- I love when the Holy Spirit just starts
to tie the bow on things.
And you're like, okay, now like David didn't know
I was teaching on birthrights and blessings,
but his whole thing there was on blessing
and some of the words that have been spoken this morning,
I can't tell you how many times this morning
I've heard somebody say something about blessing.
And so I love when we just kind of can settle our spirits
in under the Holy Spirit and allow him to just minister
the things that he wants to minister, you know?
So this, today we are going to jump forward.
I tell you what, I miss our teens today,
our little worship leaders.
And we have, they're on a retreat of their own this weekend
and we miss them and we pray that the Lord
is just messing them up in the most amazing ways.
I pray for Doug and Jody and James and Dana
and all the leaders and that the Lord would just pour out
over them this weekend.
I'm so excited for them and Pastor Kevin
and some of the others are ministering in East Tennessee
this weekend and we miss them as well.
But you know what?
God has a word for us today too, you know?
So Father bless them, use them today.
And Father I pray that you be with us today.
We are going to be talking about birthrights and blessings.
Okay, the assignment was Jacob, but I don't really like him.
(congregation laughing)
I'm just gonna put that out there.
He did some stuff that made you go, "What?"
And he's one of the ones that God used.
But fortunately for us, people look at us sometimes
and go, "What?"
Yeah, that's one of the ones that God used too, you know?
So anyway, he eventually gets it right.
But in the beginning, I'm just kinda like,
"What's up with this guy?"
And so we changed the title.
We took his out of the big part and put it on the little part
and we're gonna stand up and we are gonna read
a passage of scripture together,
then we're gonna jump into the word.
Genesis 25, 21 through 34, if you brought your Bible,
I think this is really important.
That way you can look and make sure
that we're telling you the truth here.
All right, here we go.
Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife
because she was unable to have children.
And the Lord answered him and his wife, Rebecca, conceived.
And the Lord said to her, "Two nations are in your womb
"and two peoples will be separated from your body.
"And one people will be stronger than the other
"and the older will serve the younger."
When the time came for her to give birth,
the first to come out was red,
his whole body like a hairy garment, so they named him.
Does anybody else get the image of animal from Muppets
when you read that?
I'm just asking for a friend.
Anyway, after this, his brother, now wait a minute,
I corrected that and then I took the R back out
because it just seemed appropriate
that his bother came out rather than his,
(audience laughing)
it should say his brother, but his, okay.
"His brother came out with his hand grasping Esau's heel,
"so he was named Jacob.
"The boys grew up and Esau became a skillful hunter,
"a man of open country,
"while Jacob was content to stay home among the tents.
"Isaac loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob."
How messed up is that?
I'm just saying, if you have favorites, you don't tell 'em.
(audience laughing)
"Once when Jacob was coating some stew,
"Esau came in from the open country famished.
"He said to Jacob, 'Quick, let me have some of that stew,
"'I am famished.'
"Jacob replied, 'First, sell me your birthright.'
"That was random.
"'Look, I am about to die,' Esau said.
"'What good is birthright to me?'
"But Jacob said, 'Swear to me first.'
"So he swore an oath to him,
"selling his birthright to Jacob.
"Then Jacob gave Esau some bread and some lentil stew.
"He ate and then drank and then got up and left and this.
"So Esau despised his birthright and won final."
Watch out for the Esau syndrome,
trading away God's lifelong gift
in order to satisfy a short-term appetite.
Father, thank you for the truth of your word.
It's pretty clear, Lord Jesus, if we just grab hold of it,
let our hearts be wide awake to learn from you this morning.
Lord, let my stuff fall in your stand.
In Jesus' name, amen.
- Amen. - Amen.
Okay, I'm already a little convicted
over saying I didn't like Jacob.
Not terribly much, but just a little bit.
But here's the beautiful part of it.
We are doing the greatest stories ever told,
not the greatest people ever talked about.
We're talking about their stories.
And I love that God uses ordinary people
to tell extraordinary stories.
And that tells me that he can use us
to do extraordinary things with these little ordinary lives,
with these little ordinary gifts that we have
as they are imparted by him.
You know, I always thought,
does everybody know the story of Jacob and Esau?
If so, let's go to lunch.
We're out of here.
Jacob and Esau from the very beginning,
you know, I'll look at this and I do this thing.
And if you walk by my office during the day,
I apologize in advance because I look at some
of these stories and I have this mental thing going on.
And it'd be like a story of intrigue,
birthright stolen, blessings captured, lies,
deceit, parental favoritism.
Join us this week for The Supplanter.
Because that's what they are, man,
they're these stories that should have been a mini series.
You know, it's like if Lifetime would just grab hold of it,
it should be a story.
But the Lord is teaching us through these things.
But I always thought, you know, when Esau,
was he dramatic or what?
I need to eat or I'm gonna die.
This is the right service for that message, isn't it?
But he's, I mean, he's so dramatic.
It's like, what does birthright matter to me
if I starve to death standing right here?
And man, Jacob just goes, "Well, sell me your birthright."
How long had he been carrying that
for it to come out like that?
I mean, seriously, the abundance of the heart,
the mouth speaks, "Sell me your birthright
"and I'll give you this bowl of beans."
How ridiculous!
Seriously, who does that?
We do.
(congregation murmuring)
We do.
We know the promises and the things
that the Lord has promised us,
the things that he's spoken over us and given us,
and he's going, "This is the way," walk in it,
and we're like, "Yeah, but this looks so much better
"over here and I'm famished."
Oh, I would never sell my birthright.
Some of us don't even know what our birthright is.
But all the time, God gives us opportunities
and he speaks things over us and we choose a different path
because that path just feels better to our flesh.
I wanna be fed now.
So I always thought when he sold that,
when he traded that, when the brothers did that,
when Jacob deceived him, I always thought,
"Well, that's why Jacob would go in and get the blessing,"
and all of that stuff that had happened to him.
But birthright and blessing
are two completely different things.
Birthright and blessing are two completely different things.
Birthright, birthright was given,
assigned to the firstborn son,
which is why it says birthright.
By right of birth, the firstborn was given a double portion.
A firstborn was given the name.
He would be the one that carried the name forward.
He would automatically become the new patriarch of the family
all of these things and they were related to family
because birthright is about family.
Birthright names the patriarchs, doubles the portions.
It makes you the name carrier.
You are the one that is gonna carry on the tradition.
You are that one.
So when Esau traded it for soup, for beans,
it was the equivalent of him going,
"I'm changing my name.
"Now I don't wanna carry these traditions forward.
"I don't wanna carry these things forward."
And that always concerned me because it says,
Esau despised his birthright.
And I'm like, "How do you despise your birthright?
"How do you despise it?"
I mean, I have a warped and wonderful history.
My family, those that are not in jail
are really doing well, but they didn't always do that.
I mean, I have a lineage.
I was told first service, Mario would be very proud
'cause I did find out that we have a Chicago mafioso person
in my bloodline.
I just thought you'd appreciate that.
(audience laughing)
He's no longer with me.
(laughing)
I mean, to despise your birthright.
Yeah, I might have some prostitutes in my background
and some addicts and some alcoholics and some stuff,
but you know what else I got?
I have a whole lineage of the kindest,
most soft-hearted, calloused hand farmers and poorer.
I have the most wonderful musicians and singers
and songwriters in my lineage.
And see, we can choose to focus on this
or we can choose to focus on that.
But regardless, I am breathing because a man and a woman
decided to bring me into this world
and the Lord allowed me to come.
How could I ever despise everything that they've done
to bring me to the place that I am?
And as good or as bad as your parents were,
they were just people.
They were dealing with their own stuff.
But to despise everything,
and I thought, how does that even make sense?
And then he began to show me,
it says he bazawed his birthright.
He disdained it.
It was basically him going, "Whatever."
He counted it of little value.
Do you count your family of little value?
Do you count those that God has surrounded you with?
The everything that he's poured into your life,
do you value it?
Is it important to you or is it a small thing to you?
And it matters.
You know what's interesting to me?
Is that we don't see at all.
We do not see at all Esau being super upset
about losing that birthright.
He said he got up from the table and went on his way.
We don't see that at all over the birthright.
That tells me he might've had some family issues
because he didn't value it.
It wasn't important to him.
But your family's important to the Lord.
And he put you in it with purpose.
And you might just be the one that speaks healing into it.
You don't know what God will do.
But if he has placed you
in the middle of a dysfunctional family,
show them what functioning looks like.
Show them what walking with Jesus can do for their lives.
Don't just totally separate yourself
unless the Lord tells you to be that light in that place.
Change the bloodline, man.
Draw a line across it.
But it's always struck me as interesting
that Esau just, he didn't seem too upset about it.
Oh, but we see something he's getting ready
to be upset about because birthright is one thing,
but blessing is another.
Blessing was both prophecy and divine decree
and it passed on breath.
So we see Jacob and Esau later in life.
It comes time and Isaac calls for his son to come.
He wants to speak a blessing over him.
And that was when Rebekah decided it would be really cool
to just, let's pretend that Jacob is Esau
so the spoken blessing can be spoken over Jacob
instead of Esau.
What mama does that?
I mean, seriously, come on.
We're gonna cut some skins
and we're gonna put some hair on your arms
and we're gonna put the scent of the field on you
so that you can go and deceive your aging
heart of sight father.
But that's what they do.
And he goes in and he feeds his father
and Jacob waits and he gets the blessing.
Now here's the thing too.
Blessing passed from the father
is based on everything he had in terms of possession,
in terms of wisdom and in terms of power.
This one wasn't about stuff.
This was an invoked blessing
and guys blessing in the word of God,
there's nothing like it and I'm not talking about stuff.
Here let me bless you with this gift card.
Here let me bless you with whatever.
No, this is a spoken word breathed over people
and it was invoked and it activated
when the breath hit the air.
It wasn't activated until it was spoken.
I can look at Tina and I can think in my mind,
Lord bless her, Lord cover her.
But until I go, be blessed in the name of Jesus.
Be blessed, your children will rise up and call you blessed.
You are the head and not the tail.
You are above and not beneath.
You are a teacher.
You are a daughter of the most high God.
Go and do everything that he created you to do.
That's released towards you.
I can't retrieve that.
A breath blessing and something that has to happen
in that moment is that the receiver has to understand
the authority of the blesser to bless.
The blesser to bless and so when that's spoken,
it's activated and then Tina gets a choice now
whether she wants that to be activated over her life.
And I see you teaching.
I see you pouring.
Again, I know you were a teacher previously.
You're still a teacher.
And I see that over her and when I speak it,
it isn't because I created it.
It's because I know it in my spirit
because the Holy Spirit has already spoken that over her.
And the breath blessing that is invoked, that is released.
And he does this.
This is what Jacob goes in and he gets.
Isaac says, may God give you heaven's due
and earth's richness, grain and new wine.
May nations serve you, your brothers bow down to you
and may those who bless you be blessed
and those who curse you be cursed.
And Jacob receives that blessing
because it's spoken and it's out there.
And as soon as the blessing is spoken,
Jacob gets up and he leaves and in comes Esau.
Who's cooked for his dad.
And Isaac says, I just gave away the blessing.
Who did I just bless?
And the word tells us that Esau cries out in anguish.
He cries out in anguish.
And he says, Father, do you have a blessing for me?
Father, what about me?
And Isaac says, I have blessed him and he will be blessed
because it had already been released over him.
I blessed him and he will be blessed.
The things that are breathed over our lives,
the things that are spoken over our lives
get activated over our lives.
I blessed him and indeed he will be blessed.
And Esau might not have wept over his birthright.
He might not have wept over the double portion
or losing his name or losing the right
to be the patriarch of the family.
But at this, he says he wept aloud.
He wept aloud because see blessing is irrevocable.
Blessings irrevocable.
You can't retrieve it.
So doesn't that make you just wanna release it
over the lives of people?
Doesn't it make you wanna just speak blessing over people?
What if we began to start sentences with,
I bless you in the name of Jesus.
I bless you.
I pray that you would be filled, your home would be filled
with the peace of God and that you would have the wisdom
to make every right decision that would cause your life
to be the best it could ever be.
I bless you in the name of Jesus.
I can't give that to them, but I can release it
through the Holy Spirit in the name of Jesus
over their lives.
And here's the thing, it's not like I'm making up something
for somebody.
These are things he's already spoken over you
in his word.
In the book of Genesis alone,
there's more than 80 spoken blessings.
This book right here is filled with spoken blessings.
And the very first one, you might not have recognized it
as a blessing, but when God speaks to Adam and Eve,
and he says, go, be fruitful and multiply,
have dominion over this thing.
Was that not a blessing?
Instruction comes in blessing form too, you know that?
But from beginning to end throughout the word,
it is the activation of a blessing over these lives.
I had somebody in my office recently,
and her words were,
I don't think anybody has ever said anything good over me.
I don't think anybody has ever thought I would be anything.
I don't think, and I'm sitting there going,
God, she just needs someone to speak life over her.
And that's what I was beginning to do.
Because some of us have had so many negative things
breathed over our lives.
And let me tell you something, it works the same.
You can speak curses over people's life.
People who would never cuss in the Southern slang.
I'm not a cusser.
No, but you might be a curser.
If you speak things over people or about people,
understand that you have a God,
you have a Father whose breath,
whose words created universes.
And you are created in his image.
And the word tells me that there is life
and there is death in the power of the tongue.
What do you think that means?
You can speak life, or you can speak death.
You can speak blessing, or you can speak curse.
You ever wonder sometimes why your child is struggling
when all you're doing is talking about their struggle?
What if you begin to speak something differently about them?
You know what?
I don't know if I ever told you this, Hal,
close your ears.
(audience laughing)
It was probably 20 years ago.
He had done something, I'm sorry,
I probably did whatever it was.
But we had had like a little spat.
We're not fighters, that's just not who we are.
But we had had some kind of argument and I got mad at him.
I know, it's shocking.
And given how kind I am, I'm speaking it over me.
And I walked into the kitchen and mumbled under my breath.
I'm sure none of you have ever done that.
But I walked into the kitchen and I was mad at him.
I'm gonna face this direction.
And standing there, I just went, "Oh, he is such a jerk."
And as soon as I said it, the Holy Spirit went,
"You have what you say.
"You have what you say."
And for the next couple of days, I know he didn't know
what I had done to him.
But he was so unhappy.
He was so dissatisfied.
He was grumpy and grouchy.
And I was walking around going,
"He is the head and not the tail.
"He is the priest of my household.
"He is kind and he is generous
"and he thinks I'm amazing, Lord."
And I thought about throwing in that.
And he gives me cash all the time.
But I didn't.
What the Lord used that to do is to go,
"Be careful what you speak over your spouse.
"Be especially careful what you speak to your spouse.
"Don't curse them.
"Bless them because you will get what you say.
"You will get what you say.
"So many are desperate for the breath blessing."
So how many of you have ever had negative things
spoken over you or to you?
Mm-hmm.
You ever had anybody ridicule you,
tell you you're worthless?
Not gonna amount to anything?
Were they wearing a uniform and have a badge
when that happened?
(laughs)
That has impact.
That impacts us.
Even when we try to think that it doesn't,
I mean, some of the words that were spoken over me
by my father, man, I still have to sometimes go,
"Nope, that's not what my dad says.
"That's not what my father says."
And to begin to speak life over that.
And I just wonder how many need a breath blessing
spoken over your life?
Who needs somebody to just look at you and go,
"Oh, I see the prophetic in you, Chris.
"I see the worshiper in you, Chris.
"I see the frustration that you have sometimes
"because you wanna go so deep with the Lord."
And my encouragement to you would be go, go deep.
Go do what he's called you to do.
Write the songs, do the things that you know
that he's destined you to do 'cause it's in there.
It's in there to have that breath blessing.
Now let me take it to the next level.
Let me take it to the next thing.
If breath blessing releases and activates something
in our life, now let's read this passage in that context.
And again, Jesus said to them, "Peace be with you.
"As the Father has sent me, so also I am sending you."
When he had said this, he breathed on them and said,
"Receive the Holy Spirit."
Was there ever such a breath blessing as this to go,
"Receive the Holy Spirit."
Receive the Holy Spirit.
And that breath, I believe it activated everything
on the planet.
I believe as it went into effect, I believe the ground shook.
I believe the thunder was in the distance.
I believe the cloud the size of a man's hand became huge
in that moment.
And I just believe that when Jesus spoke
and breathed over them and said,
"Receive the Holy Spirit," everything changed
from then to now.
Now what about this one?
"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ
"who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing
"in the heavenly places."
He has already, let me, okay, here it goes right here.
Look here.
(speaking in foreign language)
It literally means he has pronounced blessing
from the place of God and angels through breath blessing.
He has pronounced from the place of God and angels
a breath blessing over your life.
He's already speaking it.
How?
Through Christ, in Christ, Jesus.
All of these blessings are being spoken over your life.
And I'm not talking about monetary things,
though he does provide, but the word goes on to tell us
this blessing provides wisdom and holiness and knowledge
and understanding on and on and on this list goes
about the things that have been spoken over you
from a place of God and angels.
From a place of God and angels.
Jacob and Esau hit the point in their lives
where God is getting ready to fix things.
Esau has a pretty rough life, but the Lord blesses him.
Every blessing we get is from him,
and we know he's a little bit blessed
because when Jacob goes to meet him,
he has several hundred men with him,
and he obviously has been covered a bit.
But Jacob is feeling it.
He knows what he's done to his brother.
He's stolen his birthright, he's deceived him,
and he has received the blessing.
He's taken the name, he's the patriarch of the family now.
And so he's getting ready to come face to face
with his brother for the first time.
And Jacob in his fear divides his family
and sends some in this direction and some in that direction
because he is basically assuming
that Esau's gonna kill him.
And so the night before, it says that he's in his tent,
and it says he wrestled with the Lord.
Have you ever wrestled with the Lord?
Have you ever had the Lord tell you something
and you can't receive it or you don't receive it
and you go back and forth and back and forth?
And you know Jacob had to be going,
"I know what I did to him.
"I know what I stole, I know what I took.
"I know what I've cost him.
"Lord, please don't let him kill my family.
"Don't let it."
You know, sometimes our lack of faith shows.
So he wrestles all night long with this man,
with this Lord, with the Lord.
And then the, and he's like, "You gotta let me go."
And the man, the angel touches his hip
and puts it out of joint.
And Jacob tells him, "I will not let you go
"until you bless me.
"I will not let you go until you bless me."
I'm sure he was thinking, "Don't let him kill me."
But God's plan and blessing is so much different,
it's so much better because what he does in that moment
is he renames him.
Does anybody need to be renamed?
Have you been a liar?
Have you been a cheat?
Have you been a deceiver?
Have you been an addict?
Have you been all of these things?
Because see, the world loves to name us
and we love to name ourselves.
But God calls us something different.
God calls you his son.
God calls you his daughter.
God covers you.
He sees you as completed.
And so in that moment, in Jacob's desperation,
he gets his hip touched.
And the Lord says, "From this point forward,
"you'll be known as Israel."
So yeah, your brother's not gonna kill you,
but you're gonna be the father of nations.
You're gonna have, think about it, man.
In that tent, he had no idea
if he would breathe past tomorrow.
But when you go down the story after the blessing
that he wouldn't let go of him until he got the blessing,
after that, he had a new name.
He had a new identity.
And he would have 12 sons that would shape the nations
from then to now.
That's what a blessing does.
And I just cannot help but think,
it is time to start breathing blessing over one another.
Can I get the worship team?
Last week when Pastor Kevin was teaching
and I was sitting right there where Caitlin is,
I had this thing hit me in my spirit
and I didn't really know the direction
I was gonna go with my teaching,
but I did after that,
because what I saw in my spirit was this.
I'm gonna need some elders,
because what I saw in my spirit was this.
We had elders, remember what I said
about recognizing the authority of the blesser to bless.
And I could just see our elders lined up right here.
And one after the next, after the next came.
And they began with,
"In the name of Jesus Christ, I bless you."
And then they began to speak over the lives of the people.
And I don't know how God wants to do that this morning,
but I wanna be obedient in that.
So if I could have the elders and their wives
come and line up here for a second.
Joshua, can you come?
So many of us raised our hands
when we said we've had these things spoken over us.
Now elders, guys, wives, look at me for just a second.
I know the Holy Spirit resides
on the inside of each and every one of you.
And I know that the Holy Spirit is gonna give you words
that are gonna break chains, that are gonna break yokes,
that are gonna break the power of some words
over some people's lives today.
So do what he's equipped you to do.
Bless them in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Can you stand with us?
We're gonna sing the blessing.
And if you raised your hand,
even if you think you're healed,
if you raised your hand, I want you to come
and I want you to receive your blessing this morning
and have life spoken over you in the name of Jesus.
Jesus, Father God, I thank you, Lord,
that you are sending a blessing,
a breathed over breath blessing for your people today.
Lord, give us wisdom as we go into it in Jesus' name.
Amen.
Jesus.
(gentle music)
[music fades out]