Every choice we make has consequences.
And what if every action we take affects other people? Like dominoes toppling over beyond our control?
There are moments in time, decisions we make, that define us for years. This is Jacob’s moment. This is Esau’s moment.
Jacob has just set off a chain of events that not only sets the course for his life but also his brother’s. And Esau is ticked off.
Ticked.
Off.
Murderous rage is more like it.
I wonder it would be like to be Esau in this story. To be conned, swindled, robbed. To have everything you had planned for your future, all your expectations for life, your 5-year, 10-year, and 20-year plans erased in an instant.
Maybe it’s not so hard to imagine. Maybe today it looks like a “D” on that final when you needed an “A.”
Maybe it looks like that significant other who says, “I don’t really love you.”
Maybe it looks like Mom & Dad sitting you down with, “We can’t pay your tuition anymore.”
Maybe it looks like car wreck that leaves you with a permanent disability.
If you’re Esau, it looks like the bewildered face of your old man asking you, “Who are you?”
The world is full of Jacobs—tricksters, liars, swindlers, con-men. People who treat you as nothing more than an obstacle for their survival. It isn’t fair. While we can’t control the circumstances as they come to us, we can control what we do with them.
Jacob chose. Esau chose. And this family splintered. It didn’t have to be that way.
What about you? What do you see?
Fiftyeight 