Disregard of his Father

Genesis 26:34-35

“When Esau was forty years old, he took Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite to be his wife, and Basemath the daughter of Elon the Hittite, and they made life bitter for Isaac and Rebekah.”

 Those are two verses I’ve never heard anyone preach a sermon about, so all we can do is ask questions and look for why these two Hittite girls, married to Esau, would cause such pain for Isaac and Rebekah?  Who were the Hittites?  My search lead me to the book of Numbers and in the 13th chapter, verse 29 tells us they were a people who lived in the hill country.  But as I followed the chain to the book of Deuteronomy 7:1-4, it became clear why these marriages to the two Hittite girls, brought such anguish into the family of Isaac and Rebekah.  “When the Lord your God brings you into the land that you are entering to take possession of it, and clears away many nations before you, the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations more numerous and mightier than yourselves, and when the Lord your God gives them over to you, and you defeat them, then you must devote them to complete destruction.  You shall make no covenant with them and show no mercy to them.  You shall not intermarry with them, giving your daughters to their sons or taking their daughters for your sons, for they would turn away your sons from following me, to serve other gods.  Then the anger of the Lord would be kindled against you, and he would destroy you quickly.

God’s commands do not always seem convenient to us the created, but the God of the Bible does not change, His word is His word, and we the created have a choice to obey or disobey.  Esau chose to disobey!  And you might say, but the account in Numbers 13:29 was many, many years after Esau lived and so Esau does not fall under this commandment of God.  So the question is had God spoken or given direction in the matter of intermarriage before Esau married the two Hittites?

The answer is made clear in Genesis 24:3, where Abraham made his servant swear that he would not take a wife from the daughters of the Canaanites, but would go back to his country and to his kindred and take a wife for his son Isaac.  Esau was raised on this story and how they were the chosen people of God, and yet he chooses to rebel against his father and against God.  God often uses a man’s wife to give the right direction and this is the account of Rebekah and Isaac when it comes to following the plan God gave to Abraham.  “Then Rebekah said to Isaac, “I loathe my life because of the Hittite women.  If Jacob marries one of the Hittite women of the land, what good will my life be to me?”

(Genesis 27:46)

And because God was using Rebekah to speak to Isaac, he called in Jacob and blessed him and gave him this directive, “You must not take a wife from the Canaanite women.  Arise, and go to Paddan-aram to the house of Bethuel your mother’s father, and take as your wife from there one of the daughters of Laban your mother’s father, and take as your wife from one of the daughters of Laban your mother’s brother.”  (Genesis 28:1-2)

And because of Isaac being obedient we have a people called the Jewish people a people chosen by God to be His people.

How does this apply to our life in 2010?  It teaches us to be in agreement with God in all things and especially in the area of marriage.  When a person marries outside of the Christian faith and they claim the name of Christ, it often turns the hearts of your sons or daughters from  “following Me, to serve other gods.”  

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice