13 July 2008

The Rev'd Lloyd Prator

New York City

Today we read the next story in the cycle of tales about Isaac, Abraham’s son. Last week, we read about Isaac’s marriage to Rebekah. We drop into the story today when we find that Isaac and Rebekah seem unable to have children. Common theme in the Bible, God working with barrenness. But as a result of intense prayer, as well as a few other related activities, Rebekah became pregnant. She could tell the way she kept growing and growing, that there was either a line backer waiting in there, or at least a leg up on a basketball team, it was a rough, huge pregnancy.

So, she went to the local clergy to enquire what the problem might be. The first thing they told her was the obvious one, she would have twins. And the second was that in her case, the normal order of family priority would be reversed; the younger child would be the stronger and dominate the older.

Sure enough, she had twins. Two little boys. But not identical twins. The first born was all covered with red hair, and while Rebekahs reaction is not recorded, that was probably a surprise. The second one emerged with his hand grabbing his brother’s heel. Now, what to name the kids. In Biblical days, parents chose names based upon some characteristic of the child. So, they named the first one Esau, which is, roughly translated, “this is one hairy kid.” Equally obvious, they decided to name the second one Jacob, which means “this kid is a heel-grabber.” What can I tell you – beats Irving.

The next part of the story tells us what the kids were like as they grew up. Even then, parenting was not always a skilled enterprise. There was a lot of favoritism in the family. Rebekah liked Jacob better – even taught him to cook, apparently. Isaac preferred Esau, probably because he was a better hunter and brought home great things to eat.

Esau was impetuous; Jacob was conniving. Jacob was fixing this hearty red stew one day, made of lentils and some other stuff that made it dark, rich maroon color. Esau came in from a day of hunting and wanted some of the stew. Now, Jacob was no dummy; what he wanted was his older brother’s birthright – his place as the oldest son in the family, with inheritance privileges and a better place at the table. “Give me some of that red stuff,” asked Esau. Jacob slammed the lid on the pot and gave Esau a “down the nose” stare, and said, “Sure, you give me your birthright, and I will give you some stew.” I’m hungry thought Esau, what good is a birthright? Can’t eat one of those!. So, he agave over his birthright in exchange for the dark red stew. (Now Rebekah, who observed all of this from the next tent, thought to herself, must have named that kid right, since the hair red kid has opted for the dark red stew. She was sure that mean something, somehow.)

So the story ends with Esau wiping the last of the dark red stew from his dark red beard, Jacob busy thinking about engraved stationery, inheritance taxes, and the joys of primogeniture.

So, what does this story tell us?

One practical thing is that there is a virtue associated with waiting and not acting impetuously. The Esau who just HAD to have the stew RIGHT NOW is a little like you and me when we decide that we just have to have that I-hone or that Coach bag or that Mitsubishi RIGHT NOW and decided to slap it on the Master Card account. There is a virtue to waiting; Jacob was the more prudent, and there are times when this practical lesson on deferring gratification is just what we need to hear.

But there is a deeper lesson here.

This story tells us that God does not align himself only with the obviously important people. Sometimes the first-born is not the one to be blessed by God. This oracle is a saying against the common conventional wisdom of the day. God is perfectly willing to tamper with the customary order of things and arrange it so that the last shall be first and the first last, as Jesus would later put it. Hear this lesson whenever we reflect upon those situations in society and culture where authority needs to be put down and the lowly exalted. I saw an ad a few months ago, I think, in the subway, which commemorated Rosa Parks, the lady whose decision not to yield her bus seat to a white man led to the desegregation of buses in Birmingham, Alabama. The line on the poster went this way; “Rosa Parks stood up for her right by remaining seated.” In that way a woman confronted and changed the whole structure of American apartheid.

And, perhaps even yet a deeper meaning. There is a difference between material blessings – the things of this world, which are to be taken, managed, and controlled – and the things of heaven that are gifts from God just to be received as gifts. The story of Jacob and Esau struggling with life in the womb, and struggling with each other in life, is really a fascinating parable about life in general. Sometimes people who are struggling with religion ask Christians, why if God is such a great God, does he let us struggle against awful things like famine, earthquakes, poverty, disease and suffering? The answer — or at least one answer — is this: The things of life, material blessings, the things of this world, are meant to be taken, managed and controlled. The stuff of life is often meant to be part of our process of growing into maturity. The stuff of life, especially the bad stuff, is on our agenda to see how we do in the struggle.

Creation is a mixed bag of the good, the bad, and the ugly. The bad and the ugly are there for deeply mysterious reasons, only a part of which are readily apparent. But it is clear to me that the struggle against evil and suffering is part of the human agenda which will make us more fully human, deepen our compassion, and lift our vision.

Struggle is a dynamic which is set out in interesting, almost comic, dimension in the story of Jacob and Esau. But in a very personal way, these two fellows are you and me, and the struggle is nothing less than that which we face every day of our life, in varying degrees.

Jacob and Esau, we thank you for telling us about the value of restraint at some times, about the importance of struggle against the forces of life, and above all, the confidence we can place in a God who gives us the gift of life evan at moments which seem most barren.