All of us have read the stories of Isaac, Jacob and Joseph. One of the lessons we get from these men is the choice God made of them over the cultural pecking order of rank and hierarchy. What about the “other kids”? What about Ishmael, Esau, the older brothers of Joseph? What about Leah? These people had legitimate claims to greater rank or honor but instead had their claims over ruled. God has good reasons for doing this and makes his point known that he chooses on a standard that is outside and above man’s fallen reasoning. I don’t really want to dwell on that fact. I want us to take it for granted and then move on. I want to talk about the ones who didn’t get picked. The ones born first who didn’t get the blessing of the firstborn from God. The ones who had God’s point learned at their expense. Where they hated people? Were they cursed? Are they lost and in hell? Some of their stories are sad and I think there is another lesson we can squeeze out of the story that involves these people. Ishmael was the first born son of Abraham. It is well known that he was not supposed to be. His birth was from an act of humans trying to push God’s will on the plan already decreed by God. What do you do when you’re not part of God’s plan? What if you’re not in the plan to be a big part in the play God has to teach a lesson? How do you react and what can you do before God? I want to look at several older brothers and see the different reactions they had when they suffered being passed by.
Ishmael was a son who probably shouldn’t have been born. God had made Abraham a promise that he would have a son, (Gen 12:2), but when time went on and on and no son was coming by Sarah the two of them decided to force the issue and have a child by Sarah’s handmade Hagar, (Gen 16:2). This resulted in a son being born by Hagar named Ishmael, (Gen 16:11). Ishmael was not the son of the promise. God told Abraham that the promise of fathering many nations would come through a son by Sarah. Eventually Isaac would be born to Sarah when she was 90 years old and the blessing and inheritance would go to him, (Gen 17:19-21). And what about Ishmael? The story goes that he and his Mother Hagar were banished to the desert. Without divine intervention they would have died, (Gen 21:8-21). What would your reaction be if your father did that to you and your mother? What would your reaction be if God did that to your inheritance and birthright? Ishmael’s story continued. God actually blessed Ishmael in his new land and he was the father of twelve tribes himself, (Gen 25:16). But still, would you have held a grudge? There doesn’t seem to have been. When Abraham died at 175 years Ishmael came to his funeral, (Gen 25:9). Back to also presumably stand next to his younger brother Isaac the younger brother who received all the blessings and inheritance but should have automatically gone to the firstborn. How many people would be willing to do that? How many more people would hold a resentment for the rest of their life over being treated like that? The text doesn’t really tell us about the emotions going on for this event. We just know for a fact that Ishmael made the effort of coming to the funeral of a father who cast him out to stand together with the younger brother who got his birthright instead of him. How many of us could do that? What kind of a person was Ishmael who could do that?
Another big brother was Esau. He was the older twin brother of Jacob and was actually the favored one of his father, (Gen 25:28). There was no intention to pass it over for his birthright as the first born. And mind you it was through deception that he lost his birthright. He was extorted out of it in hunger, (Gen 25:29-34). His father was lied to and it was stolen, (Gen 27). And yet still, that blessing went to the thief. The deceiver, (Gen 27:35). The birthright went to the younger brother. How would you feel about that? What would you do? Remember that in the Middle East the first born was the heir to not only money and possessions in inheritance but also responsibility and leadership. Family, business, clan, tribe, even kingdom. It would have carried as stigma if an older son was passed over in his birthright. The shame, the insult, the damage and the injury done to Esau is legitimate. He was robbed, he was publicly humiliated, he was taken advantage of. And yet, twenty years later Jacob returns to Canaan and is met by Esau for what? Revenge? No, instead he comes out and welcomes Jacob back, (Gen 33:4). Does that sound like an older brother that’s been robbed, insulted, and taking advantage of? Obviously something has changed in Esau. Also notice that Esau went on to be Ishmael’s son in law, (Gen 28:9). I wonder how many times the two of them talked about what happened to them and, if so, whether or not they had the change of heart we see later in their lives. We are not really told one way or the other their thoughts or emotions and scripture never commends them anywhere as examples to be copied. That alone makes for a sticking point in making it a point using these men as an example.
But another older brother can give us more to study. The older brother of Joseph, in this case, Judah. Joseph was hated by his ten older brothers. They were insulted by the stories he told of his dreams and they resented the favoritism Joseph got from their father Jacob. So one day when these brothers had had enough they grabbed Joseph and threw him into a hole and then sold him into slavery. Jacob’s oldest son, the one who held the rights to eldest son was Rubin, (Gen 29:32). But Ruben lost first son rights in a profane act of debauchery and insult to his father, (Gen 35:22). Next in line was Simeon and then Levi but they lost it too. In one passage of scripture we read how Jacob rebuked the first three of his sons, (Genesis 49:1-12). Simeon and Levi were over the murderous act of revenge over their sister Dinah’s rape, (Gen 34). It was a dysfunctional family and there can be debate as to whom the next one in line for first born son rights would go to. Rubin was first born son of Jacob and Leah and next born was Simeon, then Levi, and then Judah, (Gen 29:33). But inheritance rules did not always work like that. Jacob had another “firstborn” and that was the first born son from Rachel. That was Joseph. First born rights went to the sons of wives and not to the sons of concubines like Bilhah and Zilpah. So Rubin was the first born son, he loses that status, the next in line is actually Joseph not Simeon, Levi, or Judah.
Either way no matter how you think about it, Reuben through Judah were passed over. It’s important to note because later when Joseph sees his brother’s again he threatens to keep Benjamin. When that happens the one who steps up is big brother Judah. The speech he delivers to the prime minister of Egypt, whom he does not yet know is his little brother Joseph, is full of repentance, intercession, and humility, (Gen 44:18-34). This was not the same big brother that helped throw Joseph into a pit. None of the men were the same older brothers that deceived their father into believing Joseph had died.
There we have three older brothers. Passed over for birthright and inheritance. Again, passed over by God sovereign plan. The thought comes that these men might have been robbed. Perhaps we can think they were set up before they had any chance to show whether they would submit to God or not. In the case of Ishmael and Esau their names went on to be a curse and their descendants enemies of God and His people. But what about the older brothers themselves? Did they live on to cursed lives, lost and rejected? Actually Ishmael was blessed by God and made a great nation of his own, (Genesis 17:20). Esau went to join in his uncle’s nation and was greatly blessed also. These nations do not hold a high place in scripture but the point I’m trying to make is that the men themselves, Ishmael and Esau, we learn a very profound story of forgiveness and change of heart. Two older brothers demoted and passed over. These older brothers had found grace to forgive in the years later. And Judah? Passed over and pushed back its true. Yet when the time came to take a stand to prevent another of his father’s “favorites” from being taken he stepped forward and pleaded for his little brother. Judah would not be blessed as first born. Joseph’s son, Ephraim, would father the tribe that would grow to be the largest of all and become synonymous with the northern kingdom of Israel, (2 Chronicles 25:7). And Judah? Rejected, passed over, insulted Judah? His descendants would be King David and the Messiah. And there is an older sister in this story too. Leah was the older sister of Rachel, (Genesis 29:16). She was the “first wife” of Jacob. She had every reason to expect rank and honor yet she was rejected over her younger sister for attention and love. Yet she was the mother of Judah and so in the line of Messiah. Not Rachel or Joseph.
God does His will and very rarely is the reason known by the people witnessing the actual events. But there can be trust and faith in Him that He does nothing without purpose. There can be other examples of other colder brothers who were not so forgiving it’s true. Solomon’s older brother Adonijah is one and let’s not forget the most notorious big brother Cain. But still, I have yet to mention Aaron, Moses’ older brother, who was faithful for the most part in following his little brother. And all the older brothers of David who also obeyed him as king, (1 Sam 16:4-12). The lesson found in all three men can also be learned from Jonathan who, as first born son of Saul, was next in line to be king of Israel yet chose to follow God’s next anointed, David, (1 Sam 20:32-34).
What a powerful lesson we can learn from the hearts of these people. Again, keep in mind that we’re reading about people with legitimate claims and yet God over ruled them. What is there to learn here? God rewards trust and faith. He does not reward ego and vanity. What would many of us do if we were to be kept by God on the sidelines? How many are faithful students of the Bible and God’s teachings and yet are never asked to teach adults the scripture? How many times have all of us watched while someone else less prepared seemed to get the opportunity to teach, preach, or any of the other more “honorable” jobs? What if you are working in the nursery, or in the kitchen, or cleaning the church bathrooms, and nobody ever, even once, said “Thank you” or said you’re doing a good job? What if they never do? What if for the rest of your sojourn through this world you are never once given the opportunity to teach, preach, lead, direct, or mentor? Ever. Instead, you are asked to watch children, clean toilets, vacuum floors, make the coffee, or mow the lawn? I’ll say one more time that these big brothers I have mentioned had real, legitimate, claims over what they were denied. Do you love God’s word and read it and study it like an addiction? And then, have you ever watched helplessly while someone has taught a Bible study and completely missed the point of what the passage means? You have a choice when that happens. God is teaching you a deeper lesson than you may realize. You are being taught that He is one in charge of gifts and duties in His church. You will not be judged by whether you ever preached but how your heart is fixed. By what God was able to do through the words you say. God takes the humble and the contrite and does mighty things through the weak. You would know that if you really know your Bible and your God.
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