What Can Moms Learn From Rebekah, Isaac, Esau, and Jacob

Um, so, but there's another body of content that's really valuable to react to besides YouTube and it's called the Bible. Um, and, uh, it's, it's a timeless and. Everything here, I think it's really important to see through like the lens of family and motherhood. And how do we, how do we understand these things in light of the, especially the, the fascinating narratives that we have in, in the Bible.

And then God chose Isaac. And then there's a really beautiful story in Genesis where Isaac meets his bride, Rebecca, uh, through, um, a bunch of series events. I'd love to do a whole conversation in Midrash on that. Um, but I wanted to talk through Rebecca and, um, her role, because You know, there's, there's sort of a really interesting tension in the story.

Um, they both relate to the same story. So I want to read from, uh, Genesis 25 and then from Genesis 27, um, and how we're introduced to this, the character of Rebecca, so, and you guys, whatever is, is sort of stirring up and I'll try to give some context as to, as I'm reading, if anything feels like it might be a little bit out of context.

And Isaac prayed to the Lord for his wife because she was barren. And the Lord granted his prayer. And Rebekah, his wife, conceived. The children struggled together within her. And she said, quote, if it is thus, why is this happening to me? So she went to inquire of the Lord and the Lord said to her, two nations are in your womb and two peoples.

Isaac was 60 years old. When she bore them, when the boys grew up, Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field. While Jacob was a quiet man, dwelling in tents. Isaac loved Esau because he ate his game, but Rebecca loved Jacob. All right. So that's the plot line so far. And then of course, we are, we're going to skip forward to Genesis 27 to kind of, uh, fill out the rest of Rebecca's part in, in this story.

Now, Rebecca was listening when Isaac spoke to his son, Esau. So when Esau went to the field to hunt for game and bring it, Rebecca said to her son, Jacob, I heard your father speak to your brother, Esau, bring me game to prepare me delicious food that I might eat it and bless you before I die. Now, therefore my son obey my voice as I command you go to the flock and bring me two good young goats so that I might prepare for them from them.

And the skins of the young goat she put on his hands, and on the smooth part of his neck. And she put the delicious food and bread which she had prepared into the hands of her son, Jacob. So he went in to his father. And said, my father, he said, here I am. Who are you? My son, Jacob said to his father, I'm Esau, your firstborn I've done.

So he brought it near to him and he ate and he brought him wine and he drank. And his father said to him, come near and kiss me, my son. So we came near and kissed him. And Isaac smelled the smell of his garments and blessed him and said, See, the smell of my son is as a smell of a field that the Lord has blessed.

And I ate it before you came and I blessed him. Yes, and he shall be blessed. And as soon as Esau heard the words of his father, he cried out with an exceedingly great bitter cry and said to his father, bless me even also my, oh, my father. But he said, your brother came deceitfully and he has taken away your blessing.

By your sword you shall live, and you shall serve your brother. But when you grow restless, you shall break his yoke from your neck. And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing. With which his father had blessed him and Esau said to him the days of mourning for my father are approaching Then I will kill my brother Jacob, but the words of Esau her older son were told to Rebecca So she sent and called Jacob her younger son and said to him behold your brother Esau comforts himself about you by planning to kill you.

Then Rebecca said to Isaac, I loathe my life because of the Hittite women. If Jacob marries one of the Hittite women like these, one of the women of the land. What good will my life be to me? All right. So there's a lot there. Um, but yeah, I was really interested to hear what, uh, what kinds of things struck, um, any of y'all about the story of Rebecca and what she does in this story so far.

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And, um, I don't know. That was just a question that stood out to me that she was already kind of taking that personal and like, I need to do something, you know, something like that. Yeah. I think that's so, that is so interesting that she asked and the, um, she got, yeah, this, this epic response that was definitely way beyond the scope of what she was asking.

Yeah. And then she found a way to like, it was so cross cultural, like against what the cultural norm was. And I don't think she could accept that, you know, she couldn't as the story plays out. I guess my next question would be, did she share this with Isaac? Yeah. It's a very, it's very strange in the story that it seems that Rebecca is much more tuned in to the sovereign plan of God than.

Whereas it seems that. Rebecca has this insight about the one who's actually, um, the firstborn or the one who's the, the son of promise. And that, that might, you know, be influencing her relationships with the two boys.

That's kind of like, wow, that's in and of itself is pretty amazing. And then, um, that she seemed to really fight for it. I mean, it's kind of what you were just saying, Jeremy, but it's like, I don't know. I mean, cause this was what, 20 years later, or we don't know, I guess how old the boys are, but maybe 20 ish or 18 or 22, something like that.

And so I don't know, I'm just curious about what the dynamics were, but then that she had to kind of jump through those hoops kind of says that Isaac was not really. Either listening when she did tell him or was kind of like had his own idea of the way things should be. And, you know, Esau being Harry, it kind of, um, like his name literally is Harry means Harry.

And so I don't know, like all the somewhere in there, he still is not totally trusting the Lord or following what God is, has communicated to them. And so she has to step in. And it's like admirable in some ways and like questionable in some ways. I don't know. Yeah. Well, that's why I found so important about this particular narrative.

Apparently they're not coordinating or cooperating. Like there's some level at which she's wanting something and that, The part of this that always gets me for some reason is when Esau comes in and once Isaac realizes what happened, um, he trembles and he says, you can't reverse this. And there's been just enormous amounts of theological, um, discussion around why can't Isaac reverse this blessing?

And so you think as a human being or as the leader of this family, I can, um, You know, my will can actually happen. And then we find out that somebody with all of the power of Isaac cannot, cannot give the blessing to whichever son he wants, that the sovereign decision or plan of God is going to reward him. Like, this is a really difficult thing to figure out. I don't know what that stirs up or how you guys read that, or, but this is where the wrestling really starts. I think

Like she maneuvered her way through, so I think as a mama, there's just this reminder of like, even if the Lord hasn't told me, He told her, clear as day, this is the plan, um, I have to step back and guide my children, but I have to let the Lord write that testimony in their lives. For Yeah. It's not about me.

Yeah. Yeah. It may not have looked. Yeah. Yeah. One of the details that seems to possibly indicate that is the way the storyteller describes the reason for the favoritism is not because Rebecca is trying to obey God, but because Jacob is a tentish person or whatever.

I don't know, that's something I've just been continually learning and growing in, and there's always blessing in it, you know? And it's like, I think at least for me, I feel as a woman, I know when I am like wanting to overstep and there's just like this check, you know, in my heart, like, nope, like that is the wrong route.

Yeah. I think this is very reminiscent of what Sarah did just one generation before. So this is like, this is Rebecca's mother in law who. You know, gave her servant Hagar to Abraham because the promise God had made wasn't happening. And so she intervened and, um, there are different scenarios and different people.

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And so he basically this huge rift that's sort of inevitable. I mean, what did you think was going to happen? Right. I mean, if you, there's only, there's only a scenario in which He's trying to steal the blessing and then Esau catches him right handed or he successfully steals the blessing either way Esau is going to want revenge or there's it's going to create a a massive rift between the brothers There's already a huge rift, but it's gonna get much worse.

Where, you know, Joseph has these, has these dreams about all of his siblings, bowing down to him. How is that ever going to happen? Well, it happens because his siblings hate him so much that his brothers sell him into slavery. And, you know, years and years and years later, they end up bowing down to him when he's in Egypt.

God used their, um, sinful action to bring about his divine plan. And so you have something similar going on here. It seems like with Rebecca, like it's not as clear, uh, but it does seem like if you look at the details of the story, her motives are. More self centered than God centered and the God's using them to bring about his, his sovereign plan.

And Rebecca, the one who, you know. So I'd, I'd really don't, uh, have like a cut and dry, black and white answer. And what I feel like I'm. Passing on to my daughters is like some, some of it is this reality of being a human. And like my desire is to like, my fleshly desire is to like pass perfection onto my kids.

Like I want them to be perfect and they won't ever have to struggle and they won't ever have to like, you know, Figure something out. They'll just do everything right. And so, um, like submitting the idea that I am blessing my daughters with these women of old who, um, knew somehow of God and Were, um, in their flesh and then back in, you know, however, that worked back then where they were listening to God and then taking things into their own hands and back and forth, how they were real people and they were, um, running households and, you know, making the, like running alongside their husbands in these like really leadership positions and, um, involved in the understanding of generational living and the ways that generations would be impacted and, um, you know, and not just off doing their own thing, but like somehow involved.

There's a phrase for that, a cautionary tale, or if it's like, or be like this woman, you know? So I think it's even just like the infertility issues that, uh, they both like Sarah and Rebecca and Rachel and Leah, they all have this in different times and like trusting the Lord with your womb and like all of these struggles that we get to see through all four of them.

Um, but I think that. Part of what it seems like we want is for the will of God to happen. God seemed to work in spite of them and through them and he loved them and he cared for them and And so he provided fertility, you know in multiple cases. I mean there was fertility issues with Sarah with Rebecca and with Rachel right and then ultimately with all of the things they were trying to do trying to accomplish You God, his sovereign will was happening through them.

And I was thinking of how after in that blessing, we named those matriarchs. There's now Ruth who that ended really well, like God redeemed her, her situation. And then with the faith of Mary. It's almost, I don't know, I've never thought of this, so correct me if I'm wrong in this, but there's almost a redeeming of what Rebecca said, or how she reacted to the word of the Lord here, because when Mary heard the word of the Lord, She responded with, may it be to, uh, what was it?

May it be to me as you say. And, but, and she didn't meddle with any of it. Like she stayed very submitted. I don't know. I don't know if that's a connection, but, um, and then it ends with the righteousness of Christ. So I don't know, kind of a cool redemption with that. That's good. I just, I agree, Michelle. I think that's a really neat. It. Okay. I wonder, um, how, like, the Hebraic mind juxtaposes the counterparts that you're, that you're kind of, Drawing there. That's that's really interesting.

She can't take authority in, like at the very end where she's in this conversation with Isaac about how miserable she is with her daughter-in-laws. But it's interesting that with, within her relation with Jacob, she does take authority and then she wants the curse to fall on her. Um, I, I don't know if that's even a possibility, but yeah.

But what, what we don't see in this narrative is. Was there further conversation between her and the Lord, right? Like, to rebuttal almost what I said earlier, like, we don't know if the Lord was like, and I'm going to use you, right? That part wasn't written down. So I just think the Lord knows her heart. And for a mom to fight so fiercely, I have to believe that she had a pure heart.

Um, I think we have a hard time understanding the whole blessings and curse thing because it's like kind of, I don't know, maybe ethereal or something like that, but I feel like it was so real to them. Um, and. Let me see it in the story. How Isaac's like, I can't take it back. I've already given it. It's like, well, can you just say the same words again?

And I'm sticking to it. Even if you're stubborn, father's not listening. Like, I don't know if it's that kind of thing, or if she's like, I really want this to work out with my, the, my, uh, you know, family of origin, I think this is the best way for it to go. I have my own plan and I'm willing to like die for it.

So given the story or what we've kind of teased out so far about Rebecca, you're talking to a modern, um, mother, you know, in our day and thinking about her role or her struggles or challenges in light of Rebecca's story. Yeah. Any, any, uh, applications that kind of come to mind, um, like what, what, what would it look like for us to try to understand as we've wrestled with, you The details of this story, what would you encourage a wife and mother to do or not to do, um, based on what we're seeing in this narrative?

Um, but that would be my encouragement. Like, let's. Let's be quiet. Let's make sure the Lord gets the glory and that we're not trying to meddle or weasel out our, our hopes and desires. Let's step back and really let the Lord work. That would be my, my first thought. I think one thing that like really strikes me as we look at the story this time is what a disaster the favoritism was where Esau and Jacob, um, Esau was too masculine, it seems like in the story.

Um, and instead of. Really a balance between the two. I don't know if you've ever seen this in a family, but that doesn't seem like a healthy thing, um, that there is, and the story it's, it's so strong and so pronounced, it's just obvious in the story points it out. Like one, you know, loved the, you know, and they, they slotted in and it was for really pretty superficial reasons, right?

As mother to a son, it's different than a mother to a daughter. And so acknowledging those differences and, um, being aware that there are pitfalls, um, there's a desire to make your son's life easier or, um, you know, fix all his owies when he's little. And then it's hard to make that go away as they're growing up and making around you, um, letting him fall and Pick himself back up kind of a thing is can, can be hard for a mom to do.

Awesome. Well, thank you all for jumping on this. I love getting a chance just to, um, really think through and let these stories kind of like live inside of us. Um, and just ponder and wrestle with the implications. I mean, there, these are like, these are such meta stories. Like we're supposed to. I think really they shape the way that we think about these roles so deeply.