Genesis 25:27-34; 27:30-36
GOD'S ways and dealings with His own people are marked by strong peculiarities, and distinguishing blessings. As a rule, we are not sufficiently alive to them, and fail to realize that the one great object of Christ was, not only to redeem, but to purify for Himself a peculiar people. There are two distinguishing peculiarities which mark us in these relations to God, —first, the birthright; second, the blessing. We find this to be so, even in nature. Ask a Scotchman what distinguishes him from any other man: and he will at once speak of his nationality, and tell you it is by his birth. To bequeath a blessing is beyond any earthly power to do, but birthrights are handed down from father to son. This is merely for the sake of illustration. There are, likewise, certain immunities and privileges peculiar to God's people. Another thing we find is, that our experiences govern us in these matters a great deal. A believer has, or has had, two sets of experiences; as a natural man the experiences of the heart are shown by their fruit, viz., discontent, envy, bitterness, malice, etc. But do you think that a Christian can be destitute of right experiences? Can he have knowledge of Christ, and be in communion with God, and yet have no corresponding experience; and is he not nourished by what he has got? A Christian stands here as “peculiar, “for he cannot be a discontented man, because he has got Christ; and not only this, but God makes this a realized power, and it produces experiences.” I will dwell in you by my Spirit; “our bodies are only the vessel; but the Holy Spirit in the believer is the felt power. Where are we to look for our birthright? Not in this world, nor of man, for we are “born of God." Is not this peculiar? You are not merely something better than you were, but you must altogether refuse to acknowledge what you were as in the flesh, because you are “born of God." This is a distinguishing truth, and a fact, as you read in John 5:21, “The Father quickeneth.". In Israel's days, many who were halt, and diseased, came to the pool of Bethesda, waiting for the angel,—but " My Father worketh, and I work," supersedes all remedial measures of the law; for this quickening power is the beginning of a new creation by birth. Is this not peculiar? People speak oftentimes of national creeds, and lean upon them; but a church-creed is not a life-giving power, whereas the word of God is a living word. “God gives life" through His written word. If we turn from all these considerations, to recognize others, and look on the great fact of God sending forth His Son, by the mystery of 'flesh and blood at the incarnation, will not this give a new object for faith, and bring experiences and feelings into the soul by the Holy Ghost? If not, then we can have no adequate conception of God's unspeakable gift to us, and no experiences, except our own sinful ones, which fall to our lot through the first Adam and a corrupt nature.
God creates and forms new experiences in those who are in Christ. We may have conflict between the flesh and the Spirit, and between the old and new natures in us, but conflict should never discourage; on the contrary, it is a good sign. The Spirit of God in the believer makes him live out the new life, which he has by birthright, as one with Christ, and transformed from the world. It is like the steam-power overcoming everything which is contrary, whether winds or waves, and the vessel reaching its port depends on it. Our right by birth is as sons of God, and heirs, and the pathway is to Christ at the right hand of God in glory. It is He who worketh in us to will and to do, and the Spirit is the power which leads us along through all the difficulties of the way; they only prove the mighty power which has surmounted them, when at their highest point of danger. Divine life in Christ is now the life; and our being partakers of His nature makes experiences in us of a new character. In this world, and amongst the generations of men, all the cultivation is given to the mind; they do not cultivate the heart. In Proverbs, I see: "My son, give me thy heart." Nothing here masters the heart; for how can man grapple with his own heart? It is God's prerogative, and God takes this up. “Christ dwelling in the heart by faith," and” Christ in you the hope of glory," are our birthrights by the effectual grace of God our Father. " Strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man " (Eph.), must produce many experiences of a new and right sort. The Spirit resists the lusts and desires of the flesh, and of the mind, and the bad nature; but here it is more. We have eternal life “to know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." We are likewise strengthened with might by His Spirit to comprehend, etc., and to know the love of Christ; this is a new history, and it is our birthright. If we lose sight of our birth, and rights-by-birth through grace, and begin to look at ourselves, Satan says, Do you think this is your portion, are you pure and lovely? But the believer looks at what Christ is, and we behold ourselves in His comeliness, and we are blessed according to the Father's love to Him. Nothing was too high for Christ; He is set at the right hand of the Father, and we are joint-heirs with Him. This is, then, your birthright, else you deny the love and grace of the Father, and you deny the efficacy of the blood of Christ, and the witness in you by the power of the Holy Spirit. It is not by the will of the flesh, nor by man, nor of men, that we get our own right, for they are Christ's rights, and His alone,—and this is a distinction. It is a great comfort that God insists on this with us, as the result of our redemption. We are spoken to as those who are “bought with the blood of Christ;" we are not our own, and belong to God; our bodies are His. All these new and divine rights produce heavenly feelings and affections (as they well may) in the believer's heart, supplied through the Holy Spirit. “It has not entered into the heart of man, etc.,.... but God has revealed it by his Spirit." Moreover, the anchor to our souls is inside the veil; and when tossed up and down by the wind and waves, or by the wear and tear of the wilderness journey, we look where the forerunner has for us entered, inside the veil, and this hope is the anchor of the believer. There may be rough and stormy seas, but faith and hope work out their salvation by means of them, like a gallant ship which runs out her anchor in proof thereof, and swings quietly, and peacefully thereby. " We look at things unseen, knowing that things seen are temporal." If you drop these blood-bought peculiarities, you must take up with mere earthly experiences; and the heavenly ones will not govern you, and characterize you, and, may be, will not occupy you.
In this 27 chapter, we see that Jacob and Rebekah valued so greatly the birthright and the blessing, that they falsified themselves to obtain them from Isaac. What a rebuke is this to us, it may be-if we ask, “How do we value that which we rightly and lawfully possess?" In verse 29 of the 25. chapter, Esau is guided by His own present experiences, for he was faint, and at the point to, die;—whereas his brother Jacob's heart was set upon the birthright, though Jacob acted wrongly as a supplanter; and had he been patient, God would have given the birthright by election (see Rom. 9), and bestowed upon him the blessing in His own way. Esau says: "What good shall this birthright do me," for I am faint, and he gives up his birthright for a mess of pottage. If you do no look at your birth by the grace and calling of God, you will undervalue the right, and practically you will give it up for what will suit your haste, and serve you at the present moment. Look to Christ, who gives the standard and value to the birth, and its rights, and the blessing, according to the purpose and calling of God, as displayed in the glorified Son, on the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens. We are to be like Him; so if faint, look to Him for strength. Of a natural man it is said, "When he dies, all his thoughts perish;" but the Christian's thoughts get brighter and brighter. It is not I dying, but all that is of sin, and my former self is separated from me forever, and the Spirit goes to Christ. The flesh and sin are left behind, and this is how faith sees it now, and despises the mess of pottage. If God did not summon us in John's Epistle to behold “the manner of the Father's love" in calling us out to glory, and telling us we are” sons of God," we could not speak on this subject; but there can be no question about these blessings in and with Christ, any more than of our birth. Many a natural man is born without any birthrights; but where are the heirs of God to turn for their birthright as sons? Thanks to “the Father," we find the roll in numerous Scriptures. Take Eph. 1:3, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies." Here we get birth, birthright, and blessing. Our new experiences of ourselves are according to the new creation, and take their form from Christ where He is, and we learn there is something outside and far beyond Adam, and the first heaven and the first earth, and self. There is, therefore, a new prayer offered up 'by Paul for us in verses 15 to the end, because the birthrights, and the blessing go so infinitely beyond us all, so he prays for “the spirit of wisdom and revelation, etc." Do not be afraid to say you think it beyond all that your heart ever knew, or conceived in you, for it shows, at least, that you see the birthright is there, and think rightly of it.
Take another Apostle, and a different Epistle, and see how Peter brings the inheritance down upon a level which shows that it is not beyond anyone. The fact is, that in chapter 1:3, we are viewed in our birthright and blessing “as begotten, by Christ's resurrection from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and which fadeth not away." Is not this wonderful? If I went to any conveyance and told him I came about an inheritance, he would ask me, “What is your title?" It is by death, I reply. Very well, he understands me so far; but if I add, and it is by resurrection, would he not look surprised, as indeed he well might? Suppose I went on to say, in further describing this inheritance, that " it was incorruptible (he never heard of such a thing), and undefiled, and fadeth not away;" he would tell me he could have nothing to say to me, or to do with my case. He had never drawn up a conveyance of such a character, or for such an inheritance, and it was quite foreign to all practice in conveyance in the courts below; but such is the believer's birthright! Go about with this thought of Peter's, that you are begotten to an inheritance reserved for you in heaven with Christ the heir, and that you are kept for it by the power of God through faith unto salvation; passing the time of your sojourning here in fear watching and looking for Christ, " as God's obedient children," till He come. Beloved brethren, ye do not get this exhortation in 1 Peter 1:14, until the Holy Spirit has brought out the birth, the birthright, and the blessing; then ye are addressed as obedient children, calling upon the Father if “faint or ready to die." We are nearer to our inheritance by all the circumstances and personal experiences on the way. Nearer by death, than now; therefore it can have no terrors for us. One thing more, in Gen. 25:33, take care none of us do what Esau did, when he thought lightly of the birthright, for he sat down to eat and drink, and rose up, and went his way; Jacob loved the inheritance, and Esau despised it. Jacob saw there was one thing worth having between God and His purposes of blessing, and that was the birthright. In Eph. 1, “Blessings in heavenly places” revealed to us as the heirs of God, joint-heirs in the glory; and this is told with all the freshness of the Holy Ghost's unction by Paul, as he unfolds the Father's counsels to us by the Spirit. This must produce feelings and affections. As to all else, everything worketh together (under the sun) for unmixed “good, to those who love Christ," and are the called according to His purpose.
Touching our pathway with Him, Jesus said, “If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, or whether I speak of myself." Obedience is the divine way of learning for us; and we know the Father by doing His will. The higher you mark and estimate your birthright, the more practically, and in character with it, you will walk down here, " as sons of God, without rebuke in the, midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world," etc. (Phil. 2:15, 16).