#1
“SOLD OUT OR
SELLING OUT!”
TEXT: Genesis
25:21-34; Heb.
12:16-17
INTRO: There is
little doubt that life contains many choices. There is little doubt that life has many
difficulties. There is little doubt
that the choices we make with difficulties can either make or break the quality
of our life!
The problem
with most people, including Christians, is NOT the problems themselves but the
choices we make when we face them.
We need to decide early on that if we are going to live for Christ we are
truly SOLD OUT to do so or we will find ourselves SELLING OUT due to lack of
commitment when the problems hit.
Good
preparation before problems help prevent procrastination and pain on making good
choices when the problems hit!
ILLUS: Lord Joseph Duveen, American head of the art
firm that bore his name, planned in 1915 to send one of his experts to
"I can't take
the risk of your being killed," he said to his young employee. "Don't worry," said the man, "I'm a
strong swimmer, and when I read what was happening in the
Naturally, Duveen laughed. It sounded preposterous. But his expert sailed, and the
PROP.
SENT: The Bible teaches us that
short sighted choices we may make to satisfy a momentary material need can have
life long spiritual consequences that not even forgiveness can alter later.
I. DIFFICULT CIRCUMSTANCES 25:21-26
A. Prayer
25:21
1.
Like his own father and mother, Isaac and his wife Rebekah were
childless, Rebekah was barren.
a.
Like his father Abraham, Isaac truly loved his wife and facing such
difficulties he does the right thing, he prays on behalf of his
wife.
b.
There is nothing better we can do when facing difficulties than praying,
it moves our focus off the problem and onto
God.
2. The only
right way for Isaac and Rebekah was God’s way, they knew where to turn when they
faced this challenge.
3. It is so
important in difficult circumstances to have a proper focus, it will affect the
choices we make.
a. If our focus is wrong, there is a
good chance our choices will be also!
ILLUS: It seems that more people today have a greater
desire to live long than they do to live well. -- Croft M. Pentz, The Complete Book of Zingers (Wheaton:
Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., 1990).
b. As
a relatively young man Isaac had learned from his father Abraham to keep his
focus on God and not on the problem.
4. God’s
reward for Isaac and Rebekah for a proper focus is an answer to their prayer…she
becomes pregnant not with just one child, but with two – considered by ancient
Hebrews as a great blessing!
B. Problems! 25:22-26
1. Even answered prayers don’t
remove the possibilities of new problems!
a. In fact, they sometimes
create a new set of problems!
b.
When Lazarus was raised from the dead, a great miracle, immediately the
Jewish authorities sought to kill him! – boy, talk about new
problems!
2. Rebekah
took note that these two boys in her womb were already jostling with each other,
what does this mean?
a.
She went to the Lord because she recognized that this was a potential
problem.
b.
She may have been confused by the fact that God blesses her with twins,
but only to discover that instead of ending all her problems new ones seem to be
forming!
c.
How many times have we reacted this same way to God, as soon as a prayer
request gets answered and we think there will be smooth sailing another problem
reveals itself related to the blessing of the answered
prayer!
3. Life is
a string of facing difficulties, and how we tackle each one determines the
quality of our life.
4. An
answered prayer no matter how great does not negate future
problems!
Even great blessings can become great
challenges!
5. At such
times we must choose in EACH SITUATION which way to
go!
ILLUS: It is this way. The Lord, he is always voting
for a man; and the devil, he is always voting against him. Then the man himself
votes and that breaks the tie. -Edythe Draper, Draper's Book of
Quotations for the Christian World (Wheaton: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.,
1992). Entries 1143-1146.
II. DESTRUCTIVE CHOICES 25:27-34; Heb. 12:16-17
A. Pitfalls
25:27-28
1. It
is very obvious early on here that Easu and Jacob were both very different
boys.
a.
Esau was an outdoorsman type while Jacob was a domestic
kid.
b.
Unfortunately the father Isaac made a clear favorite out of Esau because
he loved wild meat while Rebekah clearly favored
Jacob.
2. Instead
of the parents working together to help both boys appreciate each other they
actually helped keep the tension between them
alive.
3. As Isaac
got older his stomach began to rule his desires, so much so that at the end of
his life his last desires were not so much spiritual in nature as they were
physical…he wanted a bowl of his favorite meat from his favorite
son.
a.
This pitfall in his life is seen in his favored son Esau
also.
b.
Esau learned well from his dad, his stomach will rule his life
also.
c.
How important it is that we show our young people what to
value.
ILLUS: Max Jukes lived in
Jonathan
Edwards lived in the same state, at the same time as Jukes. He loved the Lord
and saw that his children were in church every Sunday, as he served the Lord to
the best of his ability. He has had 929 descendants, and of these 430 were
ministers; 86 became university professors; 13 became university presidents; 75
authored good books; 7 were elected to the
4. Rebekah
had learned to get what she wanted through deception, and Jacob learned this
skill well also.
a.
Rebekah was willing to deceive her own husband to get what she
wanted.
b.
Though she desired the right things, she often went about getting them in
the wrong way, something Jacob learned well from
her.
5. It is
NOT enough to desire the right things in life if we seek to gain them in the
wrong way, the example of our lives is so important in shaping the next
generation.
B. Priorities
25:29-34
1.
This next part of the story reveals the learned priorities of Jacob and
Esau from the respective parents who favored
them.
a.
Esau comes back from the hunt, and he is hungry, all he wants is
immediate satisfaction of his stomach.
b.
Jacob sees an opportunity to secure a spiritual blessings, but does it in
the wrong way, by taking advantage of his brother’s
weakness.
2. All Esau
can see is his immediate need of satisfaction, nothing else
matters.
a.
This is a sure formula for failure in
life.
b.
When passions rule our life
instead of priorities we become prisoners to those
passions.
c.
Esau only saw what he didn’t have that he immediately wanted … no sense
of value on what he is willing to give up to satisfy an immediate
craving.
3. Jacob
too feels he is slighted and sees his brother’s weakness as a way to get what he
wants too!
4. It is
sad when people always feel like everyone else has what they want! Tragically, neither one will be happy
with the price-tag.
ILLUS: The cards are ill shuffled till I have a good
hand. -- Jonathan Swift -- As quoted in Bob Phillips,
Phillips' Book of Great Thoughts & Funny Sayings, (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale
House Publishers, Inc, 1993), p. 59.
5. All
sense of priorities were gone in order to satisfy his immediate
need.
a.
This is how much of western civilization lives
today.
b.
Our education system stresses the learning of information over the wisdom
to know what’s important.
ILLUS: It is not the IQ but the I WILL that is important in
education. -- Vern McLellan, The
Complete Book of Practical Proverbs and Wacky Wit (Wheaton: Tyndale House
Publishers, Inc., 1996).
6. Esau’s
priorities were misplaced, and though Jacob’s was correct he goes about getting
the right thing in the wrong way … they both will pay the price-tag for their
sin.
a. It
is so tragic that Esau could be so short-sighted as to give away the birthright
of the first born son just to get something at the moment that he
wanted.
b.
How many of us live this way before our children, do they see us postpone
gratification to do the right things?
c.
You can hardly teach your kids the importance of Church if you skip it to
go to the model car show or fishing on the lake! How can you tell your children God is
more important than material things if you don’t tithe yourself? Remember, Esau and Jacob both reflected
the values of their parents who favored them, what are you teaching your
children?
C. Price-tag
Heb. 12:16-17
1. The
great reality of poor choices has both good news and bad
news:
a.
Good news: There can be
forgiveness for those mistakes we make.
b.
Bad news: The consequences
may continue throughout our lifetime.
2. The
Hebrew writer here instructs us to avoid being “godless” like Esau who for a
moment of pleasure sold off his birthright…and then later when he decided it was
after all important and he wanted it back could not get it back EVEN WITH
TEARS!
a. If
only people would realize this about sin and godless choices we may
make.
b.
Yes, God can and will forgive our mistakes, but we may learn to live with
the results of our choices for years or even a
lifetime.
3. We must
be careful not to comfort our bad choices by the fact that others have made the
same bad choice too…that doesn’t always mean we escape
pain.
ILLUS: Hurrying my 11-year-old daughter to school, I
turned right on red where it was prohibited. "Uh, oh," I said, realizing my
mistake. "I just made an illegal
turn."
"It's all
right," my daughter said. "The police car behind us did the same
thing." -- Jack Eppolito, Tulsa, Oklahoma. Christian Reader, "Lite
Fare."
4. Both
Esau and Jacob paid dearly for their choices, and so did their
family.
a.
Yet in spite of this they both did find forgiveness also, and even
blessing.
b.
How different though the quality of their lives may have been had they
done things God’s ways instead of their
own.
5. So often
we want to find someone or something else to blame the pain on, but the truth is
that we are often the ones responsible for the quality of our
lives.
ILLUS: As a rule, you will find that those who complain
about the way the ball bounces are usually the ones who dropped it. -- Croft
M. Pentz, The Complete Book of Zingers (Wheaton: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.,
1990).
6. Why not
spend your life making good bargains instead of bad ones, it is better to sell
out to God than to be sold out to the
world.
CONCLUSION: Life if full of choices and
choosing is driven by needs. What
we define as our most important needs will define what we consider our most
important choices should be. For
this reason we need to decide what we are sold out to! Actually, our choices will reflect our
passions. Our choices can bring
great joys or sorrows, some things cannot later be undone, so we need to choose
wisely.