In Genesis the story of Abraham and his family continues. Abraham dies. After 20 years of marriage Isaac and Rebekah have twins. Isaac borrows from Abraham's playbook and tells the king in the land he is living that Rebekah is his sister rather than his wife. Esau and Jacob are very different men. Jacob trades with Esau: a meal for his birthright. I've always thought of this as Jacob being tricky, but I noticed it says "So Esau despised his birthright." That sentence makes sense to me - if it had value to Esau he would not have traded it simply for a meal.
As Isaac is about to die Jacob also steals from Esau his final blessing and Esau isn't very happy about it and threatens to kill him. Rebekah sends him to her family to escape from Esau. On his journey the Lord appears to Jacob in a dream and promises to bless his family and make his descendants like the dust of the earth and "all peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring". There Jacob built an alter and promised to give to God 10% of all that God gives him.
The second time that I've seen a tithe mentioned, before there are even priests!
I don't know why I am so surprised by all the drama and tricking and lying. Maybe it's more so that I'm surprised all of that makes it into the story. Maybe it's just that I'm surprised that these are the methods that bring about God's will. He takes our sin and turns it instead into something beautiful.
Matthew 8 has in it the story of a centurion who came to Jesus to ask for healing for his servant. Jesus offers to come help him and the centurion responds "Just say the word, and my servant will be healed". He recognizes Jesus authority and has faith that he is able to heal him. He doesn't feel like he needs to be there seeing the healing take place, he just trusts that it will happen.
I am longing for this kind of faith. I believe that God called us to be living in the house we are living. As an extension of that, I believe that God has a school already picked out for our son for kindergarten. Although I don't know where he is going yet, that hasn't been a source of stress for me, I just believe that God will give us peace and direction in his timing. I haven't felt peace like this before about something important that is unknown so I feel like my faith is taking baby steps forward. What other burdens can I lay at his feet and just trust that it will happen?
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