Jacobs Heart

Origin 25:19-34
Jacob & Esau
We muster together today following the terrible terrorist attacks to London - the violence that I suspect left none of ourselves without allocation.
Tony Blair said, "They will never arrive to destroy that we hold dear", and it is strong of not to admire his elasticity, although we recognize, I think, that the root of the

the problem is not an anonymous one "they" that want all to destroy simply that we hold dear, and more than there is a poorly axis that simply wants to destroy all things

Democratic.

In our world in this moment there are vast numbers of people that feel, correctly or incorrectly, that they the sector to the war with the West. And, correctly or incorrectly, a good number of these

The people feel that this assault kind is the means more effective than they have to take war.

This assault was not simply the result of violence without intelligence or of religious fanaticism. It was our invasion of Iraq (and Afghanistan) and the Israeli occupation of Palestine that

To generated this assault. It was the result of the political foreign one United States, Brittain and Australia.

Mean-t this that we must change our political foreign one? Not necessarily. Not if these actions had reason and correct. Maybe this all is just a part of the price that we have at

Pay doing the just thing. And nevertheless this war continues must incite us to ask again if we do really the just thing, and if we should never have invaded

These countries in first place.

It is against the canvas of bottom to intensify the world-wide violence that we look at the old Biblical history of Jacob and Esau this morning - a history that, I will warn you, we will give now no

The direction that this be as for how to resolve these problems of global conflict.

Why should we look at it then? Well ae¦ partially because it is also a history of conflict, and therefore it reminds of us the Fact that the conflict always was a part of the history of God

Treat our world. And also because it is a history of the promises of God, and a reminder that true held God to Its promises despite the conflict.

, Having flown now the thunder of my sermon already, you to allow me to encourage to remain with me nevertheless, as we can find nevertheless some more of surprises in the passage.

Our history today of the chapter 25 of Origin takes after the death of Abraham and of homes on the youngest son of Abraham, of Isaac, and of woman of Isaac, Rebekah. The woman of Isaac, as

The mother of Isaac before she, apparently is cursed with aridity!

It is stunning how much of the big women in the Bible fought to have children! The exception of course Mary, the mother of Jesus, that began having children a lot of

Earlier that she wanted. Rebekah although, as his Sarah of mother-in-law, as Hannah the mother of Samuel, as Elizabeth the mother of John the Baptist, fought with the

The Fact that they could not fall naturally pregnant.

S'Isaac itself taken. We suspect that Rebekah prayed also. God intervenes, and Rebekah falls pregnant, and nevertheless we said that his pregnancy is a difficult the one.

Now we better today could have been served if we had had one of our girls that preach on this text, as I am really not the person more fitting for this to explore any ampler. Leave

me although does a theological one (instead of gynecologic) the observation - that the Fact that you are the person of God, doing the will of God, even following miraculous God

The intervention, does not mean that the process will be easy. In fact, the affable promises of God often with them the big pain just like the big blessing.

As Rebekah fought by his pregnancy, therefore she fought with his birth. Strengthen she although in his pain was a word that she obtained apparently directly of God -

this his fight was part of a wider conflict that already intervened in his uterus - the one that went to play itself in the lives of its children and in fact

By the generations to come!

Jacob and Esau fought in the uterus. When Esau emerges from the uterus, Jacob already has a taken one of him. As they grow, they are in the constant conflict, as the

Fading of Jacob and of Esau are again today! When will it finish all? This was not any cry of Rebekah of doubt, and a prophetic lamentation that does echoe by to succeed it

Generations.

Now I know not so any of never saw you that the comedy film called "Twins" with Arnold Schwarznegger and Danny Of Vito, where the pair was is saying twins.

Jacob and Esau are a little as that. The very testosterone seems to go to Esau!

This is rather clear birth itself. Esau emerges from the uterus cover in the hair! To person surprised it it grows to be a big hunter, a man of full air, the captain of

The local team of rugby and, I suspect, a very competent pugiliste. Jacob, on the other hand, were are said was a man calms and a 'the inhabitant in the stretched'. This means that it sank

Close to his mom. It cooked well, the sewing, and help everywhere in the house.

Did it Etait-il cheerful? Well ae¦ they did not use labels as that in these days. What we know are that Jacob was clever and that it was ambitious, and that it was a lot his

The boy of the mummy, while Esau was preferred it of his dad.

Which kind of parents is these, that shows the partiality and the favoritism to a child on the other? Which kind of family is this, with two brothers in conflict - a fort and hairy

And does the other smooth and intelligent? This is a true family! These are true parents! Maybe they are your parents! This is of not to say that your mom liked really your small sister

More than she did you, but maybe she did!

"Now the look here, the son, this is not that I do not want to raise to look at any of your fight. It is not my kind of thing. Look at how well your brother done with its studies! Do not do

You think that you are a little better, you modeling a little more on him.." ?

The family dynamics tends to be very subtle and lasts to understand, to say nothing of to undo. Of return in these days, before the dysfunctional word found his manner in Hebrew

The dictionary, they explained it in the simple terms: Isaac liked Esau, but Rebekah liked Jacob.

And just as always is the case in the family failure, the true crucial moment came as insignificant something as a stew bowl!

Esau is starved, having been to work all day long in the field. It returns and feels the red stew that his brother cooked on the frying pan. Said Esau, "to give me

Certain of these red things". Said Jacob, "This is not 'the red things'. This is Burgundian beef, and you not can have any". "But why not", says Esau, "I die hunger"! , Says "well" Jacob, "I will say

You that. You give your right, to be done me the heir to the family fortune, the sign on all your inheritance to me, me to be done me the oldest brother - the firstborn in the family, etc., etc.,

And I will give you a small bowl". And said Esau, "Ouais, well"! And therefore it mistaken his right.

There endeth the reading, but not the history of the fight between the brothers. In fact, the brothers continue to the war itself today in almost the same sector of earth as

They did the return manner then. The armament and the rhetoric that the two became more artificial, but to the under of him all we always have two brothers that continue to fight.

That is of not to say that the today reading we give the indices as for how we should undo the problem. As I warned you at first, this is a history that does not give us the direction

what this be as for how we should resolve modern conflicts, although I suppose that we could take as a morale to the history, "never to do important decisions when you are

Starving".

Really nevertheless, that is not that this history is of, isn't that right? This not is a lesson in how we can live more cautiously, more than this is principally a history of the dysfunctional families.

Finally this is a chapter in a beer history, where the character key is God and where the home of the history is the promise of God - the promise that It did to Abraham, Isaac

The father, that is resolved by Jacob and Esau, and maybe despite Jacob and Esau!

It is the promise of God who works out in the lives of Jacob and of Esau, and in this case it is a promise that implies itself a subversion of the normal social order.

Here as elsewhere in the Biblical drama, God is in the process to turn things upside down. The first are transferred to the back and the last one comes first. The oldest one

the brother, that should have been established for the life as the heir of the property and new Lord of the Manoir finds itself dispossessed by this small clever nancy-garason that it

Cannot believe always is really his brother.

This cannot arrive! This is not simply a question of family. This removes to basic social fabric of corporation of east Old Close. By these actions, the social body

Order potentially is launched in the confusion. How this can be that the oldest one will serve the youngest one? This is not the things in a manner are supposed to work!

The corporation of east old Close could not have been the culture more easy in the world to live in, but at least everyone knew their place. The men did the work and did the

Decisions. The women have remained at the house and did their thing. The oldest brothers knew than the responsibilities of their fathers finally would be passed them, and younger

The brothers and the sisters knew that the manner to obtain a good future to keep itself implied in the vouchers deliver of your older brother.

But here it all is turned upside down. "God done to lower the powerful one of their hold court and student the low ", as said Mary later. "It fills the starved with

The good things, but the rich one It sends empty far"!

And this is not because Jacob is a big guy - a man of prayer and compassion, a man after the own heart of God. No, Jacob is a heel (therefore the name). But God remains true to

Its promises, despite the morally doubtful character of certain ones of its children.

Now it is easy to find us this history that entertains of course when this is all to a distance, but the truth is, when we look at our world-wide climate today, I think that we begin finding

We in the position of the oldest brother.

We the bourgeois people of Australia are part of a privileged class in the today world. We inherited a lot in this country that we did not work for. We appreciate a level of

Wealth and the comfort that are completely foreign to the people of Iraq, or so many people in the African nations. We took our level of comfort and of security for granted, and

Now we turn ourselves and we see that small Jacob seizes itself of our heel!

This is of not to say that the terrorism acts that interromp our world are a part of work of God, but this is to say that the Lord not promises us stability while it fills his

Promises. In fact, It never promised stability while It fills Its promises. In fact, according to Jesus, the earthly security is not only not on the offer to its disciples, this is not

An option!

Therefore if we cannot foresee God to keep ourselves the cover teapot in this world, that we can foresee?

We can foresee God to be true to Its promises. We can foresee the Kingdom!

This is in fact the ultimate promise of God - the promise that was resolved by Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - a promise that a day everyone would be

Blessed by this fading one of Abraham, of Jesus, when It enters his glory to introduce the new world.

That is the promise that remains behind our history today, and it is the promise that we always hang to as live ourselves out our party in this same history - that the day will come in fact 'when

The earth will be so full of the knowledge of the Lord as waters cover the sea '. Who the 'the lion and the lamb will go to bed', that 'every tear finally will be wiped' in

This new world 'where the death, the final enemy fact destroyed itself '.

This is the Biblical hope. This is the promise of God. This is the wire that runs by these old Ecritures, we connect return to these people of old one, and which

The points that we dispatch in the hope to a new one tomorrow. This is not a hope of stability in the short one run. This is a promise of a new world.

So how do we treat the violence problems that we do facing in our today world-wide one?

Well ae¦ we do our which one more better to do is just! We act in love and in justice, and we live with the consequences from which that love and justice take us.

And we recognize that although the position that we take, it there always will have the conflict, as the conflict always was a part of God treats our world. And therefore we put our hope in

The promise of God, that a day ae¦ the Kingdom.