Election and Its Alternatives

Genesis 36
Gregory Broderick | Sunday, December 04, 2022
Copyright © 2022, Gregory Broderick

Second Timothy 3:16–17 tell us, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness.”  This means that everything written down for us in the Scriptures is authored by God and is perfectly tailored and useful for us as His people.  Sometimes that is more challenging to believe than at other times, such as when you come across Genesis 36, and you are tempted to skip this chapter and move on to preach Joseph, from whom the lessons seem a little bit more obvious.  But God says otherwise.  God says there is something for us to learn in this chapter.

When we look at Esau, his role as a biblical actor is essentially concluded after Genesis 33.  Even though this is later in Genesis 36, it is more or less just a list of his descendants.  And none of those descendants individually have some particularly significant role in the Bible.  By this point, we are also more or less done with Jacob, at least as a central figure in our Genesis narrative.  And our focus is, as I said, about to shift to the godly Joseph for more or less of the rest of our series on Genesis.  Yet right before the focus shifts to Joseph in Genesis 37, we are given this long list of Esau’s offspring with somewhat difficult to pronounce names.  And we are left to ask ourselves, why do we have this information?  Why do we need to know this?  Well, God has a message for us from this chapter, even though it might at first glance appear superfluous to us.

First, God is speaking about divine election.  God chooses those He will save and He chooses those He will damn.  He does so on one reason and one reason alone—His own great love and rich mercy.  Second, God is reminding us not to envy the short-term success of the ungodly, but rather to take the long view.  Third, God is saying especially to those born and raised in the church:  Do not seek an alternative.  There is an alternative to election.  It is loss, it is destruction, and it is hell.

Election:  The Elect and the Unelect

Esau and all his line represent the unelect, the reprobates, those who reject God.  Esau is not born again.  Thus, he remains twisted by sin for his whole life, unable to love, to serve, or to please God, and, in fact, living in enmity against God and against His people.  That is the mark of Esau’s whole life.  Esau always chooses to feed the flesh, for he was not born of the Spirit.  This is a fundamental characteristic of the unregenerate: they always choose the flesh.

We see this in Esau early on in his life.  Esau is a man of the open country.  He has a wanderlust.  He wants to go out and see what else is out there.  Now, there is nothing wrong with exploring the world around you, but what characterizes Esau is his desire to seek the other, to seek something else, to go some other place than where God has put him.  Or we see Esau craving the lentils.  He is ruled by his stomach, ruled by his lusts.  He has no room in his thinking for God, and so he despises his birthright (Gen. 25).  Esau bitterly blames Jacob for supposedly stealing his birthright and stealing his blessing when God said they were never Esau’s in the first place.  Again, he is ruled by his desire: My desire makes it right.  It has nothing to do with the word of God.

We see later Esau is ruled by rage, ruled by emotion, planning to murder his brother Jacob and breathing out slaughter and threats against him (Gen. 27:41).  Esau reminds us of Cain.  He is crybully.  He is always whining about how he was treated and trying to use that to bully other people.  The next time Jacob and Esau see each other some twenty or thirty years later, they are best pals again.  It is like it never happened.  We are all best friends again.  Here again, he is ruled by his nostalgia, ruled by his emotions.  He never dealt with the supposed sin problem, but simply smoothed it over in the name of “how I feel in the moment” (Gen. 33).

We see Esau’s flesh-dominance again in middle age.  In Genesis 28:6–9, Esau marries the daughters of Ishmael.  He wasn’t supposed to do that, but he did it.  Why?  He was already married by that point, but he wanted to satisfy his lust for more; to satisfy his lust for “strange women,” for Canaanites, for the forbidden; to satisfy his lust to strike back at his parents for their perceived actions against him.  In other words, he married these women he wasn’t supposed to marry because he “saw how displeasing the Canaanite women were” to his parents.  That was his motivation (Gen. 28:8).  He did it because it would grieve them.  So when we look at Esau, we see lust, lust, lust-driven life.  Flesh-driven life.

Esau’s lust is further demonstrated by his living arrangements.  The promised land of Canaan was given to the offspring of Abraham and Isaac.  Yet Esau vacates God’s appointed land and goes to live in another place: in Seir.  We are not told why he does this.  There are all kinds of possible reasons.  Maybe Seir was good ranch land.  Genesis 33:9 says Esau has plenty.  He has flocks and herds, and he needs a good place to graze and water them.  Or maybe Seir was nice open country with fertile hunting grounds for tasty game.  Maybe it was enmity for his parents, for God, or for Jacob:  I want to get away from those people.  Whatever it was, Esau left that special place where God had put him and that God had promised to their family.  Notice that Esau was never told to get out of Canaan.  Genesis 27:23 says, “The older will serve the younger.”  It doesn’t say, “The older will expel the younger.”  It doesn’t say, “The younger is cast out.”  It says, “The older [Esau] will serve the younger [Jacob].”  Now, “serve” implies togetherness, not apartness.  You have to be around someone to serve him, to be under him.  Jacob is given authority over Esau, and yet we see Esau running away.  The point is that the subordination of Esau did not mean exclusion of Esau from the Promised Land.

Genesis 36 gives some indication of the reason or the justification for why Esau went elsewhere.  Verse 6 says, “Esau took his wives and sons and his whole household .  .  .  and moved to a land some distance from his brother Jacob.”  And verses 7 and 8 tell us that their possessions were too great to remain together, “so Esau .  .  .  settled in the hill country of Seir.”  That is the stated justification.

There are two problems with this stated justification.  First, Esau seems to have been already living in Seir when Jacob was living in Haran.  By definition, Jacob’s large flocks and herds could not have driven Esau to Seir when Jacob was not there with his large flocks and herds.  This does not imply any conflict in the Bible, but it shows that the heart of Esau was to be in the other place.  So much for “the livestock and the land” excuse.  But the second problem with this is that I have heard this excuse before.  This was the argument of Lot in Genesis 13:  We have too many flocks and herds; let us separate and let us go in the other land.   It was a disaster for Lot to go to the other land.  Bad for Lot, bad for the cattle, bad for everyone involved.

I would say to Esau, “Why don’t you learn from your relative Lot?  It doesn’t do you any good to take your flocks and herds and go to the other land, unless you are attempting to reproduce the great successes of Lot.  Why don’t you stick in God’s land?  Why don’t you stick with God’s man whom God has chosen?  Don’t go off to Sodom or Seir or San Francisco or any other name you want to give it.  It is all the world.  It is all the flesh-life.  It is all apart from the land that God chose for Esau’s family.  It is all apostasy.  That is what apostasy means: to stand apart.  That was what Esau was interested in doing, and that is what Esau did.

That is what the unregenerate always does.  The light shines brightest in the place where God is, in the place where God’s man is, but the unregenerate hates the light so he has to get out.  It is too bright.  It is too holy.  I have got to move some distance away.  So Esau makes up a reason, a justification, a fig leaf, and he goes.  “You see, I’d like to stay, but the land cannot support us both, so you know how it is.  I’ve got to go over there with my flocks and my herds.”  Or in our day we would say, “Well, I’ve gotten this promotion from work that I have to take.  Pressing matters of business, you know.  I have simply got to go somewhere else.”

Some people spiritualize their desire to go away from the place that God put them.  They blame the church or they try to limit what the church is.  You can only say exactly the words that are in the Bible.  Of course, that “exact verse” is not in the Scripture either, so I don’t know how they make that argument.  The Scripture does not say you can only say the exact verses that are in the Bible.  In fact, it indicates otherwise.  They would reduce the Scriptures to a bunch of truisms, and I will give you an example.  First Timothy 6:18 says, “Command the rich to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share.”  Now, that sounds like a pretty specific command.  But when you break it apart, it doesn’t actually say anything, if that is all you can say.  It doesn’t tell you exactly what to do.  So, rich man, you give one penny and you say, “I’m rich in good deeds.  I was willing to share.  I was generous.”  That is not what that verse is saying.  But you can cabin any verse in Scripture, if you want.  Or Ephesians 5:25 says, “Husbands, love your wives as your own bodies.”  It doesn’t tell you how to do that.  It is a general guideline.  So if that is the only thing pastors can say is to love your wife as your own body, it is not going to be much help to you.  This would reduce the Scriptures to Hallmark cards: nice sentiments that do not have any real application to your life.

Some spiritualize their apostasy by saying, “I feel that God has called me to do this,” or that “God has called me to do that.”  That sounds pretty spiritual.  I feel that God has called me to do something.  How do you know that is what God is calling you to do?  “I feel it; therefore, I must do it.  It must be right.”  Never mind that that the Holy Spirit brings unity: when the Holy Spirit is directing, he directs everyone in the same direction.  Never mind that you are breaking your vows and so on.  It is ungodly to break your vows.  Never mind that every other indication says that God is not directing because I have the veto card: “I feel that God is directing me.  God says to keep your vows in Numbers 30:2, but I feel.”

Whether cloaked in false spirituality or openly hostile, the man of the flesh will always choose the things of the flesh, and the man of the flesh will always go out from where the light is.  That is just like our man Esau this morning.  Esau hates the light, so he moves away from the place where the light is shining.  He violates every command of God, driven by enmity and lust.  God says, “Don’t marry a Canaanite” (Gen. 28:6), so I marry three, or maybe even more.  God says, “Stay in the land,” so I go to Edom.  God says, “You will serve your older brother,” so I fight for first place and even plot to kill him.  It is all rebellion against what God commanded.

Contrast Jacob.  As we have preached these past several weeks, Jacob is a flawed but ultimately godly man.  Jacob flees to Haran but he returns to God’s promised land.  Jacob is a deceiver in his youth, yet later we see that he has no part in the Shechemite deception and murder in Genesis 34.  He is changing.  He is becoming sanctified.  He is leaving the old ways behind and moving ahead.  Jacob marries two women.  That is not very good, but at least they were of the line of Shem and not Canaanites.  Jacob hides out near Shechem when he goes back to the land, but he ultimately goes back to Bethel at God’s command.  In his old age, we see Jacob at his apex.  In his old age, his only concern seems to be for his sons and their obedience to the Lord.  He has changed his focus.  He used to be focused on position and power and stuff, but now he is focused on the godly lineage, focused on preaching the word to his children as his days grow short.  Jacob mourns deeply for Joseph, and yet he takes measures to preserve the family line in Genesis 42.  He puts his own fears aside and sends Benjamin down to Egypt in Genesis 43, even though he was afraid to do so.  He instructs his sons in how to deal honestly with the Egyptians: Take back that silver and give it back to the man.  Now, young Jacob would not be doing that.  He would be figuring out a way to keep that silver and how to get some more.  But old Jacob is a changed man, being conformed, being sanctified by God.

God speaks to Jacob again and again, and Jacob obeys the difficult command to go down to Egypt: Take your whole family, leave the promised land, and go down to Egypt and shelter there.  God told them to do it in Genesis 46.  And when Jacob is about to die in Genesis 48, what was he speaking about?  He was not speaking about money, possessions, power, or any of those things.  What was he speaking about?  He speaks about God.  He tells his children in his old age what God told to him.  He blesses Joseph’s sons in the name of God.  He tells them that God will take care of them and bring them back to the land.  God had promised him that in Genesis 46, so he is relaying that promise to his sons.  We see the focus that comes to him later in life as a man of God.  He is more focused, and more focused on things above.

Jacob gives instructions about the disposition of the land.  That means he really believes the promise that God is going to send them back to the Promised Land: “Here, you get this piece and you get that piece.  We are preparing for what we know is coming because God told us so.”  He gives instructions about the disposition of his bones:  “Don’t bury me here in Egypt.  Take me back to the land that God promised.  Oh, when I was a young man, I left that land.  I went to Haran.  But now I want to go back there, and I want to be buried there because that is the place that God had for me.”  By faith, Jacob worshiped as he leaned on his staff, and he died in the Lord.

Jacob was fundamentally different from Esau.  Esau progressively moved away from God.  Jacob progressively (though unevenly) moved towards God.  Jacob was a flawed man to be sure, just like every one of us.  But ultimately, he trusted in the Lord.  Esau was also a flawed man, but ultimately he rejected God and trusted in himself.  Different wives, different land, different life, apart, apostate, off to Seir, off to Edom, never to return to the land.

You have to ask yourself what accounts for this difference.  Why was Jacob flawed but godly, and Esau flawed but godless?  They are both flawed, so it is not that one was flawed and the other was not.  Nor is there anything indicating that Jacob was the “better” man by nature.  It is at least a close race, and Esau may have the edge.  Jacob defrauded his brother twice.  He did all the shenanigans in Haran.  He refused to stay in the land.  He refused to deal straightforwardly.  So it is not that Jacob was the better man by nature.  It is not that he “decided for God” or willed himself to be a better man.

The difference is that Jacob was elect of God and Esau was not.  It is set forth in Genesis 27 and Malachi 1.  It is explained further in Romans 9:10–13.  Paul writes, “Not only that, but Rebekah’s children had one and the same father, our father Isaac.  Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: not by works but by Him who calls—she was told, ‘The older will serve the younger.’ Just as it is written; ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.’”  The bottom line difference is God.  God chose.  God chose Jacob and not Esau.  Why?  Because “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”  Why?  Because.  Because in God’s sovereign election, He chose one and not the other.  In His sovereign will, He loved and elected Jacob before all time, not because of anything Jacob did, or not because of God’s ability to see the future and what good things Jacob would do, but because God.  Ephesians 2:8 calls this God’s great love and rich mercy.

God purposed before all time to save a people for himself, to save a small remnant of mankind, and He chose particular people all for His own great glory.  And let’s be clear.  All deserve God’s great wrath and judgment.  Esau deserved it.  Jacob deserved it.  You deserve it.  I deserve it.  All of us—all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23).  We are all alike under sin (Rom. 3:10).  And what does our sin deserve?  Death (Rom. 6:23).  The wages of sin is death: eternal death in eternal hell for unrighteous sinners.  And if that sounds like a difficult message, your problem is not with me.  Your problem is with Jesus Christ, who said it: “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life” (Matt. 25:46).  Who are these righteous, since we are all under sin and hell.  They are those that God elected—not born righteous, not earning a righteousness for themselves, but made righteous by God.  They are born again by God’s Holy Spirit.  Romans 5:6 says, “You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the unrighteous.”

We all were sinners who deserved the wages of sin, which is death.  We were all powerless, slaves to sin who kept on sinning, unable in any event to pay the infinite penalty of our infinite sin against infinite God.  Because we were unable and because of God’s great love and rich mercy, God the Son, the Second Person of the Trinity, became man, lived in perfect righteousness, suffered the full wrath of God in our place, which He could do as both man and God, and then He died the death that we deserved.  He paid all those wages for us: all the wages of the wrath of God, all the wages of eternal death and even physical death—He paid the whole price for us.  So the debt is paid for us.  That is why He said on the cross, “Tetelestai,” “It is finished, it is satisfied, it is complete.”

And this God changes our nature.  He changes the nature of the elect—a new heart to love God; a new spirit to obey God; the indwelling Holy Spirit to guide, to direct, to power us and to sanctify us; a new spirit making us able to say “No” to sin and “Yes” to righteousness.  We were slaves to sin before.  We couldn’t say “No.”  Now we can say “No” and make it stick.  We are nothing less than a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17).  No longer the old deceiving, scheming, conniving Jacob.  No, a new God-serving, God-loving Israel.  (GTB)  God even changed his name in order to make clear that point of departure.  Oh, he still sins from time to time, and he falls.  But what does he do then?  He repents.  He gets up and he does the next right thing.  His progress is uneven, but the arc is changed.  It no longer bends away from God, but it bends towards God and not towards Edom, not towards Seir, not towards worldly gain.

Left to himself, Jacob would have been just like Esau—maybe worse.  But God intervened.  But God loved Jacob.  But God saved Jacob.  So Jacob was born again by the power of the Holy Spirit.  What Jacob received was nothing less than new life, and it is available to you as well.  Confess with your mouth, “Jesus Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, and you will be saved too, just like Jacob.

Now, you can reject it, as Esau did.  Indeed, most people will.  But God calls all people.  He offers it to all people, and He calls you personally today.  So I say, stop living the Esau life off in Seir, off in Edom.  Stop moving away from God in your own power and in your own understanding.  Fall down before Him.  Trust in Jesus Christ alone.  Confess with your mouth, believe in your heart, and you too will be saved.

He is calling you.  It is a general call, but He is also calling you specifically.  He arranged all of this for you to hear that call, for you to hear it today.  The light is shining on you this morning.  I have these big lights that shine on me when I speak up here.  It is like that for you.  The light of God is shining on you today.  He is calling you today, “Come to Christ.  Come to the light and be saved.”  Confess Christ.  Don’t run away from the light that is shining on you.  Run to the light that is shining on you.  Confess Christ and He will embrace you.  He won’t reject you.  Then you can live for Him in the hope of glory.  You can live for Him in joy unspeakable and full of glory.

Message for Church Kids

I want to speak a special message for church kids this morning.  Church kids: those born and raised in the true church—this or any other true church: Church kids who are familiar with the Scripture: Church kids who know all about God.  Church kids, I want you to hear this and take it to heart.  Esau was a church kid too.  Abraham was his grandfather.  Sarah was his grandmother.  Mighty Isaac was his father.  Rebekah was his mother.  That is all true of Esau.  Esau was born as a result of prayer, same as Jacob (Gen. 25:21).  Esau was the offspring, the descendant of Abraham and thus, although incompletely, he was included in that “sand of the seashore” and “stars in the sky” promise.  He was raised in the home of Isaac, certainly hearing all about God, certainly hearing all about what God had done in the lives of his father and grandfather and so on.  Hearing all of God’s miraculous works.

It is likely, if you follow the biblical timeline, that Esau knew Abraham in some way.  The biblical timeline suggests that Esau was fifteen years old when Abraham dies at the age of 175.  There is some dispute about it and it is not a key point.  But it is likely that Esau had some overlap with Abraham in his life.  No interaction is recorded, but it seems quite likely that it would have occurred.  So that is a pretty good pedigree.  It is a better pedigree than any of our pedigrees.  Abraham may be our father in a spiritual sense, but he is none of our grandfathers in a direct relational sense.

My point is that Esau was born with every advantage in life, just like you church kids.  You might not know Abraham, but you know godly men appointed by God to minister to you.  You might not be born to Isaac and Rebekah particularly, but you were probably born to godly parents and certainly as a result of their earnest prayers.  You may not be in the Promised Land in Israel, but you were born in the kingdom, the true church preaching the true word (the Bible).  And if you are from here, you are living in a community striving to live for God.  Just like Esau, you have every advantage, and just like Esau, you can blow it too.  Despite all the advantages, you can blow it too.

Just look at Esau.  He had no interest—he never had any interest—in the kingdom of God.  Every inclination of his heart was to be away, to go away, to go somewhere else.  Always fascinated by the open country.  I don’t want this thing that God gave me.  I want to see what else is out there.  Not in the center with the people of God.  He went after foreign wives as we discussed earlier—pagan wives: Judith, Basemath, Mahalath, and so on.  Genesis 36 notes Adah and Oholibamah.  Genesis 28 said he did it to spite the parents.  He is always interested in the other things.  And, finally, he abandons the land that God had promised, settling instead in Seir.  Oh, pretty close.  Seir is just next door.  It is arguably close, but just far enough away where the light of God’s word does not shine so bright.  In fact, it may not shine at all.  The light is too bright over there, so I will go over here into the shadows or into the dark.  Esau was always interested in the other, and so we can say, “Amen, he truly despised his birthright.”

Church kids, the message to you is this: Don’t do that.  Don’t be like Esau.  If you are lucky enough to have the privilege of being born and raised in a true church—that rare privilege—then value it.  Appreciate God’s great grace to you in granting this great privilege.  Few people get it.  Don’t long for what you imagine is out there.  It is not what you imagine, by the way, and it is not better.  Those of us who did not have the privilege of growing up in a true church know that what is out there is not better and it is not what you imagine.  It is darkness.  It is immorality.  It is anti-God.  It is sin.  It is loss.  It is frustration.  God has already given you His best: a home and a people, a place where He is worshiped, a portion of His good promises, and a share in His very self.  Why would you want to go elsewhere and look for something different when God has already given you the best?  Do not be like Esau, imagining that there is something better out there.  That is really a way of saying that the place where God has put me is not good, or at least not good enough.

This lesson is taught all over the Bible, not just in the life of Esau.  Think of the prodigal son.  Think of the rich young ruler.  Think of Gehazi.  Think of Demas.  Think of the rich man of Luke 16.  They all chose the world over the kingdom.  They were all disappointed.  They were all filled with regret, usually in this life and certainly in the next.  They found out—they said, “I want to find out for myself.”  Well, they found out, all right, and they are still finding out to this day.  They found out with great suffering and so did Esau.  Why find out on your own what you already know from the word of God?  Instead, believe God’s word.

And don’t blame election.  Don’t say, “Well, there is nothing I can do about it.  It is all God’s sovereignty.”  That is true.  God’s sovereignty controls.  But there is human responsibility.  God commands all people everywhere to repent (Acts 17:30).  God makes His gospel available to all for free (Rom. 10:13; John 3:16).  God desires all people to repent and be saved (1 Tim. 2:4).  He has made provision for you.  So don’t argue, “I am not elect.”  How do you know that you are not elect?  I will give you a couple of arguments to indicate otherwise.

1. You are alive. God elected you to live.  Pastor Mathew said this morning that to be born again, you must first be born.  So you have at least satisfied that condition.
2. God elected you to hear the gospel. The proof is that you are hearing it now, and most of you have heard this many, many times throughout your life.
3. God elected you if you are a church kid, to be raised in a true church whether here or elsewhere—a church that preaches the word of God.

That is a lot of electing to conclude that you are non-elect.  Don’t say, “It is God’s problem to save me or not.  I will do my own thing until then.”  That is not what God said to do.  What did He say to do?  “Call upon the name of the Lord.”  What did He say to do?  Cry out, “Have mercy on me, a sinner.”  Have you done that?  He says in John 6:37, “Whoever comes to me I will never drive away.”  So we know God will do His part in saving.

What is your responsibility?  You do your part.  Cry out to the Lord, “Have mercy on me, a sinner.”  Cry out, “I believe; help Thou my unbelief.”  Fall down before Him in humility.  Cry out for mercy.  He says He will change your heart and He will make you a new creation, able to confess, “Jesus Lord.”

Don’t Envy the Ungodly

A further point for you church kids: Don’t envy the Esaus.  Sometimes the Esaus seem to have it all.  They seem to be ahead of where you are.  It is true: they do look that way sometimes.  After all, Esau married what appear to be some prominent women.  That seems to be a step ahead.  He had at least five sons.  He had many grandsons.  They succeeded.  They were chiefs and kings in Edom.  That is why we read that passage this morning to show that these were not a bunch of immediate losers.  They were chiefs and kings in Edom.

Esau went his own way and he had success, or so it seems.  And then we compare Jacob.  Compared to Esau, Jacob does not have such worldly success.  He had a lot of flocks and herds and things, but Reuben was not a king, Ephraim was not a chief, Judah was not some high ruler.  There were sixty-six or so people living a nomadic life in the desert raising sheep.  It doesn’t look very successful next to Mr. Kings and Chiefs in Edom over there.  Now, Joseph became a powerful ruler, but I am not sure that is the family story you want to brag about.

Esau seems to have it all while you seem to have problems.  But, remember, that is a short-term view.  Where are Esau’s descendants today?  They are destroyed.  Even on this earth, they were destroyed by a combination of Egyptians and Babylonians.  And even when they ran from their territory in Seir to Idumea, which they did later, they were not safe there.  They were ravaged by the Romans, and they are lost to history.  What good are all the kingships, the chieftainships, doing them now?  They are no more, as I said—lost to history.  And yet God’s people remain.  God’s people prosper.  God’s people thrive, and that is just an earthly perspective.  Biblically speaking, Esau’s descendants are even worse off today.  They are cursed.  In fact the Bible curses them.  In Amos 1:11 the Lord says, “I will not turn back my wrath on Edom.”  In Malachi 1:4 we read, “Edom may say, ‘Though we have been crushed, we will rebuild the ruins.’ But this is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘They may build, but I will demolish.  They will be called a wicked land, a people always under the wrath of the Lord.”  Oh, it doesn’t seem so successful now.  In Ezekiel 25:14 the Lord says, “I will take vengeance on Edom by the hand of my people Israel, and they will deal with Edom in accordance with my anger and my wrath; they will know my vengeance, declares the Sovereign Lord.”

Are you jealous of Edom?  Are you jealous of Esau and his descendants now?  And, of course, the unelect, the unregenerate, the unsaved Esau and his descendants are all in hell, suffering torment and agony.  No, we are not jealous now.  Are all the wives, all the sons, all the chieftains, and all the kings helping him now?  Are they any comfort to him now?  The answer is, “No.”  If Esau could speak to you, he would say to you this morning: “Don’t be a fool like me.  Don’t trade eternal things for temporal things like I did.  Don’t take Satan’s bargain of earthly pleasures which fade so fast.”  No, he would say like the rich man of Luke 16 in eternal hell, “I beg you, take warning.  Do not come to this place of torment.”

Moreover, Esau’s descendants opposed God and they opposed His people.  First, they went away.  They were apostates.  They stood apart.  Then, later on, we see they refused to help their brother Israelites during the exodus.  Eventually they fought against Israel openly as their enemies.  In fact, they are called ruthless and heartless. This is progressive depravity, progressive hostility towards God and His people.

If you go the Esau route, this will happen to you too.  You may first find yourself saying, “I just want to explore the open country of the world.”  Then a Judith or a Basemath comes along, and you rationalize it: “They are like us.  We are all descendants of Abraham one way or the other.”  Then you go away from God’s kingdom and God’s people permanently.  Then you say, “Their problems are not my problems.”  Then you say, “They are my enemies.”  That is the progression of Esau.  That is the progression of the unregenerate man.

Friends, this is the alternative to election.  It is not the good life now.  It is the bad life now, the bad life for your descendants, and the bad life in eternity.  It is life apart from God, life apart from the people of God.  Pastor Mathew would often ask people the question: How is your life?  It is a penetrating question.  How is Esau’s life?  It is no good.  Don’t go the Esau way.  Remember what God said: “Esau I hated.”  Don’t strive to be like Esau.  He is hated by God.  Go the Jacob way.  What did God say?  “Jacob I loved.”  Yes, there is an element of mystery in election.  It is based only on God’s love and not on our actions.  Not at all—not even our repentance, which is a gift of God.  But don’t worry about the mystery.  That is outside of your control.  There is nothing you can do about it.  It is outside of your control, so don’t worry about it.  We cannot understand it, so don’t worry about it.  You do what you can do: Cry out to God for mercy.  It is all you can do, so do it.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I would ask: Have you done so?  Have you fallen down before God and cried out for mercy?  Have you trusted in Christ alone?  Have you confessed?  Have you believed in your heart?  Have you been baptized as He commands?

If that is true of you, then praise the Lord.  Rejoice in the Lord, that you are saved, that you are in the “Jacob I loved” both now and forever.  Make sure that you continue to make your calling and election sure every day by your joyful obedience, proving your stated repentance by your deeds.  Live that new life that Christ makes available to you.  Don’t confess Christ and then live the old Esau life.  That doesn’t make any sense.  Confess Christ and live the new life, the life of righteousness, peace, and joy, full of the Holy Spirit which dwells in us.

And in those tough times that come, the times of famine, the times of loss—yes, those tough times will come—in those times, don’t move away from God, but cling all the more to Christ.  Don’t look over at the Esaus.  Don’t envy their seeming success.  Their seeming success is an illusion, temporary, like a mist that will soon be blown away or burned up.  Don’t daydream about the Esau life in Seir and imagine how great it must be, and give a foothold to the devil.  Instead, understand that even in your trouble, even in your sufferings, God is for you and God is with you.  Understand that even in difficult times, even when Esau’s life looks so great, he is not the lucky one.  We are the lucky ones.  We are elect of God.  We have relationship with God.  The Esaus, by contrast, are damned to doom and destruction.

Now, don’t let that make you become proud but remain humble.  Remember that Jacob was flawed, just like you, and not chosen for his righteousness, just like you.  So don’t think, “I am better than Esau.”  We are each the chief of sinners.  Remain humble and praise God with all that is in you: “Though I was flawed, though I was the sinner, though I was the worst, Christ died for me, Christ chose me, God chose to have relationship with me.”  That is very humbling.

Praise God with all that is in you and tell of Him to others, even to those Esaus, that they too can be saved, they too can have relationship with God through Jesus Christ.  And then walk the narrow way to glory for the rest of your days until you arrive.  You see, when we look at Esau, we see his name is written in history.  It is written in biblical history, and it is also discussed in history books of the ancient times.  Kings and chieftains—his name is recorded in history.  But your name is recorded in the Lamb’s book of life, and that is where it matters.  It is better by far to be in the Lamb’s book of life than in the books of history.  So praise God, confess Christ, live for Him, and rejoice.  Amen.