Our Birthright

Well, thank you once again, Mr. Consela, and good afternoon again, everyone. It's a very good pleasure. It's a pleasure to be here with all of you and to have, again, all of you joining us from the various locations throughout the Willamette Valley. Nice to have our Eugene brethren with us and our Roseburg brethren with us. And hopefully all is going well with the connection today, and everything is nice and working as it should.

So sometimes not always. So we appreciate those days when the technology cooperates with us. Well, some of you might remember this. A number of years ago, there was a series of commercials that were released onto network television that featured a number of well-known celebrities in situations where they were intentionally, by the advertisers, placed in a location that was intentionally out of place.

In one—I'll just see if you can guess what this is as I go through it. Let's go back through your institutional memory here. In one, a group of men are playing a game of tackle football on a muddy field. Quarterback drops back into the pocket to pass. He looks up. He's looking for somebody. He doesn't see anybody. Looks up field, and in the middle of the field, the camera cuts to Betty White. Betty White's standing in the middle of this muddy field going, as only Betty White can do, and then she just gets absolutely lit up by a linebacker and put into the mud.

After the conclusion of the play, the team kind of huddles back up, and one of the players turns to Betty White and says, man, you got to get in the game! You're playing like Betty White out there! An argument ensues between the two players, and eventually the person's wife steps in to fix the situation, handing the player the product, and solving the problem. Another of the commercials has Rowan Atkinson's character, Mr. Bean— some of you may be familiar with Mr. Bean—running along the rooftops in feudal Japan, as Mr.

Bean does. He and his fellow warriors are jumping from rooftop to rooftop to rooftop, like ninjas and, you know, all stealth. The three men that are ahead of him are jumping from the rooftop to rooftop, and Mr. Bean, of course, can't do anything right. He manages to scare off a pigeon, alerting a guard down below. He steps on a tile that slides down and crashes onto the ground and alerts another guard.

And at every one, his friends look back and go, ugh, come on, man, you got to get on it. And he finally says, remember your training, and Mr. Bean kind of wryly smiles, and he slides down the curved corner of the roof, flies across the expanse to the other roof, and crashes right through the roof down into a pile of enemy soldiers.

He stands back up, and the guy up in the upper part of the roof drops down the product. He quickly takes a bite, and then he does this little windmill kick out of the hole, and then they go on and they do their thing. The final commercial I'll mention has the Brady's from the hit TV show, The Brady Bunch, and the parents are talking with Marcia after Marcia gets hit in the face with a football.

Some of you might remember that episode. But instead of Marcia, they're talking to Danny Trejo, who is a Mexican-American actor who plays villains on television and movies most often. And he's complaining about how Peter hit him in the face with a football, and that now he can't go to the dance looking like this. And the family's talking back and forth, and he's talking about how he's going to get revenge on Peter because of what he did.

And they pan to Florence Anderson, who says, I'm sure it was an accident, to which Danny Trejo's Marcia slams the axe that he's holding. Not sure why he's holding an axe, but he slams it, buries it into the coffee table, and says, No!

Dad always says an eye for an eye! And Florence suggests that Mr. Trejo have some of the product because he gets a little hostile when he gets hungry. The advertising campaign, as you might have guessed if you've seen any of these commercials, was a campaign for Snickers candy bars. And the advertising campaign ran for about 10 years, actually, just a little bit here and there. Oftentimes timed with a Super Bowl release, but the whole campaign was titled, You're Not You When You're Hungry. You're not you when you're hungry. And in every case, in every situation of these commercials, and there's probably close to a dozen of them that they've put together and they've recorded, in every single situation, the first time that person took that bite of that candy bar, they went right back to their original self.

But in the meantime, they were operating a little bit hangry, as we might say. Some of you might be familiar with that term. The term itself actually has risen in popularity over the past decade or so. In fact, it is now, as of 2017, it is now an official word in the Oxford dictionary. So I think that means you can use it in Scrabble. I'm not 100% certain, but I'm pretty sure hangry is a legit word in Scrabble now, in case you might be curious. There have been shirts that have graphics on them that say, I'm sorry for what I said when I was hungry.

They say, moody without foody. Another one says, I know I said I wanted abs, but I'm hungry. And the final one says, there's three check boxes on it. It says, the first one says, single. The second one says, taken. And the third with the check-in, it says, hungry. So, you know, I'm sure a number of us can relate to this concept, at least, and maybe even perhaps suffer from this particular affliction.

When you're hungry, you can struggle to focus. You can struggle to maintain a good attitude at work. You can struggle to maintain a good attitude at school and at home. Maybe you're just not as generally effective as you otherwise would be at whatever it is that you're trying to do because you're not running on a full tank. We know during the times that we fast, as we've talked about here during the announcements, the times in which we fast and we go 24 hours without food, 24 hours without water, you know, Day of Atonement or the other times we fast throughout the year, we know how challenging it can be at times to engage in tasks that require sustained mental or physical effort.

We just kind of bonk, for lack of a better term. We just run out of energy. God created man to be dependent on our physical needs. We need water. We need food. We need comfort. There's a lot of different things that we need in order for us to be satiated as humans and for us to be content. And when those things begin to get out of balance, when those things start to get to the point where maybe that balance is not where it should be, that internal portion of our body that holds on to homeostasis and keeps us regulated starts blinking.

Like, hey, we got a problem here. You need to eat. You need some water. You know, you need to be comforted, whatever it may be. But it starts to tell us very quickly that there are certain needs that we have and we need the mace out. In fact, I mean, think about one of the purposes for fasting and why do we fast? It's to disrupt those physical things. To be able to disrupt those physical needs that we have and to be able to focus instead on the spiritual. To kind of force us out of that routine of wake up, coffee, breakfast, lunch, dinner, sleep.

Wake up, coffee, breakfast, lunch, dinner, sleep. Get out of that routine. Because by getting out of that routine, we can focus on the spiritual. We can focus on seeking not our own will, not our own desires, our wants and needs, but instead focus on and pray for what God desires of us. As was mentioned in the opening prayer, man does not live by bread alone. Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. But the reality is we need bread now and again, too. Right? Because again, when you're hungry, you don't always think straight. You don't always make good decisions.

Some of you may already be anticipating where we're going next. You turn over to Genesis 25, please. Some of you may have thought, well, this is probably where we're going. But we're going to begin in Genesis 25 today. We're going to pick up the story of Jacob and Esau. We're going to pick up the story of Jacob and Esau.

I'm going to examine these two men and various aspects of their lives. And then we're going to look at some spiritual connections and some spiritual lessons that we can learn from the example of Jacob and Esau. Genesis 25, again, well, as you're turning over there, we see from Scripture that Jacob and Esau are brothers. So they were brothers. In fact, they were fraternal twins.

They could not have been much more different than one another. They certainly were not identical when they came out. In fact, Esau is described as being incredibly hairy and reddish, ruddy, as the term is. In fact, so hairy that it's described in Scripture that it's as though he was wearing the skin of an animal. And these are like these guys at the football games that shave the logo of their mascot in their back, you know, at the football game. But incredibly hairy man, very hairy man. Jacob, on the other hand, it doesn't seem to describe in that way. We know that while they were in the womb, they gave their mother Rebecca such fits that she actually went to God to inquire of what was wrong. She had been barren prior to becoming pregnant, and she was certain that God had blessed her barrenness, but she thought, you know, something's not right here.

So she went to God, and she inquired, why am I feeling like this? I know you've blessed my barrenness. God informs her that not just one, but two children were in her womb, that they would struggle with one another, that they would be two nations of people that would eventually come from her body. We later learned through Scripture that that was the line of the Edomites and ultimately the line of the Israelites. Esau, the progenitor of the Edomites, and Jacob, or Israel, later the progenitor of the Israelites. We also see that God told Rebecca that the older would serve the younger. Prophetically said that one would be stronger than the other, but that the older would serve the younger. Children were born. Again, their differences couldn't be more apparent. Esau was read. The word ad monai in Hebrew meant ready. But he was covered in hair. In fact, his name Esau, some marginal references may say means Harry. You know, actually H-A-I-R-Y, not H-A-R-R-Y. We have people named Harry today, too, but it doesn't quite mean the same thing.

The second son Jacob we know was born, holding on to his brother's heel. Hosea describes that he was holding on to his heel in the womb. They named him Jacob, which means supplanter. Jacob was mild. He dwelled in tents, while Esau is described as a wild man. He was described as a wild man. He liked to be out in the fields. He liked to hunt. He liked to be away from the tents. He liked to be out in the woods. So you can start to get a picture of the personalities of these two men from just these passages of Scripture. Get an idea of who and kind of what they were like. We also know, and this is probably no end of issues within the family, I would imagine, but Isaac loved Esau because he liked his wild game. I can't blame him there. I do like me some wild game as well.

Rebecca preferred Jacob. So you've got this scenario where one parent favors one child and the other favors the other. We don't know how apparent that was. We don't know if that was something that was obvious. Whenever kids in school ever ask you which one your favorite class is, you just say yes. Then if they look at you funny and they go, what? You just go, no.

You never tell them what your favorite class is, right? You never tell them that. Never tell them what your favorite kid is. But it does say that Isaac preferred Esau, while Rebecca preferred Jacob. Now, the other question is, did Rebecca share with the boys the prophecy which God gave her? Did the boys know in some way, shape, or form that the older would serve the younger?

Because, again, that creates tension. That creates issues among the family. Keep in mind, again, every time we read scripture, these are people. These are not just characters in scripture. These are human beings, and they do human stuff. They get frustrated. They get angry. They have anxiety. They get all these other things. But we also know, based on birth order, that Esau held the birthright. So what does that mean? We know that Esau had a birthright based on his birth order, that he was the firstborn son. So he had a birthright. What does that mean? According to the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, the birthright was the right that belonged to the firstborn son. So when you had a firstborn son, they received what was known as the birthright. And it consisted essentially of a double portion of what the father had to leave. So it was like a double inheritance, in a way. Like it would be, you know, fractionally broken up among the children, and the birthright, the oldest son, receives a double portion of what the father had left to leave. And so what that likely meant is that that inheritance would be divided in some way among the children. We don't have specifics to exactly what that looked like during the patriarchal period, but we get some hints. This seemed to show that the lands and the flocks that the father owned remained with the father's family after the death of the patriarch.

The eldest son would become the head of the family. They would take charge of the family property. They would care for the younger sons. They would care for the widow, who had just been widowed. They would care for any unmarried daughters. So they kind of stepped in, in a way, the one with the birthright, stepped into the role of the man of the house, so to speak, as the patriarch of that family after the death of the original patriarch. Now normally, the firstborn son would also receive the blessing. Ordinarily, you would receive both the birthright and the blessing, and that blessing would position him into a patriarchal relationship with God.

So not only do you have a double inheritance, you also have someone who is stepping into that role as the one who connects that family to God. Now, we see from Scripture a number of examples.

These things could be diverted to other children based on the consent of the firstborn. They could be diverted to other children based on the decision of the father. So there doesn't appear to be legal things against that. It doesn't seem to be something that, you know, you necessarily had to, in this case, though, God in Deuteronomy, when he's giving the statute, says you can't just choose to give the blessing and the birthright to your favored wife's son. It's a specific requirement, a specific restriction in that regard.

But these birthrights and these blessings positioned the firstborn's son into a place where they would take on a leadership role within that family, both physically and spiritually. Okay, so with all that context in mind, let's jump into Genesis 25.

Genesis 25—and we'll go ahead and pick it up in verse 29. Genesis 25 verse 29 says, now Jacob cooked a stew, and Esau came in from the field, and he was weary. Esau said to Jacob, please feed me with that same red stew. Interestingly, the word there is Adam, the same red stew. Adam is the word red, which is why he has the name Edom. That's why they call him the Edomites, or the Ottomites, as they probably pronounced it. We say Edomite, but that's why he has that name.

Therefore, his name was called Edom because he wanted that red stew. But Jacob said, sell me your birthright as of this day. He says, I'll give you the stew, but I'm going to need your birthright going forward. I'm going to need to be the one that is in that leadership role in this family, both physically, both spiritually. Esau said, look, I'm about to die, so what is this birthright to me? It doesn't do any good to have this birthright if I'm dead. He says, so Jacob said, swear to me as of this day, and he swore to him, and he sold his birthright to Jacob. Jacob gave Esau bread and a stew of lentils. Some of you might think he sold his birthright for lentils. Lentil stew can be very good if it's done right. It can be very good if it's done right. Maybe not so much if it's not done right. But he gave bread and stew of lentils, and then he ate and he drank. He arose, and he went his way. Thus Esau, it says, despised his birthright. So we see Esau comes in from the field here. The field, word field is the same word that describes pasture or acreage in Hebrew, so it's not 100% sure that he was out hunting. Not 100% he could have been out working the fields. Because he's been out taking care of the animals out in the wilds and, you know, whatever might have been happening. But what's interesting is it says that he was weary. It says that he was weary. In fact, the word weary in Hebrew is ayep, the word that's used here, A-Y-E-P. And it actually means to be tired or to be exhausted, but interestingly the root can be used to describe losing consciousness. So it wasn't just weary. He was so exhausted he was ready to faint. I mean, he was absolutely tanked. He was hungry. He was tired. Might have been warm. We don't know. Might have been warm. So Esau shows up just absolutely wore out. He's to the point of fainting. You might even imagine him teetering a little bit or stumbling a little bit, kind of like you see in the movies of the guy walking wearily through the desert. You might see something, you might imagine something like that. But the food that Jacob had prepared must have smelled amazing. You ever been so hot and dry and thirsty that water tastes incredible? There's no taste in water, but when you are absolutely parched, that water is the best thing you have ever, ever drank. And it must have been like that with Esau and the food that Jacob had prepared. Esau again must have been incredibly concerned about his survival because he basically tells Jacob, look, what good is it to me if I'm dead anyway?

So he must have really truly thought that he wasn't going to make it if he didn't eat what Jacob had provided there and the food that was present. So Jacob makes sure that it's official. He says, I want you to swear on it, and it was, and the deed was done. Esau's birthright position, that double share along with its responsibilities and all that went along with it, was transferred to Jacob. Jacob made sure Esau got the much-needed bread and lentil stew. He ate, he drank, and he went his way. Final statement in verse 34, though, I want to focus on. It says, thus Esau despised his birthright. Now, the word despised there doesn't necessarily mean that he hated it, that he had adverse feelings against it and just couldn't wait to get rid of it. That's not what it means. It means that he had disdain or contempt for something. It means that in that moment, he didn't value it above what was right in front of him.

In his mind, in that moment, it was worth less than the food that Jacob had prepared. He had disdain for it. He had contempt for it in that regard. He entered into this deal willingly. We don't... this is not something he was coerced into doing. He entered into this deal willingly.

You know, Jacob maybe wasn't the most above board in this scenario. He knew what he was doing, but that was part of the prophetic role that Jacob was to play.

Book of Hebrews provides a degree of clarity into this. Let's go ahead and turn over to Hebrews 12.

Hebrews 12. We see a reference to this event. Again, keep in mind the point of the Book of Hebrews and what the Book of Hebrews is designed to do. The Book of Hebrews takes what the Jews would understand to be true. The things that they had known for millennia. Aspects of the old covenant. Aspects of the faith that they had known from their fathers. And it made spiritual connection. It took it to the next level and connected those things to Jesus Christ as Messiah.

So it took what they understood. It took things like the things that occurred on the day of Atonement, for example. And it said, here's why you did this for all those years. It was because of the forgiveness that you would receive from Jesus Christ. It was because of the reconciliation that you could receive as a result of Christ's sacrifice on your behalf and that blood that would be poured out for you. He says that is like the bowls and the goats that were offered on the day of Atonement. So it's making that connection. It's grabbing where they were and what they understood and connecting it spiritually to Jesus Christ. Connecting it to the Messiah. Connecting it to what God was doing ultimately with that. So, you know, written to a group that was well-versed in the Old Testament and aware of all these stories, it would help them to connect what God was doing at that point in time and what he was doing now. So Hebrews 12, and we'll go ahead and pick it up in verse 12. In fact, a passage that was referenced by Mr. Kubik in the ending part of his letter.

Hebrews 12 verse 12. Hebrews 12 and verse 12 says, therefore strengthen the hands which hang down.

Strengthen the feeble knees. Strengthen the hands which hang down in the feeble knees. Make straight paths for your feet so that what is lame may not be dislocated, but rather be healed. Writer focuses with a very encouraging statement. Focuses with a very encouraging and edifying statement. He says, as a result of all these things that come before, again, that word therefore, as a result of all this that we're talking about in Hebrews 12, this idea of chastening, this idea of the unpleasantness of chastening, but the importance of that role that it plays in our lives, it says, therefore strengthen the hands which hang down.

Strengthen the feeble knees. Make straight your paths, and then what is lame may not be dislocated. He says, don't become weakened. Don't become discouraged. Don't become exhausted. Don't become weary. Strengthen the hands that hang. Strengthen the weak knees. Walk with surety. Ensure that the path before you is clear. Verse 14, he goes on, and this is where we see this connection to what we just read. Verse 14 says, pursue peace with all people and holiness without which no one will see the Lord. Verse 15, looking carefully, lest anyone fall short of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness springing up cause trouble, and by this many become defiled.

It says, lest there be any fornicator or profane person like Esau, who for one morsel of food sold his birthright. It says, for you know that afterward, when he wanted to inherit the blessing, so after Jacob had also received the blessing, and he went to Isaac and he said, Father, isn't there a blessing for me, too, with tears in his eyes? And Isaac said, there is a blessing, but not that blessing.

That one can't be taken back. Esau had missed out on them both. He says, to pursue peace with all, to pursue holiness, that Greek root again, agios, that idea of being separate, that separated expectation that God provides us, being different, being set apart from the world around us, not in step with the world, not walking like the world walks, but walking differently, again renewed, transformed by his spirit, sanctified, really maintaining the presence of God in our lives.

He also says, be very careful not to let any root of bitterness spring up, which challenges us. You know, bitterness is an incredible challenge because it can get between us and God, it can get between us and our brother. For us to experience bitterness, bitterness causes separation. Why does it cause separation? Because bitterness causes us to naturally pull back or to retract as we get upset, as we get frustrated, as we get angry.

We begin to separate ourselves from the people we love, sometimes even separate ourselves from the God which we love. Again, it's impossible, as we mentioned before, we don't know the full dynamics between Jacob and Esau. Again, remember they're human, but is it possible that Jacob was so well liked by Rebekah that Esau could see that he was favored? You know, was it obvious?

Did that cause rifts between Jacob and Esau? Did that cause a root of bitterness? Is that why the writer in Hebrews is referencing a root of bitterness here? Is because there was a root of bitterness between Esau and Jacob? Again, did Rebekah share the prophecy with the boys, uncertain of how it would play out ultimately? Was there maybe suspicion on Esau's behalf or suspicion on Jacob's behalf? Again, we don't know, but that whole account, as you read through it in Genesis 25, it reads like an incredibly challenging family situation. And in some ways, you know, a family that in many ways puts the fun in dysfunctional, you know, as in their relationships with one another, at least, even though God was very clearly working with them. But the writer of Hebrews says that the root of bitterness that we experience and that we can experience, it causes defilement. It says it causes us to become contaminated. It causes us to become stained or sullied.

Then he jumps in and he warns the reader not to be like Esau, who for a single morsel of food sold his birthright. Afterward, when he sought that blessing that Jacob had tricked Isaac into giving him, Jacob ultimately held both the birthright and the blessing. Esau sought it with tears, but it was too late. There was no place at that point for repentance, even though he sought it diligently. Now, at some point in this passage, just within the last verse or two, the writer in Hebrews is no longer talking about food. He is no longer talking about food anymore. This is not about food. This is about a spiritual connection to a story that the Jewish people would know inside and out. And he's bringing a spiritual element into this, and he's illustrating, don't do what Esau did spiritually. Don't sell your birthright for a morsel of food.

Again, this book is designed to take Jewish concepts and connect them spiritually, to help the Hebrews understand Messiah, to understand the way of God, to understand the spiritual connections that God has. He says, don't, don't be like Esau. Don't, you know, have a low viewpoint or low value of your birthright. Esau didn't value what he had.

He despised it. He had contempt for it in that regard. He didn't see it with the value of what it really was. And as a result of that, he traded that birthright for something that was temporary. He traded it for something earthly, something that would come and go and ultimately have absolutely no long-term payoff in any way, shape, or form. He settled for a morsel of food in his time of craving. You know, Jewish commentary, as I mentioned this earlier, in the rabbinic literature, talks about how during this period the firstborn son also inherited the birthright and the blessing, and how that would become both the physical and the spiritual leader of that family going forward after the death of the patriarch. And so it meant a role in serving God in that family. You know, I called for a short time, at least in Israel, the firstborn sons were to be dedicated to God before he eventually shifted that to the tribe of Levi. It was originally going to be the firstborn sons that would be dedicated to God and serve him. And then he shifted that to the tribe of Levi after the captivity in Egypt and ultimately the episode with the golden calf.

But he saw his disdain of his birthright, in some respects, was an abdication of his role in that patriarchal period. It was a rejection in some ways of service to God.

You know, we think about our own lives, think about our own calling. We've been provided an incredible birthright opportunity. We've been given an incredible opportunity and an incredible birthright as part of the body of those that God has called today. Let's turn over to Titus 3 and verse 7. Because from a spiritual standpoint, brethren, we have been offered an incredible, incredible birthright, an incredible blessing that God has offered to us.

Titus, we'll go ahead and pick it up in chapter 3 and verse 7 as soon as I can figure out where it's hiding.

Kill me, Titus. There we go. We'll pass it a couple times. Titus 3, and we'll go ahead and pick it up in verse 3 to begin. Titus 3 and verse 3 says, For we ourselves were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another.

He says, But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, like not as a result of anything we've done, but according to his mercy, he saved us. Remember, that is a gift. That grace of God is a gift. It's his to give to whom he wills. But according to his mercy, he saved us through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior. And then verse 7, That having been justified by his grace, we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. You know, you look at that first passage, verse 3 there.

We were also once foolish and disobedient and deceived and serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. And guilty is charged, right?

I don't think there's a single person in here that can say, nope, that doesn't describe me at all.

Maybe we're honest with ourselves. It describes every last one of us. And to some degree, these are still the things that we fight against, because these are the things that carnal human nature operates in ourselves.

These are the aspects of our character that we continue to struggle with, despite God's Spirit dwelling in us, despite that Spirit guiding us and leading us.

But he goes on to say that when that kindness and the love that God provided us through Christ is our Savior, again, not based on what we've done, but through the mercy that he provided us, he says we're saved. That it's the regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit that's been poured out on us at baptism that does that. And then again, justified by that grace that God has given us, that we would become heirs. We would become inheritors in the hope of eternal life. Now we know Jesus Christ is the firstborn, the first of the firstfruits. We know that that is his role, but that we are to be a part of that family. We are to be children of God. In fact, Romans 8, 14 to 17, we won't read it now. We're going to read it at the end, but it records that we will become children of God, will become heirs and joint heirs with Christ, who is again the firstborn, the first of the firstfruits. But it's really important for us to keep in mind that we are a part of those firstfruits. As those who have been called in this life and given this opportunity to know God, to live this way of life today, and to inherit eternal life, we are among those firstfruits. Christ is the first of them. He's the first of the firstfruits, but we are among those firstfruits. And brethren, what that calling comes in inheritance comes a birthright, so to speak, and a blessing. You know, there are perks to the calling. There are great perks to the calling, and there are also great responsibilities that come right along with it. But just like that birthright and that blessing that was available to Esau, our birthright as firstfruits has obligations of service to God. It absolutely has obligations of service to God. And brethren, we have got to be careful, and we have to ensure that we are doing everything that we can not to devalue what that represents, not to exhibit disdain for what God is doing in our lives, to desire things that are physical and temporary and passing away more than what God has offered us and what God has given us. Let's go to Mark 8. Let's go to Mark 8. You know, Christ addresses this concept with the multitudes. Mark 8. We'll go ahead and pick it up in verse 34. Mark 8 and verse 34.

Mark 8 and verse 34 says, When he had called the people to himself, Whoever desires to come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the Gospels will save it. Verse 36, he says, For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? Word there is psyche. It's referencing eternal life. It's referencing life.

Or what will a man give in exchange for his, we might say, spiritual life?

It says, For whoever is shamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation of him, the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.

Christ explains to them that the level of commitment to this way of life that they would need to have says that they would need to, if they desire to come after him, if they desire to pursue him, that they would need to deny themselves, that they would need to take up his cross, and ultimately need to follow him. He then asks him a question. He says, What profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world and loses his spiritual life in the process? What profit is it? If in his pursuit of the things of this world, the things that are temporary, the things that are passing away, he loses out on the kingdom of God and eternal life. Verse 37, Christ asks a question that I want to ask all of us today. In verse 37, Christ asks those gathered, What's it going to take?

What's it going to take? What exists in this world that you are willing to trade that calling for?

What's important enough in this physical life that you are willing to trade this spiritual life for? What would cause you to give up what God has promised? His heirs, his children, his firstfruits?

You know, when we ask the question like this, the answer that comes back in our head is immediately, It's nothing! There's nothing in this world that would make me give up on what God has provided me. Nothing at all! Nothing that I would trade eternal life for. But, brethren, is that reality?

Is that reality? The unfortunate reality is that quite often there are many things that we put in our life before God. Pursuits, habitual sin, relationships.

There's a number of things that we put before God in our lives. We see the thing that we desire, we seek after it, and often that can take a whole lot of different forms. You know, everybody's a little bit different, you know, it can take a whole lot of different forms.

You know, a variety of different things. But at its core, it's the exact same thing.

At its core, it's idolatry. Plain and simple. At its core, it's idolatry. It's putting something else in the position of God in your life. And, brethren, we do it all the time.

We do it all the time. I want to read a section from a book today. The book's entitled Gods at War. And it's by Kyle Eitelman. I've referenced this book before. This is the same author that wrote the book Not a Fan, which I would also recommend. But if you've not read this before, I have a copy. I'm happy to loan it out if you promise to give it back.

If you don't, well, then I'll hunt you down and find it. No. But I want to read this, because it's an interesting perspective, and it's a thought that I think is important for us to keep in mind when we talk about the things that we put in front of God in our lives. Kind of, he explores throughout the whole book, he explores this idea of what the modern concept of idolatry looks like today. What does that look like in today's world? Because I think, you know, you look at it and you think, well, I'm not bowing down before some random little carved idol in my closet. You know, I'm not worshiping false gods. Well, what does that look like today? This is pages 22 and 23, not the whole thing, but sections from pages 22 and 23. He goes on and he says, idolatry isn't just one of many sins, rather it's the one great sin that all others come from.

So if you start scratching at whatever struggle you're dealing with, eventually you'll find that underneath, far enough down, is a false god. Until that god is dethroned and the Lord God takes his rightful place, you will not have victory. Idolatry isn't an issue, it is the issue. It says all roads lead to the dusty, overlooked concept of false gods. Deal with life on the glossy outer layers and you might never see it. Scratch a little beneath the surface and you begin to see that it's always there, under some other coat of paint. There are a hundred million different symptoms, but the issue is always idolatry. That's why when Moses stood on Mount Sinai and received the Ten Commandments from God, the first one was, I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. Exodus 20 2-3. When God issued this command during the time of Moses, the people were familiar with a lot of other gods. God's people had just spent more than 400 years in Egypt as slaves. Egypt was crowded with gods. They'd taken over the neighborhood, literally. The Egyptians had local gods for every district. Egypt was like the Baskin-Robbins of gods. You could pick and choose any flavor you wanted.

The Bible's paradigm, however, is different. We hear God say, you will have no other gods before me. And what we do is we think of it as a hierarchy. God is always in first place, but there are no places. There are no places. God isn't interested in competing against others or being first among many. God will not be part of any hierarchy. He wasn't saying before me as ahead of me. A better understanding of the Hebrew word translated before me is in my presence.

I will not have another god in my presence.

God declines to sit atop an organizational flowchart. He is the organization. He's not interested in being president of the board. He is the board. Life doesn't work until everyone else sitting around the table in the boardroom of your heart is fired. He is God. There are no other applications for that position. There are no partial gods. There are no honorary gods, no interim gods, and, my favorite, no assistance to the regional god. And I'll stop reading there. It's a phenomenal book. If you have a chance to read it, it's very, very good. Again, happy to lend it out if you promise to give it back. It's a part of my lending library, so hopefully it can go to a few different folks throughout. But Christ asks the question, what will a man give in exchange for his life? In other words, what's it going to take? What's it going to take? What is that thing in your life?

Because, brethren, without fail, that is the thing that Satan will exploit.

That is a place in your armor that he will hit again and again and again, relentlessly.

Relentlessly. Looking for the gap in that armor until he finally gets flesh.

Do we view the inheritance that we've been provided with disdain, such that we might trade it for a proverbial morsel of food? I certainly hope not, but do we understand its value? Do we recognize just how important it really is in those moments when we're under attack? Does that realization of the importance of that calling give us pause?

Does it give us a moment where we stop and we go, wait a minute, I've been called to something more.

I've been given an opportunity for something more. This physical whatever isn't worth it.

It's not worth it. It's not worth it. And so do we have that pause? Do we have that moment in which we're able to look at that and we're able to realize that, you know, kind of have that moment of clarity, so to speak? Let's go from Matthew 13. Matthew 13.

This is the attitude that we need to display for the inheritance that we've been provided. This is the attitude that we need to have. This is what we need to be doing, what we need to be displaying, ultimately. While you're turning over there, I want to share a story with you that I came across yesterday afternoon. Some of you might have heard a blip this week on the news about the price of Bitcoin. Bitcoin's a popular cryptocurrency that people have been trading in for a little over a decade now. It kind of started 2009-2010, roughly. And as of this past Thursday, Bitcoin was trading at over $42,000 a Bitcoin. Per Bitcoin. 42 grand. Which has a whole lot of people going back and checking their little online Bitcoin wallets that they got back in 2009, just hoping to find more than one or two sitting in a Bitcoin wallet. Bitcoin is the weirdest thing in the world. It's trading on error, in a way. I mean, it really is. It's trading on ethereal concepts. But there's a story I saw yesterday. A guy by the name of James Howell. He's in the UK. And he used to vacation at his grandfather's home during the summers, and he was a big online gamer. And so he had a laptop that he would play his video games with at his grandpa's house when he was there. And for whatever reason, sometime between 2009 and 2013, Mr. Howell managed to accumulate a lot of Bitcoins. Now, this was at the time in which Bitcoin had a value of, in fact, it was kind of a funny story. The first official purchase of Bitcoin was two pizzas. And somebody paid for them with Bitcoin, and it cost them 10,000 Bitcoin to buy two large pizzas in 2010 when that transaction took place. Now, Mr. Howell, on his hard drive of his laptop that he used to game on at his grandfather's, had 7,500 Bitcoins. The problem is, in 2013, he threw that hard drive away.

He has no access to the keys that will allow him to access his Bitcoin. Currently, based on the current rate, I think the Bitcoin is dropped now. It's not $42,000. It's like $38,000, $39,000 of Bitcoin.

But it's still, 7,500 of them is $280 million. That is sitting on a hard drive in a landfill in this little town in England. So Mr. Howell approached his little town in England, and he said, listen, I got a deal for you. I will give you $80 million if you let me dig in the landfill.

And they said, no, you can't. It's against the law. And he said, no, literally, $80 million. I'll give it to you. You do what you want with it. I don't care. I just want to dig. I think I even know where it is. I won't even make that big of a mess. They said, no. So he said, and the person on the interview, the person on the interview from the county said, we're very familiar with Mr. Howell. He's been contacting us since 2014. So for the last seven years, trying to get a hold of this hard drive that has $280 million sitting on it currently. Matthew 13, verse 44. Matthew 13, verse 44. Again, the kingdom of heaven, kingdom of God, is like treasure hidden in a field. Or we might say a hard drive hidden in a landfill, which a man found in hid. And for joy over it, he goes, and he sells all that he has, and he buys that field. Brother, if you managed to discover a field that just happened to have a hard drive in it with $280 million worth of cryptocurrency, would your current liquid assets mean a whole lot to you? Literally your house, your cars, would you even care? Of course you wouldn't! You would sell everything you owned, go buy the field, dig up the hard drive, cash it out, and buy all new stuff again, right?

Would there be anything that prevented you from seeking that treasure with every fiber of your being? The reality is, brethren, we've found a treasure that's worth even more than Mr. Howell's hard drive. Worth so much more than $280 million. We're literally talking about eternal life with God the Father and Jesus Christ forever. That is the essence, and that is the core of the gospel of the kingdom of God. That is the hope in which we place our trust. Those are the things that we look forward to in this life. That's the birthright that we've been provided as firstfruits.

That's the inheritance that our great God has offered us to be heirs with his son Jesus Christ, and it is an incredibly precious gift. It's the pearl of great price, as we see reference in Scripture. It's a treasure in a field that we must be willing to sell all that we have to obtain.

There can be nothing which we love more. Not our relationships on this earth. Nothing.

That is the primary. You know, particularly this world and the things that are in it, because realistically, this world and what is in it pales in comparison to what God has called us to. That's one of the concepts that John brought out in his epistle. Let's turn over there. 1 John 2.

And we'll go ahead and pick it up in verse 15. 1 John 2 and verse 15. It says, But as of the world. In other words, these aren't the treasures that you're looking for.

These are not the treasures that you are looking for. Right?

It says, verse 17, Now, we recognize not everything in the world around us is bad. Not everything is. There is good in the world. It's hard to find sometimes, but it's there.

Along with that good is a great deal of evil. Along with that good is a great deal of evil. And we have to discern. We have to discern, because even the things that are good, even the things that are good, even our pursuits and our passions and the things that just absolutely make us feel alive, can be problematic if they end up pushing God out.

You know, if we cannot maintain a balance, so to speak, between the things that we do and our love for God, we end up in a tough place. We end up selling our inheritance just as easily in our own passions for the things that are not necessarily good or evil. They're immoral.

But in all that we do, we must first seek the kingdom of God and pursue it with a dogged determination. An absolute dogged determination. Not allowing, again, the temporary cravings of this physical life, again, whatever form they may take in your life, my life, to cause us to not recognize the value of that opportunity that God has given to us. That just precious spiritual birthright that we've been provided. Esau sold his birthright for a meal. You know, in the moment, it seemed like a trade that was worth it because of the level of exhaustion that he was experiencing it. Again, after all, what was the point of the birthright if he wasn't going to live to be able to fulfill it? So he traded it for pottage, traded it for food. I want to close today on Romans 8.

Romans 8, as we draw a message to a close.

Romans 8. Again, we have opportunity to see this incredible blessing that God has given to us, this incredible opportunity that we've been provided, and this calling that he's given us in this life.

Romans 8. And we'll go ahead and pick it up in verse 12 to begin. Romans 8 and verse 12.

It says, Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, according to this physical world, so to speak, he will die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, for as many as are listening and paying attention and allowing that Spirit of God to lead us through life, says these are sons of God. For he did not receive the Spirit of bondage again to fear, but you receive the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out, Abba, Father. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are, children of God. And if children then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with him, that we may also be glorified together. Paul goes on to say that the sufferings of this world, the things that are in it, they're not even worthy to be compared to the glory of what is to come. Skip down a few passages here to verse 22. It says, For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now. Not only that, but we also, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, eagerly waiting for the redemption of our body. For we were saved in this hope, but hope that is seen is not hope, for why does one still hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance.

That hope that we can have in the things that we have not yet seen, but that we have promised to us, can provide us with the ability to stay in it and to keep fighting and to persevere.

Likewise, verse 26, the Spirit also helps in our weakness. For we do not know what we should pray for, as we ought, but the Spirit himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. You know the birthright that we've been provided is incredible? It really is. We await this adoption, we await this redemption of this physical body, and at that point, gone will be the cravings, the needs for physical sustenance will have a glorious spirit body like God and Christ. Creation groans and eagerly awaits that moment. And there's a hope that guides us as we go through this, and that hope is in the treasure that we know is buried in that field. We know that there is a treasure buried, and we need to purchase that field.

We haven't seen it yet. We know it's there. We have to be willing to sell everything and to purchase that field. Brethren, as we've, as we go through, I should say, the world around us, and the different ups and downs, I mean, I don't know how many of you watching the news, this pendulum has just gone batty the last year. Absolutely back and forth and back and forth, and up is down and down is up, and it's hard to keep track of everything.

In these times, brethren, we have a hope. We have a blessing. We have a calling that we have been given, and if we keep our eyes on that calling, and we keep our eyes on that, we continue to fight the good fight, and we continue to stay strong. We can persevere, and we can stay hungry, because, again, man does not live on bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.