God's Perfect Plan Equals God's Perfect Peace - Genesis Part 62

Well, as you know, we're in a verse by verse study of the book of Genesis. And last week, we looked at Genesis chapter 27, and we talked about Isaac, and Jacob, and Rebecca, and Esau, and how these folks plotted against each other, and how they lied to one another, and how they schemed against each other, and how they behave sinfully towards one another. But yet, in spite of all of that, how God's sovereign plan and will triumphed in the end. Now, if you missed that, I urge you to get the CD before you leave in the lobby, or to go online to McLeanBible.org and download or podcast that message. But today, what we're going to talk about is something else that's in the story of Jacob and Esau.

I didn't have time to deal with it last week, but it's a great truth about God that we need to know. So we're going to talk about it today. You all ready?

You ready? All right, here we go. We're starting in Genesis 25, and Rebecca, the Bible says, conceived twins, this is Jacob and Esau of course, but the children jostled within her, so she went to inquire of the Lord. And the Lord said to her, two nations are in your womb, and two people shall be separated from your body, and the older, that is Esau, shall serve the younger, that is Jacob.

Now friends, this was unheard of in the ancient Near East. This was unheard of in ancient Hebrew society, because in those societies, the oldest son was the preeminent child in those families. Everybody else in the family served that oldest son. The blessing of the father went to that oldest son.

The biggest part of the inheritance went to that oldest son. And yet here God is saying that in the case of Esau and Jacob, it is the younger son who's going to be favored over the older son. Now in the New Testament, the apostle Paul draws on this conversation that God and Rebecca had to teach us a great truth about God's character and God's attributes.

So let's look at that. Romans chapter 9 verse 10, Paul says, Rebecca's children had one and the same father Isaac, yet before the twins were born, or had done anything good or bad, Rebecca was told that the elder Esau will serve the younger Jacob. Now what this means is that when God decided to favor Jacob over Esau, to choose Jacob over Esau, Paul's telling us that God was not rewarding Jacob for any good things he'd done. And he was not punishing Esau for any bad things that he'd done already in time and space, because as Romans 9 reminds us, at the time God made this choice between the two boys, they were both still in Rebecca's womb.

They hadn't done a thing. The point that Paul's making is that God's choice between these two boys was based on another basis. It was based on something else than their actions up to that point in time, because they had no actions up to that point in time. Y'all with me?

Everybody with me? Okay, so what is this other basis upon which God chose between these two boys? Well, part of it, for sure, is God's immutable, inscrutable, unsearchable sovereignty.

In other words, God decided to favor Jacob simply because God wanted to, period. When God says he's sovereign, what he's telling us is that the entire universe belongs to him, and he can do whatever he pleases in this universe. It's his universe. And Paul goes on to say, Romans 9, verse 15, for God said to Moses, Exodus 33, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. It's my universe, Moses.

I'll run it the way I choose to run it. That's the sovereignty of God. But, folks, God's sovereignty wasn't the only part of the reason why he chose Jacob over Esau. The other part of why God did this was based on God's omniscience. You say, God's what?

No, listen, don't let that word throw you. Omniscience simply means, when we say God is omniscient, what we're saying is that God knows everything about everything, not just everything that's already happened, but God knows everything about things that are yet going to happen. Isaiah 40, verse 13, God says, With whom has the Lord ever consulted to enlighten him? Or who was it that taught him knowledge? Listen, folks, God has never been taught anything. God has never learned anything. God has never discovered anything. And God has never been enlightened by anyone because there is not a single piece of information in the universe that God doesn't already know everything about. Praise the Lord. And this was the other basis upon which God chose Jacob over Esau, namely God's complete and utter knowledge while they were still in the womb of just how each of these boys was going to turn out.

Let me explain what I mean to you. Let's start with Esau. Genesis 26 says, And when Esau was 40 years old, he married Judith, the daughter of Biri, the Hittite, and also Bazimath, the daughter of Elon, the Hittite. Esau married, the Bible says, not just one Canaanite woman, but two Canaanite women.

And remember what we said two weeks ago. We said about these women that these women didn't know the Lord and these women didn't love the Lord. And these women sacrificed their own living children to their idols, to their demons, and that these women practice sacred temple prostitution, the sex act as part of their temple worship.

And yet these were the kind of women that Esau liked. And this is why in the New Testament, in Hebrews chapter 12, the Bible calls Esau a sexually immoral and godless man. Why was he sexually immoral? Well, because of his activities with his wives in the temples of their gods. And why was he godless?

Well, because of his complete disregard for the things of God, including letting his wife sacrifice his living children to their demon gods. The point, listen carefully, is that even in Rebekah's womb, God in his omniscience could look down the corridors of time and could see what kind of man Esau was going to turn out to be. That he was going to be a man driven by the lusts of the flesh, that he was going to be a man who was spiritually unqualified to inherit the blessing of Isaac, and who was spiritually unqualified to inherit the promises of the Abrahamic covenant. And so knowing this in his omniscience, God chose against Esau. Do we see that?

You see that? Okay, now what about Jacob? Well, Jacob for sure got off to a bad start, a little rugged start, lying, deceiving, stealing, conniving, he got off to not a great start. But in his omniscience, God could see also down the corridors of time that Jacob was going to end up at a different place than Esau. We're going to see as we keep going through the book of Genesis that Jacob eventually is going to give his life to the Lord. And he's going to end up becoming a godly man who loved the Lord with all of his heart. And friends, God knew that this was going to happen to Jacob decades before Jacob knew it was going to happen to Jacob. And this is why God sovereignly chose him while he was still in Rebekah's womb, because God knew that Jacob would grow up to be spiritually qualified to inherit the blessing of Isaac. And Jacob would grow up to be spiritually qualified to inherit the promises of the Abrahamic covenant, and that's why God chose him. And God knew all of that about both of these boys while they were still in the womb.

Why? Because as Paul is trying to teach us, God is omniscient. He knows everything about everything, past, present and future at the very same moment. Praise the Lord for a God like that. Amen.

Amen. Now, we're going to stop in our treatment of the passage, and we're going to ask now our most important question. And you know what that question is, so are you ready? Yes. Okay. Now, I just want you to know that God in his omniscience knows how good this so what's going to be. So, are you ready?

Okay, because he already knows. Here we go. One, two, three.

One. That was beautiful. You say, Lon, look, I understand what you're saying here. I do. And I get it. But I don't see what this has to do with me at all in my life. I mean, I'm already out of the womb. What does this have to do with me?

Okay. Let's try to help with that. You know, when I was growing up, in fact, my whole life, I've had a big mouth. My father used to always say to me, Lon, if you would just keep your mouth shut, 90% of your troubles would go away. And I actually think that percentage is low.

I think more of my troubles would go away. And you know what the worst part of it is, folks? The worst part is that half the time, I don't even know what's coming out of my mouth till it comes out of my mouth. That's why my wife, Brenda, godly wife, for 35 years has sat in the services of this church and with her head bowed and the hands over her face going, oh, Jesus, help him up there, Lord. Oh, Jesus, don't let anything come out of his mouth. Oh, Jesus, put a muzzle on that mouth. Oh, Jesus, she's the biggest prayer warrior in this church. For 35 years, she spent more time in prayer on Sunday than I bet you you have sitting in the services saying, oh, Jesus, watch him up there, Lord, watch him. Amen?

I got a great wife. But I got a big mouth. And yet, I want you to see what David said. Look at this. Psalm 139. David said, even, what? Say the next word out loud.

Even before. Right. There's a word on my tongue, oh, Lord. You know it. Say the next word.

Completely. Is this amazing? David says, before the words even come out of my mouth, you know exactly what I'm going to say. And, Lord, I read this and I go, Lord, how could you possibly know what I'm going to say before it comes out of my mouth?

Well, I don't even know what I'm going to say till it comes out of my mouth. Friends, this is how deep the omniscience of God goes. He knows what I'm going to say when I don't even know what I'm going to say.

He knows what you're going to say when you don't even know what you're going to say. And David goes on farther than that to say, and all the days ordained for me and all the events of my life were written in your book, God, before even one of them came to be. God said this same thing to Jeremiah. He said to Jeremiah, Jeremiah, before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. And before you were born, son, I set you apart to be a prophet for me. I had your whole life planned out, Jeremiah, before you ever came out the womb.

David says the same thing. God has every event in my life already written in his book before I was even born. And this is not just true of David, and this is not just true of Jeremiah.

Folks, this is true of you, and this is true of me. God's done the very same thing for us. In his omniscience and in his sovereignty, he has planned our whole life out also, and it's a plan that is perfectly fitted just for you and me. Jesus said, your father knows what you need before you ever ask him.

And I love how Jesus personalizes this. Jesus didn't say, your father knows what the average person needs. Your father knows what the average American needs. Your father knows what human beings in general need.

Uh-uh. He said, your father knows what you need before you even ask for it. I love how personal this is and how individual this is. God says, hey, let me just tell you, I know when you need success and I know when you need failure as an individual. You don't need it the same time Lon needs it, and Lon doesn't need it the same time you need it. I know when you need it. And God says, I know when you need healing and when you need sickness, and I know when you need discipline, and I know when you need encouragement, and I know when you need your washing machine working, and I know when you need it broken. And God says, I know when you need a mate, and I know when you need a child, and I know when you need a job, and I know when you need a house, and I know when you need a scholarship, and I know when you need a broken leg.

I know every bit of it because I'm omniscient and I know what you need and I have put together a plan for your life to make sure, listen now, that you get personally what you need personally right on schedule. Praise the Lord. That's great. I had a lady call me the other day and she was going on my Footsteps of Paul tour in April to follow Paul's missionary journey, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. And she called me up and said, you know, she said, I really hated to make this phone call. She said, but I'm not going to be able to join you.

And I said, why not? She said, well, a week or so before I'd gone out and fell on the ice and she said, I broke my leg in four places and I lay there 20 minutes before anybody found me. And when they finally found me and took me in, the surgeon said, it was the worst break he had ever seen. She said, my foot was turned around backwards facing behind me. And so I had to go into surgery and I can't walk on my foot for the next nine weeks. So she said, I'm heartbroken.

She said, I am, I am just heartbroken. I can't go, but I can't go. And I said, well, I said, you know, my heart goes out to you, I understand what you're saying. So I tell you what, let me pray with you. I always try to pray with people whenever they call me up and they got a problem.

I always say, before you hang up, let me pray with you. And I said, well, let me pray with you before you hang up. She said, wait a minute. She said, I'm not through yet.

I said, you're not through what? She said, I got more to, I got more I want to say to you. I said, okay. And she said, I want to tell you that I was in the hospital after the surgery and the spiritual advisor of the hospital came in, not the chaplain, the spiritual advisor. And she said, this woman walked in to see me and my leg was up, you know, in his cast and everything.

And she said, we got to talking. And eventually I was telling her about the trip that I was supposed to go on and that I couldn't go. And I said to her as the spiritual advisor, I said, you know, God's will must be for some reason that I don't go on this trip.

God must know in his perfect plan that I don't belong on this trip. And the spiritual advisor, she said, said to me, she said, Oh no, honey. She said that God had nothing to do with this.

She said it was just the luck of the draw. And this lady who called me, she said, Lon, I remember when we were in Israel and we were standing at the pool of Bethesda and we were studying John chapter five. And I remember when you challenged every one of us that don't, we should never let somebody reinterpret Jesus and re make Jesus.

But we need to stand our ground for who Jesus really is. And she said, so I said to her, I said, ma'am, I'm sorry, but you're wrong. There is no such thing as the luck of the draw. She said, there is just God's perfect plan for my life. This broken leg is part of God's perfect plan for my life. And she said, because I know that that's how I can lie here and have perfect peace, even though I'm disappointed because God wants me in this bed and in this chaos. It was God's plan for my life. Praise the Lord.

And she said the spiritual advisor just turned around and walked out the room. How great is that? All right. Now, what's the one sentence summary of what I'm trying to say to you today? It's this, that God's sovereign plan for our life is perfect because God's omniscience about our life is perfect. And therefore we can have perfect peace no matter what that plan brings our way. Let me say it again, God's sovereign plan for us is perfect because God's omniscience about us is perfect, which means that we can have perfect peace no matter what God's plan brings our way. Folks, there are no mistakes in God's plan. There are no miscalculations in God's plan. There are no accidents in God's plan. There are no coincidences in God's plan. There's just perfection in the plan of God.

Amen. And that's why I should remind you, you'll never see an eraser in heaven because there's nothing to erase. God never makes a mistake, so God never needs an eraser. God gets it right the first time every time. He got it right for David. He got it right for Jeremiah. He's going to get it right for you.

He's going to get it right for me. How he gets it right for eight billion people at the same time, I don't have the slightest idea. David even says in Psalm 139, this concept, this knowledge is too high for me.

I can't even comprehend it. Well neither can I, but that's how great our God is. Praise the Lord. That's how great he is. And even with eight billion people, he'll get it right for you.

Don't you worry. He's got it just right. So let me close with Isaiah 26. The Bible says you will keep him in perfect peace. Let me stop and say, isn't that what we want? Wouldn't you like to go through life with perfect peace? So no matter what comes into your life, you can face it without fear, without anxiety. You just got peace.

Wouldn't that be great? Well the Bible says you will keep him in perfect peace, watch, whose mind is stayed, whose mind is fixed, whose mind is focused like flint on thee. Perfect peace comes from being perfectly stayed on, fixed on a perfect God and his perfect plan for our life. Perfect peace comes from being stayed on our perfect God and his perfect plan for our life.

You got that? Perfect peace doesn't come from being stayed upon your emotions. Sorry. Perfect peace doesn't come from being stayed on your feelings. Perfect peace doesn't come from being able to figure out everything that's happening to you. Perfect peace comes from saying, oh God, you are a perfect God, and oh God, you have a perfect plan, and oh God, this is part of that perfect plan, and oh God, whether I like it, whether I understand it, whether I want it, doesn't make a bit of difference.

If it's part of the perfect plan of God, I have peace with it. Let's pray together. With our heads bowed and our eyes closed, let's all admit, can we, that many of us did not walk in here today with perfect peace. Many of us walked in here today with anxiety about things going on in our life and maybe fear, maybe griping to the Lord, even anger. Well if that's you, my friend, you came to the right place today, because we're going to give you the chance to trade all that stuff in for the perfect peace of God.

And we just said there's only one way to do it. That's to bring all those things and surrender them to the perfect plan of God. Acknowledge them as part of the perfect plan of God. No matter how I feel, doesn't matter what I think, it only matters what the Bible says. And the Bible says this is part of God's perfect plan. One day you'll look back and you'll thank God. So let's thank God ahead of time by faith. So friend, if that's you, the way you walked in here today, why don't we take a quiet moment and why don't you take the opportunity right now to bring those things to the foot of the cross and lay them down there and say, Lord, these belong to your perfect plan.

I'm over my pay grade to be trying to handle these things. I'm leaving them with the perfect plan of God and I'm just going to trust you, Lord. Bring those things in for God's perfect peace today. Lord Jesus, I have to come to you today myself because I've got some tough things going on in my life, Lord, in the life of my family that I don't understand, I don't like, I don't want, they hurt.

You know what they are, Lord, I have to tell you about them every morning. But oh God, thank you for reminding me that what I need every day is to re-surrender my life to the perfect plan of God and not to depend on my feelings, not to depend on my emotions but to believe the Bible and operate on biblical truth. So Lord Jesus, help me and help all of us here to do that. Find us of the words of the great old hymn that says stayed upon Jehovah, hearts are fully blessed, finding as He promised perfect peace and rest. Help us be stayed on you, Lord, and on your plan for our life. And we pray these things in the name of Jesus and God's people said, Amen. Amen. Amen.