In Scripture many that were born first were not the firstborn. God chose Abel (and later Seth), not Cain; Isaac, not Ishmael; Jacob, not Esau. Old Jacob knew this when he crossed his arms to place his right hand on the head of Joseph’s younger son, Ephraim, Gen. 48.
Paul explains it at the cosmic level, ‘That was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven’, 1 Cor. 15. 46-47.
These first births picture, at the personal level, the natural birth of the individual which must be followed by the second, or new, birth. The elder shall serve the younger. Our bodies must be kept under the control of the spiritual.
The ‘way of Cain’, Jude 11, is to bring the fruit of a cursed earth, without blood. Abel comes God’s way, accepted in the value of the lamb. Ishmael was born after the flesh while Isaac was by promise. Esau despised his birthright, but Jacob would not let go until he had the blessing.
Note the events in Esau’s life that underline this tendency.
His birth: The words Adam and Edom, are linked to the modern Hebrew adom, meaning red, and with the word for earth, adamah. He ‘came out red’, Gen. 25. 25, says the record, and so we all are born, bearing the ‘image of the earthy’, 1 Cor. 15. 49.
His hunting: Abel, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and David were shepherds. Our Lord, ‘that Great Shepherd of the sheep’, stated that He had come to give His life for the sheep. Beware of those, He said, who come to kill and destroy.
His despising: The man named Red traded his birthright for a bowl of red pottage. Just in case we miss the connection, the Spirit adds, ‘Therefore was his name called Edom’. Beware those earthy appetites; they always cost you dearly.
His weeping: Both boys are mentioned as recipients of Isaac’s blessing in Hebrews chapter 11, and Jacob has his own listing there, but Esau doesn’t make it until chapter 12. There he is remembered, not for his faith but for his failure, v. 17. Those who reject God’s blessing find out too late that their search for anything else to satisfy is all in vain.
