All right, so we're going to pick it up at Genesis 27. We're going to do the last couple of verses there, which we didn't do last week. Then we'll get into 28. And I think what's fascinating to me about this section, probably more than anything, is if you do the math, I don't know if you guys do the math. Math is kind of an interesting thing. And if you do the math on on these guys. These are not young people. Esau and Jacob. They are most likely at least in their 50s. And probably in their 60s. Which is crazy. Young guys. Young guys. And the reason why this is interesting is that Jacob hadn't even gotten married yet, and he's supposed to be the progenitor of this great nation, and he's going to end up having 12 kids, at least 12 sons. Actually, he's going to have more than 12 kids. He's going to have 20 years with Laban. The time here, it's just hard to appreciate that these guys are this old. So we're talking about guys who are most likely in their 50s or so or whatever, just whatever the number is. And their father was pretty old when he had them at this point. And everybody thinks the father's gonna die, except the fact is that he doesn't die right away. He decides to wait for another 20 years or so. And so it's, actually it's more than that, it's actually closer to 30 years before he ends up passing away. It's just a crazy situation, just time-wise, just age-wise and so forth, just different. But we pick up here, obviously Esau's come back in, he's not happy. He's upset his brother has done this to him, although I don't think his brother's done anything to him, as I said last week. I think Esau's done all this to himself. And this is just a pretty foul guy. I love the way that the chapter before ended where it said that he married two Hittites, which is like, just to spite my parents. I'm gonna go ahead and I'm gonna marry these two Hittites. Not one. Yeah, not one, but I'm gonna get two of them. And of course, we're gonna read about how Rebecca loves that here at the end of this chapter. But in verse 41, it says, Esau bore a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing which his father had blessed him. And Esau said to himself, the days of mourning my father are going to come near, then I will kill my brother Jacob. Such a nice guy, you know? First thing he thinks about is, I'm going to kill this guy. And that just sort of tells you about where he's at. In other words, the whole idea that his father would have blessed his brother in some way just is driving this guy completely mad. It's driving him crazy. And so he commits to the fact that he's going to do this. Well, then, of course, Rebecca then hears about it. Rebecca seems to be the one who ultimately gets, you know, gets her nose into every single little thing. She's obviously aware of what's going on. And so now in the words of the elder son Esau reported to Rebecca, she sent and called her younger son Jacob and said to him, Behold, your brother Esau is consoling himself concerning you, I love that, by planning to kill you. That's how he's gonna console himself, you know, and so, you know, you can see a little bit of irony in that statement. Now therefore, my son, Shema, obey, listen, listen to my voice, and arise, flee to Haran to my brother Laban, and stay with him a few days until your brother's fury subsides. A few days turns out to be 20 years. Again, just talking about time that goes by. Stay with him a few days until your brother's anger against you subsides and he forgets what you did to him. That ain't happening. He's not going to forget anything. Even when they get back together, we'll see that as we get into the couple of chapters. When they get back together after he goes to Laban and now he's got the wives and so forth, Esau still only just tolerates Jacob at the very best he might tolerate Jacob. And Rebekah says to Isaac, verse 46, I am tired of living because of the daughters of Heth, which is what we were just talking about. She just cannot take it that this guy has brought these women into their house, and she has nothing to do with them, obviously. And so, if Jacob takes a wife from the daughter of Heth like these, from the daughters of this land, what good will my life be to me? Yeah, she's like, you know, I might as well just commit seppuku and, you know, get it over with, you know what I mean? This is just, you know, this is just it. And so Isaac calls Jacob, and here's what I think is interesting. It says, he blessed him and he charged him, and he said to him, you shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan. So he blesses him again. So it's not like, you know, Somewhere along the way here in this thing, he realizes, you know what? This is the guy. This is who I'm supposed to have blessed. And so he blessed him again. And so what I wrote in my notes was, I think there's some circumstances that need to be considered when you're really looking at this section of scripture. Esau's hatred was so intense that he wants to murder his brother. Jacob only received what God wanted him to have. And I think that's important that we understand. He didn't get any of the financial reward of this, you know, being the one who was blessed of his father. It's important for us to remember. It's better for Jacob to leave with his father's blessing than to stay without it. And so that to me is an important thing. The other thing that I think I realized was Isaac should have tried to find Jacob a wife long before this time, but he had a spiritual problem. I mean, he just wasn't with it. He was just kind of like just doing his thing and eating his chow and hanging on, but he wasn't really thinking the way he should have about his son. And I don't think he ever really thought about Jacob. It doesn't appear anywhere in Scripture where Isaac really gave Jacob much thought. Rebecca gave all the thought to Jacob. And Jacob knew it, that's no question about it. But it was clear to Isaac that Jacob was, in fact, the choice of God. And that, I think, you see right here in this very beginning. So he says to him, Arise and go to Padamaram, to the house of Bethuel, mother's father. And from there, take yourself away from the daughters of Laban, your mother's brother. And may God Almighty bless you and make you fruitful and multiply you that you may become a company of peoples. and may he also give you the blessing of Abraham to you and your descendants with you that you may possess the land of your sojournings which God gave to Abraham and then Isaac sent Jacob away and he went to Padamaram to Laban son of Bethuel the Arminian and the the brother of Rebekah, the mother of Jacob and Esau. Now Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him away to Padamaram to take himself a wife from there, that when he blessed him, he charged him saying, you shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan. and that Jacob had obeyed, or shema, that's again that same word, had obeyed his father and his mother and had gone to Badam Haram. So Esau saw the daughters of Canaan displeased his father Isaac, and so Isaac, or excuse me, Esau went to Ishmael and married, besides the wives he had, Mahalala, the daughter of Ishmael, Abraham's son, the sister of Nebaiaboth. This guy is crazy. Conniving might be the word but just insolent I think is the right word. Yeah, just insolent. I'm going to do what I'm going to do. I'm going to make everybody around me miserable. I'm going to do everything I possibly can to let everyone know that I'm really the one in charge around here. And so he goes to Ishmael. And again, it's just crazy that he would go in that direction because I can't even imagine his father looking at that and going, and now you're going to marry your first cousins? Because you're trying to impress me somehow? You're trying to win back my favor? That doesn't win back my favor. It just irritates the situation even more. I'm guessing that at this point, Rebecca, and by the way, Rebecca is never going to see Jacob again. Because Rebecca really does, I think, just gives up on living somewhere along the line, is my guess. But if you look at this blessing that Isaac gives to his son, it truly is the blessing that the Bible wanted him to have, or that God wanted him to have. It is the blessing of the promise, which is all Jacob wanted in the first place. And certainly what his mother, Rebecca, was hoping would come out of this, the blessing of Abraham, the promise to be a father in multitude, his seed would possess the land. And as I wrote my notes here, it reminds me of this verse in Isaiah, which I'd like to read to you. It's kind of an interesting verse. In Isaiah 55, we looked at this when we were studying Isaiah at length, but I just want to look at it again for a minute. In Isaiah chapter 55, This is one of those sections of scripture that is almost a standalone in the book of Isaiah, because it's that profound. It's almost like a poem that he wrote in the middle of the thing, or of his prophecy. But it starts out with, ho, everyone who thirst, let him come to the water and drink. And you have no money, come, buy and eat. These are verses that many of us have memorized. But when he gets to verse 6, Let the wicked forsake his way, the unrighteous man his thoughts. Let him return to the Lord, and he will have compassion on him. To our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, do not return from there without watering the earth and making it bare and sprout and furnishing seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be which goes forth from my mouth. It shall not return to me void without accomplishing what I desire and without succeeding in the matter in which I sent it. I mean, seek the Lord, call upon him when he's near, forsake your way. I mean, can you imagine had at that point Esau recognized that he had this opportunity, how things would have been so much different? The Lord was right there. The Lord was right there. He had every opportunity to sit there and examine what was going on. But he chose not to. He chose to ignore the ways of God. He chose to ignore everything about this. But it also, I think this also is a message to us that God's thoughts are not our thoughts. He does things differently than we do them. He's not the one who runs in the direction that we run. God does things because God has a bigger plan. He has a bigger picture of which he's dealing with. He is not one-dimensional, nor is he one-generational. He is always looking toward the ultimate situation here. And the scripture's pretty clear about this idea that we need to pay attention to the way God does things. Hosea says, wise men realize God's way. Wow, really? I mean, that's a pretty incredible thought. Do we actually recognize God's way? It is so easy to pay attention to the way we want to do things that we ignore God's way. And even when we know it, it's hard to live like that. It's hard to live a life which says, the ways of the Lord are right. You know, I mean, that's, you know, the righteous walk with him. I mean, I'm trying to think of other verses that kind of go along in this, you know, in this vein, but it's hard to do that when you're all caught up in your own little worldly thing here and your whole little, you know, your own little thing that you think is important. And we see things that kind of go awry in our eyes. It's hard to find God in it and to be waiting and to be trusting that God knows and is sovereign over all of it. Yeah. And he has a plan, you know. And it's a plan to help, not to harm. which is what Jeremiah tells us. So it's not a plan which is egregious. It's not a plan which is improper. God had a plan for Jacob. I believe God probably had a plan for Esau as well. Esau did everything that he possibly could to reject it. He didn't come alongside God? No, he never did. And what's crazy is that This is such a picture of God's sovereignty, but it's also a picture of man's improper choices kind of going hand in hand. And that's one of those things that makes the Scriptures so reliable, is they don't worry about the seeming contradiction of man's free choice and God's sovereignty at the same time. The Scriptures don't care. because it's just, there it is, it's right there, it's right in front of us. But there is a common link, excuse me, there is a common link to people that walk in the Lord, that walk according to Isaiah 51 here, that seek the Lord, that call upon him. The common link is that they believe God's word. They believe what God says. If you look at Abraham, he believed what God said. Did he live the most perfect life? No, but he believed what God said. Isaac, or all of his craziness and his worldliness and so forth, at the end of the day, he still believed what God said. And I think this is an important message for us as men that We need to believe what God says and in spite of our, or maybe despite our mistakes that we make and the challenges that we tend to do and the bad decisions often that we make and so forth, we take God seriously. You were talking about the kingdom man. That's the key to fearing God that we talk about in kingdom man. Men that fear God take God seriously. He is important. He is the thing which drives our motivation for doing things. And I have to tell you, taking God seriously is not easy. It just isn't. Because when you take God seriously, there are going to be times when you're going to have to do things that you don't want to do. Or you're going to have to not do things that you want to do. You're going to have to leave where you're at and go someplace else like Jacob did. It's just a crazy, it's a crazy thought. But the question really is, how should we then live? I think that's one of the major questions of the scripture that most men never consider. With all these things being factual, with God being the God of the universe who does things the way he does things, okay, how should we then live? And most men struggle in this area. I'm just telling you they do. And as a result, We come back to this. So go back to Genesis, because I want to look at verses six through nine, because I think this is really kind of interesting, what happens here with Jacob. Yeah. I was thinking about interaction, how God interacts with us. Isaac had a past of interaction with God, and he has a track record or whatever. Jacob really did. He was, he heard his mom and, you know, this plan and everything. He was a part of it. In a way, he's interacting with the situation, but these seeds are, you know, the inheritance that she overhears. You know, he's part of the story, but he hasn't had this interaction. So he's holding everything kind of loosely. Yeah. And, and, and I think the difference here is that Jacob is very sensitive to things that are spiritual and, and Esau is actually insensitive. He, he, he doesn't want to have anything to do with the things of God. And, uh, the truth is he's really after his own, Even when you come back to this section and you think about him saying, oh, well, I'll just go to Ismail and I'll grab one of the kids, one of the wives, one of his women, so I can be okay with my father, as though that's going to correct the situation. And I think it's an example, and this is the point that I wanted to make, I think it's an example of how people think that if they do certain things, that might kind of please God. You know, if I do this, well then God will be happy with that. You know, if I do this other thing instead of this other thing over here, you know, and not only kind of please God, but to please one another. We think that if we do something, what we do is going to be enough. And it's never enough. Oh, and we're gonna see that there's yeah, we're gonna see that because well, let's let's read it. Yes, because this is where we're gonna come back. We start verse 10 It says when Jacob departed from Beersheba and and went to Haran he came to a certain place and spent the night there and because the sun had set, and he took one of the stones of the place, put it under his head, and lay down in that place. And he had a dream. And behold, a ladder," that's the word sulon, it's the only place in the entire Bible that that word is used, which is kind of interesting. And so, behold, a ladder was set on the earth, and its top reaching to heaven. And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. And behold, the Lord stood above it and said, I am the Lord, the God of your father, Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the land in which you lie, and I will give it to you and to your descendants. So now he's dreaming about what he had just been blessed by his father about. And I think there's something to be said about that. And he says, your descendants shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread out to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south. And in you and all of your descendants shall all of the families of the earth be blessed. And behold, I am with you. and will keep you wherever you go and will bring you back to this land for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you." Not your father. Did you pick up on that? Not what your father promised, but what I promise. This promise is my promise. It's not your father's promise. It's not Abraham's promise. It's my promise. And I'm going to do that. And he goes on, he says, then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, surely the Lord is in this place. And I didn't know it. So what was he saying? Well, I think what he's saying there was he was questioning whether or not God was really in this whole entire thing. And obviously now he's been made aware in his dream that yes, God is in control here. God is doing this whole entire thing. And I didn't know it. And he was afraid. And he said, how awesome is this place? This is none other than the house of God, which is, of course, Bethel. The house of God is Bethel, so this is no other than Bethel. And this is the gate of heaven. This is the place where the angels ascend and descend. They come up and down that ladder. coming from heaven and to earth and so on. I think it's fascinating that in his dream, the angels ascend and then descend, not the other way around. You would think that they would descend and ascend, but they don't. They ascend and descend, and I think that's God showing him that they were with him, they're talking to God, and they're still with him. Yeah, the angels are working, exactly. And there's a dominant feature here, and obviously that's this ladder, and that's where these angels are going to go up and down and so forth. But to Jacob, this dream is very meaningful, because it reminds him that God is in control, that God is doing what he needs to do for him. And this is why, by the way, most Bible expositors believe that it was Jacob that wrote this section of Scripture. Basically, the last part of the book of Genesis was most likely written by Jacob, because you can see here the personal touch of Jacob, that he's telling you things about his thinking. And there's no other person that would know that except Jacob. Jacob would be the only one that could tell you what actually happened in a dream. He was the one. So if he didn't write it, he certainly was the one who told it in such a way that people were able to continue that message until Moses was able to just write it down. How do I react to my own dreams and assess my own dreams? But obviously within this dream, there was a lot of, things that he recognized, you know, that, like I said, Rebecca had, you know, been talking about that involved the inheritance. And it's like, oh, I've heard this before. Right. You know, I recognize this. Yeah, and I also think this is, The relationship that God has with Jacob and that Jacob has with God, but especially that God has with Jacob, is different than anyone else. We're gonna see as we go through the book of Genesis that God actually speaks directly with Jacob on eight different occasions. This is just the first of them. Nobody in scripture has that many encounters with God. Nobody. Or at least that are written. And To me, it really shows this personal relationship that God had with Jacob, which was so different, so unique, so special. And it's just a crazy kind of thought, but God is on his throne, but he is still dealing with us. And through Jacob, he's actually spending a tremendous amount of time because he recognizes that this is the progenitor of the Messiah. This is the most important piece, is Jacob. And he's listening. And there's no question he listens. And to me, that's important. So God reiterates his message or his promise about the seed and the land. And I also think it's important that we don't see anywhere in the Bible where God rebukes Jacob, which is crazy if you think that he stole this blessing. If you believe that he stole the blessing, Why is there no rebuke from God? Why is there no word from God saying that, you know, Jacob, why did you do that? Why did you do it that way? I mean, you know, there's never that word. There's just this word of, you know, no. Here's your blessing. Here's the promise. And I think it's important that we understand that making moral judgments is God's prerogative, not ours. I don't understand why God does the things that he does and the way in which he does them. That comes back to Isaiah 55 again. I don't get it. Would I have done it this way? Probably not. You know, I would have probably come up with a different plan. I don't know but I do know this that God does what God wants to do and That's that's just incredible so When Jacob wakes up though He wakes up in awe He wakes up in in like Wow. I This is insane, you know? And so he calls this place Beth-El, of course, and that becomes a very big part of things throughout the Word of God, throughout the Old Testament, and even into the New Testament. And I think this mixture of fear and awe is really cool. Because I don't know if you guys have ever experienced that, where you have such awe for something that you actually have, there's fear involved as well. It's just this crazy kind of experience that he had there. And so in verse 18, it says, so Jacob rose early in the morning and took the stone that he had put under his head and set it atop a pillar, a bunch of other stones, and poured oil on its top. And he called the name of that place Bethel, the house of God. However, previously the name of the city had been Luz. And when Jacob, then Jacob made a vow. And he said, and in most Bibles it says, if actually the word there in Hebrew is actually more, it's not a question of if like, like it's conditional. It's almost like since is probably maybe a better way of saying it, but whatever, if, since, whatever. So if God will be with me and will keep me on this journey, then I may take and will give me food to eat and garments to wear, I will return to my father's house in safety, and then the Lord God will be my God, and this stone, which I have set up as a pillar, will be God's house, Bethel, and of all that he gave to me, I will surely give a tenth to him. So Jacob makes this vow. And what's interesting about this vow is the word. So in Hebrew, it says he made a vow. In English it says he made a vow. In Hebrew, that actually reads nader nader. It's a double imperative. He's basically saying he's vowing a vow, if that makes any sense. He's vowing a vow. I did some research on this when I was originally doing this. This idea of using a double imperative in Hebrew is something that's done, it's kind of a biblical thing. It's not done in normal Hebrew. It's not something that a normal, when you're speaking Hebrew, that you would do. This is kind of a very formal thing that you would say. So it would be something that you would do if you were trying to address an audience or it was some kind of a big deal. So I wrote here, in Hebrew, this is a solemn promise that can be made when Jewish people make a promise, a nadir. It means they will do it at all costs, nadir, nadir. I vow a vow. I promise a vow, or whatever word you want to use there. A promise can also be like a promise. a nadir without a guarantee, but when you use the two together, you're effectively putting, as best you can, your guarantee that this is the direction you're going to go. This is what you want to be, your word or whatever. And Jacob uses that double imperative here, and it's the very first time in the scripture where that is used. There's several other places. I'll give them to you. Judges 11, it says, Jephthah vows a vow, same thing, same identical wordage, and I will not take it back, he said. In 1 Samuel 11, we read about Hannah giving Samuel to the Lord, and she vows a vow to give Samuel to the Lord. Yeah, in 2 Samuel chapter 15, Absalom uses the expression nadir nadir, except he uses it in deceit. He's the only one who actually ever uses it deceitfully, and it costs him his life. So, this idea of vowing a vow is a big deal, because when you make a vow, in this context, there's something to say about whether or not you're going to break that vow and do it. I want to look at Ecclesiastes because Solomon has an interesting thought about this. So in Ecclesiastes chapter five, Verses four through six, it says this. When you make a vow and a dare to God, do not be late in paying it, for he takes no delight in fools. Pay or keep that which you vow. It is better that you should not vow than you should take a vow and not keep it. Do not let your speech cause you to sin. Do not say in the presence of the messenger of God that it was a mistake. Why should God be angry on account of your voice and destroy the work of your hands? For in many dreams and in many words, there is vanity, emptiness. Rather, fear God. If you see oppression of the poor and denial of justice and righteousness in the province, do not be shocked at the sight. For one official watches over another official, and there are higher officials over them. After all, a king who cultivates the field is an advantage to the land." And so what he's saying there is keep your word, keep your vow, keep your promises. Because I think we have to understand that our promises, unlike God's promises, are conditional. We make a promise, it's always based upon something. I promise to do this if, I promise to do this because of, I promise to do this when, whatever. I mean, you could put all sorts of different conjunctions in there. But God doesn't do things like that. When God makes a vow, when God makes a promise, it is unconditional. So the promise to Israel is unconditional. So he's saying to Jacob, this is going to happen. Not it might happen, not if you do certain things that it will happen, no. It doesn't say that. It just says, this is going to happen. Despite your insufficiency, despite your inability, whatever, this is going to happen. I've made a vow, I've made a promise. And I remember very early in my life, very early in my life, probably 16, 17, 18, somewhere in that range, I was still in high school, thinking that people made value. It was funny, I wasn't even a believer at the time. and I was realizing how people would just say things and they would promise to do certain things, but they just never ever fulfilled it. It was like I was in high school, just in high school, and I was thinking, these people are making these promises and they're not gonna keep them. They have no intention of keeping these promises, but they're saying it because it works at that moment. And I remember thinking to myself, I don't want to be that guy. I don't want to be that guy. I don't want to be that guy. Um, when I met my wife, one of the first, I was, we were like 17, 18 years old. I met my wife and, and with that kind of context, we started dating and I thought, you know, this is, this is feeling pretty, pretty much like this is what we're supposed to do. And, I went to my wife and I said, you know, what do you think about maybe, you know, us ultimately getting married? She said something to me that I've never forgotten. She said, I won't even date you. I won't even consider it beyond, you know, just this friendly banter that we're having at this moment. I won't even consider going further with you unless you can promise me that divorce is not an option. And I remember thinking to myself, that's pretty incredible. Uh, you know, I mean, here we are, like we haven't even really dated yet. And so she says to me, I'm not even going to have a conversation with you about, you know, going any further in this relationship unless you can assure me that divorce is not an option. I think this is the only vow I've ever kept. I'm serious. I mean, I'm completely convinced that I have promised all sorts of things, but this is the one promise that God had just so ingrained in my brain. And so over the last 50 years that we've been together, which is crazy when I think about that, by the time we dated and then we ultimately get engaged and get married, 50 years have gone by. there has been a whole lot of reasons that we could have split up. There have been all sorts of reasons that we could have split up. Most of which probably would not have been good reasons, but nevertheless, they were reasons. And we both ultimately came back to this vow that we made to each other. And so when we made our public vows at our marriage, when we actually got married in 1975, and I think about that, we had made those vows long before that. We had made that promise to one another long before that. Before it was necessary, we made that. And I have thought about this over the years a lot, that God was showing me something there. He was showing us something there. That you make a vow before you make the vow. Does that make any sense? You actually make the promise ahead of the promise. Is it like you're making the promise to yourself and then you're making it to God? I don't know. I think, yeah, I think that's the thing. I mean, it's just, I didn't make it I didn't make it when I needed to make it. Does that make any sense? In other words, I made the vow before I needed to make the vow. And you wouldn't be able to make that vow unless you had previously thought about it. Correct. Okay, am I willing to do this? Yes. Then I'll make the vow. And I think that's why I had that I don't know what you'd call it, that pre-glimpse, I guess, or something, of people breaking their promises. And I said, I just don't want to be that guy. And then all of a sudden, that ultimately happened in our marriage. And it's crazy. Could it be like baptism, almost? You make the decision to say yes to Jesus, and then you do it publicly. I think it's an attitude towards God is the point. Yes, sir? I think we make internal agreements all the time, often subconsciously. And once you make an agreement, it's strong. In other words, if I say, well, I'll never be successful. Right. I may not verbalize that, but if that's an inner agreement I've said to myself, guess what? I'm probably not going to be successful. Exactly. So what you're describing to me, it's almost like that internal agreement for yourself that you made before you came and even with your ultimate life. soon-to-be-wife, and then publicly, you made that agreement. You've got to say this. Temptation works that way. If you haven't made certain agreements, I'm not going to do this. Well, guess what? If you get in a situation, you might pay the price for not standing up and making a conscious agreement. I will not succumb to whatever it might be. Yeah. Yeah. It's crazy. There is something to, I know, People don't like to use this expression. There is something to putting stuff out in the universe. I'm sorry. There just is something to it. Yeah. I mean, exactly. Well, Solomon says it right here, don't let your speech cause you to sin. So be careful what you talk about, especially to yourself and so on. But vows are a big deal to me. They really are. It's a tragic state of affairs when half the people that vowed that they're going to stay with somebody for the rest of their lives don't. That's a tragic situation. We don't think about how important vows really are. And when I see people break vows, I think, that's such a tragedy. That's the way I think of it. It's a tragedy. I don't stand in judgment over it. I really don't. But I believe it's a tragedy. I don't believe anybody comes out of that well. You make a vow to somebody and you decide that it's not worthy anymore, it's not worth it or whatever, your life becomes a little bit more futile. It really does. And you lose a lot. And I'm not talking about money. I'm not talking about losing financially. You lose financially as well, but that's beside the point. That's not what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is that you give up a piece of who you are. And I just don't think it's worth it. I look at God's promises and I say to myself, God's promises, unlike mine, they're unconditional. God's promises are unconditional. Our promises are very conditional. They're determined by whether or not we keep them. God's are totally unconditional. I mean, let me just give you a couple of verses. This is really interesting. Look at Jeremiah 31. This is such an interesting section of Scripture. Jeremiah 31. And starting at 31, I get it totally blocked off in my Bible, because it's that, I think, that big of a deal. It says, Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by their hand, brought them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant which they broke. My covenant which they broke. Isn't that interesting? although I was husband to them, declares the Lord." So that's the same idea. He says, but this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after these days, declares the Lord. I will put my law within them, and on their heart I will write it, and I will be their God, and they will be my people, and they shall not teach again each other his neighbor. and his man his brother saying know the lord for they shall all know me from the least of them to the greatest of them declares the lord for i will forgive their iniquity and their sin i will remember no more god's covenant is unconditional not based upon what we do it's god saying i'm doing this And I'm going to even forgive everything. I'm going to forgive your sins. I'm even going to, I'm going to send my own son who's going to ultimately pay the price so that your sins can be forgiven. In Malachi chapter three, it says, the Lord does not change. I am the Lord, your God, I change not. Therefore your sons of Jacob shall not be consumed. It's like, I change not period. And that to me is a big deal. That's a big deal. To say that he's given us this promise is a big deal. Vows. Jacob makes a vow. And the vow is, I'm going to, well, go back to it, because the vow is really pretty cool. He says, since the Lord is with me, he will keep me on his, yeah, you guys are back, good. Sorry, we had a little internet problem there. Make a vow like Jacob made. Look at what he says. He says, God will be with me and I will keep and he will keep me on this journey that I take, and he will give me food to eat and garments to wear. In other words, I don't have to worry about those kinds of things. Remember, Jesus said that in the Sermon on the Mount. He's basically, what Jesus was doing was sort of reiterating the vow that Jacob made. Jacob said, I'm gonna trust God. I'm going to trust him that he keeps me on this journey. I'm going to trust him that he gives me the food that I need to eat. I'm going to trust him that he gives me the clothes that I need to wear. I'm going to trust him. And then he says, and I will return to my father's house in safety. And then the Lord will be my God. In other words, he trusted God. That was his vow. His vow was, I'm going to trust God. And I think what's fascinating is, and I've thought a lot about this, and as we go through these next, especially the next few chapters, next 10 chapters in particular, the one thing that you cannot say about Jacob is that he did not believe God. You just can't say that. He had every opportunity to say, What in the world am I doing here with Laban? What in the world is going on with this? What in the world? I mean, he could have said all of this. He could have said all of those things. But at the end of the day, he trusted God. He trusted God when Laban gives him the ugly stepdaughter, that kind of thing. He trusts God in all of these things. He trusts God when God doesn't do what he thinks he probably should have done, but he doesn't do it that way. It's so interesting that he made this vow, and the vow is that I trust God. I think he gave it over to God at that point, his hatred towards his brother. You know, it's interesting. The Bible never says that Jacob hated his brother. Well, he's going to kill him. No, no, that's Esau wanting to kill Jacob. It never says Jacob wanted to kill Esau. at all. Never says that. But I also think it's interesting that at the end of this he says, and I will surely give him a tenth of everything. Tithing was not something that was done necessarily, although we see tithing on two different occasions in the book of Genesis at this point. This is the second time. The first time, of course, we saw with Abraham giving Melchizedek a tenth of all that he had. We talked about that when we looked at Melchizedek. But I do think that there is something to be said here for Jacob realizing that He was going to do the things that were necessary to have God honored. And that's really what tithing is all about. Tithing is really just about honoring God. God doesn't need our money. I mean, it's crazy. I mean, the whole thought of it is like it's our money to begin with. I was talking to somebody about this just this week and I had a reminder that the things she was worried about were not things worthy to be worried about. And she was worried about, well, who's going to get what? If I died, who's going to get what? And I'm like, they're going to get everything. That's what I told her. And she said, what? I said, yeah, they're going to get everything, because you're not going to have any of it. And it was like a slap across the face. I don't want you to take it that way. I don't like that control anymore. Exactly. And for her, it was like a slap across the face. She was like, oh, wow. And it really was interesting how it just sort of changed her perspective of things and so forth. But this piece, it's kind of striking me today because I don't think I've ever really looked at it in this relief before. But you've got Jacob. In this situation where I never, I guess I've never seen this transition, so. It's when you kind of look at those following verses, it becomes very apparent that this was Isaac saying to Jacob, you need to leave and you need to leave now. Now. Like this isn't this. We just heard this. You're out of here today. Right. Nothing with you. Right. So you've got this guy who's who's just been given this grand promise from his father. Right. He thinks he's on top of the world and he loses everything. And he's sitting out in the wilderness, sleeping on a rock, right? Like that's, that's his pillow. That's his pillow is this rock, right? And he's, and this moment, this dream is, is him realizing that this is all God's plan, right? And that he stumbles upon this perspective that the only thing that really matters is God's plan. And I just need to be with God's plan, whatever that is. Right. And he'll, and he'll take care of my food problem and he'll take care of my food and my clothing problem. My life. I would like to say is the important part is that from, for me is the fact that God is communicating with Jacob. I don't see nowhere in scripture where he communicated with Esau. No, it just tells us clearly that the only way we know Christ is to we who he whom he revealed himself to and in this passage in this whole what you just talked today. is God revealing himself to Jacob. He never ever revealed himself to Esau. He never had a conversation with Esau. He never built a relationship with Esau. And from my perspective, it's saying there's one who walk in the spirit and there's one who walk in the flesh. And I think that's the most important thing. It doesn't matter what we have on this planet. What matters is our relationship with God. And if God revealed himself to us, I mean, that is everything. And this is what I see with Jacob. Jacob is laying down and God speaking to Jacob. I don't see nowhere in scripture where God speak to Esau. I don't see nowhere in scripture where God speak to other people. But when you are with God, and God is communicating with you, that is so powerful. because God is revealing, and that's what we do with Jesus. He revealed himself. That's why other people can't see Christ. But once you see him, oh my God, it is a game changer. It changes your whole perspective of life. Absolutely. I was gonna say with that, Orlando, is I don't think it was, God was always willing to have a relationship with him. It's just that he pushed it away. He didn't want it. Well, that's the point of the flesh and the spirit. That's the point I'm making. It's the flesh and the spirit. Whosoever you yield your members to, that's whose servant you become. And Jacob never, ever, ever, not Jacob, but Esau, never, ever tried to walk in the spirit. He was only dealing with the earth. Yeah, and I think Matty's point is so well taken because When he leaves, there's no indication he left with even a horse. It doesn't indicate that he left with a servant. Or with anybody else. Yeah, no servants, he's by himself. I mean, he was on the road. Isn't that, isn't, doesn't that- And another thing, Don. Hang on for one second. Orlando, Orlando, hold on for one second. I want to hear what John has to say. Isn't that true of, well, it's true of me. It's probably true of a lot of us that you come to that communication with God when you come to the end of yourself. Yeah. Leave the world behind. And I mean that, what Matt was saying, that really comes home to me because that's where I was when Yeah, yeah, it's powerful stuff. Orlando, last word. I was gonna say, it doesn't say who, you know, essentially, it does not say who Jacob's gonna give that tent to, other than God. Abraham gave his tithes to Mechizedek, which was a priest. It doesn't say who Jacob's gonna give this tent, he says it to God, but the mere fact is that person's gonna take his tithe. Right. And I think it's, I think it's fascinating because he's promising a 10th to God when he's got nothing. He's got nothing. Yeah. So a 10th of nothing is nothing. Uh, but, but I gotta tell you, he's got, he's got cremated. Look, he knows that God's, you know, God's, he has now convinced himself God is, This is his vow. I am going to adhere to your promise. Yeah. I got nothing to show for it right now, but I'm going, I'm going to adhere to your promise. That's incredible. And, uh, and, and, and really lovely to think about it. All right, let's get out of here. We'll pray and we'll end this thing. So our,