WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:08.160 Thank you, Alex. We continue in the book of Genesis. Last week we were Genesis 26. 00:00:08.580 --> 00:00:14.400 ! And we got a glimpse into the life of Isaac, the only chapter about Isaac. Remember, he had a great 00:00:14.400 --> 00:00:19.839 ! father, he had a great son, and he was stuck in the middle with just one chapter. But we did get to see 00:00:19.839 --> 00:00:26.560 something pretty cool. We got to see him go on this journey of choosing faith over fear. He started not 00:00:26.559 --> 00:00:31.339 very well. He started by lying about his wife, just like his dad. And we talked a little bit about the 00:00:31.339 --> 00:00:36.659 generational sins that we pass on to our kids. Even though he didn't witness his dad lying, you can 00:00:36.659 --> 00:00:41.560 bet that around the dinner table, that's what he absorbed. That's what he caught. Choose fear. 00:00:42.159 --> 00:00:47.299 Choose to protect yourself as opposed to entrust yourself to God. But encouragingly, we started to 00:00:47.299 --> 00:00:52.679 see him grow. We started to see him decide, you know what? I can trust God. And so whilst the Philistines 00:00:52.679 --> 00:00:56.460 were looking at him constantly getting richer and richer and getting envious and trying to 00:00:56.460 --> 00:01:01.140 sabotage his wealth, he was like, take the wealth. I don't need the wealth. You can have it. Take this 00:01:01.140 --> 00:01:05.340 wealth. You can have it. I don't need it. My God will be the one that provides for me. And so there's 00:01:05.340 --> 00:01:10.739 this exciting or encouraging journey we got to see of Isaac getting better and better, growing. 00:01:12.500 --> 00:01:18.579 I wish that could be the end of his story. I wish that's how we all go about. Maybe it's not a perfect 00:01:18.579 --> 00:01:23.959 rocket ship to heaven where we go from A to Z and we become perfect, but maybe through the oscillating, 00:01:24.060 --> 00:01:28.019 through the ups and downs, we eventually get better and better. I wish I could tell you that. 00:01:28.959 --> 00:01:37.019 And yet that is far from the case. This week, we're looking at God's promise, continually working 00:01:37.019 --> 00:01:43.659 through his people, but his people continually being dysfunctional to the point where this Isaac, 00:01:43.659 --> 00:01:50.340 who was growing and getting better and better, doesn't finish well at all. And as I was reading 00:01:50.340 --> 00:01:59.259 this, I was like, this is another bad example, another messed up case. And I started feeling a 00:01:59.259 --> 00:02:06.019 little bit hopeless. But hopefully as we go through this journey, we will see there is much more to the 00:02:06.019 --> 00:02:13.159 dysfunction than meets the eye. And God somehow still works through all of it. We have people from all over 00:02:13.159 --> 00:02:19.979 the world in this room. And when possible, I like to introduce and expose us to different accents 00:02:19.979 --> 00:02:26.280 from around the world. And today we have a treat. We have one of the university students who's joined 00:02:26.280 --> 00:02:32.560 us and sadly only for a year, but he's going to introduce to us the word of God through the Scottish 00:02:32.560 --> 00:02:39.019 accent. And can we invite Benny up to come and read for us? And can I invite you to stand for the 00:02:39.020 --> 00:02:45.140 word of the Lord? Wow. An applause for the Scotsman. There we go. Okay. Because of that, I'm going to 00:02:45.140 --> 00:02:50.500 have to pray for us just to repent of anything that we have. Lord, we focus fully on your word. We thank 00:02:50.500 --> 00:02:56.100 you for this brother that you've brought him into our midst. Hong Kong is the opposite of Scotland in 00:02:56.100 --> 00:03:01.480 many regards, but we thank you that through you, your son, what you did on the cross for us, 00:03:01.479 --> 00:03:07.000 we are family. And so we lean into your word this morning now and ask that you would speak. 00:03:10.500 --> 00:03:16.219 Okay. So I'll be reading from Genesis 27, 1 to 13. 00:03:18.159 --> 00:03:23.839 When Isaac was old and his eyes were dim so that he could not see, he called Esau, his older son, 00:03:23.840 --> 00:03:32.060 and said to him, my son. And he answered, here I am. He said, behold, I am old. I do not know the day of 00:03:32.060 --> 00:03:38.879 my death. Now then take your weapons, your quiver and your bowl and go out to the field and hunt game 00:03:38.879 --> 00:03:46.080 for me and prepare for me delicious food such as I love and bring it to me so that I may eat, that my 00:03:46.080 --> 00:03:53.219 soul may bless you before I die. Now, Rebecca was listening when Isaac spoke to his son Esau. 00:03:53.219 --> 00:03:59.520 So when Esau went to the field to hunt for game and bring it, Rebecca said to her son Jacob, 00:04:00.020 --> 00:04:06.300 I heard your father speak to your brother Esau. Bring me game and prepare for me delicious food 00:04:06.300 --> 00:04:12.199 that I may eat it and bless you before the Lord before I die. Now, therefore, my son, 00:04:12.840 --> 00:04:20.339 obey my voice as I command you. Go to the flock and bring me two good young goats so that I may prepare 00:04:20.339 --> 00:04:28.599 for them delicious food for your father such as he loves. And you shall bring it to your father to eat 00:04:28.599 --> 00:04:36.219 so that he may bless you before he dies. But Jacob said to Rebecca, his mother, behold, my brother Esau 00:04:36.219 --> 00:04:44.259 is a hairy man and I am a smooth man. Perhaps my father will feel me and I shall see to be mocking him 00:04:44.259 --> 00:04:51.620 and bring a curse upon myself and not a blessing. His mother said to him, let your curse be on me, 00:04:51.680 --> 00:04:55.920 my son. Only obey my voice and go bring them to me. 00:04:55.920 --> 00:05:03.780 This is the word of the Lord. Please take a seat. Thank you, Benny. Actually, as far as Scottish 00:05:03.780 --> 00:05:09.980 accents go, that's pretty easy to listen to. If you've actually been to Scotland and some of the 00:05:09.980 --> 00:05:14.120 people that you speak to, you have no idea what they're saying. You just nod and it's kind of like 00:05:14.120 --> 00:05:21.300 when I go to Shenzhen. Doi, doi. Doi, doi. And Benny's actually here. He's fairly new and he's only 00:05:21.300 --> 00:05:24.560 here for a year in Hong Kong and he's one of the university students. So if you want to hang out 00:05:24.560 --> 00:05:31.439 with him, then come and let us know. Isn't this sad? You see Isaac kind of growing up. 00:05:32.019 --> 00:05:36.240 Now we see him getting a little bit old. Just one second here though. When Isaac was old and his 00:05:36.240 --> 00:05:41.079 eyes were dim, so he's actually getting blind. Ironically, it's not just physically blind. 00:05:41.139 --> 00:05:45.840 He's actually spiritually blind. He could not see. He called his son. He says, I don't know when I'm 00:05:45.840 --> 00:05:50.100 going to die. Ironically, we think that this is actually him on his deathbed. It is not. He actually 00:05:50.100 --> 00:05:55.060 lives for another 43 years after this. So it just tells you, actually, you don't know when you're 00:05:55.060 --> 00:06:02.379 going to die. But sadly, what we can tell is that he doesn't really finish well. And it really got me 00:06:02.379 --> 00:06:07.620 thinking. If you look at, actually, let's start with the Bible. If you look at the Bible, there are so 00:06:07.620 --> 00:06:16.180 many examples of people not finishing well. God's chosen man, Saul, to be a king. He doesn't finish well. 00:06:16.180 --> 00:06:28.199 The wisest man of all time, Solomon, does not finish well. Gideon does not finish well. 00:06:29.079 --> 00:06:36.879 Elvis Presley did not finish well. Christina and I, we watched the movie Michael this last week. 00:06:36.879 --> 00:06:48.079 Good film, good songs. Did not finish well. Whitney Houston does not finish well. It makes me think, 00:06:48.600 --> 00:06:56.379 what's the problem here? We can oscillate and hopefully trend upwards, but that isn't always 00:06:56.379 --> 00:07:04.339 the case. What are some of the pitfalls that these people fall into that cause them to not finish well? 00:07:04.339 --> 00:07:12.299 Have a think about that. I might even ask someone, what do you think is the reason why people don't 00:07:12.299 --> 00:07:23.419 finish well? Matthew, what do you think? Pride. Pride comes before the fall and you start making 00:07:23.419 --> 00:07:30.879 decisions where you feel as though you are the center and that's how you fall. Beth, any thoughts? 00:07:30.879 --> 00:07:39.800 Pride. Yeah, pride as well. Tim Keller has a description of pride, which is you take credit 00:07:39.800 --> 00:07:46.560 where it isn't deserved. We think that we, everything that we have, everything that we have 00:07:46.560 --> 00:07:54.420 achieved is because of what we've done. Well, it is far from the truth. What else is there? What is the 00:07:54.420 --> 00:07:59.480 reason why there are people, so many people who don't finish well? Caleb, what do you think? 00:08:02.400 --> 00:08:07.540 Complacency. That's such a big one. So the fellowship is the discipleship cohort we've been 00:08:07.540 --> 00:08:13.280 doing. As Alex mentioned, we've been going through Hebrews this last week. And chapter two, it's stay, 00:08:13.379 --> 00:08:20.580 listen carefully, study carefully the word, the truth, lest you drift away from it. Drift. That song 00:08:20.579 --> 00:08:26.199 that we are prone to wander. Like we start off well. Often January 1st, we start off well, but it takes 00:08:26.199 --> 00:08:32.840 us till what? January 6th when we start to drift. The scripture says, cling on closely. You fast 00:08:32.840 --> 00:08:37.500 forward into Hebrews 12, you see the same thing. And I've been asking that question, God, how do we 00:08:37.500 --> 00:08:45.360 finish well? How do I finish well? Only recently in these last five, six years, pastors that I grew up 00:08:45.360 --> 00:08:51.820 watching, listening to, reading their books, one by one, falling like flies. And I find myself asking 00:08:51.820 --> 00:08:57.440 the same question to brothers who I'm walking with, who are walking with me, how do you finish well? 00:08:58.000 --> 00:09:03.519 It seems like it's way easier to go the other way. What's the big source of this? I think it's pride. 00:09:04.820 --> 00:09:12.019 I think another source of this is deceit. We lie to ourselves. We lie to those around us. You talk 00:09:12.019 --> 00:09:16.639 to the pastors who were fallen. You talk to the leaders who have fallen from grace. 00:09:17.899 --> 00:09:20.019 They just fall into this cycle of deceit. 00:09:22.179 --> 00:09:25.519 You look at this chapter that we're going to go through, this family, this 00:09:25.519 --> 00:09:31.980 covenant family that God chose to bless the nations through. It's just filled with deceit. 00:09:32.899 --> 00:09:37.220 It's filled with them lying to one another. And we're going to unpack that a little bit because I 00:09:37.220 --> 00:09:44.519 think you can trace this all the way back to the original sin. When the enemy says, did God really 00:09:44.519 --> 00:09:52.320 say that? Oh, I'm not sure that's true. I was talking to a dear brother in our congregation this 00:09:52.320 --> 00:09:57.100 last week. And he says, whenever he's struggling through anxiety or kind of stress that he's going 00:09:57.100 --> 00:10:03.379 through, he goes back to books about trust in God because he knows the remedy to all that anxiety, 00:10:03.379 --> 00:10:08.740 to all that fear, to all that pride, is to going back to trusting in God, in the truth of who he is. 00:10:08.879 --> 00:10:13.299 Because when you know who he is, and you know he is the promise keeper, you know he is the light in 00:10:13.299 --> 00:10:19.299 the darkness, you know he will make a way, then that fear will subside, that anxiety will pass. 00:10:20.500 --> 00:10:27.639 Deceit is what we see here in probably the most famous dysfunctional family we see here in the Bible. 00:10:27.639 --> 00:10:35.679 And it starts with desire. It makes me think about Jeremiah 17 9. The heart is deceitful above all 00:10:35.679 --> 00:10:41.639 things. It is sick. How many times have we said that about someone else? Oh, he's got a good heart. 00:10:41.799 --> 00:10:47.139 Oh, she's... Oh, trust in your gut. Trust in your heart. Whenever someone tells me that, I'm like, 00:10:47.179 --> 00:10:54.500 I can't. I trust in my heart, I'll be in a very bad place. Because my heart is deceitful above all 00:10:54.500 --> 00:10:59.419 things. And you think, oh, I'm pretty okay now. Well, just look back on our own lives five years 00:10:59.419 --> 00:11:04.919 ago, ten years ago, some of the silly mistakes that we made. In fact, it's Keller who also said, 00:11:04.980 --> 00:11:09.620 every time you look back five years and you see your old self, you're like, oh, that old self was 00:11:09.620 --> 00:11:15.379 pretty silly, was pretty stupid. And guess what? You, yourself, five years from now, will look at you 00:11:15.379 --> 00:11:21.559 right now in the same way. Surely that just instills humility in you, that right now I do not know 00:11:21.559 --> 00:11:26.839 everything. Right now I can be deceived. Because the whole definition of being deceived, you don't 00:11:26.839 --> 00:11:33.119 know that you are being deceived. So what we see here is a family of deceit that we're going to go 00:11:33.119 --> 00:11:38.719 through. This covenant family ends up turning into a corrupt and compromised family. And we start here. 00:11:39.239 --> 00:11:45.000 Isaac, he is getting old, 137, I believe. His eyes were dimmed, so he couldn't see. 00:11:46.039 --> 00:11:50.799 His mind was probably dimmed. Spiritually, he was blind. He calls his older son, Esau. Remember, 00:11:50.799 --> 00:11:54.919 that's his favorite. We talked last week about the dangers of favoritism. And so he calls his 00:11:54.919 --> 00:11:59.079 older son. He says to him, my son, here I am. Behold, I'm old. I don't know when I'm going to die. 00:11:59.439 --> 00:12:03.120 Now take your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt game for me and 00:12:03.120 --> 00:12:07.979 prepare for me delicious food such as I love and bring it to me so that I may eat, that I may, 00:12:08.120 --> 00:12:16.639 my soul may bless you before I die. This seems innocent on the surface, but it is far from it. 00:12:16.639 --> 00:12:23.860 Remember, what happened to Esau? Why did he trade away his birthright? Because he was hangry. So he 00:12:23.860 --> 00:12:29.699 traded it for a bowl of soup. Because why? Because his God was his belly. Philippians 3 talks about 00:12:29.699 --> 00:12:34.279 this. Their end is destruction. Their God is their belly. Their glory and their shame. They set their 00:12:34.279 --> 00:12:40.379 minds on earthly things. So Esau had an appetite. Guess where he got that from? We can see here. He got it 00:12:40.379 --> 00:12:47.059 from dad. The apple never falls too far from the tree. Esau is his favorite son. Why? Because Esau 00:12:47.059 --> 00:12:51.379 was a strong man. Because Esau would go out and hunt wild game and cook delicious food for his dad. 00:12:51.500 --> 00:12:55.259 And his dad would be satisfied. His belly would be satisfied. So that's why he was his favorite. 00:12:55.519 --> 00:13:00.019 And then he does something really sneaky. He does something very deceitful. He speaks to Esau and says, 00:13:00.080 --> 00:13:10.120 son, come here. Go out and hunt for me and cook that delicious food. Do you remember that Wagyu A5 that you did last time? 00:13:10.379 --> 00:13:16.580 Do the same. Come. Don't tell mom. Don't tell your brother. I'm going to eat it. It's going to be 00:13:16.580 --> 00:13:24.460 delicious. It's going to be yummy. Then I'm going to bless you. Isaac knows. He's known from the 00:13:24.460 --> 00:13:29.360 beginning, even when his wife was pregnant, that it was going to be the other way around. It was going 00:13:29.360 --> 00:13:36.039 to be Jacob over Esau. He knew that. He knew he would have known about the swapping for the bowl of soup 00:13:36.039 --> 00:13:42.099 for the birthright. And yet here, despite knowing all that, he still tries to be sneaky. He still 00:13:42.099 --> 00:13:46.079 tries to be deceptive and say, hey, I know all that happened. I know there's prophecies about that. 00:13:46.120 --> 00:13:52.299 But tell you what, go and cook me a delicious meal. I think I can, I've got a way around this, 00:13:53.079 --> 00:13:58.000 is what he's saying. You see deceit starts from the very beginning and you see that it passes down 00:13:58.000 --> 00:14:03.419 from father to son. But just when you think, oh, that's their fault, actually on the other side, 00:14:03.480 --> 00:14:08.340 you can just favoritism. It's so destructive here because on the other side, guess who's 00:14:08.340 --> 00:14:14.019 listening in just on the outside of the door? His wife, Rebecca. So you can see, actually, 00:14:14.080 --> 00:14:18.120 if this was a proper blessing, it would have been the whole family occasion. Yeah. He's saying, 00:14:18.120 --> 00:14:24.019 hey, come here. I can give you this blessing myself. So not only is he trying to deceive 00:14:24.019 --> 00:14:29.600 his wife and his youngest son, he's also trying to deceive God because God's already told them 00:14:29.600 --> 00:14:34.720 it'll be Jacob, but he's like, I can do this. Let's figure it out this way. And so then he goes, 00:14:34.939 --> 00:14:38.980 but his wife is actually listening. And so this is what happens. Verse five. Now, Rebecca was 00:14:38.980 --> 00:14:42.840 listening when Isaac spoke to his son Esau. So when Esau went to the field to hunt for game and bring it, 00:14:43.000 --> 00:14:47.939 Rebecca said to her son, Jacob, I heard your father speak to your brother Esau, bring me game and 00:14:47.939 --> 00:14:52.500 prepare for me delicious food that I may eat it and bless you before Lord, before I die. Now, 00:14:52.500 --> 00:14:56.879 therefore my son, obey my voice as I command you, go to the flock and bring me two good young goats 00:14:56.879 --> 00:15:00.799 so that I may prepare from them delicious food for your father, such as he loves. 00:15:01.120 --> 00:15:06.200 Just as the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree from Isaac down to Esau, Rebecca is the same. 00:15:06.399 --> 00:15:11.679 She hears this and goes, well, that's not right. Jacob is the chosen one. My favorite is the chosen 00:15:11.679 --> 00:15:16.159 one. But instead of trusting in God and saying, look, God, you said that it will be Jacob. I'm going 00:15:16.159 --> 00:15:20.799 to trust you and leave you to do it. She decides to take matters into her own hands. How often have we done 00:15:20.799 --> 00:15:27.740 that? It's almost out of good intention, but we do it in this manipulative way. And so she says, hey, 00:15:28.219 --> 00:15:32.199 we can deal with this. Can you see the, just the destructive and disgusting nature of deceit 00:15:32.199 --> 00:15:38.620 that's happening? So she tells him, you go, actually you can beat Esau to dad. Why? Because Esau's got 00:15:38.620 --> 00:15:42.879 to go out and hunt. We're going to take a shortcut. You go out to the garden, find two young goats that 00:15:42.879 --> 00:15:48.159 we've domesticated. It'll taste different, but don't worry. I know exactly how your dad likes the food. 00:15:48.159 --> 00:15:55.219 So I will cook. What does Jacob say? The apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. He says, 00:15:55.439 --> 00:16:00.679 verse 11, but Jacob said to Rebecca, his mother, behold, my brother Esau is a hairy man and I am a 00:16:00.679 --> 00:16:11.759 smooth criminal. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Perhaps my father will fill me and I shall seem to 00:16:11.759 --> 00:16:18.939 be mocking him and bring a curse upon myself and not a blessing. It's interesting. The moment mom tells 00:16:18.939 --> 00:16:24.399 him, hey, why don't you go and lie and do this? We can, we can, we can out scheme your dad and your 00:16:24.399 --> 00:16:30.939 brother. Instead of saying, hey, that's not right. God already blessed us and it will happen regardless. 00:16:30.940 --> 00:16:38.500 What's he afraid of? He's not afraid of actually doing the deed. He's afraid of getting caught. 00:16:39.480 --> 00:16:46.500 Don't we have that too? We're not so afraid of doing the bad things, but actually we're afraid 00:16:46.500 --> 00:16:51.540 of getting caught, the consequences. And then you see favoritism continue. His mother then said to him, 00:16:51.600 --> 00:16:56.740 let your curse be on me, my son. Only obey my voice and go bring them to him. And so he went. Okay. 00:16:56.740 --> 00:17:02.519 So it's okay now because your mom's going to take the heat. If it happens, the curse will go on her. 00:17:03.840 --> 00:17:08.299 He goes out and actually he gets the goat and then his mom who prepares the food. So not only is he 00:17:08.299 --> 00:17:12.920 willing to let the curse go on to mom, he's willing to take the credit for it. If it goes well, if it 00:17:12.920 --> 00:17:19.400 goes well, it's me. If it goes badly, it's you. The deceit begins, the dysfunction begins. And you're 00:17:19.400 --> 00:17:24.420 like, this is one messed up family. But before we point our fingers over there, we must wonder, 00:17:24.420 --> 00:17:30.039 are there moments of deceit in our lives? Whether it's completely bad intention, knowing exactly what 00:17:30.039 --> 00:17:34.200 God wants and still going around it, or knowing that actually God will provide, but still deciding 00:17:34.200 --> 00:17:39.779 to take matter into our own hands. And as we see deceit here, I wonder whether we see deceit in our 00:17:39.779 --> 00:17:44.940 own hearts too. So he goes out and he gets it. Of course, these are young goats. These are not the 00:17:44.940 --> 00:17:51.660 wild game, the venison that maybe Isaac was especially hoping for. But then Rebecca knows this and she 00:17:51.660 --> 00:17:57.300 says, this scheme, we have to dress it up even more because just the food isn't going to be enough. 00:17:57.940 --> 00:18:03.740 Let's go and get some of Esau's clothes. So then verse 15, then Rebecca took the garments of Esau, 00:18:03.800 --> 00:18:07.220 her older son, which were with her in the house and put them on Jacob, her younger son, 00:18:07.820 --> 00:18:11.779 and the skins of the young goats she put on his hands and the smooth part of his neck. And she put 00:18:11.779 --> 00:18:16.380 the delicious food and the bread which she had prepared into the hand of her son Jacob. Can you just 00:18:16.380 --> 00:18:21.360 imagine that scene, Rebecca dressing Jacob, putting the goat skin on the back of his neck? 00:18:22.540 --> 00:18:25.740 No doubt, Esau was probably a bigger man. He would have just looked ridiculous. 00:18:27.080 --> 00:18:32.800 And then I think, oh, don't we sometimes do that? Reminds me of the fall in Genesis where Adam and 00:18:32.800 --> 00:18:37.240 Eve hide themselves with fig leaves from God. And we think, that just looks so ridiculous. He sees you. 00:18:37.240 --> 00:18:44.180 You're hiding behind a bush, hiding from the creator of the universe. You look ridiculous. 00:18:44.180 --> 00:18:50.460 And then I think, some of us hide behind our CVs. Some of us hide behind our bank accounts. Some 00:18:50.460 --> 00:18:58.279 behind our accomplishments. And often it looks just as silly. But here we have the deceiver 00:18:58.279 --> 00:19:04.120 continues the plot. And there has to be a whole elaborate thing. It's funny because truth is simple. 00:19:05.539 --> 00:19:10.779 When you're living by the truth, you don't have to worry. But when you're living a deceitful life, 00:19:10.779 --> 00:19:14.859 you have to cover it up with so many other things. St. Augustine was the one that says, 00:19:14.940 --> 00:19:19.420 truth is like a lion. You don't need to defend the truth. Just let it loose and it will defend itself. 00:19:20.259 --> 00:19:26.519 But when it comes to lies, they get complex. You have to hide a lie with a lie, with a lie, 00:19:26.899 --> 00:19:32.980 and with a lie, and it never ends. So anyway, he does it and he turns up and what happens? 00:19:32.980 --> 00:19:37.339 Verse 18. So he went into his father and said, my father. And he said, here I am. Who are you, 00:19:37.420 --> 00:19:42.360 my son? Jacob said to his father, I am Esau, your firstborn. I mean, I am Esau, your firstborn. 00:19:42.680 --> 00:19:46.599 I have done as you have told me. Now sit up and eat of my game, that your soul may bless me. 00:19:46.940 --> 00:19:51.420 But Isaac said to his son, well, this is a little bit strange. Why? How is it that you found it so 00:19:51.420 --> 00:19:57.259 quickly? My son. He answered, because the Lord your God granted me success. The audacity. 00:19:57.259 --> 00:20:06.539 It's called blasphemy, brothers and sisters. When you say that this is God, when it really isn't. 00:20:07.079 --> 00:20:13.299 Interestingly, he says, because the Lord your God has blessed me. It's a level of mocking and ridicule 00:20:13.299 --> 00:20:19.079 in it and definitely deception. This tells me something else. Right now, you can be growing up 00:20:19.079 --> 00:20:23.579 in a covenant family with Isaac and Rebecca and Abraham and Sarah as your grandparents. You can grow 00:20:23.579 --> 00:20:27.240 up in a covenant family, but just like Esau, you can actually be left out of the covenant. 00:20:27.240 --> 00:20:30.839 Just like Jacob, you can still make bad choices and you can still ridicule God. 00:20:31.819 --> 00:20:36.460 And you can still have no relationship with God. Because he didn't say the Lord our God. 00:20:36.759 --> 00:20:39.680 He didn't say the Lord my God. He said the Lord your God. God, 00:20:40.500 --> 00:20:44.660 Dad, you've got this because your God helped me. 00:20:46.599 --> 00:20:51.579 It's interesting because we know Jacob's story as it continues to go. He is going to meet God and 00:20:51.579 --> 00:20:55.019 it's not going to be pretty. He's going to end up with a limp for the rest of his life. He's going to 00:20:55.019 --> 00:20:59.720 wrestle with God and only, and then he's going to have his name changed. And then, and only then, 00:20:59.920 --> 00:21:03.839 once his identity's changed, once he's gone through the fight, then he will start to say, 00:21:03.839 --> 00:21:09.359 this is the Lord my God. This has now become the God of Jacob. Until then, it's my dad's God. 00:21:09.359 --> 00:21:19.819 Some of us have to, and we'll go through wrestling ourselves. Some of us wrongly attribute things to 00:21:19.819 --> 00:21:25.419 God when they really are not, only to help fulfill our own selfish desires. And those selfish desires 00:21:25.419 --> 00:21:31.159 lead to deceit and those deceitful thoughts lead to actions. And we'll see the consequences that happen 00:21:31.159 --> 00:21:38.559 after that. A covenant family ends up being a corrupted one, but he gets the blessing anyway. So he continues to 00:21:38.559 --> 00:21:43.339 lie. The voice of Jacob's voice, verse 22. So Jacob went near to Isaac, his father, who felt him and 00:21:43.339 --> 00:21:46.940 said, the voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau. And he did not recognize him 00:21:46.940 --> 00:21:50.839 because his hands were hairy like his brother's hands. So he blessed him. And he said, are you, 00:21:51.019 --> 00:21:57.679 he checks again. Often when we are lying, we actually do have chances to come clean. God in his grace 00:21:57.679 --> 00:22:02.599 gives us opportunities to come clean and say, Hey, that's just not right here. But yet he continues to 00:22:02.599 --> 00:22:07.399 double down and go further and further into the lie. And he did not recognize him because his hands were hairy. 00:22:07.400 --> 00:22:12.440 He said, are you really my son Esau? He answered, I am. Then he said, bring it near to me that I may 00:22:12.440 --> 00:22:16.380 eat at my son's game and bless you. So he brought it near to him and he ate and he brought him wine 00:22:16.380 --> 00:22:21.480 and he drank. And then he kisses him and then he blesses him. And here is the blessing. See, 00:22:21.660 --> 00:22:26.440 the smell of my son is as the smell of a field that the Lord has blessed. May God give you of the dew 00:22:26.440 --> 00:22:31.800 of heaven and of the fatness of the earth and plenty of grain and wine. Let people serve you and nations 00:22:31.800 --> 00:22:36.380 bow down to you. Be Lord over your brothers and may your mother's sons bow down to you. 00:22:36.380 --> 00:22:40.600 Cursed be everyone who curses you and blessed be everyone who blesses you. 00:22:41.560 --> 00:22:48.880 What a blessing. Talks about the future. It's a spiritual realm that is going on. There's a social 00:22:48.880 --> 00:22:52.120 realm that's going on here. Remember, he already had the birthright 00:22:52.120 --> 00:22:56.620 when he swapped it for a bowl of soup in the greatest trade of all time. 00:22:56.619 --> 00:23:02.179 And yet now he's taking matters into his own hands to try and get this blessing when he would 00:23:02.179 --> 00:23:07.539 have gotten it anyway, by the way. But he does get it. And here's the difference in the ancient world. 00:23:07.799 --> 00:23:15.779 Actually, when a father speaks a blessing over the son, it is binding and it is legal. It cannot be 00:23:15.779 --> 00:23:20.539 retracted. It cannot be taken back. And so he's got exactly what he wants. He gets the blessing that 00:23:20.539 --> 00:23:24.419 would have been his anyway. He's going to be prosperous. He's going to have authority, 00:23:24.420 --> 00:23:27.840 especially over his brothers. And his future is going to be secure. 00:23:28.860 --> 00:23:33.180 Oh, what a great thing. Okay. Maybe a little bit of deception, maybe a little bit of white lying. 00:23:33.440 --> 00:23:36.880 Finally, I've got my blessing. Everything is going to be smooth sailing for me from now on, 00:23:37.019 --> 00:23:39.039 says Jacob. Quite the opposite. 00:23:41.140 --> 00:23:47.440 Because desire leads to deceit. Deceit leads to decisions. Decisions leads to actions. 00:23:47.440 --> 00:23:55.440 And actions lead to consequences. And so even though he does get the blessing, we'll find out now that 00:23:55.440 --> 00:24:00.019 there are consequences that come. And let's go to verse 30. As soon as Isaac had finished blessing 00:24:00.019 --> 00:24:04.700 Jacob, when Jacob had scarcely gone out from the presence of Isaac, his father, Esau, his brother, 00:24:05.039 --> 00:24:10.420 comes in from his hunting. He's also prepared delicious food and brought it to his father. And he said to his 00:24:10.420 --> 00:24:15.220 father, let my father arise and eat of his son's game that you may bless me. His father, Isaac, said to him, 00:24:15.220 --> 00:24:22.339 who are you? He answered, I am your son, your firstborn, Esau. Then Isaac trembled very violently and said, 00:24:22.420 --> 00:24:26.779 who was it then that hunted game and brought it to me? And I ate it all before you came and I have 00:24:26.779 --> 00:24:41.019 blessed him. Jacob manages to escape just in time. Esau comes back and is absolutely devastated because he, 00:24:41.019 --> 00:24:46.799 well actually Isaac is devastated too, because why? Their deceitful scheme didn't work. Because remember, 00:24:46.900 --> 00:24:52.779 they had a plot, but that didn't work. And they got tricked by Rebecca and Jacob. So this is a 2v2 00:24:52.779 --> 00:25:00.819 situation and their team lost. Now they're very angry. And of course, so angry. Verse 34, as Esau heard 00:25:00.819 --> 00:25:04.980 the words of his father, he cried out with an exceedingly great and bitter cry and said to his 00:25:04.980 --> 00:25:11.019 father, bless me, even me also. Oh, my father, your brother came deceitfully and he has taken away your 00:25:11.019 --> 00:25:16.620 blessing. Esau said, is he not rightly named Jacob? For he has cheated me these two times. He took away 00:25:16.620 --> 00:25:22.059 my birthright and behold, now he has taken away my blessing. Wait a minute, Esau. Jacob didn't really 00:25:22.059 --> 00:25:29.099 cheat you. The trade was pretty clear. You would give him your birthright and he would give you a bowl 00:25:29.099 --> 00:25:34.059 of soup. Yeah, it's a terrible trade, but he didn't cheat you. You agreed to the terms. Isn't it 00:25:34.059 --> 00:25:40.879 interesting? When we fall into our own desires, not only do we deceive others, but we actually deceive 00:25:40.879 --> 00:25:49.099 ourselves too. His memory starts to twist. Like, I got cheated from all of this. Again, in the ancient 00:25:49.099 --> 00:25:54.799 world, the firstborn gets the birthright. And most often, the birthright then leads to the blessing. 00:25:55.099 --> 00:25:59.119 Remember, the birthright is actually just the financial material stuff. You get the double portion 00:25:59.119 --> 00:26:03.659 of inheritance, the land, the people, the animals. But then the blessing that comes 00:26:03.660 --> 00:26:10.660 shortly after is the spiritual one. He was hoping that, okay, I gave away the birthright, but maybe I can 00:26:10.660 --> 00:26:18.920 still get this one. And then he's outraged because he realized he cannot. And he cries wolf and he says, 00:26:18.920 --> 00:26:28.580 this is not fair. Interestingly, he leaves and then, actually no, he actually begs his dad to give him a 00:26:28.579 --> 00:26:34.299 blessing. He says, please. Again, this tells you his heart, that he's not just there because he believes 00:26:34.299 --> 00:26:39.079 that this is God's sovereign plan for his family. Once he finds out what's happened, he gets on his 00:26:39.079 --> 00:26:43.559 knees and he begs and cries, dad, just give me a blessing, any kind of blessing. Just give him it to me, 00:26:43.799 --> 00:26:49.119 which again shows you his heart. So maybe not too much sympathy for Esau here because we know that he's 00:26:49.119 --> 00:26:54.559 not really interested in the giver. He only really wants the gift. He only really, doesn't that happen to us? 00:26:54.559 --> 00:26:59.419 We do something bad. We're not really worried about doing bad. We're just worried about getting caught. 00:27:00.700 --> 00:27:03.159 And actually the main thing is that we just don't lose the things that we want. 00:27:04.259 --> 00:27:09.980 So you see the selfishness that still is just surrounding the heart of Esau. And so he begs 00:27:09.980 --> 00:27:14.339 dad, come on, you've got more in there, please. You must be the gift that keeps on giving. 00:27:14.579 --> 00:27:19.099 Give me something. And so his dad actually does give him something, but it's not quite the blessing 00:27:19.099 --> 00:27:24.039 that he's after. We can only call this the Taobao version of the blessing. And this is what it is. 00:27:24.039 --> 00:27:28.619 Behold, away from the fatness of the earth shall your dwelling be, and away from the dew of heaven 00:27:28.619 --> 00:27:32.659 on high. By your sword you shall live, and you shall serve your brother. But when you grow restless, 00:27:32.799 --> 00:27:37.359 you shall break his yoke from your neck. So it's not quite a blessing. It's not quite a curse. It's 00:27:37.359 --> 00:27:40.940 actually, you're going to go and live in a land that's going to be really tough. You are going to 00:27:40.940 --> 00:27:45.399 survive through your sword. But there will be one time where you will break away from the yoke 00:27:45.399 --> 00:27:52.639 of your brother. That's not a great blessing. But that's all he has. That's all he has. 00:27:52.640 --> 00:27:59.480 Remember, scripture says Esau despised his birthright. Not in the sense he hated it. He just 00:27:59.480 --> 00:28:04.440 passed over. He just rejected it. He just chose something else. How often do we choose something 00:28:04.440 --> 00:28:13.200 else than come back crying when that thing doesn't work out? We lie to ourselves. We deceive ourselves. 00:28:14.220 --> 00:28:19.460 Of course, he gets the Taobao blessing. Verse 41, he's not too happy. And now Esau hates Jacob because 00:28:19.460 --> 00:28:23.660 of the blessing with which his father blessed him and said to himself, said to himself to the point 00:28:23.660 --> 00:28:28.400 where his mom actually hears him, the days of mourning for my father are approaching. Then I will kill my 00:28:28.400 --> 00:28:33.920 brother Jacob. Just you wait. I'm just going to let dad die, not knowing that it's going to be another 00:28:33.920 --> 00:28:41.079 43 years. And then I'm going to kill him. Then we will know whether that blessing is real. 00:28:41.079 --> 00:28:47.559 Mom hears though. And then mom does something really interesting. She goes to Jacob and says, hey, 00:28:48.619 --> 00:28:57.639 Esau's going to kill you. Run. Run and leave this place. But don't go too far. Go to Laban, 00:28:59.199 --> 00:29:04.679 my brother in Haran. This is verse 43. And stay with him. Actually, stay with him a while. So in 00:29:04.679 --> 00:29:08.659 another version, it's actually just stay with him a few days. Just, you know Esau. He's impulsive. He's 00:29:08.660 --> 00:29:13.180 arrogant. But he also forgets. And he's a little bit dumb. He'll forget after a while. Maybe after 00:29:13.180 --> 00:29:15.940 a couple of days, maybe after a couple of weeks, you can come back and it will all be okay. 00:29:16.560 --> 00:29:22.500 So go. Run. And so then actually he does run. And here comes the consequence. 00:29:23.840 --> 00:29:30.000 The deceitfulness of Jacob, where he does end up getting the blessing, brackets, that would have 00:29:30.000 --> 00:29:36.560 been his anyway. He just took a shortcut. He does get the blessing, but the consequences are dire. 00:29:36.559 --> 00:29:41.639 He ends up on the run. Not just for a few days or a few weeks. He ends up out there for 20 years. 00:29:42.519 --> 00:29:46.579 Another consequence, he never actually gets to see his mom, Rebecca, from this moment. 00:29:47.159 --> 00:29:53.639 That's a consequence for Rebecca as she schemes this. She, trying to get her favorites and the 00:29:53.639 --> 00:29:59.799 blessing, now will never see him again. In fact, we don't even hear much from Rebecca, actually. We 00:29:59.799 --> 00:30:04.779 don't even hear the account of her death from here. This is just a sorry end to her life. 00:30:04.779 --> 00:30:10.500 Funnily enough, we'll find out in the next few weeks that Jacob himself, the one who deceived 00:30:10.500 --> 00:30:13.160 and got the blessing, he himself will be deceived too. 00:30:15.559 --> 00:30:21.240 And you see the consequences just keep piling up and the fracture that has happened in the family 00:30:21.240 --> 00:30:26.539 now will be forever. She then says something very interesting at the end of this chapter. 00:30:26.539 --> 00:30:28.460 Verse 46. 00:30:28.579 --> 00:30:31.819 Then Rebecca said to Isaac, I loathe my life because of the Hittite women. 00:30:32.319 --> 00:30:36.639 If Jacob marries one of the Hittite women like these, one of the women of the land, what good 00:30:36.639 --> 00:30:38.420 will my life be to me? 00:30:39.500 --> 00:30:40.420 I was like, what does that mean? 00:30:41.079 --> 00:30:43.980 It's a bit of a random comment that comes from this whole scene. 00:30:44.839 --> 00:30:49.420 To find the answer, we have to go a little bit back, actually, to the end of chapter 26. 00:30:49.639 --> 00:30:50.659 Just have a look with me there. 00:30:50.660 --> 00:30:57.080 So remember, last week was about Isaac growing in faith and not fear, getting very rich. 00:30:58.140 --> 00:31:01.100 And then so he gets to the point where King Abimelep is scared of him. 00:31:01.720 --> 00:31:05.080 Verse 34 finishes this way, and I deliberately left this bit out last week. 00:31:05.320 --> 00:31:05.920 And it says this. 00:31:06.320 --> 00:31:10.519 When Esau was 40 years old, he took Judith, the daughter of Biri, the Hittite, to be his wife, 00:31:10.820 --> 00:31:12.680 and Basemath, the daughter of Elon, the Hittite. 00:31:12.740 --> 00:31:15.380 And they made life bitter for Isaac and Rebecca. 00:31:16.120 --> 00:31:19.460 Can you see the blind nature of favoritism that comes here? 00:31:19.460 --> 00:31:25.200 Isaac favors his son and spores his son to the point where even though his son makes 00:31:25.200 --> 00:31:29.500 these terrible mistakes and actually makes him and his wife's life bitter, he still keeps 00:31:29.500 --> 00:31:30.039 choosing him. 00:31:30.460 --> 00:31:32.720 What you see here, again, is an example of compromise. 00:31:32.920 --> 00:31:34.400 You see the slippery slope. 00:31:34.559 --> 00:31:38.360 C.S. Lewis in the Screwtape Letter says this, that the road to hell is a slippery one. 00:31:38.840 --> 00:31:40.920 It starts with small decisions that you make. 00:31:41.600 --> 00:31:42.420 It's gradual. 00:31:43.299 --> 00:31:44.039 And you see this. 00:31:44.039 --> 00:31:48.519 And actually, the decisions that Esau makes, he takes multiple wives from a foreign nation, 00:31:48.519 --> 00:31:53.559 and you see the road of compromise that he heads down, and it actually causes life to 00:31:53.559 --> 00:31:54.779 be bitter for his parents. 00:31:55.500 --> 00:32:00.779 Now you go back to the end of chapter seven, almost it kind of just bookends it. 00:32:01.559 --> 00:32:02.500 Why is she doing this? 00:32:03.359 --> 00:32:05.039 She goes to her husband and says, 00:32:05.039 --> 00:32:13.000 The last thing I want is for Jacob to do the same thing as Esau. 00:32:13.299 --> 00:32:17.000 You know how Esau and his wives have just made our lives so bitter. 00:32:17.559 --> 00:32:21.839 Let's just send him away, back to my brother's land, and he'll hopefully find a wife there 00:32:21.839 --> 00:32:23.859 that matches with the values that we have. 00:32:24.819 --> 00:32:25.539 What's she doing? 00:32:25.920 --> 00:32:27.119 She's telling a half-truth. 00:32:27.119 --> 00:32:30.979 But she's telling a half-truth to cover a lie. 00:32:32.479 --> 00:32:34.000 You see that road of deceit. 00:32:34.099 --> 00:32:36.259 You need lies to tell more lies to tell more lies. 00:32:36.279 --> 00:32:39.259 Because she needs to find a way to explain to Isaac why Jacob is going. 00:32:40.239 --> 00:32:44.239 She needs to explain to her husband that actually we're going to send Jacob back over there 00:32:44.239 --> 00:32:46.559 without telling him the whole story. 00:32:46.559 --> 00:32:50.700 So she uses a lie to cover up a lie. 00:32:51.419 --> 00:32:52.819 And she makes it all dramatic. 00:32:53.779 --> 00:32:57.379 If I have this again, my life will be worth nothing. 00:32:57.539 --> 00:32:58.559 There's no point in living. 00:32:59.039 --> 00:33:01.639 Let us send our son back so he will have a godly woman. 00:33:02.899 --> 00:33:07.279 The hypocrisy, the deceit is disgusting. 00:33:07.879 --> 00:33:10.639 And you use lies to cover lies. 00:33:12.159 --> 00:33:13.619 So where do we finish from here? 00:33:13.619 --> 00:33:16.639 None of these people finish that well. 00:33:18.000 --> 00:33:24.000 You see Isaac who started well, but through deceit, he ends up trying to deceive his wife, 00:33:24.099 --> 00:33:25.519 his younger son, God. 00:33:26.019 --> 00:33:28.439 You see Rebecca trying to deceive her husband. 00:33:28.959 --> 00:33:30.539 In doing so, losing her son. 00:33:31.879 --> 00:33:34.319 You see Jacob trying to deceive his own brother. 00:33:35.599 --> 00:33:38.000 Gets the blessing, but then has to run for his life. 00:33:38.459 --> 00:33:40.719 And then ends up getting deceived himself. 00:33:40.720 --> 00:33:43.839 You see Esau deceiving himself. 00:33:47.360 --> 00:33:51.220 The destruction that is led to from deceit. 00:33:51.779 --> 00:33:52.900 These are bad examples. 00:33:53.799 --> 00:33:56.360 We don't need to follow these examples. 00:33:56.620 --> 00:34:00.960 But you might be sat here going, well, to be honest, James, if you look at my family, it's pretty dysfunctional. 00:34:01.500 --> 00:34:02.680 There's a lot of deceit going on. 00:34:03.539 --> 00:34:05.120 There's a lot of desires of the flesh going on. 00:34:05.119 --> 00:34:08.420 And I'm here saying, yes, mine too. 00:34:09.980 --> 00:34:11.339 What wretched people we are. 00:34:11.880 --> 00:34:13.719 What dysfunctional families we come from. 00:34:14.559 --> 00:34:15.940 What hopelessness we have. 00:34:17.500 --> 00:34:19.299 Yet then why is this story here? 00:34:19.880 --> 00:34:24.699 What is the point of leaving this account here, this covenant family for us to see here, 00:34:24.900 --> 00:34:28.159 is because we now know one thing that they did not. 00:34:28.779 --> 00:34:33.400 And that we don't have to go around cheating and stressing and chasing blessings anymore. 00:34:33.400 --> 00:34:33.800 Why? 00:34:36.740 --> 00:34:37.500 Because Jesus. 00:34:38.980 --> 00:34:42.300 And this is where I started to get more hope throughout this week. 00:34:42.340 --> 00:34:43.579 And you're going to have to turn with me there. 00:34:44.260 --> 00:34:47.599 We go to the New Testament, which sadly this dysfunctional family does not have. 00:34:48.220 --> 00:34:49.119 You go to Ephesians. 00:34:49.119 --> 00:35:00.579 I've been reading with a few people this week through Ephesians and just so blessed by this verse in Ephesians 1, verse 3. 00:35:00.579 --> 00:35:11.319 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 00:35:11.739 --> 00:35:16.319 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, 00:35:16.539 --> 00:35:21.139 that we should be holy and blameless before him. 00:35:21.920 --> 00:35:22.940 Are you kidding me? 00:35:22.940 --> 00:35:24.519 We are Esau. 00:35:24.700 --> 00:35:25.579 We are Jacob. 00:35:25.900 --> 00:35:26.579 We are Rebecca. 00:35:26.920 --> 00:35:27.579 We are Isaac. 00:35:27.679 --> 00:35:33.840 Yet now, because of Christ, we have received every spiritual blessing that we ever need. 00:35:34.800 --> 00:35:38.480 They've been cheating and lying and scheming their way to these blessings. 00:35:38.860 --> 00:35:46.539 And yet, sat now, here are people who have all received this blessing because we've been chosen and we've been loved by our Most High God. 00:35:46.539 --> 00:35:49.039 So you don't have to scheme anymore. 00:35:49.460 --> 00:35:51.460 You don't have to lie anymore. 00:35:52.840 --> 00:35:59.659 No deceit needs to live inside you because you already have the blessing because I already have the blessing because of Jesus. 00:36:01.679 --> 00:36:04.019 How often do you remind yourself of that truth? 00:36:05.460 --> 00:36:07.420 That I don't have to cheat my way through anything anymore. 00:36:08.659 --> 00:36:10.599 I don't have to be afraid of anything anymore. 00:36:10.599 --> 00:36:18.099 Because God who graciously gave me his son, will he not graciously give us all things now? 00:36:18.880 --> 00:36:21.860 And hasn't he already given me every spiritual blessing that I need? 00:36:21.920 --> 00:36:23.839 I have all that I need because I have Jesus. 00:36:25.000 --> 00:36:26.779 How often do you tell that to yourself? 00:36:27.480 --> 00:36:30.759 And this isn't just like a positive self-taught life. 00:36:30.900 --> 00:36:33.799 This is truth that we need to speak over our lives. 00:36:33.880 --> 00:36:35.699 That's why Hebrew 2 says, listen carefully. 00:36:35.980 --> 00:36:37.019 Hold on to this truth. 00:36:37.400 --> 00:36:39.259 You are blessed because of Jesus. 00:36:39.260 --> 00:36:39.920 Full stop. 00:36:40.200 --> 00:36:40.740 Nothing else. 00:36:41.440 --> 00:36:43.100 And that changes the way you go to the office. 00:36:43.440 --> 00:36:44.900 That changes the way you go to school. 00:36:45.040 --> 00:36:47.360 That changes the way you deal with deceit in your family. 00:36:47.600 --> 00:36:50.120 That changes the way of everything because you're like, take everything. 00:36:50.880 --> 00:36:51.560 Have the well. 00:36:51.760 --> 00:36:52.160 Have this. 00:36:52.260 --> 00:36:52.600 Have that. 00:36:52.940 --> 00:36:53.760 It doesn't matter. 00:36:53.880 --> 00:36:54.220 Guess what? 00:36:54.280 --> 00:36:55.020 Because I have Jesus. 00:36:56.800 --> 00:36:57.620 That's what it means. 00:36:59.120 --> 00:37:03.000 The firstborn who comes and gives us the blessing. 00:37:04.820 --> 00:37:09.060 Allows us to live in a way that is free from fear and anxiety and deceit. 00:37:09.260 --> 00:37:19.720 Ironically, that ridiculous picture of Jacob wearing his brother's clothes, putting the goat skin on his neck. 00:37:19.719 --> 00:37:28.239 What a just ridiculous story in the Old Testament showing the depravity and the deceit of man. 00:37:29.119 --> 00:37:30.319 Yet guess what the gospel is? 00:37:30.320 --> 00:37:37.600 The gospel is that we have actually been given a robe that does not belong to us, that we did not deserve. 00:37:37.920 --> 00:37:47.380 Yet the prince of heaven took off his robe and put it on us so that when we walk up to the throne of grace and mercy, he will see that robe and he will count us as righteous. 00:37:47.380 --> 00:37:48.380 Not because of what we've done. 00:37:48.380 --> 00:37:50.320 Not because of what we've done. 00:37:50.660 --> 00:37:52.180 Not because of that CV. 00:37:52.360 --> 00:37:53.400 Not because of that fig leaf. 00:37:54.340 --> 00:37:56.360 Not because of that skin that you're covering your neck with. 00:37:57.840 --> 00:38:00.900 We go to the throne because we have also borrowed garments. 00:38:02.340 --> 00:38:06.000 But we didn't have to lie and deceive and cheat to get them. 00:38:06.700 --> 00:38:09.660 We got them undeservedly while we were still sinners. 00:38:09.659 --> 00:38:13.500 Because Christ died for us and handed us his robe. 00:38:15.539 --> 00:38:19.460 So we too actually need to see the ridiculousness of us in that robe. 00:38:19.940 --> 00:38:21.139 Because it doesn't really fit. 00:38:21.859 --> 00:38:22.920 Because we are not holy. 00:38:23.059 --> 00:38:25.179 We are not doing what we're supposed to be doing. 00:38:25.299 --> 00:38:27.679 We are deceitful above all things. 00:38:29.119 --> 00:38:30.239 Yet isn't it crazy? 00:38:32.039 --> 00:38:36.500 Outrageous that we get to wear that robe and be presented as righteous. 00:38:36.500 --> 00:38:40.900 Because there was one who took to the cross and took it all away. 00:38:42.920 --> 00:38:45.239 That is the gospel message that we have. 00:38:46.940 --> 00:38:49.400 That we are now presented without blemish. 00:38:50.900 --> 00:38:54.420 You and I, we sit here with deceit in our track record. 00:38:56.260 --> 00:38:59.420 If we had a CV of all the things that we've done in our lives. 00:38:59.440 --> 00:39:00.139 The things that we've said. 00:39:00.219 --> 00:39:00.920 The things that we've thought. 00:39:02.260 --> 00:39:03.280 The plans that we've schemed. 00:39:03.280 --> 00:39:07.080 That would be a very shameful, embarrassing CV that we have. 00:39:07.980 --> 00:39:08.340 Yet. 00:39:09.940 --> 00:39:11.280 All of that is wiped clean. 00:39:12.620 --> 00:39:14.019 And we approach the throne. 00:39:15.519 --> 00:39:17.040 With the robe of a king. 00:39:19.200 --> 00:39:20.340 Adopted into the family. 00:39:20.900 --> 00:39:21.960 A co-heir with Christ. 00:39:24.700 --> 00:39:26.460 So despite our dysfunction. 00:39:27.019 --> 00:39:27.800 God still works. 00:39:29.080 --> 00:39:30.420 Despite our deceit. 00:39:30.900 --> 00:39:32.620 God still comes through in truth. 00:39:33.280 --> 00:39:36.360 That's why he says I am the way. 00:39:36.460 --> 00:39:37.180 The truth and the life. 00:39:37.280 --> 00:39:39.140 Nothing that you can do will get to heaven. 00:39:39.480 --> 00:39:40.320 Other than through me. 00:39:42.280 --> 00:39:44.140 I'm here to reverse the curse of deceit. 00:39:45.440 --> 00:39:46.700 I'm here to point you to the truth. 00:39:46.760 --> 00:39:48.200 And that way is me. 00:39:49.500 --> 00:39:50.320 That's good news. 00:39:51.160 --> 00:39:53.500 If you're a sinner like me. 00:39:53.560 --> 00:39:55.340 If you're a deceiver like me. 00:39:55.480 --> 00:39:57.140 If you're a warrior like me. 00:39:57.240 --> 00:39:58.600 If you're prideful like me. 00:39:59.140 --> 00:40:00.360 That is good news for you. 00:40:00.360 --> 00:40:02.559 And that is good news for me. 00:40:05.559 --> 00:40:06.559 We're going to finish now. 00:40:06.640 --> 00:40:09.539 Just with reflection in our own lives. 00:40:10.440 --> 00:40:11.500 If that is really true. 00:40:11.579 --> 00:40:13.260 That we really do have every spiritual blessing. 00:40:13.380 --> 00:40:14.220 That comes from Jesus. 00:40:14.400 --> 00:40:14.980 Through Jesus. 00:40:16.059 --> 00:40:17.300 Why is that not really. 00:40:18.620 --> 00:40:19.599 Transforming the way we live. 00:40:20.320 --> 00:40:22.360 If we are really wearing those robes. 00:40:22.360 --> 00:40:26.280 What is it that we still need to confess? 00:40:26.519 --> 00:40:27.800 What do we need to bring out. 00:40:28.340 --> 00:40:29.220 From the darkness. 00:40:29.579 --> 00:40:30.280 Into the light. 00:40:34.660 --> 00:40:35.720 Jesus says. 00:40:35.980 --> 00:40:36.760 I am the light of the world. 00:40:36.820 --> 00:40:38.160 In me there is no darkness at all. 00:40:38.240 --> 00:40:39.579 There is no deceit at all. 00:40:41.700 --> 00:40:42.519 No deceit. 00:40:42.780 --> 00:40:44.160 Not one word of deceit. 00:40:44.300 --> 00:40:45.460 Has ever come out of his mouth. 00:40:49.059 --> 00:40:50.340 It's going to spend a moment now. 00:40:50.440 --> 00:40:51.559 And we're actually going to do communion today. 00:40:51.559 --> 00:40:52.119 Today. 00:40:52.579 --> 00:40:53.039 As well. 00:40:54.059 --> 00:40:55.259 And scripture actually tells us. 00:40:55.779 --> 00:40:57.039 As we partake. 00:40:57.299 --> 00:40:57.840 Of the bread. 00:40:57.920 --> 00:40:58.440 And the wine. 00:40:58.639 --> 00:40:58.980 Let us. 00:40:59.400 --> 00:41:00.440 Let each of us. 00:41:01.940 --> 00:41:03.320 Let each deceiver. 00:41:03.460 --> 00:41:04.420 In this room. 00:41:04.679 --> 00:41:05.880 Examine their own hearts. 00:41:06.019 --> 00:41:06.539 And repent. 00:41:08.139 --> 00:41:09.980 Whether you have been deceiving. 00:41:11.099 --> 00:41:11.900 Loved ones. 00:41:13.559 --> 00:41:14.579 Or colleagues. 00:41:15.239 --> 00:41:16.139 Or classmates. 00:41:16.980 --> 00:41:17.799 Or yourself. 00:41:18.840 --> 00:41:19.559 Or God. 00:41:19.559 --> 00:41:24.159 Let us come before the king. 00:41:24.840 --> 00:41:26.259 Who speaks no deceit. 00:41:26.519 --> 00:41:27.739 Who is completely truth. 00:41:29.259 --> 00:41:29.940 John 1. 00:41:30.000 --> 00:41:30.340 He says. 00:41:30.739 --> 00:41:31.679 He is grace. 00:41:31.940 --> 00:41:32.779 And truth. 00:41:32.780 --> 00:41:35.620 Let us come to him. 00:41:36.180 --> 00:41:37.220 Let him expose. 00:41:38.060 --> 00:41:39.740 The lies inside our own hearts. 00:41:40.400 --> 00:41:41.260 Let his grace. 00:41:41.560 --> 00:41:42.100 And love. 00:41:42.300 --> 00:41:43.200 Drive out the fears. 00:41:43.300 --> 00:41:43.700 And cover. 00:41:44.260 --> 00:41:45.140 All the sins. 00:41:45.220 --> 00:41:45.500 That we. 00:41:45.900 --> 00:41:46.260 Have done. 00:41:47.820 --> 00:41:48.660 Spend a moment now. 00:41:48.720 --> 00:41:49.060 Just to. 00:41:49.860 --> 00:41:50.380 Let him. 00:41:50.560 --> 00:41:51.440 Examine our hearts. 00:41:51.560 --> 00:41:52.040 Holy Spirit. 00:41:53.160 --> 00:41:54.460 We welcome you here again. 00:41:54.460 --> 00:41:55.240 We pray. 00:41:56.500 --> 00:41:57.519 That you would lead us. 00:41:57.599 --> 00:41:57.960 That you would. 00:41:58.159 --> 00:41:59.159 Convict us of sin. 00:41:59.280 --> 00:41:59.820 And righteousness. 00:42:00.019 --> 00:42:01.159 You would purify us. 00:42:02.360 --> 00:42:03.380 Our hearts are. 00:42:03.639 --> 00:42:05.159 Deceitful above all things. 00:42:05.159 --> 00:42:14.559 But would you create in us. 00:42:15.279 --> 00:42:16.420 A clean heart. 00:42:19.179 --> 00:42:20.299 Would you renew. 00:42:21.139 --> 00:42:22.539 The right spirit in us. 00:42:24.899 --> 00:42:26.359 Would you restore to us. 00:42:26.460 --> 00:42:26.899 The joy. 00:42:27.960 --> 00:42:28.899 Of your salvation. 00:42:30.759 --> 00:42:32.739 Let the bones you have broken. 00:42:33.779 --> 00:42:34.259 Rejoice. 00:42:34.260 --> 00:42:36.320 Would you blot out. 00:42:36.320 --> 00:42:37.520 Our transgressions. 00:42:39.920 --> 00:42:41.140 We have believed. 00:42:41.320 --> 00:42:41.760 A lie. 00:42:43.880 --> 00:42:45.120 But we come back. 00:42:45.740 --> 00:42:46.280 Today. 00:42:46.480 --> 00:42:47.020 To the truth. 00:42:56.400 --> 00:42:57.440 Search our hearts. 00:42:59.900 --> 00:43:00.900 Test our thoughts. 00:43:04.260 --> 00:43:28.760 may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may may