Genesis 25 - Redemption history in motion

We study through books of the Bible here at the Village Chapel, and we have been studying the very first of the 66 books of the Bible.

It's called Genesis, and we've called our study in the beginning.

That's the way the book starts itself, but it also points us all the way back to the very origin of all things in this universe and uh begins to help answer some of those really big questions that people have had forever, as long as there's been any human beings thinking.

We've wondered about where everything came from.

We've wondered about what does it mean to be a human person.

We've wondered about what's going wrong with the world and is there any solution to it?

And we've wondered about is there a God?

And if so, what kind of God is this God that exists?

And Genesis is just overflowing with helpful declarations and helpful insights to help us with all of those kinds of big giant questions.

It's not a science book, so it doesn't seek to explain how God created everything, but it does declare that in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and then we've flowed through the chapters all the way, we're into chapter 25 today.

But let me put up there first for you sort of an outline I ran across, uh, just based on the personalities that are at the center of the storyline, anyway.

And this might be helpful for some of you who'd like to have an outline for the book.

Genesis 1 and 2, of course, the creation event, Genesis 3 through 5, the fall, um, uh the entrance of sin into the world, the rebellion of humanity against the God who created them.

Um, 6 through 9, really the story of the flood, and many of you are familiar with the story of Noah.

Uh 10 through 11 are kind of a table of nations, and then we've been in the storyline that uh focuses in a little bit on uh Abraham and Sarah, and now um Isaac in chapter 25 just has a couple of chapters, not nearly as much uh text given to the story of Isaac and his life, but there's some there, and it can, it's a there's a continuity that's being shown.

So I think we need to be aware of that, and it helps to see this in context, I think.

The story of Jacob and uh and his life and his wrestlings with God, etc., chapters 27 through 36.

And then, of course, Joseph, uh, as we come toward the last section of the book, what a powerful uh story, and um what a what you know when you watch God in pursuit of a people he can call his own, and um and you you look at all that happens throughout the book of Genesis, you keep seeing this amazing God who is so patient, so gracious, so kind, so generous with people who continue to sort of be self-centered and impatient and want to take the reins and want to be in charge and all of that sort of thing.

So I'm gonna call Genesis 25, the story of redemption history in motion.

Uh, it is gonna show us that God's plan for redemption history that that began really all the way back uh right after the fall, we are sort of the, we got the preview of it in Genesis chapter 3, it continues to unfold throughout the pages of Genesis and really all the way through the entire Bible, all the way to Revelation, such that uh some have said if you if you had a little thread that ran all the way through the Bible and you you pulled on that thread in Genesis, it would crinkle the pages in the book of Revelation.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

I think that's true.

Um, I think it's all connected, I think it all finds its fulfillment in the person and work of Jesus Christ.

But here in Genesis 25, we'll read about Abraham passing from the scene, and the storyline shifts to the much shorter story of Isaac.

So let's uh, without much ado here, let me just pray and we will uh take a look at Genesis 25.

Lord, thank you for your word, that it's living and active.

As we uh approach these pages today, um I pray, God, that um you will show us what we cannot see on our own.

Holy Spirit, that uh you'll lead us to uh understand things that we wouldn't be able to understand on our own.

Open the eyes of our hearts and our minds uh and may your word uh speak to us.

Give us a clearer vision of your truth, a greater faith in your power, and a more confident assurance of your love toward us.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen and amen.

So Genesis 25, and it begins with uh the passing of Abraham.

Now, Abraham took another wife, as we just read in chapter 24 and 23, as Sarah passes from the scene, and uh we see that um uh Abraham has arranged for a wife for Isaac, his son, and it's just amazing, uh so such masterful, uh masterfully told stories there in those two chapters.

But Abraham now, at probably about age 140, which is remarkable, just to even think about it, he's gonna live to 175.

We'll find that out in this chapter, but he is about 140 right now, and he remarries, or he takes another wife, if you will.

Uh, her name was Ketura, and she bore to him Zimran and Jakshan and Medan and Midian and Ishbak and Shua.

And these names, of course, are quite strange to our ears here in our own time.

Uh, I always find myself just fascinated with them.

Sometimes they have meanings that we can discover.

Um, other times they might lead us to see the fountainhead, for instance, of another people group that we hear about later on, like uh Midian, for instance.

Verse 3, Joxhan became the father of Sheba and Dedan, and the sons of Dedan were Ashuram and Letushim and Leumim, and the sons of Midian were Epha and Efer and Hanak and Abidah and El Daa.

All these were the sons of Katurah.

Now Abraham gave all that he had to Isaac.

So he has got some great respect for God's covenant promises and for God's instruction to him as it relates to this, because God has told him that while he has made many promises to Abraham, even to Ishmael, to Isaac as well, uh, the promised covenant Messiah, the seed of Abraham, if you will, that will be coming, will be coming through the line of Isaac.

And God's made that really clear to Abraham.

And so he gave all that he had to Isaac, but to the sons of his concubines, Abraham gave gifts while he was still living, and he sent them away from his son Isaac eastward to the land of the east.

And so this is probably Transjordan and parts to the south as well.

All these are all the years of Abraham's life that he lived, 175 years.

And that just blows my mind to think about that.

But and Abraham breathed his last and died in a ripe old age.

An old man, satisfied with life, and he was gathered to his people.

Man, what an interesting tombstone, if that were, you know, in some way summarized for him.

He'll be buried, as we'll be told, here in the same cave that Sarah was buried in.

But what a great way to describe someone's life.

Um that he was satisfied with life.

Some of your English translations will probably say uh full uh or full of years, or they will say it might say um contented, and uh just had a flourishing life, and uh not without trouble, not without some uh failure and some frustration, not without some family trouble, etc., just like we all have.

But I love that this is the way he's described.

He died at a ripe old age, an old man, satisfied with life, and he was gathered to his people.

Well, verse nine is interesting because it says, Then his sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machbilah, in the field of Ephron, the son of Zohar the Hittite facing Mamre, the field which Abraham purchased from the sons of Heth.

There Abraham was buried with Sarah, his wife.

And this is such, you know, the narrator is taking great care to remind us of this cave at Machbilah.

Um, as we we learned before when Abraham buried Sarah in that same cave.

This is the only bit of land that Abraham actually owns in what is the whole promised land that God promised to Abraham and his descendants.

And so he ends up purchasing this cave and the field in front of it, and he buries Sarah there.

Now he's buried there.

Uh we will see later.

Isaac and Rebekah will be buried there, Jacob and his wife Leah will be buried there, Joseph's bones will be brought back from Egypt to be buried there as well.

And so the gathering of the people of God, so to speak, together in this tomb.

And you know, here Genesis closes with this full tomb, and you read on into the New Testament and you see the four gospels, they close with an empty tomb.

And I love that the book of Revelation, the end of the entire Bible, the end of the New Testament, uh, declares that one day uh God intends to empty literally every tomb and great resurrection uh day.

But here at this particular funeral, Isaac and Ishmael come back together, and they have not had.

Last time we read about them being in the same space, it wasn't going well.

And so, uh, as with a lot of us in our own experiences in our own families, um, sometimes a funeral is what brings people back together.

And Isaac and Ishmael are together, they bury Abraham in this cave.

And it came about that after the death of Abraham that God blessed his son Isaac.

And Isaac lived by Bir Lahai Roy.

And uh that's the the well of the living one, uh, my seer.

And this is just an interesting name.

We've read that name before, and its meaning is rich.

And uh, the living one, of course, God, the author of and source of life itself, again answering some of the big questions we have, and yet at the same time telling us that God is He's the one that sees us, which I also really appreciate.

Um, if God is just the battery or the hum of the universe, or just the sort of uh some kind of conceptual thing as opposed to a personal being, um, that would lead us to think a certain way about God.

But here we're told that God is the living one and that he sees us.

And no matter where you're at today, no matter where I'm, what's going on in our lives, no matter where any of us are at, uh, we can trust that this God who is alive, the God who is really there, he sees you.

He knows exactly what you're going through and what's going on in your life.

And uh that is a is is fresh water.

Uh it's a well here.

It's it's a place that uh Isaac and he this is where he's gonna sort of center hub his home out of.

Well, anyway, we get now a couple of uh verses that are gonna give us the records of the generations of Ishmael, and then we'll begin with the sort of story of Isaac and his sons.

So, verse 12, now these are the records of the generations of Ishmael, Abraham's son, whom Hagar the Egyptian sernus maid bore to Abraham.

And these are the names of the sons of Ishmael by their names in the order of their birth.

Umbeoth, the firstborn of Ishmael, and Kadar, and Abdil, and Mibsam, and Mishmah, and Duma, and Masah, Hadad, Temah, Jetur, uh, Nafish, and Kedimah.

Um, these are the sons of Ishmael, and these are their names, by their villages and by their camps, twelve princes according to their tribes.

And remember, if you will, that all the way back in chapter 17, I think it's verse uh 20, God had promised uh to Hagar, Ishmael's mother, that the Lord, uh, as he makes this promise to Hagar, that the Lord would cause uh Ishmael to have many descendants.

Uh I think it's even mentioned 12 there.

And so here we have their names.

And thank you for uh uh listening to me as I struggle to read some of those.

Uh if I mispronounced any of them, which I'm sure I mispronounced some of them, um you probably don't know that I did anyway, so we're all just kind of working at this, aren't we?

Uh in terms of pronunciation.

But anyway, 17 says this these are the years of the life of Ishmael, 137 years.

And he breathed his last and he died, and he was gathered to his people.

And uh again, that uh the rootedness, the connection of family, so important.

And uh something that are in our own day and time, um, I think we need to recapture a sense of the value of that.

Well, they settle settled from Havilah to Shur, S-H-U-R, which is east of Egypt, as one goes toward Assyria.

He settled in defiance of all his relatives.

And that's this is gonna be, you know, though the way that this the narrator summarizes the life of Ishmael there goes, it's in keeping with the prediction that God had said that he would be a wild donkey of a man, that he would be sort of live a contentious life.

Maybe you know somebody like that, or or maybe that even resonates with you and might describe your own life.

Are you always in contention with other people?

Are you always having difficulty with other people?

Um, you won't be the first one, uh, but at the same time, it need not be that way.

And uh the Bible's great about leading us to the place of seeing how God works uh redemption in and through history into our lives.

Well, verse 19 is a little pivot.

Now, these are the records of the generations of Isaac, Abraham's son.

Abraham became the father of Isaac, and Isaac was 40 years old when he took Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel, the Syrian of Padan Aram, the sister of Laban the Syrian, to be his wife.

And this is this is, you know, Rebecca, as we as we studied earlier, uh, came from uh, you know, Abraham's uh sort of hometown area, if you will, and his extended family.

And uh here we're given insight into the age of Abraham.

That's why I said Abraham was had to be somewhere in the neighborhood of um 140 years of age when he took Keturah as his wife, or somewhere, maybe a little bit more than that, because how do we know that?

Well, because Isaac marries Rebekah at age 40.

So we know that Abraham was or Abraham was 100 years old when Isaac was born.

So if we're still reading about that and we know that Abraham was alive when Rebekah and Isaac married, then we know that Abraham's at least 140.

Well, Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife, verse 21 says, and she had a a similar, uh, similar difficulty to the difficulty that Sarah had.

Watch this.

Uh Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife because she was barren.

And the Lord answered him, and Rebekah his wife conceived.

Um, what you aren't told in that verse, because so often with the narration of these stories, he's moving so fast, covering a lot of territory, and summarizing.

Well, 20 years go by.

Uh he uh between when they're married and when they actually have a child.

And we'll see that in verse 26 here in just a second.

So 20, let me just emphasize, 20 years of praying for the same thing and not getting the answer you desire.

Um I don't know how patient you are.

I don't know how patient uh as I look at my own life, I I recognize I've I've not been patient.

I'm often frustrated with God's timing.

Um, but what happens is God continues to show us over and over and over and over again that he's ultimately the one in charge, that he is faithful to his promises.

And that that even in when all of the physical circumstances seem to say, this can't happen or that can't happen or whatever, with God all things are possible.

And so here uh Isaac is praying for for Rebecca, and it goes on for 20 years, and we're in summary, we're told that Rebecca becomes pregnant.

But the children struggle together within her, um, and so she's got twins within her.

And uh she said, if it is so, why then am I this way?

In other words, if this is an answer from God uh, you know, to our prayers, why am I having this struggle?

Why all this difficulty?

And of course, whatever her age is at this particular point, first time pregnant after 20 years of trying to get pregnant, um, here is this, you know, difficulty, this struggle that she's having, and she's going, why is it this way?

And how many times have we said, Lord, why are we going through this struggle?

What is going on here?

Um, and so she went to inquire of the Lord, we're told in verse 22, which is beautiful.

Do we?

Great thing, great challenge for all of us, too, to inquire of the Lord.

And watch how the Lord speaks to her.

And the Lord said to her, Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples shall be separated from your body.

The one people shall be stronger than the other, and the older shall serve the younger.

And so here's a uh a prophetic word to her, to Rebecca, uh, directly from the Lord, as far as we can tell here.

And it's basically suggesting that that struggle she's feeling within her womb is sort of foreshadowing the kind of struggle that's going to happen between the two boys.

Well, when her days were to be delivered, were fulfilled, behold, there were twins in her womb, just as God had said, there are two people or two nations are in your womb, right?

And the first came forth red all over like a hairy garment, and they named him Esau.

And Esau means hairy, not H-A-R-R-Y, but H-A-I-R-Y, Harry.

And so he was he was hairy all over like a hairy garment.

And afterward his brother came forth with his hand holding on to Esau's heel, his heel, so his name was called Jacob.

And Isaac was 60 years old when she gave birth to them.

And so, if Isaac is 60 when they're born, how old is Abraham?

He's still alive, even though we read about his death.

That was kind of a summary statement.

But he's still alive because he's gonna live to be 175.

So Abraham is gonna have 15 years with these two wrestlers, these two, you know, strugglers, if you will.

And uh, and that's that's just wonderful to think about, isn't it?

Well, when the boys grew up, verse 27 says, Esau became a skillful hunter, a man of the field, but Jacob was a peaceful man living in tents.

Now, now here it says that the parents had sort of a favorite child each, and the favoritism is not something to be admired here at all, I don't think, for parents.

Um, but it's stated as a bit of reportage.

It's uh it's they're letting us, and the narrator is letting us know that each of the parents had a favorite.

Now, Isaac loved Esau because he had a taste for game, but Rebekah loved Jacob.

And when Jacob had cooked stew, Esau came in from the field and he was famished.

And Esau said to Jacob, Please let me have a swallow of that red stuff, therefore I am famished.

Therefore his name was called Edom.

And so Esau also has the name Edom, and this this was common.

This wasn't an uncommon thing to have more than one name.

And Edom means red, and so he's he's red and hairy.

He's, you know, he's he's both, he he wants that that porridge, that, you know, that uh lentil soup, whatever, that chili, whatever it is, because it it's just he's famished, and he's he's his stomach is driving him, is what's happening.

And Jacob said to him, first sell me your birthright.

Now, this is huge.

Um Jacob the younger um would not have been in line for the cultural thing called the birthright.

The birthright went to the firstborn.

Uh in in lots of nations, actually, it was pretty much a sort of a uh common cultural tradition.

And the birthright would be a double portion of the inheritance that would be split up among the siblings, a double portion we go to the the it was part of the birthright that went to the firstborn, and also uh all of uh the the sort of the headship or the leadership of the family would be included in the birthright as well.

So Jacob says, You want this porridge?

You want this stuff out?

Made, you're so famished.

And he literally takes advantage of this particular opportunity to say, Give me your birthright.

Esau said, Behold, I'm about to die.

So of what use then is the birthright to me?

And um he's just, you know, again, he's letting his stomach completely drive him here.

Um, Jacob then responds, First, swear to me.

So he swore to him and sold his birthright to Jacob.

And then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate it, and he drank, and he rose, and he went on his way.

Thus, Esau despised his birthright, is the way the narrator assesses, summarizes, and closes out what we call chapter 25.

Of course, the chapter breaks were put in uh much, much later, but it's an interesting way to describe these two boys.

And I think we've got something to learn.

Now, this chapter for me is a bit of a patchwork when I look at the themes, and I was trying to think of, well, what am I gonna, what, what is it we want to talk about when we study a chapter like Genesis chapter 25?

Genesis 25 · chapter mention

Uh, first of all, very real people.

I think that's an important thing for us to all know and to recognize that as we read the scriptures, as we read these historical narratives, especially, um, uh they they give real names and real places, and some of these can be, you know, sort of triangulated and cross-referenced in extra-biblical literature from the ancient Near Eastern cultures.

Uh, but here we have, you know, some 4,000 years ago, uh, some some stories of uh that have been preserved for us for a reason, uh, but they aren't fictional characters, they're actual, real people.

And Isaac experienced at least three things in life that a lot of us do.

Um, he buried a parent.

Yeah.

He actually may have helped, you know, um, literally put Abraham's body in that cave right next to Sarah, he and uh uh Ishmael together.

And speaking of Ishmael, Isaac also forever shaped his relationship with a sibling, um, which I think is interesting because they they to have that common experience like that, um, and to to go through that uh together is uh uh always creates some kind of bond.

Sometimes people get uh upset with each other, sometimes there's difficulty in all of that, but it seems like when they came together to do this, to bury their father, um, that they did it with respect and with honor.

And thirdly, Isaac began the great adventure really of raising children, didn't he?

And um uh I I I want to point out, by the way, that Abraham loved Ishmael and he loved Isaac both, um, both of the brothers.

But they had a difficult start, didn't they?

And yet here uh as they're reunited for this uh for this funeral of their father, um, it's a it's a good reminder to all of us.

Let's let's don't wait till we are at a funeral to reconcile with one another if we have sibling rivalries or difficulties with other family members.

Why would you wait?

Uh sometimes those events like that uh push us out of the comfort zone of of our withdrawal or our or our you know anger and all that sort of thing fades to the back.

And sometimes the Lord will use an event like that.

And I don't know if that's the case for you, if you need to do that or not.

But that's when I read about this kind of thing, I always um I'm praying to the Lord that He'll show us how is it that the story of this common experience that we even have today, how is it that that might in some way encourage some of us, uh, especially considering the gospel and how much we have been forgiven, uh, how much might that might uh might that just encourage you or me to reach out to those that we might have been separated from in some way?

Um now, if you've had the great privilege and and pleasure of uh being a parent, you might also read some things in here that you could um draw into your own life uh about.

For instance, when we see the favoritism of Isaac for Esau, of Rebecca for Jacob, uh you can learn by uh uh reading about these stories, especially the way they're presented.

They're presented in honesty and with some clarity, and we see what goes wrong when people behave in a wrong way, in a way that isn't um honoring to God and loving toward others.

But I think that the this this isn't just a chapter about moralism, and uh I think there's more to the story, and I want to rise up just a little bit, if you don't mind, uh, as I give you just three summary points here.

Number one, Genesis 25 reminds us of divine faithfulness.

These portions of scripture that catalog generations remind us that God is guiding human history towards his plan and his purposes.

Um, he will bring about Messiah at you know, about a couple thousand years later.

Um, but his plan and purpose is to do that through it's that through the seed of Abraham, through the line of Isaac.

And it just continues on, and we and we'll see this unfolding uh as you go through your Old Testament, all the way, leading all the way, all the way up to Matthew chapter one.

Um God is always faithful to his promises.

And so divine faithfulness, I think, is huge.

I think this is something that is um uh we we need to remind ourselves of over and over and over again.

Why?

Well, because we're so often in the in the, you know, we read here about Isaac praying for Rebecca for 20 years before God fulfilled um his prayer request for children.

And and sometimes we're in year number one of that sort of proverbial 20 years of of praying.

And sometimes we get tired and weary of praying.

We stop asking, we stop seeking God for his will and his ways and his wisdom.

Um, and so we need to continually be going to the Lord and surrendering all of our hearts to all of who he is, uh, so that he can work in our hearts and uh do the kind of deep work that he's so good at doing, and what so that we don't waste the waiting, that we don't waste even our suffering, but that we open ourselves up to God so that he can be uh show himself faithful in our lives as he does, uh, and we will see uh amazing glory flowing even through some stuff that is undesirable in our lives as well.

So these portions of scripture serve the purpose to remind us of God's faithfulness.

I love the way that David Atkinson put it.

He says, We do not see the glories and tragedies of national and global events and the joys and the pains of day-to-day family life as finding their meaning only within human history or personal biography.

Their true meaning lies within the purposes of a God who has made himself known as loving and holy, as personal and infinite, as creator and redeemer, as sustainer and ruler.

And I think that's so important for us to understand.

It's so easy to get, and I think the world that we live in right now trains us up and shapes and forms us to think about it's all about me, it's all about my little slice of history and my story.

Um, the problem with that is that we just turn in on ourselves and we don't un we don't take a larger view or an eternal view of what might be going on.

And the Bible's so great about setting us free from the our sort of navel gazing and obsession with the self and being able to see what God's doing on a much grander level, a much more majestic, much um more eternal perspective that we really, really do need to gain.

John Flaville was a 17th-century English Puritan, and he said, This providence is like a curious piece of tapestry made of a thousand shreds, which, single, appear useless, but put together, they represent a beautiful history to the eye.

And I want to encourage us as we're reading through Genesis together and studying it, to begin to see the big picture a little bit better.

Secondly, Genesis 25 reminds us not only of divine faithfulness, but it reminds us too of human self-centeredness.

I gotta be honest, man, neither Jacob nor Esau come off looking very good here in this passage.

In Esau's case, he becomes the poster boy for the deception of immediate gratification and the blinded foolishness of impulsive living.

The high price that we pay when we define what is valuable in life or significant in life by the way it meets our physical needs or wants.

Like mere animals, we recklessly toss aside what is truly valuable for a mere moment of pleasure or satisfaction.

It's like switching the price tags in a department store, taking the price tags from all the expensive items and putting them all on all the inexpensive items, and then taking all the price tags from the inexpensive items and putting them on all the expensive items.

We just have everything backwards, and we're valuing the wrong things in life all the time because we're just thinking impulsively, just following our nose like a dog would going through the neighborhood.

Esau is shown to be that way.

He's impulsive and he he he's we're told here at the end of the chapter, he despised his birthright, something he should have treasured and valued, especially since it was tied to the covenants of God, the promises of God, um, the importance of family, all of that.

And he just simply despised it all.

Jacob's uh also not very shown very positively here, if you actually think about it too.

He's shown to be uh maybe what you might call a cunning extortionist.

Um you know, he he's he's got, while Esau had no forethought, he just was acting impulsively, Jacob's got all the forethought of a of a uh you know, a master manipulator, as he takes advantage of uh someone else who's expressing some need, some desperation, and all that sort of thing.

So I mean, Jacob is is um instead of you know loving his brother and wanting to share with him, being eager even to share, um, here comes Jacob to take advantage of his brother just to get what Jacob wanted.

And in some way, it's kind of a the two of them also to me are a picture of uh uh irreligion and religion.

And in the sense that, you know, this birthright that Esau should have valued, he just dismissed it completely out of hand.

It's almost as if you say, I don't need that.

I don't need what's important.

And there are people who are irreligious in the world that think, I don't need God.

I don't need any help.

I don't I don't need that.

I want what I want, and I want it now.

And I'll I'll do anything to get it.

And that's a reckless way to live.

Uh irreligion, where you simply set yourself up as the final word, and you're you're your own little g God.

And it's too great a burden for anyone to bear, and uh and ends up in really leading to self-destruction.

Um, but Jacob's way isn't the better way, it's another problematic sort of way of doing things.

Jacob thought that what really was of great value could simply be negotiated for or manipulated, and so he's more like the self-righteous, you know, ultra-religious rule follower type person in a way, uh, because he thinks he can just take it himself and that he deserves to be able to do that, and if he's shrewd enough and all that sort of thing.

And we're, I think sometimes we all get to be like Esau or Jacob in our lives, don't we?

We we just we've we just follow our impulses sometimes in life, and other times we think that God needs our help manipulating things, and uh, but sometimes we're not even thinking about God, we're just thinking about what we think is right and how we want what we want.

And we and they're both doing that.

They want what they want and they want it now.

And that self-centeredness is really just another way of saying there's sinful human beings here on display.

And I think it's important for us to know that when self is at the center, uh, sin has free reign in our lives.

Uh Tim Keller has a brilliant little, tiny little booklet called The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness.

In it, he says this true gospel humility means I stop connecting every experience, every conversation with myself.

In fact, I stopped thinking about myself.

The freedom of self-forgetfulness.

Think about that.

Think about how free you would be if your life became a little less about you, and a little bit more about what Jesus said when he said, If you want to find your life, you do that by giving it away.

And it's paradoxical, I know.

Uh, but that's what the gospel is in so many ways, so many categories, isn't it?

Um, and there is a great freedom that comes in that.

Uh highly recommend that booklet, by the way, The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, if you uh want to go online and grab a copy of that.

So Genesis 25 so far reminds us of divine faithfulness, God working through history as he is accomplishing his purposes and aligning things just so in his own time.

And that's his divine prerogative, isn't it?

And uh, but his faithfulness, as we look back through history, we continue to see it over and over and over again.

And then, yes, Genesis 25 really showing us and sort of holding that mirror up to all of us and uh reminding us of our sort of capacity for depravity, our our uh human self-centeredness that breaks our relationship with God, um, separates us from God, separates us from others as well.

We'll see that play out, of course, in these two brothers' lives right here.

And as well, uh we see that throughout the pages of scripture, and we're we're we're seeing that in our own lives as well.

So I love the the reality of the Bible in this regard, that it's it's not uh sort of a fairy book that's telling us about some Pollyanna world, but it's telling us about the here's the real diagnosis, about the real problem, and it's answering that very big question that so many people ask: what's gone wrong with the world?

Well, what's gone wrong with the world is that we're all individually self-centered, and we can't get past that on our own.

And so I also love the third point I wanted to make about Genesis 25.

It reminds us of gospel progress.

So you got divine faithfulness, you got human self-centeredness, but I'm reminded of gospel progress as well.

In spite of the shortcomings that we see in Esau and Jacob, in spite of the shortcomings that we saw in Abraham and Sarah.

The bigger picture here is that God is superintending a redemption history, uh, his progress of moving us toward the good news, or the gospel, as we call it, and progress is actually being made.

Um, God was quietly at work and at his own pace, in the sometimes in the in the far background and or underneath, and sometimes around the corner, ways we can't see, but God is while we may not be able to see what he's doing, that doesn't mean he's not doing anything.

And I think that's important for us to be reminded of as we look here at this page, this this particular chapter, Genesis uh 25.

So I'm sometimes Esau, I'm sometimes Jacob in my self-centeredness.

Perhaps you would see some of that in yourself, and be able to come before the Lord in repentance and prayer and lift up the empty hands of faith and ask the Holy Spirit to instruct us, to show us our need of Him, and to move us forward in the gospel, growing from grace to grace.

How is this story about gospel progress?

How is how's what God's doing in your life or doing in my life about gospel progress?

How's what he's doing in the lives of maybe the Esau's in our life or the Jacobs in our life, the people that choose to manipulate us, the people that are always demanding from us?

How is it that there's gospel progress going on in this world right now?

I mean, Jesus has already come, Jesus has died on the cross, Jesus is risen from the dead, and here is God's down payment on the fact that he's basically showing us look that Jesus is the one.

You need look no further.

He really can do what needs to be done to redeem and rescue us all.

Evelyn Underhill was uh sort of a 1920th century, you know, bridge the gap there, English Anglo-Catholic mystic.

And while I don't embrace everything she taught and said, I gotta tell you, she said some things in some of her writings that are just so powerful and so beautiful.

And I want to throw one up on the screen for you here.

Many a congregation, when it assembles in church, must look to the angels like a muddy, puddly shore at low tide.

Littered with every kind of rubbish and odds and ends, a distressing sort of spectacle.

And then the tide of worship comes in, and it's all gone.

The Dead Sea urchins and the jellyfish, the paper, the empty cans, the nameless bits of rubbish, the cleansing sea flows over the whole lot.

So we are released from a narrow, selfish outlook on the universe by a common act of worship.

And folks, that's what's so important is that we turn our eyes to Jesus.

We get our eyes off of ourselves, we get our, even our story itself, we get off of our eyes off of our, it's not all about me.

It's not all about you.

We need, when we, when we turn our eyes toward Jesus, see, when he's preeminent, when he's first in our lives, then we start to see that kind of healing in our relationships because, and even our internal selves begin to heal.

Because we begin to see him.

Um, he then showers us with his love and grace and mercy.

And we receive his fresh forgiveness each and every day, his mercies that are new.

Um, and it's because our our our eyes, our gaze, we're fixed on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.

You see, God himself is precisely what many of us have never known that we always wanted.

It's not a bowl of soup, nor is it the birthright that we're trying to, you know, claim from somebody else, take something, some power, some control, some prestige from somebody.

No, it's none of that.

The Lord Himself is what your soul and my soul are hungering for.

He's placed eternity in our hearts, you see.

And we will never be satisfied, we will never rest or find rest until we rest in him, as St.

Augustine said.

Lewis said it another way, too, and some of you are familiar with this quote, but I bring it around every now and then.

I think it's so brilliantly said.

If we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the gospel, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak.

We are half-hearted creatures, fooling around with drink and sex and ambition and perhaps a bowl of soup, right?

When infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea.

We are far too easily pleased.

So, yeah, man, that speaks to me every time I read it or think it through a little bit in my own life.

Um, let us pray together and ask the Lord to open our eyes to be able to see and to open our hearts that he might redirect our affections, reorder our priorities, and place within us an increasing uh hunger for him, for his word, for his wisdom, for his ways, uh, and the desire to walk in his will.

All of that, join us, friends.

Let's let's let's fall before him and express our great need and our deepest heart's desire for him and for him alone.

Amen.

Amen.