Esau had despised his birthright. It says in Genesis 27:34 that when he heard that he had missed the blessing, "he cried out with an exceedingly great and bitter cry." Now he regretted the decision he had taken many years earlier to sell his birthright. He had then thought that he would outsmart his simple-minded brother, Jacob, by getting the porridge from him then and the birthright as well later. But God outsmarted Esau finally. God knows how to "catch the wise in their own craftiness" (1 Cor.3:19). He ensured that Jacob got the birthright. So let all clever schemers beware. You will finally reap from God what you sow now.
It says in Heb.12:16,17: "Let there be no immoral or godless person like Esau, who sold his own birthright for a single meal, for you know that afterwards when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected". You make a choice in life when you are young. You come to a fork in the road when you are young, concerning moral matters especially. That is why it talks there about immoral people.
Do you want the birthright, the eternal blessings, the spiritual blessings, or do you want the temporal blessings, the immediate ones, the bowl of porridge, that will satisfy your bodily needs? That's a choice that faces many young people today - a choice between that which is eternal, spiritual and in the future AND that which is temporary, material (physical) and available immediately.
We all come to that fork in the road often. Moses came to that, and he refused the pleasures of sin, the wealth of Egypt and the honour of being Pharaoh's grandson (Heb.11:24-26). And so God could use him. Many of you are at that fork in the road right now. You may say, "Let me indulge a little bit in these things. Ultimately, I will repent and get the spiritual blessing too." Let me assure you that you will not. Like Esau, you will only reap what you have sown.
Make the right choice now for it says there, "See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God" (Heb.12:15). May none of us fall from the grace of God and end up like Esau.
