24.000 |
And he said that Eglon was a guy who was a ruler oppressing Israel, 00:44:27.000 |
and God raises up a Benjamite, and he goes and kills him, 00:44:30.000 |
but the guy is so obese that he sticks the knife in him, 00:44:33.000 |
and he can't pull it back out because he gets stuck, right? 00:44:45.000 |
He gets stuck, and then he's able to escape because his guards don't come in. 00:44:50.000 |
And the reason why they don't come in is because they thought he was relieving himself 00:44:54.000 |
for a long time, that he was in the bathroom and he wasn't coming out. 00:45:07.000 |
I was like, "What am I going to preach on this? 00:45:10.000 |
I'm going to preach on God teaching us through this couldn't pull the knife out, 00:45:18.000 |
Like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, what's the point here?" 00:45:21.000 |
And I remember very specifically what I preached there, 00:45:26.000 |
but I remember preaching that when you are not right with God, 00:45:43.000 |
So when I took a close look at him, he was like, 00:45:45.000 |
"This is the judge that God raised to deliver Israel?" 00:45:48.000 |
There's a lot of stories in the Bible where it just doesn't fit. 00:45:56.000 |
This is one of those things where it's like, "What? 00:46:18.000 |
Everything that Abraham did, everything that he went through, 00:46:25.000 |
And the way it happened was, like, "You sound like Jacob, 00:46:44.000 |
Why did God allow this in redemptive history? 00:46:51.000 |
In fact, if you look at Jesus' genealogy, this is Jesus, the Son of God. 00:46:56.000 |
There's prostitutes, adulterers, and murderers in Jesus' genealogy. 00:47:06.000 |
And God orchestrated this, and yet we see people in there, 00:47:19.000 |
Why wasn't Jacob punished for his lying and scheming? 00:47:32.000 |
Again, I told you that the main point is at the end, so we're at the end. 00:47:37.000 |
You look at Esau, it's like, "Wow, that's unfair for Esau." 00:47:42.000 |
How many of us have made dumb decisions when we were young? 00:47:45.000 |
And because of that, his whole heritage, all his descendants, 00:47:56.000 |
In fact, in Hebrews 12, the chapter we're going to get to pretty soon, 00:48:02.000 |
"That there be no immoral or godless person like Esau, 00:48:08.000 |
who sold his own birthright for a single meal. 00:48:10.000 |
For you know that even afterwards, when he desired to inherit the blessings, 00:48:14.000 |
he was rejected, for he found no place for repentance, 00:48:23.000 |
"And Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate it and drank and rose 00:48:27.000 |
and went on his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright." 00:48:31.000 |
We may look at this particular event and say, "Well, he made a mistake. 00:48:35.000 |
He was hungry, and he wasn't thinking properly, 00:48:47.000 |
And because of that, he's called immoral and godless, 00:48:55.000 |
You have to understand that the rejection of his birthright 00:49:04.000 |
It was a rejection of all the promise that God made 00:49:11.000 |
God was planning to bring about the salvation of mankind 00:49:18.000 |
And so when he rejected, when he despised it, 00:49:21.000 |
it may seem like a small act, but from God's perspective, it was immoral. 00:49:34.000 |
You know the word for glory in the Bible literally simply means "weighty." 00:49:39.000 |
Something serious. That's what the word "glory" means. 00:49:45.000 |
So when it says that he simply despised it, he considered it as nothing. 00:49:50.000 |
He compared his birthright, the promise of God, the covenant promise, 00:49:55.000 |
and he compared it with his hunger, and his hunger was more important. 00:50:03.000 |
What we may look at as a simple mistake, a useful indiscretion, 00:50:13.000 |
"Truly I say to you, all sins shall be forgiven, the sons of man. 00:50:18.000 |
but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, 00:50:24.000 |
He said all things can be forgiven except for those who reject his promise. 00:50:30.000 |
And that's exactly what it says that Esau did. 00:50:33.000 |
Esau considered the weightiness of what God was doing, 00:50:40.000 |
How often do you and I look at simple indiscretions 00:50:51.000 |
I'm not saying that God is not important, but I've got to pay my bills. 00:50:58.000 |
I've got to do this, and I've got to do that. 00:51:00.000 |
And so we don't look at it as a rejection of God. 00:51:07.000 |
I've got to take care of my needs first, and then I'll consider the big picture," 00:51:11.000 |
not realizing that we may be rejecting, despising the promises of God. 00:51:21.000 |
The small things that sometimes seem so urgent in our lives 00:51:29.000 |
Whether we become millionaires, become famous, 00:51:31.000 |
where our children grow up to become superstars and taken care of, 00:51:36.000 |
and we live to 105 years old, all of that eternity is very, very trivial. 00:51:42.000 |
But the things that God says in His Word has eternal value. 00:51:47.000 |
So His covenant promise, Esau's great sin was that he considered the covenant of God, 00:51:57.000 |
Jacob's, he's a guy who's like, "Well, okay, now we see why Esau's sin was so great, 00:52:13.000 |
The Bible says that if you have a faith of a mustard seed-- 00:52:21.000 |
I don't know if you've ever seen a mustard seed. 00:52:25.000 |
It's so tiny, but if you see that plant, and when it grows, it grows into this great tree. 00:52:30.000 |
He says if you have a seed, if you have faith of a mustard seed, you can move what? 00:52:35.000 |
So the point that Jesus was making is not that you're a great man, 00:52:40.000 |
it's not your great achievements, but if you have faith in this great God, 00:52:44.000 |
even if it's tiny like a mustard seed, even if it's hard to see, but it's there, 00:52:50.000 |
even if you have that, you will see the power of God. 00:52:56.000 |
His power is that tiny little connection to this power is where the power is. 00:53:04.000 |
Jacob is a perfect example of a man who had tiny faith, at least at this time, 00:53:08.000 |
or at least what we see at this time in his life. 00:53:13.000 |
I think the best way for us to understand what Jacob did is this way. 00:53:19.000 |
I don't know if you've ever been to a large conference, you have, you know, 00:53:22.000 |
like celebrity pastors come and speak in great sermons, great music, 00:53:31.000 |
They're like beating everybody to the front seat, and they get there, 00:53:38.000 |
All their friends and family and cousins who may come there, may not come there, 00:53:42.000 |
but they're saving all the seats, and everybody else is ticked off. 00:53:52.000 |
And so people watching that may look at it and say, "What are they doing? 00:53:57.000 |
But the reason why they're doing that is because they want the great seats. 00:54:03.000 |
They wanted to be in the front and have the best seats so that they can have the best blessing. 00:54:09.000 |
They can see whoever is speaking, all the nuances and emotions on their face, 00:54:16.000 |
and the motive behind what they're doing is great. 00:54:20.000 |
But the method in which they did it ticks off a lot of people. 00:54:24.000 |
I don't know if you've ever been to a big conference. 00:54:26.000 |
You know, I've been to big conferences like that where it's just eager. 00:54:29.000 |
It's like, you know, iPhone 18 is coming out, and they have to be the first ones to get it, 00:54:33.000 |
and they run, and they're literally running against other people. 00:54:36.000 |
And they get there, and they spread out like, "Mine!" 00:54:42.000 |
I look at what Jacob does here is similar to that. 00:54:46.000 |
You know, you could see that tiny faith where he understood what he was getting, and he wanted it. 00:54:55.000 |
Let me ask you, what does God want from us more than anything else? 00:55:14.000 |
Now, all of these things are commanded in Scripture. 00:55:17.000 |
But what does he desire of us more than anything else? 00:55:21.000 |
To love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. 00:55:32.000 |
When we value something, when we desire something, worship comes from that. 00:55:36.000 |
He didn't just say plant churches, and make disciples, and pray, and do all this, and be a good Christian, 00:55:41.000 |
and get things done, bear a lot of fruit so that other people can... 00:55:45.000 |
He said, "All of these things are true, but the biggest, the most important thing..." 00:55:49.000 |
In fact, he says, "All of that thing, all of those things that I desire can really be summed up in one thing. 00:55:54.000 |
To love God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength." 00:55:59.000 |
Jacob, as foolish as he was, as questionable as the method was, 00:56:17.000 |
And that tiny little faith, that tiny little faith is what brought the blessing upon his life. 00:56:23.000 |
In Jeremiah 29, 13, "You will seek me and find me when you search me with all your heart." 00:56:33.000 |
And you see that repeated over, and over, and over again, all throughout Scripture. 00:56:38.000 |
You know, the challenge of being a Christian for a while, knowing things, studying the Bible, 00:56:48.000 |
I think all of us can remember when we first became Christian, when Christ was everything. 00:56:53.000 |
He was just not a good thing. He was everything. 00:56:56.000 |
Your life got flipped upside down. Nothing else seemed to matter. 00:57:02.000 |
And for the rest of our Christian life is to look back at that, 00:57:05.000 |
and try to be that same person I was when I first met Christ. 00:57:10.000 |
Because that's what God desires from us more than anything else. 00:57:14.000 |
That's why Hebrews 11, 6, it says, "Without faith it is impossible to please him, 00:57:17.000 |
for he who comes to God must believe that he is, and he is a rewarder of those who seek him." 00:57:23.000 |
But that word "seek" isn't just passively seeking. 00:57:27.000 |
King James, in New King James, says, "He who diligently seek him with all his heart." 00:57:33.000 |
In fact, Jacob, this slippery mama's boy, who used all of his trickery to get the blessing, 00:57:43.000 |
he's the guy where his name gets changed to Israel, the one who contends with God. 00:57:50.000 |
And that's the name of Israel, the apple of his eye. 00:57:56.000 |
He calls them people who wrestles with me, who wants me. 00:58:05.000 |
Because that's what he wants from all of us, to be people who are contending for God, 00:58:11.000 |
who want him more than anything else, more than church, more than friendship, 00:58:20.000 |
And if there's anything that is highlighted in Jacob's life, 00:58:24.000 |
is that through all of his trickery, he wanted God. 00:58:29.000 |
And that's why he has a limp on his side, because he wrestled with God. 00:58:34.000 |
He's like, "I'm not going to let you go until you bless me." 00:58:50.000 |
Why didn't he, when he realized that he was tricked, say, "Okay, forget it. 00:59:02.000 |
You have to understand that at that time, for him to bestow a blessing, 00:59:15.000 |
For him to reverse what he did would have not simply been reversing what he said, 00:59:23.000 |
Because in the oral tradition, basically declaring that would have been no different 00:59:27.000 |
than signing a legal document saying, "I hand all this over to you." 00:59:30.000 |
And it wasn't in his authority to simply just wipe that out. 00:59:35.000 |
So as small and tiny his faith may have been, it was still faith. 00:59:42.000 |
The point of all of this is all of this is described in verse 20. 00:59:56.000 |
Because he's a younger brother, but his name comes first here 00:59:59.000 |
because he was the one who receives the covenant blessing. 01:00:03.000 |
They're blessed, even regarding things to come. 01:00:08.000 |
So the point of the story is not about Isaac. 01:00:16.000 |
Ultimately, it's about a faithful God who keeps his promise, 01:00:24.000 |
And if there's one thing that stands out of all of this, it's this tiny faith. 01:00:30.000 |
This tiny faith that connects them to this great God 01:00:38.000 |
We could probably pinpoint a minimum of two to three dozen times 01:00:45.000 |
in redemptive history where you and I should have been gone. 01:00:50.000 |
I mean, think about a thousand years of the Catholics 01:00:59.000 |
And literally killing people for wanting to translate his word. 01:01:13.000 |
Look at the chaos that you and I are in today. 01:01:16.000 |
I mean, people say, like, "It's hard to find a church where the word of God is taught." 01:01:25.000 |
how many of you knew people that you thought were men of God at one point 01:01:56.000 |
If the only reason why you and I are still here is because Jesus said, 01:01:59.000 |
"I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it." 01:02:06.000 |
It was small faith in a great God why you and I are here today. 01:02:11.000 |
So if there's anything that we learn from this, 01:02:30.000 |
Let me read a couple of verses for you before we end. 01:02:33.000 |
2 Corinthians 1:20, "For as many as are the promises of God, 01:02:39.000 |
Therefore also through Him is our amen to the glory of God through us." 01:02:44.000 |
1 Peter 1:24, "For all flesh like grass and all its glory like the flowers of the grass. 01:02:48.000 |
The grass withers and the flower falls off, but the word of the Lord endures forever. 01:02:52.000 |
And this is the word which was preached to you." 01:03:01.000 |
As our worship team comes up, why don't we take a few minutes to reflect and to pray. 01:03:10.000 |
put our confidence in things that we shouldn't have. 01:03:13.000 |
Maybe there's people who have disappointed you in life, 01:03:20.000 |
I hope that this would serve as a reminder to us that our God is sovereign. 01:03:26.000 |
There's times when we feel like our faith is even smaller than a mustard seed. 01:03:32.000 |
And yet it is that tiny mustard seed that connects us to God, 01:03:36.000 |
where we see God being faithful to His promise. 01:03:40.000 |
So wherever you are in your faith, let's take some time to pray 01:03:43.000 |
and ask the Lord to open our eyes so that we may see the glory, the weightedness of who He is, 01:03:48.000 |
and that we may not despise the things that God has called us to be. 01:03:53.000 |
So let's take some time to pray as our worship team comes up. 01:05:45.000 |
Brothers and sisters, let's rise together for a closing praise. 01:09:33.000 |
Out to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, 01:09:36.000 |
and to make you stand in the presence of His glory,