A Straight Lick with a Crooked Stick (Genesis 25-27)

There's an old saying: God can hit a straight lick with a crooked stick! Yes, indeed, the Scripture shows this to be true over and over again. Here's what I mean: We're all imperfect human beings, and God still accomplishes His perfect plan through our imperfections.

Isn't this clear in Genesis 25-27? Just think of how dysfunctional Isaac, Rebekah, Esau, and Jacob are. Yet, God still has a plan for them, and He's working it out even through their faults and failures.

What's God's plan? Well, the Lord says in Genesis 25:21-26 that the elder son in Rebekah's womb would serve the younger son. Now this is contrary to custom. Usually, the older or firstborn son received the blessing not the younger son. But God's plan here was to reverse human customs for His divine purpose.

And we can see how God accomplished His purpose even in through all the human flaws in this family. Let's just recap a few of their faults as we see them surface in this story:

1) Parental Partiality: Did you catch Genesis 25:28? Isaac was partial to Esau, and Rebekah was partial to Jacob. This isn't a good thing, and it's a recipe for disaster in this family, too.

2) Deception and Cowardice: Did you notice how Isaac followed right in his flawed father Abraham's footsteps in Genesis 26:1-11? Here's what we mean: Abraham lied not once but twice about Sarah being his wife (see Genesis 12:10-20; 20). It seems that the "apple doesn't fall too far from the tree" in this respect, unfortunately.

3) Deception and Scheming: Did you notice how Rebekah was "listening" (NIV) as Isaac told Esau to prepare him a meal and get ready to receive his blessing (see Genesis 27:1-10)? It appears Rebekah was hatching her own plan to hijack Isaac's blessing from their custom and the firstborn son he loved for the younger son she loved.

4) Deception (starting to see a pattern, yet?): While Jacob initially objects to his mother's plot, it's not because he's concerned about violating principles. He's just afraid of getting caught because he eventaully goes right along with things as planned (see Genesis 27:11-29). Talk about this family needing a good dose of integrity and the strength to let God work things out by His power and according to His timing instead of trying to manipulate people and circumstances for their selfish and sinful agendas.

5) Resentment and Violence: Although Esau refuses to shame his father with the murder of his younger brother while Isaac is alive, he decides he's going to "take care of business" after his father passes away (see Genesis 27:41).

So there's the family God is working through to accomplish His purposes! Definitely not a "picture-perfect" bunch, huh? Well, the point here isn't to suggest that since God can hit a straight lick with a crooked stick, you and I can simply cast away all restraint and responsibility to do whatever we please because God will clean-up our mess anyway. No, Romans 6:1-4 is God's definitive answer to that type of false thinking. We don't live in sin so grace can abound because God's grace isn't a license to sin; it's liberty from sin! Those who truly appreciate God's grace don't look for loopholes to abuse it but surrender their lives completely in appreciation for it!

The point here is to encourage you with this word: God not only can but does hit a straight lick with a crooked stick because He wants to use us to accomplish His purposes, and we're all imperfect human beings. But the repetitive message of Scripture is that God's purpose doesn't hinge on us but on Him. He's sovereign or in complete control, and He's forging His perfect plan even in the midst of all the failures of His imperfect people so that when everything's said and done, all things will be to the praise of His glorious grace (see Ephesians 1:4-6)!