Heb 11:20-21 By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau in regard to their future.
By faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of Joseph's sons, and worshiped as he leaned on the top of his staff.
Hebrews only wants to show us examples of faith, choosing to highlight what seems to us to be a seemingly insignificant detail of Isaac and Jacob’s stories--the blessing of their sons. Isaac blessed his two sons Esau and Jacob. Jacob blessed his twelve sons before he died.
These blessings were not fatherly affection. Some were not affectionate at all. Look at the blessing Isaac gave his sons: To Jacob he said.
Gen 27:27 May nations serve you and peoples bow down to you. .Be lord over your brothers, and may the sons of your mother bow down to you. May those who curse you be cursed and those who bless you be blessed."
But to Esau he said. Gen 27:39-40 "Your dwelling will be away from the earth's richness, away from the dew of heaven above. 40 You will live by the sword and you will serve your brother.But when you grow restless, you will throw his yoke from off your neck."
An underwhelming blessing, t o be sure.
Jacob's blessing to his children in Genesis 48, this is even more blunt. He predicts the future of each tribe. Some get bad news, like Simeon and Levi
Gen 49:5-7 Cursed be their anger, so fierce, and their fury, so cruel! I will scatter them in Jacob and disperse them in Israel.
Some got good news, like Judah in Gen 49:10 The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his.
Imagine if we talked to our children that way. They would probably have to answer to the Department of Social Services! Not only would it be cruel, it would also be presumptuous!.
Yet Isaac and Jacob blessed their children, and everything they said came true. How did they know?
They knew by faith. Faith is "The substance of what is hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Faith is looking beyond what appears to be with our eyes, and predict seeing with God’s eyes. Faith is not about how things look today, but how they will look tomorrow. Faith is believing that God is in charge, and that He hears and listens to the words we say. Then he grants us a future according to our faith.
Isaac and Jacob knew his voice. They heard His sayings. Therefore, they knew That God’s will would be one. The world would proceed according to the rule He sets. Nothing is up to chance. It is all in the hands of God.
We do not know what tomorrow hold, but we know who holds the future. This is true in the future of the world, the future of our children and family and our own future.
Right now, the future of the world is uncertain to us. Secularists are prophesying that in a hundred years or so, religion would cease to exist.
Recently a writer in Russia predicted that within a year, the United States would break apart. Twenty years ago climatologists warned us that we were approaching an era of global cooling, a new ice age. Now they say we are experiencing global warming. Either way, they are covered.
Yet Isaac and Jacob blessed their children, and everything they said came true. How did they know?
God will not let us down. Religion will not pass away. Evil will not triumph. Heaven and earth will pass away before God’s word passes away. We may not understand Revelation, but w know its central message--we win in the end. Our faith is based in the fact of God’s eternal Word.
We do not know what will happen to those we love, either. We have no guarantee that they will survive us, or that we will survive them..
It is appointed that a man die once and after that the judgment. But the time or our death and the length of our lives are unknown. Stephen, the first martyr, died young. Methuselah died very, very old. Good people die young and sometimes bad people hand on forever.
We may not be able to predict the length of a life, but we can see the things that will lengthen it or shorten it. They blessings of Isaac and Jacob may have been based on divine knowledge, but they also rest on God-given knowledge about where sin will lead. If we see a man who is filled with violence, the man will never see one hundred. If we see a man who lives according to God’s word, then he has every reason to believe he will have a long and fruitful life. If he does not, then something better awaits him in the next life. This man will probably live longer than the man who doesn't. The results of righteousness are all around him.
You cannot control what happens to your children, but God can. Trust God for them. Worry is a failure of faith. We trust God for them while we go on and live.
Faith is the confidence of our children’s welfare, the evidence of their unseen survival. No matter how things may seem, they are still in His hands, and He will never let them go.
Faith for the future is not just about our loved ones.. It is also about ourselves.
One of my fathers in the ministry was Dr. Robert Marshburn. When he was the age I am now, he had his first heart attack and almost died. He told me later how he did not know if he would ever come home. Then God laid a verse on his heart--Jeremiah 29:13. 'For I know the plans I have for you,’ says the Lord. 'Plans for God and not for evil, to give you an end and a purpose.'" he remembered this verse and knew that God had something else for him. God was not finished with him yet.
Ten years later, he died of a second heart attack at the age of 67. But during those last ten years of life he accomplished wonderful things. He finished raising seven children, the youngest of when went on to fly on the space shuttle. He mentored and several young men in the ministry, including two pastors of this church. Along with them, his ministry produced church planters, missionaries, youth workers and even a professor at Erskine Seminary. He helped start our first Korean church and went on to serve as moderator of Synod. The prediction the Holy Spirit gave to him was true. God was not finished with him yet.
God has a two-fold promise for your life. The big promise is this--you will go to heaven if you trust in Jesus. But the other one is almost as wonderful--that as long as you live, there will always be a future and a hope. We will always have purpose as long as you are willing to find it.
By faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of Joseph's sons, and worshiped as he leaned on the top of his staff.
Hebrews only wants to show us examples of faith, choosing to highlight what seems to us to be a seemingly insignificant detail of Isaac and Jacob’s stories--the blessing of their sons. Isaac blessed his two sons Esau and Jacob. Jacob blessed his twelve sons before he died.
These blessings were not fatherly affection. Some were not affectionate at all. Look at the blessing Isaac gave his sons: To Jacob he said.
Gen 27:27 May nations serve you and peoples bow down to you. .Be lord over your brothers, and may the sons of your mother bow down to you. May those who curse you be cursed and those who bless you be blessed."
But to Esau he said. Gen 27:39-40 "Your dwelling will be away from the earth's richness, away from the dew of heaven above. 40 You will live by the sword and you will serve your brother.But when you grow restless, you will throw his yoke from off your neck."
An underwhelming blessing, t o be sure.
Jacob's blessing to his children in Genesis 48, this is even more blunt. He predicts the future of each tribe. Some get bad news, like Simeon and Levi
Gen 49:5-7 Cursed be their anger, so fierce, and their fury, so cruel! I will scatter them in Jacob and disperse them in Israel.
Some got good news, like Judah in Gen 49:10 The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler's staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his.
Imagine if we talked to our children that way. They would probably have to answer to the Department of Social Services! Not only would it be cruel, it would also be presumptuous!.
Yet Isaac and Jacob blessed their children, and everything they said came true. How did they know?
They knew by faith. Faith is "The substance of what is hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Faith is looking beyond what appears to be with our eyes, and predict seeing with God’s eyes. Faith is not about how things look today, but how they will look tomorrow. Faith is believing that God is in charge, and that He hears and listens to the words we say. Then he grants us a future according to our faith.
Isaac and Jacob knew his voice. They heard His sayings. Therefore, they knew That God’s will would be one. The world would proceed according to the rule He sets. Nothing is up to chance. It is all in the hands of God.
We do not know what tomorrow hold, but we know who holds the future. This is true in the future of the world, the future of our children and family and our own future.
Right now, the future of the world is uncertain to us. Secularists are prophesying that in a hundred years or so, religion would cease to exist.
Recently a writer in Russia predicted that within a year, the United States would break apart. Twenty years ago climatologists warned us that we were approaching an era of global cooling, a new ice age. Now they say we are experiencing global warming. Either way, they are covered.
Yet Isaac and Jacob blessed their children, and everything they said came true. How did they know?
God will not let us down. Religion will not pass away. Evil will not triumph. Heaven and earth will pass away before God’s word passes away. We may not understand Revelation, but w know its central message--we win in the end. Our faith is based in the fact of God’s eternal Word.
We do not know what will happen to those we love, either. We have no guarantee that they will survive us, or that we will survive them..
It is appointed that a man die once and after that the judgment. But the time or our death and the length of our lives are unknown. Stephen, the first martyr, died young. Methuselah died very, very old. Good people die young and sometimes bad people hand on forever.
We may not be able to predict the length of a life, but we can see the things that will lengthen it or shorten it. They blessings of Isaac and Jacob may have been based on divine knowledge, but they also rest on God-given knowledge about where sin will lead. If we see a man who is filled with violence, the man will never see one hundred. If we see a man who lives according to God’s word, then he has every reason to believe he will have a long and fruitful life. If he does not, then something better awaits him in the next life. This man will probably live longer than the man who doesn't. The results of righteousness are all around him.
You cannot control what happens to your children, but God can. Trust God for them. Worry is a failure of faith. We trust God for them while we go on and live.
Faith is the confidence of our children’s welfare, the evidence of their unseen survival. No matter how things may seem, they are still in His hands, and He will never let them go.
Faith for the future is not just about our loved ones.. It is also about ourselves.
One of my fathers in the ministry was Dr. Robert Marshburn. When he was the age I am now, he had his first heart attack and almost died. He told me later how he did not know if he would ever come home. Then God laid a verse on his heart--Jeremiah 29:13. 'For I know the plans I have for you,’ says the Lord. 'Plans for God and not for evil, to give you an end and a purpose.'" he remembered this verse and knew that God had something else for him. God was not finished with him yet.
Ten years later, he died of a second heart attack at the age of 67. But during those last ten years of life he accomplished wonderful things. He finished raising seven children, the youngest of when went on to fly on the space shuttle. He mentored and several young men in the ministry, including two pastors of this church. Along with them, his ministry produced church planters, missionaries, youth workers and even a professor at Erskine Seminary. He helped start our first Korean church and went on to serve as moderator of Synod. The prediction the Holy Spirit gave to him was true. God was not finished with him yet.
God has a two-fold promise for your life. The big promise is this--you will go to heaven if you trust in Jesus. But the other one is almost as wonderful--that as long as you live, there will always be a future and a hope. We will always have purpose as long as you are willing to find it.
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