Being Second Best

Jacob, according to what I have heard in the pulpit, was a Mummy's boy. He was the son of Rebekah, wife of Isaac, who himself was the son of Abraham, making Jacob the grandson of Abraham. Jacob had a twin brother Esau who was first to be born, making him the heir of his father's estate. Isaac admired his older son Esau for his muscular body, hairy chest and manly traits, including his ability and willingness to hunt for game, therefore becoming the breadwinner of the family, including the servants.

 

Jacob, in turn stayed at home and helped Mother with the cooking and domestic chores. Rebekah wanted her favourite son to inherit his father's estate, so she devised a plan for the younger son to deceive his father Isaac, who chose this particular day to bless Esau, and to confirm that he and his descendants will not only inherit his father's estate, but become a God-blessed special nation to dominate the middle East. So Jacob entered Isaac's tent wearing a furry garment which felt just like Esau's neck and chest, and after eating his favourite venison prepared by his wife, the blind, elderly father blessed his younger son Jacob, believing that he was Esau, despite his sense of hearing was telling him otherwise.

Esau sells his birthright to Jacob for a mess of pottage
 

When the older brother returned after a successful hunt, he discovered how his sibling had stolen his blessing, and in a rage promised to slay him. When his mother found out about this, she sent her younger son off to stay with her brother Laban several days walk away, probably in what is now Iraq. She never saw her favourite son again, for she died before he had a chance to return. Such was the price for favouritism and deception.

 

At Laban's estate, Jacob fell in love with his uncle's younger daughter, Rachel. She was beautiful and ravishing. Jacob promised to work for his uncle for seven years before he can marry her. When the wedding day arrived and the marriage consummated, he discovered that he had married Leah, Laban's older daughter. Jacob was furious at such deception, but had promised to see out the wedding week with Leah before marrying Rachel and working for his uncle for another seven years.

 

Poor Leah! The NIV Bible says that although Rachel was beautiful, Leah had weak eyes, probably referring to sloping eyelids which made her look more like "Plain Jane" - which failed to turn Jacob's eye, let alone attract his attention. Throughout those first seven years, Leah was totally ignored by Jacob while courting and petting Rachel and giving her all his attention, along with all the support from her father and all who were present. I have wondered how Leah must have felt as her sister enjoyed such courtship. The crushing feeling of rejection must have got to her, and she probably sat in her tent weeping alone quietly, so nobody was aware of her grief.

 

Even after marriage, Leah felt that her husband did not love her at all, but used her merely for breeding, while he lavished love and attention to her sister. When her firstborn son Reuben came into the world, her first hope was that Jacob would give her more affection. He didn't. Instead he spent far more nights in Rachel's tent, with the desire for her to conceive and provide for him a male heir, while Leah spent her time tending to Reuben. Eventually, in a desperate attempt to win her husband's affection and failing, Leah became the mother of six sons, which made up half of the nation of Israel, including Levi, her third son, who became the father (ancestor) of Moses and the tribe of Levitical priests, and her fourth son Judah, who became the father of King David and of Jesus Christ himself.

 

It was later that Rachel eventually conceived the first of her two sons, Joseph, who became his father's favourite son and heir to his estate, symbolised by the coat of many colours which enraged his brothers. They eventually sold Joseph as a slave to a passing caravan heading for Egypt. Jacob, in turn, believed that his favourite son was killed by a wild beast. He spent the rest of his life in sheer misery, looking at mud all the time and suffering bouts of depression.

 

I relate the whole of this story in condensed form for those not familiar with the Bible or the importance of Israel in human history. The story looks to expose the dire consequence of favouritism and the resulting devastation such feelings of rejection or being second best can bring. Yet having a preference for one person or group of people over another is the core of human nature. And apparently God's nature, too. After all, it was God who inspired Noah to favour his son Shem above his other two sons: Ham and Japheth. Also God chose Abraham above his brothers Nahor and Haran to make a special covenant with him. Then there is the better known case of God loving Jacob but hating his brother Esau, as Paul the apostle so succinctly writes in his letter to the Romans (9:13). But this "hate" is not the human emotion of distain, or desire for revenge or vengeance, but more akin of loving someone with less intensity than another, and that is always for the benefit of others. For example, God made a covenant with Abraham above his brothers Haran and Nahor. Yet Haran was the father of Lot, who the apostle Peter called a righteous man, indicating that he was brought up in a godly way by his father and mother. And Nahor was the grandfather of Laban and Rebekah, and the great grandfather of Leah and Rachel, all or part of Nahor's house became the founding family of the nation of Israel. Yet God made the covenant only with Abraham, his son Isaac, and his son Jacob.

 

What I have seen and experienced in church life, it looks to me that even God seem to favour the English middle classes to fill the auditorium every Sunday. I have seen that the vast majority of church-goers in the UK are well-educated professionals who will always vote Tory during polling day, and a large number of them live within the commuter belt in the leafy-posh Southern county of Surrey. They are a vivid contrast to the inner city gang world of the uneducated, unemployed, drug-dealing, knife-carrying State benefit recipients, whose territories are no-go areas for those who are not gang members. If a rival gang member is murdered over some drug feud, then its a lost eternity in Hell and damnation. When a middle class Christian professional dies, it is Heavenly bliss for him. Indeed, it looks as though God does show favouritism, so it seems.

So we are not any different. Suppose you were a letting agency, and there is a spare apartment for rent. Who would you give the keys to? The tattooed guy with the design showing through the wide V-neck of his shirt-less jumper and his breath smelling of alcohol, tobacco or even cocaine? Or would you hand the keys to the gent dressed in a business suit and tie, who will be shortly starting work in the area? Even I must honestly admit; if I was in the same situation as that agency, I know full well who I would hand the keys over. It's simply human nature.

Yet this sort of thing had been going on for decades. During the 1950s and '60s, if you were a coloured immigrant looking for accommodation and a job, chances of having the landlord slamming the door on your face was very high, along with a failed job interview - if such an interview ever took place at all. To this day there is always something about a white man in a business suit - the greater respect offered to him, a deeper trust, even perhaps a sense of reverence. Even more extreme is the contrast between a noted celebrity about to appear at a movie premier and a homeless beggar sitting alone in the street. Yet then again, our present Tory Prime Minister is a target for harsh criticism, not so much for bad or biased leadership as for being an Old Etonian and one of the Old Boys club, along with the Chancellor George Osborne and the Benefits Secretary Ian Duncan Smith, another toff whose intent is to withdraw State handouts from the poor and needy while bowing to the high earners and profiteers who are getting richer and richer all the time.

And so the newspapers tell us. In the City, 2,700 bankers have received sky-high bonuses, each one pocketing £1,600,000 - a rise of 37% in a year, compared to a rise in income of just 0.8% for the average worker. This makes England with the highest rate of city high-earners in the whole of the European Union. Yet do we really hate these bankers as much as we say we do? Or do we harbour a secret admiration for their talents while realising this country's economy can't do without? And this is when energy and fuel bills are rising to such an extent that now there are many who cannot afford to heat their homes during the cold Winter months - while our Government ministers prattle around like headless chickens as the profits created by these energy companies continue to soar. Then there was a case of a keen swimmer who drowned as he took on a daring challenge to swim through a submerged cave tunnel while on holiday in Malta a couple of years ago. Under the online article, one commentator asked; Why such emphasis that he was a student at Cambridge University? Of course, that was the whole point of the article, wasn't it?

Cliffs at Malta, 2012

Let us be thankful for certain Scripture passages which assures us that God is not like a human after all, even when at times he appears to be. As we are all steeped in favouritism, bias and social class to one degree or another, we can be assured by Isaiah, who wrote:

The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim freedom to the captives, and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the LORD'S favour, and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion -
to bestow on them the crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the LORD for the display of his splendour.
Isaiah 62:1-3.

Poor Leah, rejected and unloved by her husband she adored. She was keen to be a breeding machine for him, in a vain hope of winning his love and affection. How many times had she sat alone in her tent and wept her heart out, while Jacob was courting and petting Rachel? How often had she lay alone in bed, looking up at the tent roof while the man she loved is making love with her younger sister? And the times she held baby Reuben tight in her arms as a tear rolled down her cheeks. As she told stories to her young boys, how often did she look out of her tent and glimpse her husband frolicking with her beautiful sister? Were there times when Leah gloated over Rachel's infertility? Did she smile as she overheard the two having a blazing row over her childlessness? Really, I can't help but pity this unfortunate woman whose fate was of no fault of hers. And God pitied her too.

As she was watching her husband adore Rachel's firstborn son Joseph and bestowing on him a beautiful garment; a token of heir to their estate, all this must have been a little too much for Leah, who believed that her own son Reuben was entitled to their inheritance. How did she really feel in her heart when Rachel died on route to Canaan while giving birth to her second son Benjamin? And were her tears of genuine grief when her younger sister was buried in her own tomb near Bethlehem? When the rest of the family returned to Canaan from Laban's house, Leah also died some time afterwards, but was given the privilege to be buried in the Cave of Machpelah, the fifth person to be buried together with Abraham, Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, as Jacob was still alive at the time of Leah's death, and the last to be buried in the family tomb.

The Hebrew name for Israel is Yisrael, an acronym for Yacob, Isaac, Sarah, Rebekah, Abraham, Elohim, Leah - all six buried in the Cave of Machpelah. But in God's combined omniscience and pity for poor Leah, he had her initial as part of his own name, a sign of how much God loved her, and even rejected by her own husband, safe in the arms of God himself. This is something worthy of consideration during times when I feel low, rejected, disliked for no reason, and feeling put down, or even plain ignored. There is a God whose love and pity for the weak is beyond human understanding.

God HATING Esau???

Way back in 1974 I found myself sitting next to a very distressed man at St Jude's Anglican Church in South London. When I saw his despair, I turned to him and asked what was the matter.

He then explained to me that he had read in the Bible that God loved Jacob, and HATED Esau. He felt that he had committed enough sins in his life for God to hate him too. Having access to a Bible, he turned to Romans 9:13: Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. I saw the tears and the fear of Hell in his eyes. Over time, I can't remember what I said to him, neither was I able to go into depth back then, for I had only been a true believer since early 1973, and as a strapping twenty-one year old, I still had a lot to learn.

Whatever I said to him in reply I can't fully remember, but his grief ceased, his spirits lifted and his face shone with a new found freedom. Then this guy, all of two metres tall and a physique to match, gave me a bear hug in gratitude, and after the service left in a better state of mind.

I wish I could remember what I said to him back then. But even with the basic learning I possessed, there was a good chance that the individual named Esau was referred to as a nation of people, as suggested in Malachi 1:2-5, from where Paul quoted when writing to the church in Rome. Here, the prophet writes that God had loved Jacob but Esau he had hated and has turned his mountains into a wasteland suitable for jackals. In addition, a people always under the wrath of the Lord, mainly for oppressing Jacob, that is, Israel, and refusing access for Moses and the fledgling nation to pass through their land on their way to Canaan from Egypt (Numbers 20). It was a typical example of the antagonism Esau (Edom) had against his younger brother. And they were under the wrath of God, according to the prophet Malachi, which was before Jesus Christ was crucified, through which God had made peace with the world, including Edom. It is through this peace that Edom, along with his cousins Moab and Ammon, will escape the future times of trouble. More of this later. But just before Esau and Jacob were born, God did not say anything about loving one and hating the other. All he said was that one will serve the other.

Esau was the older of the two brothers born to Isaac, the son of Abraham, and his wife Rebekah, who did not have children for the first twenty years of marriage. When Rebekah eventually gave birth to twins, it was already confirmed by divine decree that Esau shall serve Jacob.

But during their lives, Esau never served his younger brother! Esau was his father's favourite son, an icon of masculinity. He went out each day hunting for game, which would feed the entire household, including the servants. In other words, he was the breadwinner, the pride of Isaac his father. Jacob, on the other hand, was Rebekah's favourite son. As a Mummy's boy, he stayed at home, engaged in "women's work" according to eastern culture. Jacob did the cooking, prepared the table, took care of the tablecloth and cutlery and did the washing and tidying up. Jacob, as with the rest of the family, was sustained by Esau's hunting skills. To bring this to modern times, one can say that Jacob stayed at home with Mother while his brother went off each day to work at the shipyard.

Jacob was the craftier of the two. As their father grew old and his vision became impaired, the rest of the family knew that the time for the blessing from Isaac was drawing near. One day, Esau came home hungry and bitterly frustrated in not catching any game. Jacob saw an opportunity to steal his brother's birthright. When Jacob offered some stew to his hungry brother in exchange for his birthright, Esau was too hungry and frustrated to give a moment's careful thought. Not long after, Isaac called for Esau to go out on a hunt and bring back game for him to feast on, and he will receive the blessing. Rebekah overheard the conversation and sent her son Jacob to fetch a goat and prepare it for his father, while Esau was out. Jacob's objection to all this was the deceit, not because he felt that it was wrong, but in fear of being caught out by his father. However, his mother disguised him with some fur on his neck and arms, and clothed him with his brother's clothes, making him feel and smell like his brother Esau.

Isaac was surprised at the rapidity of the dinner being prepared and served. After the meal, Isaac called in his son, believing him to be Esau. In fact, his vision was impaired, therefore blind. His sense of touch fooled him, as did his sense of smell. Only his sense of hearing was telling him the truth, and immediately aroused his suspicion. Jacob had to lie to his father in order to keep him deceived and receive the prophetic blessing.

Meanwhile, Esau returned from a successful hunt and prepared the feast. But when he discovered that his brother, through deceit, had stolen his blessing, he was furious, and vowed to kill Jacob. Rebekah had to send her favourite son away to spare his life. Lying and deceit is always sinful, no matter the circumstances. Rebekah's punishment was that after sending her favourite son away, meant for a duration of just a few weeks or several months at most, she was never to see her son again, having died before his return.

Jacob remained in exile for more than twenty years at his uncle's tent. But when the time came for him to return to Canaan with his own family, he was literally terrified of his own brother, and prepared gifts to offer for peace and reconciliation. When the two eventually met, Esau was far from angry. Rather, he was joyous to see his brother return, and both went to the tent of their elderly father Isaac, still alive but widowed. After his death and burial, the two brothers went their separate ways, Jacob remaining in Canaan while Esau settled on Mt. Seir, a territory south and east of the Dead Sea.

The people of Edom, descendants of Esau, were never subservient to Israel. Rather, the two became hostile to each other. Not long after the exodus, Moses begged the king of Edom to allow his people pass through their land, promising that nothing of theirs would be taken or even disturbed. But the Edomites railed at Israel and even sent troops to destroy or disband the fledgling nation. Their unkindness to Moses and all Israel was what brought the wrath of God, and not Esau himself! It was a part fulfillment of what God had told Abraham that he will bless those who bless him and curse those who curse him, Isaac and Jacob (Genesis 12:3). It was not until nearly a thousand years after Jacob and Esau had died that Edom became subservient to Israel under King David, who set up garrisons across their land.

Edom's subjection under King David foreshadowed a greater fulfillment which, even in the present day, is still future from our standpoint in time. In the book of Daniel, there is a prophecy which foretells the deliverance Edom will share along with cousins Moab and Ammon (Daniel 11:41). This verse is in context of a passage (verses 36-45) which many, if not most, Bible students consider to be the rise and reign of the future Antichrist, the Man of Perdition of the second chapter of 2nd letter to the Thessalonians. In short, God will deliver Edom, Moab and Ammon from the terror of the future world dictator. So who is Edom, Moab and Ammon? According to Biblical chronology, they are all descendants of Terah, Abraham's father. Abraham had a brother, Haran, whose son was Lot, making Lot the nephew of Abraham. Lot became the father of  Moab and Ammon. The present city and capital of Jordan, Amman, comes from the name Ammon.

Therefore the three nations of Edom, Moab and Ammon makes up the modern Arabs who to this day, are an irritant to Israel. At present, Edom is by no means serving Jacob. Rather, it has been one of Israel's oppressors for many years, particularly from 1948, the year the sovereign nation of Israel came into existence. This is the age of grace. God in Jesus Christ has removed all hostilities between himself and mankind, including Edom and the Arabs in general. God's grace is available for all believers in Jesus Christ being God and the Jewish Messiah, regardless of which nation the believer comes from. For God so loved the world - all who believe will receive eternal life and be saved. Therefore who will Esau be serving? I think it's none other than Jesus Christ himself, the seed of Jacob. This will be the final fulfillment of the prophecy Rebekah received from God during her pregnancy, that their Messiah will come from the younger brother Jacob, whom Esau, and everybody else, will willingly serve.

God hating Esau? Not anymore! Jesus Christ died on the cross to reconcile all mankind to himself. Now that looks very much more like the love of God, not hatred.