Isaac, Jacob and….

REVELATION OF GOD Meditations No.5 of 10

Gen 25:21-23 Isaac prayed to the LORD on behalf of his wife, because she was barren. The LORD answered his prayer, and his wife Rebekah became pregnant. The babies jostled each other within her, and she said, “Why is this happening to me?” So she went to inquire of the LORD. The LORD said to her, “Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated; one people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger.”

Now we have a problem here; there is so much that could be said that we could write pages, but we have set ourselves the task of just providing an overview. They key task is to see God revealing Himself. That, we said, is the key role of this set of readings.

So as the book rolls on, we see Isaac growing up, getting a wife and eventually having twin boys, Esau and Jacob. What is interesting in the verses above is that both Isaac and his wife Rebekah have clearly had passed on to them from Abraham, the knowledge of a possible relationship with God, whereby they can talk to him (prayer) and He can talk back. Rebekah was barren and so Isaac prays. She conceives. She finds she is carrying more that one baby and so prays and God speaks (somehow) to her and she comes to this understanding that she is carrying twins and that God knows all about their future, and indeed seems to be involved in directing that future.

Now Isaac doesn’t come over very well in some of this, as you’ll see if you read the following chapters, but one thing that does become clear through him is that he has learnt the same as Rebekah, that which we have just commented upon, that 5. God knows the future and acts into it.

We then watch Jacob growing up, and he’s a real little twister. He’s an opportunist who gets his older brother to sell him his birthright (Gen 25:27-34) – culturally the older son became the leader and took over management of the farm – and later cons his father into promising him the goodness of taking the role of the older son with all that went with it (Gen 27:1-40). We watch him working his way through life as a schemer, working for his own selfish good.

Now here’s the tricky part: God has chosen him, even though he’s the younger son, to become the leader and become a major figure in history. 6. God knows what He can do with individuals. Thus Jacob encounters God, submits to Him and we gradually see some remarkable changes taking place, until eventually in old age (renamed as Israel), he is a wise old man, patriarch of a family of twelve sons and one daughter, with a great understanding of God.

Following Jacob, we said, are twelve sons, but one of them, Joseph, is picked out by God. He is given pictures of the future by God (Gen 37), but then apparently everything goes wrong, except the end result of it all is that he ends up as Prime Minister of Egypt, one of the most powerful men in the world. It is in this position that, with the wisdom God gives him, he acts as saviour of that whole part of the world, by making provision for seven years before a further seven year period of famine strikes. We see behind Joseph all the way through his tumultuous circumstances, the invisible hand of God at work, being there for him. In this we come to realise that 7. That God works in and through and around us as He works for His end goal for the good of mankind, He is the God of destiny.

To summarise, in considering Isaac, Jacob and Joseph we have added the following knowledge about God, that He:
5. Knows the future and acts into it
6. Knows what He can do with individuals
7. Works in and through and around us as He works for His end goal for the good of mankind.

In other words, God who is Almighty, works for the good of mankind and uses those He sees will be open to Him, as He sees the future and knows what He wants to achieve in it. He doesn’t force them but calls them – despite their initial apparent negative, self-centred and godless attitudes. Part of the process of revealing Himself, involves drawing out the best out of men and women who will be open to Him. With Jacob and Joseph in particular it is the picture of a God of grace and mercy who tolerates their self-centredness because He knows their potential – the ability to develop into men of faith and goodness.