Why did God choose Jacob instead of Esau? The sorry of this two brothers is an interesting story particularly the election of Jacob by God over Esau to a man through whom God will fulfill His promise to Abraham.
In the human point of view, Esau was more righteous than Jacob. Two incident attest to this. Once upon a time, when Esau came back hungry from hunting, he met Jacob preparing stew and when he requested for the stew, Jacob said that he can only give him stew on one condition and that is in exchange of birth right. This is not common. One cannot imagine what was on Jacob's mind to make such a bargain. Morally and culturally it was not correct for Jacob to make such a demand. He was rather bound to give his brother stew even without any demand.
The second instance is when Jacob connived with Rebecca (their mother) and deceitfully receive blessings that were meant for Esau from Isaac (their father). I believe you know the story. Again, this was not in anyway right in morally. Their father’s decision was to culturally bless his first son who will take after him and when it was time for that, he send Esau fielding so that he would enjoy his field dividend and then bless him in pleasure. Unfortunately, Isaac ended up blessing Jacob whom he had not plan to bless. Jacob got his blessing through deception and cheating by deceiving his father and cheating his brother Esau.
The amazing thing in this story is that this same Jacob is the person God chose and bless “Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated (Romans 9:13).” From human judgment, Jacob would have rather been sentence to certain number of years in castration or condemned to death and Esau would have received justice. This however, is not the case with God’s dealing and judgment.
This teaches us that God’s ways are different from human ways. His ways are far beyond human understanding. Ordinarily, this does not make any sense; it seems unfair that God would bless Jacob despite his unfair treatment to Esau. Esau that should have been blessed and loved, from human point of view, is rather hated.
This also reveals the grace of God in his dealing with the sons of men. God’s election is not based on merit but by grace. Humanly speaking, Esau is the qualified and the right deserving person to receive God’s blessing. But God graciously chose Jacob so that Jacob will look back, remember his past, and see nothing but God’s mercy and grace and then all the glory will be unto God.
Lastly, this shows that God choose the despised to shame the honored (1 Corinth. 1:27) Isaac was bias in his love for his children, he loved Esau more than Jacob, though Jacob was loved by his mother but every child needs the love of his or her father. Jacob could have coveted and envied his father’s attention to Esau, he might even have struggle to get his father’s attention over to himself. You can imagine the psychological challenge Jacob could have grown in.
May be Isaac loved Esau because he was more masculine nature and Jacob more feminine, as their activities attest to that fact, whatever the reason, no reason can justify a father from loving his children equally. However, the child who was less consider by his father became the child of the promise. Sometimes parent have tendency to be selective in showing love to their children. And it always happen that children who are always given less consideration always amazingly turn out to become important personalities in future.
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