you Well, good morning. I'd like to share a few thoughts for your journey ahead today from Genesis chapters 27 and 28. What strikes me in chapter 27 is just the depths to which we can go to deceive someone to get what we want. I'm referring here to the situation with Jacob and Esau and their father Isaac. Many years ago, when Jacob and Esau were born, God revealed to the parents, to Jacob and Rebekah, that the younger would rule over the elder. In other words, that Jacob would be the one who is primary, and Esau secondary in terms of leadership and so forth within the family. through whom the blessing of the Abrahamic covenant was going to come. It would come through the younger, and not through the elder. It seems, as chapter 27 begins, that Isaac, who has favored Esau over Jacob, wrongly so, of course, is intent on giving the blessing to Esau. In other words, to declare that the Abrahamic covenant blessing would come through Esau rather than Jacob, as God revealed. That, of course, was in violation of the revealed will of God, but nevertheless, Mom hears about it, Rebecca hears about it, and Rebecca's favorite is Jacob. Here you get some insight into dysfunctional family when parents have favorite children. Nevertheless, let's continue on, because the key I want to get at is the deception on the part of Rebecca, the mother, and Jacob. Rebecca says, here's what I want you to do. I want you to pretend that you're Esau, I want you to go out and kill an animal, and I'll prepare it the way your dad likes it prepared, and then you come and bring it to him, pretending that you are Esau, so that you may get the blessing." That's exactly what he does. He goes into his father's presence, pretending, Jacob does, pretending to be Esau, Dad is not able to see, he's almost blind, and so he doesn't recognize that this is Jacob in front of him, and Jacob's pretending to be Esau. Isaac says, well, how did you accomplish this so quickly? How did you get this? Here's what I'm talking about, the depths to which we can go. Jacob says in verse 20 of chapter 27, how were you able to find it so quickly, dad-ass? He says, because the Lord your God brought it to me. That's just a flat-out lie. That's a flat-out lie. Jacob went out and killed an animal. There was no hunting involved in it, as Esau would do. Jacob went out and killed one of the animals from their livestock, one of the goats, and brought it in. Mom prepared it, and yet he says, the Lord your God brought it to me. Yes. How Awful this is that Jacob can invoke the Lord's name and use the Lord in his deception. How cold and hard the heart can be when it is intent on getting what it wants no matter what. And as it turns out, Isaac turns around and puts a blessing on Jacob, and then later finds out he's been deceived. Now, one thing I want us to notice here is, was all of this necessary? Even if Isaac succeeded in pronouncing the blessing on Esau rather than Jacob, Was the Abrahamic covenant promise going to come through Esau, therefore? Could Isaac overthrow the decreed will of God, which was to bring the Abrahamic blessing through Jacob? Is that possible? Could he possibly have done that? No. It doesn't matter what Isaac said to Esau in announcing or pronouncing a blessing on him, that could not overthrow the determined, revealed will of God. his will was going to be accomplished. Did God accomplish this through this deception and all this kind of stuff? I don't know that you need to go there. What is evident later on, in the next chapter, as the consequence of the deception is that Esau wants to kill his brother Jacob, and Jacob has to flee and get out of town. On his way out of town, God meets him and says to him, look, I'm going to use you. I'm going to cause the Abrahamic blessing to come through you. I'm going to do that. You don't need to worry about your brother, you don't need to worry about all this stuff that you did. I'm going to do this. Of course, all this does is further magnify the glory of God's grace. Did Jacob deserve that? No, absolutely not. But Jacob didn't deserve it when he was still in his mother's womb either, when God said, this is the way it's going to be. I find in here some great encouragement that we don't need to resort to deception to try to get what we think God wants us to have. If God has promised something to us, then we can simply trust him, and yield ourselves to him, and yield the circumstances to him, knowing that God will bring to pass what he has promised. Our Father and our God, we do thank you that we can trust you and don't need to resort to things of deception and trying to manipulate matters to get things the way we want them to be. Help us, O Lord, to trust you, we pray. In Jesus' name and for his sake, amen. All right, listen, have a good rest of your day. May God bless you in it. you