It came to pass when Isaac was old, and his eyes were so dim that he could not see that he called

Esau, his older son. Do you see the picture? Isaac now is not the young man bound by ropes and

placed upon an altar looking up at the upraised knife of his father there at Mount Mariah.

Now Isaac himself is of advanced age, and he knows that the moment of his death is near.

Although none of us deserve the favor of God, the Bible is filled with individuals who seem

like unlikely candidates to receive the blessing of God. Numbered high on that list would be Abraham's

grandson, Jacob. Hi, I'm Nathan W. Bingham, and thank you for joining us today for renewing your mind.

Jacob conspired, schemed, lied, yet he still received the blessing from his earthly father,

and God himself. Today, Arcee Sproul tells the dramatic story of Jacob, the patriarchal blessing,

and the redemption that we enjoy in Christ. Here's Dr. Sproul.

The history that is recorded for us in the book of Genesis is sometimes called the history of

the patriarchs or the history of the patriarchal period, because the featured characters in this

narrative include people like Noah and Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and so on. These are the

leading characters throughout the history of Genesis. Now, a patriarch in Old Testament days,

as the name suggests, indicates a father who is a ruler. That is, the authority in this environment

and this system is invested in the father. We've also known cultures that we call matriarchal,

where the ruling authority is vested in the mother when a queen is on the throne in a monarchy.

At that time, the monarchy is matriarchal, as it were, as opposed to patriarchal. But the term

patriarch indicates more than the head of an individual household. In the ancient scriptures,

that patriarch, for example, Abraham was not only in a position of leadership and authority

over his own immediate house, but also over his extended family. And as long as he was alive,

even after his sons were born and so on, he remained the patriarch of the wider family. In fact,

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