Revelations of Jacob
Dec 25, '04 9:14 AM ETHihi blessed and beloved people of Christ!
This Christmas has truly been amazing for me personally. Not only because I had the chance to proclaim our Lord's name in praise and worship in the heart of Orchard with the rest of my fellow brothers and sisters in choir. But also, personally, I truly believe that the year of 2005, like what Pastor Prince has prophesied, is going to be a year of divine, abundant, overflowing favour.
It's uncanny that I should receive a book titled "Finding Favour with the King" as an early Christmas present from a beloved sister, Gail (who's also from New Creation) at a Christmas gathering with my uni clique. Even before that, I've experienced so many instances of favour in my daily living that I lost count, and I expect more to come in 2005. These few weeks leading up to Christmas, the Lord drew my attention to Jacob, and revealed to me how this person is truly one with great favour upon his life.
Now when we think of favour, we often associate it with Biblical characters like Abraham, Joseph or David. But the Lord said: "Son, can you see the favour in Jacob'ss life?" And he opened my eyes to the reasons, which is what I'm going to share, and I want to pen it down just in case I forgot about all this as time passes.
We all know that Jacob was a very deceitful and conniving person "he stole his brother, Esau's birthright (Genesis 25: 33-34) and later Esau's blessings from his father Issac as well by pretending to be his elder brother (Genesis 27: 34-36). It's interesting why the Lord chooses to bless and pours forth His favour on such a person. Even Jacob's name, in itself, means "supplanter" (one who takes the place of someone else) or deceitful because the Bible says "his hand took hold of Esau's heel; so his name was called Jacob" (Genesis 25: 26). Esau was the one that Issac loved and favoured because he was a macho-michie. He's a skilful hunter, very ga-rang kind, you know, a man's man. But the Bible describes Jacob as "a mild man, dwelling in tents", the quiet-quiet and like-to-stay-at-home kind.
But Rebekah loved Jacob. (Genesis 25: 28). And she was the one who actually taught him how to steal his elder brother's blessings from Issac. Read the story on how Jacob stole Esau's birthright. "Jacob (the nerdy SNAG - he likes to cook stew too) cooked a red stew, and Esau came in from the field, and he was weary." (Genesis 25: 29). And he asked Jacob to feed him the red stew. But Jacob wanted Esau to sell him his birthright as a pre-condition.
We don't know what Esau did that caused him to be so tired because he actually said to Jacob:" Look, I am about to die, so what is this birthright to me?" Look at what Jacob did in Genesis 25: 34:"He gave Esau bread and stew of lentils; then he ate and drank, arose, and went his way."
I was drawn to the word "lentils" because I didn't know what it means. So I checked the dictionary, and it means "a type of leguminous plant", basically, your long-beans kind of plant, any plant with peas. And Lord spoke to me: "Son, read it again."
And I was drawn to the word bread, red stew with lentils. And I recalled Deaconess Lian's sharing on why Cain was rejected by God and Abel's offering was accepted. Because Cain offered plants to God, a picture of self-effort while Abel offered meat sacrifices which speaks of blood being shed.Notice that you cannot mix "bread" and "red stew" with "lentils". The bread speaks of the body of Christ, the red stew a picture of the sufferings that Christ went through and the shedding of his blood. You know what "a stew" means? It's to boil something until it becomes very soft. You can't mix that with lentils, a picture of self-effort; it's mixing grace and self-effort.
And that's how Esau surrendered his birthright.
Today as Christians, if we mix grace and try until we are so weary to gain right-standing with God by our own efforts, we are "surrendering our birthright", just like what Esau did. And many Christians are doing just that. They're wondering: what happened Lord? I did this for you Lord, and I did that for You, went to China, Africa and Myanmar for Your missionary's sake but why am I not enjoying the blessings of a true child of God. God's favour was on Jacob because he understood the significance of a son's birthright, and he wanted it so much.
Now I'm not trying to encourage you guys to resort to all means, like what Jacob did. Because today, we don't have to. We have that birthright because of the blood of the true Lamb of God, who came to Earth in human form and died for us on the cross. But we must be conscious, always, of who we are in Christ, lest we resort to self-effort, like Esau, and relinquish that birthright.
The Lord pointed to me another illustration that really got me so excited. In Genesis 29. Jacob fled to Laban, Issac's brother in Haran because Esau sought to kill him for the two treacherous acts of deceit Jacob brought on him. And we all know the story of how Jacob wanted to marry the beautiful Rachel but was given the ugly Leah, and he worked for the cunning Laban for 14 years. So Jacob was kana conned himself too. We know the story about the spotted and streaked sheep that the "magician" Jacob created. (I tell you Jacob is an expert in genetics man. He started R&D way before Charles Darwin came up with the Theory of Evolution). And Jacob was so blessed with favour that he basically took over and multiplied whatever Laban gave him, and even took over his flocks as well!
Now here's something that happened in between these two chapters that the Lord drew me to. In Genesis 28, the Lord appeared to Jacob in a dream and he saw "a ladder set up on earth and its top touched the heaven; and there the angels of God were ascending and descending on it." (Genesis 28: 12) And there the Lord stood above it and promised Jacob that his descendants will be like the dust of the Earth, and He would be with him and keep him wherever he went.
Then Jacob said: "Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it. How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of Heaven!" (Genesis 28: 16-17)
Then something puzzled me as to what Jacob did next. Early the next morning, Jacob took the stone that he had used as his pillow the previous night, and set it up as a pillar! And he poured oil on top of it! Come on, I hope you are getting the revelation. Who was anointed with oil before he took to the cross? Who was set up like a pillar, the Rock of our salvation?And then it was mentioned that Jacob made a vow before the Lord there before the stone. And he said:"And this stone which I have set up as a pillar shall be God's house, and of all that You gave me I will surely give a tenth to You."
Hmmm...We know that tithing was first mentioned earlier when Abraham tithed ten per cent to the Lord. We don't hear of it later, not in Issac's story but it was mentioned here again in Jacob's story.So we now know that Jacob is so highly favoured because he was always conscious of his birthright as the son of God, he was conscious of Jesus, the Son of God, and he was conscious of God's blessings in his life and he was conscious of tithing to the Lord.
Hallelujah!!! Praise the Lord!!!You may ask how can we assume Jacob ever know Jesus? Because Jesus had not appeared. But earlier when God cut the covenant with Abraham, we know that Abraham was not a participant at all.
In fact he was put to sleep by God. (Genesis 15: 12).Whatever Jacob saw or experienced in the dream, we only know this much from the text in the Bible. But we can conclude that Jacob was truly overawed by what he saw, and felt impressed sufficiently to "set up a pillar and pour oil on it" and called that place Bethel, which means the House of God. So, brothers and sisters, get excited for 2005! Because we can expect more favour in our lives, the favour that Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, David and other great men of God experienced. Because weâre the beloved children of God!
posted by weiwen @ 9:14 AM
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