Monday, January 27, 2014

Year 4, Day 27: Genesis 28

Theological Commentary: Click Here 


Discipleship Focus: Obedience

  • Obedience: Genuine and satisfying obedience comes out of our identity.  Our true identity comes only from Father.

For two straight days we’ll take a look at obedience, for again we get two great perspectives on obedience.  The first example, Esau, is another negative example.  Esau hears Isaac talk to Jacob about the trouble of wives from outside God’s family and he does something about it himself.  He finds himself an Ishmaelite woman, which means that this third wife would have been a part of Abraham’s descendants.  However, Esau is simply compounding the problem.  Esau hasn’t dealt with the two wives he already has.  Adding a third wife won’t solve anything!

Jacob, on the other hand, finally begins to sort out his life.  Jacob begins to obey.  He is obedient to His father and seeks out Laben.  In that obedience, he is also obedient to God.  We can see this in the dream that Jacob has.  God comes to Jacob and tells him that so long as Jacob follows His ways that He will bless Jacob.  This is a promise of obedience.  So long as Jacob follows God, gets his identity from God, and obeys Him then God will bless Jacob.  Here we get our first glimpse of the obedient Israel shining forth out of the deceiving Jacob.


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