Here's a family in all of this legacy of dysfunction, but God is speaking.
And here is the obvious point. A dysfunctional family never stopped God from functioning. It never stopped God from working, never stopped God from blessing that family, and never stopped God from working through that family. Because here in chapter 31, you've got these dirty looks, these aloof kind of looks, cold shoulders.
I'm not looking at you nicely anymore, all whispers around the tents. And God speaks to Jacob. Sometimes, dysfunction in a family can last for generations, but Jesus can intervene to break the cycle. Connect with Skip Heisig today, as he talks about the hope your family can find in Christ through any challenge. Right now, we want to tell you about a resource that will help you build your knowledge of who God is and inspire you to follow him more faithfully. Does God exist? And if he does, is it possible to know him? Your answer to those two questions shapes how you see the world.
Skip Heisig once wrestled with those very questions himself. You know, I've been teaching the Bible for over three decades. Before I became a Christian, and when I was new to the faith, I studied science and philosophy alongside the Bible. As I studied, I grew confident that God does exist, and yes, we can know him. In Biography of God, the brand new book by Skip Heisig, you'll learn to remove the limits you may have placed on your idea of who God is. Everything changes when you acknowledge and believe that God is who he says he is. Biography of God is our way to thank you when you give $35 or more today to help expand this Bible teaching outreach to more people.
Request your copy when you give online securely at connectwithskip.com slash offer or call 800-922-1888. Now, as we join Skip Heisig for today's teaching, we're in Genesis chapter 31. One of the most beautiful, romantic passages of the Bible, it says, and those seven years seemed but a day to him because of the love that he had for her. So he worked seven years. Then comes a wedding day, and that wedding night, and that bride is all dressed up, and he thinks it's Rachel, but it's not. Laban, the master deceiver, father-in-law, switches his daughters on Jacob and gives him, not Rachel, the girl he loved, but her sister Leah, the older sister who wasn't as pretty, who wasn't as pretty. He wakes up the next day, turns over in the bed and sees his lady. That's what Laban did.
You say, well, how is that even possible? In those days at weddings, brides were heavily veiled, and the husband didn't really get a good look, except until the next morning. So father-in-law pulls a switcheroo. He's just out deceived the deceiver, and he's goofing around with his own daughters. So he has to work another seven years to get Rachel.
Then we come years later to this scene. Years have passed, two wives later, two more concubine wives later, a whole bunch of kids later, and then verse one, now Jacob heard the words of Laban's sons, so that's his brother-in-law, saying, Jacob has taken away all that was our fathers, and from what was our fathers, he has acquired all this wealth. And Jacob saw that the countenance of Laban, that's the body language, you know how it is when somebody was always looking at you kind of with a nice look, and all of a sudden they look at you with a scowl?
That's what's happening. And indeed, it was not favorable toward him as before. So now you've got these two deceivers, they spent time together, at this point they can't trust each other, and these false accusations are flying in the family about Jacob. I'm sure that when Jacob left home, when he fled after stealing the blessing, he probably thought, am I glad to be out of that house.
Now I can have a normal life. And yet he marries into this family only to discover it's very much the same as his first family. I bring that up because there was an interesting study from Brown University, and the researchers said this, many people hope that once they leave home, they will leave their family and childhood problems behind. However, many find that they experience similar problems, as well as similar feelings and relationship patterns long after they have left their own family environment.
And it's easy to answer why that is, because wherever you go, you take you. All that made you, all that formed and shaped you, all of that stuff from your background follows you around until you deal with it. But the greater point is this, all families are dysfunctional.
All of them. Every human on this planet has their own issues. And because every person has their own issues, that will affect the balance of the family that they're in. And it will affect the balance of the family they marry into. They take that with them.
And I bring this up because I've heard this for years. People say, but I'm from a dysfunctional family. And my answer is, join the human race. I'm from a dysfunctional family. I conduct a dysfunctional family.
I'm a dysfunctional human being, and so are you. We don't function the way God originally intended us to function. And that's because of one little three letter word called what? Sin.
It happened at the fall. Paul said, by one man's sin, death entered the world and death through sin and it spread to everyone. We're all affected. So it affects every person. Thus, it affects every family. Every family. Some of you will remember a comedian by the name of George Burns.
He lived to be a long time, but he's no longer with us. George Burns said, happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close knit family in another city. Can we just dispel the myth of the perfect family?
There is not one. We're all broken, flawed individuals. Thus, those are the families.
In fact, let me take it a step further. Even God's family on earth. The church is a dysfunctional family and you're part of it. Say, oh, no, no, no. I'm looking for the perfect church.
You've heard this before. If you find one, don't join it. You'll ruin it. It doesn't exist. You say, oh, but the early church, they weren't dysfunctional. That's the way we should get back to be like the early church.
Really? You need to read your Bibles again. Read in fact, 1 Corinthians. And you'll discover Paul is really writing a polemic against all of the problems in that church and how to correct those problems from not loving each other, to abusing spiritual gifts, to disorderly conduct at the communion table and at the love feast, all the way to incest in that church congregation that they didn't deal with. That's dysfunctional.
Then Jesus talked about his salvation and redemption and the people who would follow him. He called them poor, broken hearted, captive, blind, oppressed. So we are all broken. We're all dysfunctional people with our own issues.
As J.I. Packer wisely put it, we are all invalids in God's hospital. Every family is dysfunctional. Let's see, let's take it now to a second level.
Take it up a step. God can function in our dysfunction. All of us are dysfunctional to some degree, but God can function in our dysfunction. I mean, what other choices does he have?
So we've read the text. I've told you the story about Jacob. He comes from that messed up, weird family. He comes from a weird family. He comes from a weird family.
He's married into this messed up, weird family. Now watch this. In the midst of all that, verse three, then the Lord said to Jacob, boy, that's good to read. Then the Lord said to Jacob, now God speaks, return to the land of your fathers and to your family.
And I will be with you. God says that to Jacob. Go down a few verses.
Go down to verse 22, in fact. And Laban was told on the third day that Jacob had fled. I'm sure he left town without saying anything to anyone, just left. Then he took his brethren with him, pursued him for seven days journey and overtook him in the mountains of Gilead.
I think he wanted to kill him. But God had come to Laban the Syrian in a dream by night and said to him, be careful that you speak to Jacob, neither good nor bad. Here's a family in all of this legacy of dysfunction, but God is speaking.
And here is the obvious point. A dysfunctional family never stopped God from functioning. It never stopped God from working, never stopped God from blessing that family and never stopped God from working through that family. Because here in chapter 31, you've got these dirty looks, these aloof kind of looks, cold shoulders.
I'm not looking at you nicely anymore. Whispers around the tents. And God speaks to Jacob. God speaks to dysfunctional Jacob in the midst of his dysfunction and to Laban in the midst of his. It's not like God said, well, Jacob, I have a truth I want to convey to you, but I'm not going to tell you what it is till you get your family act together.
And when you get a little more perfect, a little more mature, then I have something I want to say to you. Right in the midst of all this crud, God speaks. Because God can speak to and lead people in your family who are not perfect. The perfect God works through and uses imperfect people. Amen. The holy God speaks to and works through unholy people.
And here's why. There are no other kind of people for God to use. Because if everyone is dysfunctional, then God has to function in the midst of our dysfunction.
That's the gospel. That's why Paul said, God has chosen the foolish things of this world. He's chosen the weak things of this world.
He's chosen the base things of this world. Hey, did Peter fail? The apostle Peter, did he fail? Yeah, he denied Jesus three times. Did Jesus use him again?
Sure did. Moses failed, lost his temper. God had used him again. Lost his temper, God had used him. David failed, anger, murder, adultery, God used him. Abraham, the father of faith, was faithless a few times. Isaac, same way.
Jacob, same way. But taking failure as the final word is to fail. Taking failure as the final word is to fail. Learning from failure is to grow. So don't let your failure define you. Make your failure serve you. Use it. Grow from it. Launch from it.
Do something with it. Case in point, Paul and Barnabas. Paul and Barnabas went on a mission trip.
It was a good, successful mission trip. At the end of it, Paul goes, let's do it again, Barney. Barnabas says, okay, I'm taking my nephew, John Mark. Paul goes, no, you're not. He flaked out on the last trip.
We're not taking him on trip number two. Well, they had an argument. It was an unresolved argument. It became so divisive between them that they split company. And there's never a record that they reconciled, Paul and Barnabas. So you have two men who are dysfunctional in their little relationship with each other.
They dig their heels in. They were imperfect, but they were used by God to spread the gospel. God uses two groups now to do his work. So you got a church, the church splits. Now there's two churches to do his work.
And here's my point. God reserves the right to use people who disagree with you. In fact, God reserves the right to use people who don't like you.
I wish you wouldn't. There's sometimes, you know, if God would just consult me first before he blesses somebody, just make life a whole lot easier for me. But he's decided that's not a good strategy to consult, Skip about much. So he just says, no, no, thanks. I'm going to bless and use and speak to and work through people that don't like you. God reserves that right. So every family is dysfunctional and God can function in the midst of our dysfunction.
Now here's the third and best level. Growth is seen, spiritual growth is when we see God instead of the dysfunction. You're focused on God, not the dysfunction.
Growth is seeing God instead of dysfunction. Now let's begin in verse four. Notice what Jacob does in the midst of all this. And I just have to say, as we begin to read this again, I'm proud of Jacob.
This boy has grown. So Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah to the field to his flock and said to them, I see your father's countenance that it's not favorable toward me as before, but the God of my father has been with me. And you know that with all my might, I have served your father and your father has deceived me and changed my wages 10 times, but God did not allow him to hurt me. If he said thus, the speckled shall be your wages, flocks bore speckled. If he said the streaks will be your wages, the flocks bore streaked. So God has taken away the livestock of your father and given them to me. I see real spiritual growth in Jacob.
I mean, leaps and bounds. From his early days when he was complicit with his mom's scheme to steal the blessing, to his fugitive days when he ran away and was at Bethel thinking God wasn't even with him, to his confrontational days when he and Laban were negotiating which girl would be his wife, to this day, still a confrontation, but he's very different here. Notice how he's different. First of all, he brings his wives together to have an open, candid, honest, frank conversation about the issue.
They will agree with him. If you keep reading the story, they said, yep, our dad's been a scoundrel. He even stole money from us and you just do what God told you to do.
We're with you. So he talks it out, but even more than that, he shows how he views his life. He shows the lens through which he is focusing and processing all of the negative, bad, deceptive things that have even happened to him. In short, Jacob is wearing a new set of glasses, outfitted with lenses that focus on God, not on garbage. Let's call them the butt God bifocals. So Jacob puts on his butt God bifocals.
Oh yeah, there's the garbage right in front of him where he's walking through it, walking in it, but he's gazing on God, the butt God bifocals. And did you notice as we read this paragraph that he says, but God, or so God, three times, he acknowledges, first of all, God's presence verse five, but the God of my father has been with me. He acknowledges God's protection verse seven. He says, your father changed my wages 10 times, but God did not allow him to hurt me. What if your employer changed your wages 10 times?
You wouldn't still be working for that scoundrel. You're thinking, well, it depends if he changes them up or down, right? It's inferred that Jacob had his wages changed 10 times down, but God wouldn't allow him to hurt me. So he acknowledges God's presence and God's protection. And also look at verse nine, God's partnership.
So God has taken away the livestock from your father and given them to me. I see this boy as grown up, spiritually speaking. He's looking at the God who is functioning rather than the dysfunctionality around him.
Jacob is not going. Jacob is wearing the same glasses that Joseph wore when he said to his brothers, you meant this for evil, but God meant it for good. He's wearing the same bifocals David wore when the Bible says David stayed out in the strongholds, in the wilderness, Saul sought him every day, but God did not deliver him into his hand. He's wearing the same glasses that Ezra wore in the book of Nehemiah.
When Ezra said they refuse to listen to your voice. They were hard hearted, but you are God. He wore the same glasses that Paul the apostle wore when he said, we know that all things work together for good to those who love God and are the called according to his purpose. It's those glasses, those, but God bifocals that let you see the hand of Providence.
They lift back the curtain and let you see the divine hand. At the beginning of our series, I gave you a quote, a little quip by James Montgomery Boyce. It bears repeating. He said, if you understand those two words, but God, they will save your soul. And if you recall them daily and live by them, they will transform your life completely.
Here is Jacob's life transformed completely. This happened, but God, that happened, but God, this happened, so God, these are the, but God bifocals. So this dysfunctional pastor is standing in front of this dysfunctional flock saying, let's wear those glasses from now on. Let's find those, but God bifocals and let's interpret life through that lens. Let's realize that God is never intimidated by our flaws, our failures, because he can match all of that with his faithfulness.
In spiritual terms and in moral terms, we are all sick, damaged, scarred, lame, lopsided, but God, but God. I'm going to close with a story that comes from a book written by Richard Hoffler, several little short stories in this book. The book is entitled, Will Daylight Come? He writes, a little boy visiting his grandparents was given his first slingshot. Remember those days?
I do. He practiced in the woods, but he could never hit his target. As he came back to grandma's backyard, he spied her pet duck. On impulse, he took aim and let it fly. The stone hit its target.
The boy panicked. Desperately, he hid the dead duck in the wood pile only to look and see his sister watching. Sally had seen it all, but said nothing. After lunch that day, grandma said, Sally, let's wash the dishes. But Sally said, Johnny told me he wanted to help in the kitchen today, didn't you, Johnny? And she whispered to him, remember the duck. So Johnny did the dishes. Later, grandpa asked if the children wanted to go fishing. Grandma said, I'm sorry, but I need Sally to help make supper.
Sally smiled and said, that's all taken care of. Johnny wants to do it. And again, she whispered, remember the duck. Johnny stayed while Sally went fishing. After several days of Johnny doing his chores and Sally's, he couldn't stand it. He confessed to grandma that he had killed her duck.
I know, Johnny, she said, giving him a huge hug. I was standing at the window when I saw the whole thing. Because I love you, I forgave you. I was just wondering how long you would let Sally make you a slave.
I have a question for you as we close. How long are you going to let that dysfunction make you a slave? How long are you going to hide behind that title?
How long are you going to let that title drive the rest of your life? Because no matter how bad things have been for you, that doesn't have to define you. God is able to function in our dysfunction. The question is, will you choose to see that?
Will that be the lens you live your life from? The dysfunction or the God who can function? In the midst of it. I think that the best example that I can think of, of how God functions in dysfunction is the cross. That really is the gospel. World is so dysfunctional, sin spread to everybody.
Everybody's so flawed and broken. The only solution was to send his perfect sinless, only begotten son into this world to take all of the guilt, all of the sin on himself in our place. All of the sin on himself in our place so that God can bless you and take you with him to heaven.
That's God functioning at peak, even in the pinnacle of our own dysfunction. And that's the offer God makes in every generation, that he will take you as you are. You come as you are. He will forgive you as you are, and he will make you a new person. He will change you, but he will forgive you, make you his son or daughter, and then bring you with him into his kingdom forever.
That concludes Skip Heisig's message from his series, But God. Now we want to tell you about a unique opportunity to take your knowledge of scripture to a new level. Calvary College is now open for registration. Calvary College is offering select online classes as an opportunity for individuals to take their life's calling to a whole new level. With an educational emphasis in Biblical studies, with our unique partnerships with Veritas International University and Calvary Chapel University, you will have the opportunity to obtain your bachelor's or master's degree with complete online programs. Whether you're looking to obtain an accredited online degree or take individual courses to become better equipped in your knowledge of God's unchangeable truth, Calvary College has you covered with a range of opportunities. For updates on classes and registration information for Calvary College, please visit calvaryabq.college. That's calvaryabq.college. For Calvary College, calvaryabq.college. We often feel weighed down by past failures and present mistakes, but your struggles don't have to be the last word for you.
Jesus came to redeem us from our past, and through his work on the cross, you can have a new life. That's good news we want to share through this broadcast, and you can help share that truth with many others while keeping these teachings coming to you. Call now to give a gift, 800-922-1888. Again, that's 800-922-1888, or visit connectwithskip.com slash donate. Connectwithskip.com slash donate. Thank you. Tune in tomorrow as Skip Heisig shares why you can have hope, peace, and joy even in the face of death. Connect with Skip Heisig is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.
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