A Spiritual Pilgrimage

MEMORY VERSE: “Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” —John 3:3

GENESIS 27:18-24; 28:11-17; 46:1-3

IN THIS lesson we have the climax of Jacob’s efforts to obtain the family birthright. We believe that in this episode Jacob and his mother have been made more blameworthy than the circumstances warrant. Isaac was now old, and without sight, and he wanted to confer the blessing of the birthright upon his favorite son Esau. The mother learned about this, and decided with Jacob to deceive his father in making him think that he was Esau.

In appraising the right and wrong of this act two points are to be kept in mind. The most important of these is the knowledge of Rebecca, the mother, that the Lord’s special favor was upon Jacob, and that on her part she may very well have considered that she was merely co-operating with the Lord in doing what she did to help Jacob get the blessing which she was convinced the Lord wanted him to have.

And then there was the fact that Jacob had purchased the birthright from Esau. Actually, when Isaac told Esau that he wanted to confer this special blessing upon him, Esau should have told his father that he had relinquished his rights to it in favor of Jacob; that he had actually sold his birthright. But he did not do this, and Jacob took the means suggested by his mother to secure that which by right belonged to him. We today might question the method employed by Jacob to get what belonged to him, but there is no record that the Lord condemned him; in fact, subsequently he was very much favored by the Lord.

Naturally Esau was very angry with Jacob when he learned that he had been deprived of his father’s blessing, and Jacob found it necessary to leave home hurriedly. He went in the direction of his Uncle Laban’s home, and the first night out he had a wonderful experience which confirmed him in the belief that the Lord was truly overruling in his affairs.

In this account we are told that Jacob put a stone for his pillows. This could be construed to mean that he used a stone, or stones, on which to place his pillows to keep them off the ground. The traditional view is, however, that Jacob actually used a stone as his pillow. That night Jacob dreamed that he saw “a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it.”—Gen. 28:12

In the dream he saw that “the Lord stood above it, and said, I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed: and thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed.”—vs. 13

Then the Lord assured Jacob of his loving care over him in all his ways, and said that he would bring him back into his own land, “For I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of.” Jacob awaked out of his sleep. He was understandably afraid, but quickly recovered, and said, “This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”—vs. 15-17

True to his promise, God continued to bless Jacob throughout the years, and through many difficult circumstances. He was eventually reconciled to his brother Esau, and together they attended the burial of their father Isaac. Jacob reared twelve sons, the next to the youngest being Joseph, who was sold by his brothers into slavery in Egypt.

Years later a famine came to Canaan, and eventually Joseph’s brethren had to go down to Egypt for food. There, in time, they learned that Joseph was still alive, and next in power to Pharaoh, the ruler of all Egypt. When Joseph learned from them that his father was still alive he sent for him to come to Egypt to reside, and to bring his household with him. The last three verses of our lesson indicate that Jacob accepted this invitation, and in Egypt, as the prophecy states, the Israelites became a great nation.

We fail to see where our memory verse has any direct relationship to the remainder of the lesson. It is true that all who live and reign with Christ in his kingdom must be exalted to the divine nature—“born again.”

QUESTIONS

Did God blame Jacob for the means used to obtain the birthright?

Where did the Israelites first become a great nation?

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