Okay, well now let's continue our study of the patriarchs, this period of salvation history where God begins to call his people through the vocation of Abraham in the first generation and then Isaac and Jacob, which is what we're going to focus on in this lesson, lesson nine, and then lesson 10 we'll look at Joseph again this introductory overview of how God calls us people and begins to prepare to redeem humanity right from bondage to Satan and the new woman and the new woman who is the new Eve and the new man who is the new Adam down the line. So we covered a lot in the past couple of lessons with Abraham powerful stories, especially that Calvary of the Old Testament, the Akkadah and how Jesus fulfills the story of Isaac and the binding of Isaac powerful stuff. Let's continue from there and look at the patriarch Isaac. Now Isaac is interesting if you look at the scriptures Isaac doesn't have a lot of what I would call airtime right by comparison with Abraham his father and his son Jacob and his grandson Joseph I mean he just really doesn't have a lot of airtime a lot of verses sections dedicated to him.
And I think that's because he really he really shined in his test of faith with the Akkadah remember that everyone has a test of faith we all do faith must be tested our love must be tested were free creatures we must choose to love in the face of adversity. Well the Akkadah the binding of Isaac was just as much a test of faith for Abraham to give up his only begotten son as it was for Isaac who freely cooperated with his father's will and with the will of God. So he passed this test with flying colors and as a result I think relatively speaking he lives a peaceful life his twin sons were going to see later give him some problems which is no surprise sometimes our children's give us a lot of problems but by and by he lives a pretty pretty peaceful life and the story is really going to pass quickly on to Jacob because Jacob kind of drags things out a little bit as we're going to see soon so he so Isaac's major test of faith was the Akkadah it's not the only test of faith and I'm going to explain just a little bit. So after he passes this test after the ram is given in place of Isaac the story goes on and Abraham wants Isaac to marry it's time for him to marry to get him a job and get him out of the house that kind of a thing.
Well what Abraham really recognizes immediately is he cannot marry amongst the Canaanites you cannot have the line of promise intertwined with the pagans right kind of an echo to the sons of God and daughters of men scenario back in chapter six. So what he does and I'm going to spend a lot of time summarizing some of these stories here because we just simply do not have the time to go into the details which we will in our Bible study on Genesis. So I'm going to summarize a lot of things here just to be forewarned. Well Abraham sends his servant in here in chapter 24 he sends his servant makes him swear an oath to go back to his home country back where his kindred live to find a wife for his son Isaac.
That's precisely what his servant does very successfully a servant goes travels back to where Abraham's kindred is and then he goes to a well and that's really really important there because if you want to find a lady if you want to pick up chicks you're going to go to a well in the Old Testament there is no match. There are no bars or pubs or anything like that so to speak like we have you want to go meet women you go to a well and so he goes in chapter 24 verse 11 he made his camels kneel down outside the city by a well of water at the time of evening the time where the women go to draw water because as you could expect you probably know it was the women who went to draw water so you want to meet women you go to the well all right so the well is really important and it's going to come up multiple times in our story of salvation history so it's going to put that in your back pocket. Well the servant says to the god of Abraham you know help me give me success I need to find the perfect spouse for my master son and you know give me a sign maybe the lady who comes and waters my flock and shows in hospitality essentially you know may she be the one sure enough. There is this young lady Rebecca in verse 15 who comes and meets him and it says in verse 16 she was very fair and that's actually a common thing about amongst the matriarchs you would expect these women behind these great men to be smart and beautiful and resourceful well you betcha they absolutely were Rebecca is a dynamite woman she's smoking hot.
She's very very intelligent as we're going to see later on in the story so she's a powerful woman a lot of people focus on the patriarchs well the matriarchs have big roles to play as well. Well she comes along and she waters the flock and takes care of the men he's like this is her this is turns out of course they are related Rachel excuse me Rebecca takes him to take the servant to her family and he tells the whole story he I was sent here by Abraham I need to find a spouse a wife or my master son and her family gives Rebecca the choice would you like to go back and sure enough she cooperates right she says absolutely I will go back and the servant gives all kinds of gifts. And then they go home and in the distance this is actually really good sign here in the distance Isaac is meditating in the field chapter 24 verse 63 that's really important because Isaac is a godly man that's a good sign for him and in the horizon here comes the servant and Rebecca and they fall in love almost instantaneously kind of like a love at first sight kind of scenario I'll read it to verse 66. It says the servant told Isaac all the things that he had done and Isaac brought her into the tent and took Rebecca and she became his wife and he loved her so Isaac was comforted after his mother's death and you've got this beautiful story this monogamous story between Isaac and Rebecca.
As I'm going to share with you Isaac doesn't make the same mistakes as that his dad does that his son is going to do it's only Isaac and Rebecca and I think this is one of the reasons why relatively speaking they have peace they never leave the land and some monogamous relationship no shenanigans with other women they never leave the promised land that's a good sign that God is blessing them and making them prosper right then and there without having to be no man's and wander around. Okay, so this is kind of how Isaac and Rebecca get married God kind of directs this whole entire scenario and then God will renew the blessing with Isaac later on this threefold blessing promise oath that we've been spending some time talking about in the past. He's going to renew it with Isaac a number of times. I'm just going to read before you want to skip ahead to the time that go to chapter 26 verse two.
This is the second generation so God is going to be faithful and renew the promise. So this is what God says to to Isaac now incidentally the context is interesting because there's another famine in the land. You start studying the details and you find out that Isaac has a lot of repetition with his father but Isaac doesn't make a lot of the same mistakes he does some of them. But there's a famine in the land and just like when Abraham went down to Egypt out of fear God is going to tell Isaac don't go down to Egypt.
So here are verse two. Do not go down to Egypt well on the land of which I shall tell you. So join in this land and I will be with you and I will bless you. And for to you and to your descendants I will give all these lands and I will fulfill the oath which I swear to Abraham your father.
Now I will multiply your descendants as the stars of heaven and give to your descendants all these lands and by your descendants all the nations of the earth shall bless themselves because Abraham obeyed my voice. Alright, so this is the renewal of the threefold promise in the second generation. And Isaac is a I mentioned earlier he's meditating in the field. He also like his father is a priest.
He offers up sacrifices. In fact, if just to prove it if you look at chapter 26 verse 25 he builds an altar. Right. So this is all priestly a role here offering sacrifices and then calls upon the name of the Lord which we've seen multiple times.
This is a sign of worshiping the one true God being in friendship with God. So he's praying and interceding and offering sacrifices. These priests profit and will call him a tribal chief just like his father. So this is the beginning of Isaac's life after the Ahadah.
And what I like to do before we talk about the birth of his sons is wrap up the story with Abraham and Sarah and their deaths. So Sarah dies back in chapter 23 after the binding of Isaac story takes place. She dies at the ripe old age of 127 years old and Abraham at this point has no land. So in God promise I will give you this land all that you see northeast West out.
I'm going to give it to you in your descendants. Well, he has no land to bury his wife. So he buys a cave back in 23 the cave in the field of Mahpala to bury her. And this is kind of like you could think of it as like the acorn of what will later become this great oak tree.
The only piece of land that he ever owns himself is this cave where he buries his wife. And ultimately later he's going to be buried as well. And it's like this acorn. So later on it's going to grow and become this massive oak tree where his descendants will of course possess all the remaining land.
So there's one little seed, this one little pledge in Abraham's life of possessing the land is just this cave. This cave at Mahpala. All right. So after, this is interesting.
A lot of people don't know this. After Sarah's death, Abraham got married again. And you would think like after all that he's been through the dude would just be a bachelore, be a widower and just chillax a little bit and enjoy his golden years. But he doesn't.
He gets married again in chapter 25 verse one and following. And he had six more kids by this new wife. That's dynamite. You know, God's blessings make you virile, I guess.
This dude is very old. He has multiple sons. But what's important to keep in mind is these sons are not inheritors of the promise. He will give them gifts and he's going to send them eastward.
And if you remember in previous lectures, we kind of pointed out a couple of times that going east is going away from the land. So he sends them east. Everything is going to go to Isaac. Isaac is the bearer of the blessing.
He's the son of the promise. He will be the heir of Abraham. The rest of the boys will take their gifts and they're going to move on eastward. And then finally he dies at the ripe old age of 175.
And there's kind of this implied peacefulness because Isaac and Ishmael hadn't seen each other for many, many, many years. Isaac and Ishmael both bury him in chapter 25 verse 11. And that's the end of Abraham and Sarah's life. And so this brings us perfectly to the birth of Isaac's twin sons.
Here in chapter 25 verse 19 and following. And we're going to discover immediately Isaac does have another big test of faith. And I would think that these are the two biggest tests of faith. They're not the exclusive.
They're probably the biggest for Isaac. The binding of Isaac when he was in his 30s or whatnot. And then now of course the birth of his twin sons because in verse, let's see here 29. No, I'm sorry verse 19.
You discover that Rebecca was barren. She's barren just like Sarah. There's some echoes right here. And Isaac does not make the same mistakes as his father.
He waits and he prays. It says in verse 21, he prayed to the Lord for his life. So he's not taking matters into his own hands. He's not taking a concubine in order to have a son through her try to force God's hands.
He learned the lesson from his father. He prays and we discover. So he's 40 years old. All right.
When he marries her. He's not in the same detail. And then later on, we know the detail that when his boys were born, he was 60. So that's 20 long years of praying and of being patient and waiting for God's promise.
That's not too different than Abraham. Abraham waited 25 years for the birth of Isaac. So this is very positive for the second generation. Isaac waits and prays 20 long years.
And then sure enough, his wife Rebecca does conceive. Okay. We find this in verse 22. Well, 21 and 22, he prays.
He conceives and then it says that children struggled together within her. And she said, if it is, that's why do I live? Like, you're going to imagine these boys are fighting so much in utero. I mean, talk about sibling rivalry.
Sibling rivalry is a huge theme in scripture. Well, these two boys are fighting in utero in a powerful way. And you can just see Rebecca, I just can't bear it another minute. Why do I live?
Why do I need to endure this? And she goes to inquire of the Lord, what's happening? And the response in verse, and then verse 23 is two nations are in your womb. Two people is born of you, shall be divided.
The one shall be stronger than the other and the elder shall serve the younger. And that's an interesting twist here to what you would usually expect. What you would usually expect is that the elder son, the first born son in this culture, is going to be the leader, have the authority, have the responsibility on behalf of the rest of the family. But no, God says the elder shall serve the younger.
This is a huge theme of passing over the unworthy, first born son for the more worthy or the more deserving or the more humble, more virtuous, whatever it might be, younger sibling. Doesn't have to be the second born. It could be, you know, someone else. So that's pretty fascinating here.
This prophecy that Jacob, who's the younger son, will be the master of his older brother. All right, so here's the prophecy. Then in verse 24, she finally gives birth. When her days to be delivered were fulfilled, behold, there were twins in her womb.
The first came forth, red, all his body hairy, like a hairy mantle. I like to joke, it's because she gave birth to Ewok, a little baby Ewok, this very hairy boy, a friend of mine likes to joke. It's like Elmo, right? She gave birth to Elmo, this red hairy child giving birth to Elmo here.
And so they named him Esau. He saw meaning hairy. Later on, he's called Edom, by the way, not just because he's red at his birth, but also because of the whole story of the Red Stew, which we're going to talk about in just a moment. So there's little baby Elmo born named him Esau.
And then afterward, it says his brother came forth. His hand had taken hold of Esau's heel, so he was named Jacob. Then there's the detail. He was 60 years old when his sons were born.
So he pranked for 20 years. All right, so Jacob means supplantor or he who supplants. Names are very important in scripture. Names are very important for us.
I mean, the catechism will even tell us, you know, we need to know our names because our names kind of reveal a bit of our mission, right? Who we are, our identity. And in scripture, that's certainly true. And name changes are very important as well, like a change from Abraham to Abraham, Sarah, to Sarah, even Jacob who is called supplantor or he who supplants.
His name will be changed later on to a much more positive name because you meet somebody and his name is supplantor. You're kind of like wondering if you should be friend or not with this person, like he's going to steal your wallet or something like that. So later on, that's going to change. So names are important.
And here we have Esau, little baby Elmo, and then Jacob who is smooth-skinned here. All right, now, verse 27. When the boys grew up Esau was a skillful hunter. A man of the field while Jacob was a quiet man, dwelling in the tents.
Isaac loved Esau because he ate of his game, but Rebecca loved Jacob. Well, here's the game of playing favorites. This is never going to turn out well in scripture. We're going to see that doubly so in the next lecture with the story of Joseph.
You know, Isaac loves Esau because he's a man's man. I like to call him. He's this man's man. He hunts.
He's a man of the field. He makes some really killer stew. He will see pretty soon. So Isaac loves him.
He's also the firstborn son, so there's no surprise there. But Rebecca loves Jacob. Jacob's the mama's boy. So you've got the man's man and the mama's boy who totally different sons.
He is just chilling out, living the quiet life, reading his scrolls and the tents, putting his feet up, and just living it up, right? And so Rebecca loves him maybe because he's the underdog and maybe because of that prophecy that the elder shall serve the younger and so she loves him. Well, the family's divided and we're going to see the consequences of that right now.