SERMON IX.

JACOB'S ELECTION.

GENESIS XXvii. 25.

And he said, bring it near to me, and I will eat of my son's venison, that my soul may bless thee.

THE chapter on which we are now going to discourse, carries us on, if I may so express myself, another stage towards the completion of those great events, the progress of which we are tracing. It brings before us a new scene in the eventful drama of man's religious history, more and more confirming the truth of God's declaration, that he is no respecter of persons. Again, it will be necessary for me to supply the blank that lies be

tween the subject which we last discussed, and that which, on the present occasion, demands our attention; and as the events recorded in the Bible are neither very numerous nor very complicated, I will occupy but a small portion of your time in describing them.

After the sacrifice of Isaac, and the inpouring upon Abraham's mind of the flood of Divine light, which that remarkable occurrence struck out, the life of the great Patriarch seems to have been one of perfect repose. Happy in the accomplishment of every wish that he had formed, happier still in the strong assurance that the favour of the Lord was with him, Abraham spent his days in quiet and his nights in peace, till it pleased God to remove from him the beloved partner of his joys and sorrows, at a very advanced age. He buried her in a cave which he purchased of Ephron, in the land of which he well knew that his children would by and bye be the possessors; and having now only one point to arrange, ere he should shake

hands for ever with earth and earthly things, he turned his attention to that. He despatched his most trusted servant to the land of Mesopotamia, that he might choose from thence a wife for Isaac out of the daughters of his kindred; and, God blessing the undertaking, the man fully succeeded, and in due time returned to Beersheba with Rebekah. To her the soul of Isaac clave, so that, contrary to the customs of those early times, he took no other female to wife : while Abraham, rejoicing in the rapid accomplishment of all God's gracious promises, died and was gathered to his fathers.

There is not much resemblance, except in one or two minute particulars, between the personal histories of Isaac and of his father Abraham. The career of the latter had been, during the greater portion of it, one of trials and difficulties. That of the former was generally the reverse. At first, indeed, his faith was put to the same test which

that of Abraham had so well borne; for Rebekah, much to his regret, brought him no children; but, as had been the case with Abraham, God dealt kindly with Isaac in the end, and his wife bore twins. In like manner we find Isaac forced, by the pressure of famine, to change his place of abode; and falling into the same weakness, by representing Rebekah as his sister, of which Abraham had been guilty. But, except in these instances, there is no marked resemblance in the histories of the two men. The life of Isaac was one, from beginning to end, of quiet and prosperity; though whether he was permitted to see so far into God's designs for the future as his father had done, may be doubted.

Time passed, and the children that had been born to Isaac by Rebekah, unlike even in their outward appearance, grew up to bear little or no resemblance to one another in their dispositions and habits. The elder, Esau, was a cunning hunter, a man of the field, -the younger, Jacob,

was a plain man, and dwelt in tents. Nor was this the only remarkable distinction which the will of God had drawn between them. Ere yet they saw the light, or, as a necessary consequence, could have done either good or evil, He who ordereth all things had appointed to each the part which he should play in the moral guidance of the world. A decree had gone forth from God, by which the younger was chosen to be the stock from which the Messiah should come; while the elder, through no fault of his own, was denied that high honour. Now I am not ignorant that this gracious act on God's part has sometimes been brought forward as a proof that He accepts or rejects, that He rewards or punishes, that He will receive into heaven, at last, or thrust into hell, whomsoever of the human race he may think fit so to deal with, without any reference whatever to their personal behaviour. But he who takes this view of the matter, very much misrepresents both the nature of the Most High,