It Comes Down to Love
August 26, 2020Telling Yourself the Truth
August 28, 2020In the book of Hebrews, the Apostle Paul refers to the story of Jacob and Esau, and he interprets this story that has been so misunderstood:
Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many. See that no one is sexually immoral, or is godless like Esau, who for a single meal sold his inheritance rights as the oldest son. Afterward, as you know, when he wanted to inherit this blessing, he was rejected. He could bring about no change of mind, though he sought the blessing with tears. Hebrews 12:14-17
Esau is referred to as “godless.” He sold his inheritance rights as the oldest son for a single meal, and yet Jacob fought, planned, yearned for the birthright and the blessings. The point is this: many people come to Weigh Down Ministries just to lose weight. They learn the techniques, but their motive is all about weight loss and all for self—they were not seeking or longing for the birthright, a relationship with the Almighty God of the Universe.
Weigh Down is not about losing weight at all. It is about connecting to God your Creator so that you can live and live eternally. To connect, we must be like Jacob and compete for His presence and love and show God that we want it—that we are not going to let food get in the way of a relationship with God, laying down the love of the created things on Earth over the Creator, and the result just happens to be the receiving of the fruit of God’s Spirit and His characteristics, which include love and joy and peace and patience and kindness and goodness and faithfulness and gentleness and self-control. This self-control leads to weight loss.
This is about a relationship with God. Esau would despise the relationship with God. This means that he did not consider being close to God as more important than anything in the world. Food could come between him and being first with God, getting all the blessings from God—he would sell it all for food. You have to reverse that. You have to show God that you would rather have a relationship with Him than just a single meal. You would rather have His blessings than food.
