Letter to the Hebrews Volume 167

 We Believers Must Renew Our Spiritual Energy Part 5

Hebrews 12:17 For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. KJV

As we were reminded of the twin brother of Jacob (whom God later changed his name to Israel), we saw how he (Esau) had sold away his rightful birthright to his brother for the satisfaction or gratification of the temporal (his flesh), yet in this very next verse of Scripture we are also reminded by the writer of Hebrews how badly this man (Esau) wanted his father's (Isaac) blessing to be given to him, as it is written, "For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears." (Hebrews 12:17) (KJV). The example of this man Esau is given by the writer of Hebrews to these new Hebrew converts because they all would have been well aware of this history within the Hebrew/Jewish community, seeing how that Jacob was the third in line of the great Patriarchs of the Hebrew people being the grandson of the father of the Hebrew Nation Abraham. Esau too was the grandson of Abraham. From this one man (Abraham), God made an entire new race of humantity that did not exist before him, as it is written by Paul the Apostle with these words, "(As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before Him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were. Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be." (Romans 4:17-18) (KJV). The English word 'repentance' is translated by the Greek word metanoia meaning a change of mind; (subjectively) compunction (for guilt, including reformation); by implication reversal (of [another's] decision): - repentance. Esau wanted his father's blessing more than anything, however, he did not realize that his act of despising his birthright (as the eldest son) by selling it to his brother Jacob (which by the way was not seen nor known by his earthly father Isaac), but God saw his despisal and it is why He even allowed Rebekah and Jacob to get Isaac to give the blessing, even by deception (as first born son) to Jacob. God saw the despisal and rejection of the birthright by Esau, even before the two boys were born, as we recall when He spoke these words to their mother Rebekah, "And the LORD said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger." (Genesis 25:23) (KJV). Esau did not seek repentance (a change of mind) to have his birthright (as eldest son) restored, regained, or returned unto him, instead he only wanted his father's blessing so that he would be lord over his younger brother Jacob. The real reality is that the One True God who is All-Powerful and All-Knowledgable knew that the twin Esau would reject his birthright before he was even formed in Rebekah's womb. Did God make Esau this way? Certainly Not!!! However, the One and Only God (Elohim, Adonai, Jehovah, YAWEH) who made all things seen and unseen and who has always been knows the end from the beginning and this is why He rejected Esau from being the third in line from Abraham and Isaac. God knew the inner men of both Jacob and Esau before they were ever born (this being yet another example of the elect or chosen of God) and this is why He said this of them both as written by the Prophet Malachi, "I have loved you, saith the LORD. Yet ye say, Wherein hast thou loved us? Was not Esau Jacob's brother? saith the LORD: yet I loved Jacob, And I hated Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons of the wilderness. Whereas Edom saith, We are impoverished, but we will return and build the desolate places; thus saith the LORD of hosts, They shall build, but I will throw down; and they shall call them, The border of wickedness, and, The people against whom the LORD hath indignation for ever. And your eyes shall see, and ye shall say, The LORD will be magnified from the border of Israel." (Malachi 1:2-5) (KJV). Note: "Let us know and understand that God/Jesus Christ our Lord already knows every human soul from the beginning of creation to this very present time right now and to all the time He will allow to go forward before He will return to the earth and put an end to time for all eternity every single solitary soul that belongs to Him through true and genuine repentance and faith in Him and His sacrifice on the Cross of Calvary. Selah, that is, let this sink in deeply in your inner man or inner woman and by so doing let it remove any notions that God is harsh or cruel to give people up to their own way, for it is not Him doing that it is only Him being Himself and that is All-Knowing." Listen carefully to the wisdom that God the Holy Spirit wrote through King Solomon in 10th Century B.C., "Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out My Hand, and no man regarded; But ye have set at nought all My counsel, and would none of My reproof: I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh; When your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you. Then shall they call upon Me, but I will not answer; they shall seek Me early, but they shall not find Me: For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the LORD: They would none of My counsel: they despised all My reproof. Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices." (Proverbs 1:24-31) (KJV).  

Here is what Alexander MacLaren had to say of Hebrews 12:17, "Remember what I have said as to points which come out in the narrative, that the man there seeks with tears for the blessing, that so far from vainly seeking to repent, in the lower sense of the word which alone is appropriate in the present ease, he does repent. Therefore that expression of our text ‘he found no place of repentance’ does not mean ‘he found no place where he could repent,’ but it means he found no field on which such repentance as he had could operate - so as to undo that which was past. His repentance did not alter the fixed destination of the blessing. His repentance, his change of mind as to the worth of the thing thrown away, and as to his own conduct in despising it, did not bring the thing back again to him. His tears did not obliterate what was done. He wished that it had been otherwise, but his wishes were vain. And that is the lesson, my brethren, which this text as it stands is intended to teach us. We are pointed back to that tragic picture of Esau there, weeping, wringing his hands in the wild passion of his uncultured nature, when the blessing, seen to be desirable too late, had vanished from his convulsive grasp. And the lesson that is taught us is just this old solemn one. There may come in your life a time when the scales will fall from your eyes, and you will see how insignificant and miserable are the present gratifications for which you have sold your birthright, and may wish the bargain undone which cannot be undone. You cannot wash out bitter memories, you cannot blot out habits by a wish. Tears will not alter the irrevocable, you cannot avert consequences that fall upon a man, the consequences of a lifetime, by any weeping and wringing of your hands, and by any wish that they might disappear. ‘What I have written I have written,’ said Pilate, and in tragic sense it is true about many a man who at the end looks back upon many ‘a line which dying he would wish to blot,’ but which stands ineffaceable, not to be scratched out by any of your penknives, unless you can cut out the substance of the soul on which it is written. My brother! learn the lesson. You young men and women, do you begin right, that there may not be in your career deeds or a set of the life which one day you may wake to see has been all madness and misery! Oh! it is an awful thing for men to stand looking back upon a past life which to them appears as the vale of Sodom, on the morning after the eruption, did to Abraham as he looked on it from Mature, ‘and lo! the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a furnace.’ So foul with slime-pits of boiling bitumen, the indulged lusts of the flesh, and dark with curling smoke-wreaths which tell of infernal fires wasting the fields that might have waved fruitful with harvests, the dark remembrances and blighting habits of sin set on fire of hell, does many a man’s life lie spread out to his gaze. How fain would he cancel the record, if he could! How fain would he forget and reverse the history! How fain would he bring back his early innocence of these lusts and crimes! In vain! in vain! The past stands - ‘Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.’ I know, thank God for the knowledge, I know that - as we shall have to say presently - any man, at any moment of his earthly career, may find, if he seeks for it, the mercy of the Lord which bringeth salvation, but I know too that the salvation which comes to a man who has all his life been giving himself up to earth, and limiting his views and moulding his character by the present and its contemptible objects, will not be as large, as full, as blessed in many an aspect, as the salvation which might have been his if at an early stage in his life, with his character still to mould, and his memory still unwritten with evil, he had turned himself to his God, and found peace in the blood of Jesus Christ. Maimed and marred in a thousand ways, having memories which burn and sting, having habits which it will be hard to fight against; with the marks of thee gyves upon his wrists; and his eyes unaccustomed to the daylight, like the prisoner that came out of the Bastille after a lifetime of imprisonment there, and wanted to go back again because he could not bear freedom and sunshine: so many a man brought to God and saved yet so as by fire, near the end of his days, has to feel that it is not all the same whether a lifetime has been spent in the temple and priestly service, or in the foul haunts of vice and debauchery. We shall always have as much of God as we can hold, and as much of salvation as we desire; but the tragic thing is that a life spent in living, Esau-like, for the world and for the present, lames our desires and limits our capacities, so that even if such a man afterwards become a Christian, it may be impossible even for the giving God to give us as large a bestowment of His mercy and grace as we might otherwise have possessed. On the other side it is not to be forgotten ‘the publicans and the harlots shall go into the Kingdom of God before you,’ Pharisees and Sadducees. And there is such a thing as the deep repentance and the passionate trust with which a soul, all spattered and befouled with fleshly sins, may cleave to the Master that may overcome even these disabilities of which I have spoken. But in the main it remains true that even if Esau at the last gets a blessing, he bears away a less blessing than he might have done had his earlier life been different."

If you do not know the Lord Jesus Christ and His amazing healing power, pray this from your heart to the Lord Jesus Christ (you speaking directly to Him), Dear Lord Jesus, I confess to You that I am a sinner and I need Your forgiveness. I believe You shed Your Blood and died for my sins. I believe that You rose from the dead proving that You alone are God. I repent of my sins. I want to turn from my sins. I ask You Dear Lord Jesus to come into my heart and take control of my life. I want You to be my Lord, Savior, and my God. Amen...


Sincerely in Christ,


Clifford D. Tate, Sr.


Author of “Silent Assassins of the Soul - Are you Broken by Pornography and Masturbation? You can be Restored by the Lord Jesus Christ and brought into Deliverance, Freedom, and Victory! A Guide for Men and Women in the Enemy’s Crosshairs” e-book available now @ Amazon Kindle, @ Apple I Bookstore for IPod, Barnes and Noble for Nook, Reader Store for Sony Reade, Kobo, Copia, Gardners, Baker and Taylor, and eBookPie…