“Mom always liked you best!” That is the signature line of Tommy Smothers, half of the famous musical comedy team The Smothers Brothers.  Tommy and Dick Smothers have been performing together for 50 years, and have gotten quite a career and a lot of laughter out of the “foolish older brother/clever younger brother” bit that is their trademark.

Sibling rivalry is probably the first rivalry any of us experience.  We compete for care and attention from the adults around us with our brothers and our sisters.  By the time of adolescence, this rivalry can become ferocious and vocal; and sometimes it persists well into adulthood.  Buried for years in polite relationship, it often emerges again when it is time to make decision about the care of aging parents.

If one of our kids was misbehaving, the other would often turn into a little angel.  “the good child,” we’d joke.  And when aware of liking him better, we’d say, “well, right now, he’s more likeable.  But he won’t keep it up – tomorrow we’ll like his brother better.”

Neither the Smothers Brothers nor the Stevens brothers invented sibling rivalry.  Cain kills Abel while the first blush of newness is still on God’s creation.  Jealousy between the mothers establishes enmity between Isaac and Ishmael, the sons of Abraham.  And then Isaac’s twin sons, Jacob and Esau, turn out to be one foolish and the other manipulative.

Who knew that the Smothers Brothers were playing out the theme of a biblical story!

In the case of Jacob and Esau, the story makes no effort to conceal the fact that Rachel does like Jacob better than Esau.  Jacob is nurtured by his mother’s side, no doubt preferring cooking and reading over hunting and football.  Esau, on the other hand, as the oldest son and one interested in pursuits typical to the male social role models, is favored by his father, Isaac.

The patriarchal values typical of the ancient biblical world are woven thoroughly into this story.  And one of those values is that the oldest son is the heir, both of the property of the family, and of the blessing of the elder for the role as head of the family.  When this story is heard in its original context, here is what the neighbors are saying:

“That Esau is a rascal – can’t think beyond the end of his own nose.  Boy, he’ll make a mess of things when old Isaac dies.  He won’t have a clue how to manage his inheritance.  And poor Jacob – Esau will probably throw him out of the house once Rachel’s not there to protect him.  On the other hand, Jacob is always scheming with his mother, so heaven only knows what they’re up to.”

In between Jacob and Esau in the ancient text – and Tommy and Dick Smothers and their comedy routine, there are plenty of us who could learn from the contrasts between Jacob and Esau.

Esau is all about instant gratification.  He sells his whole future because he’s hungry right now.
Jacob is all about exploiting his brother’s weakness to achieve his own goals.

Aren’t biblical family values just precious?

What they are is real and honest about who we are when we are human.

Real families are at real risk today because the temptations of instant gratification and the exploitation of the weaker to achieve prosperity for the stronger is not only tolerated, but expected.  There are a lot of levels on which to think about instant gratification and its danger; economics is one way.

In 2003, savings rates in the United States hit their lowest level since the Great Depression – actually going negative for one quarter of the year, primarily because savings were being depleted to fuel consumer spending, a lot of it on big ticket items.  According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis of the Department of Commerce, personal savings rates remain below 1% of disposable personal income.

At the least, we learn from Esau that our temptation to instant gratification is not unique to the last 50 years of American culture.  It is an old, old temptation.

We have a basic human need for relationship, for approval, for a sense of our worth and our ability to contribute meaningfully to the world.  We need to know that we are loved and valued and worth receiving a blessing.  The truth is – we can never feed that need enough by buying things.  And the further truth is, instant gratification steals the future.  The woman I saw on Oprah who spends thousands of dollars a month on clothes and salon appointments is stealing her children’s future.  Your part of the National Debt, by the way, is around $31,000.

There’s a little bit of Esau in all of us – feeding today’s hunger because tomorrow is always a day away.

And there’s a little bit of Jacob in all of us, too.  Jacob has thought carefully about how he might secure his future.  He knows what he wants and he sets out to achieve his goal.  That he is up against an iron clad patriarchal system that will allow him no inheritance provides no real obstacle.  He exploits his brother’s human weakness to gain the upper hand.  Later, he will trick Isaac, his father, into also giving him the blessing.  That kind of strategic planning is likely to get him a big corporate bonus at the end of the year!

But – to return to the biblical narrative for just a moment.  This story does tell us how the God called Yahweh became the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  If you want to understand how the younger twin got to be the bearer of the covenant, this story explains it.

And if you want to know what God does with us when we are people smitten with instant gratification and tempted to exploit every advantage, this story can help with that too.

This kind of rivalry depends upon a winner/loser set up; or an either/or mentality.  Jacob cannot see his way to gaining blessing and prosperity without finding a way to take it from Esau.  True enough, the father has only one blessing and one inheritance to give.  The blessing goes with the birthright.  This perception of scarcity is at the root of so much rivalry – including sibling rivalry.  We somehow are led to believe that if someone else gets what they need, we will get less of what we need.

But God’s economy appears to work differently.

It’s hard to say whether God liked Esau or Jacob better.  The culture would have given Esau the covenant.  Jacob got it.  The story never tells us what God preferred.  What it does tell us is that God worked with the people God had chosen, and used their rivalries and their foolishness and their conniving to accomplish blessing for everybody.  In fact, Esau will go on to prosper.  Jacob will have his share of challenges.  The blessing does not come without significant struggle.

This story is surely not prescribing manipulation and instant gratification as biblical values by which we should live.  It is describing the human values by which we often discover we are living.  And reminding us that God redeems us using whatever we bring to God.

Not one of us is immune to jealousy and rivalry.  In our families, in our social settings, in the workplace, in academic settings, when we play sports; We all struggle to make space for ourselves; to get what we deserve, what we need, what we have worked for and feel we’ve earned.  And we don’t always get it.  Sometimes because, like Esau, we give away our future by our own foolishness.  Sometimes, like Jacob, because someone more clever than us undermines our efforts.

And sometimes, honest to goodness, because there is somebody legitimately more capable or more deserving than us.  Rivalry and jealousy is seldom really about the other person – it’s almost always about our own insecurities, the smoldering suspicion that the one whose love or approval or affirmation we treasure loves our rival more.

I don’t know if Mrs.  Smothers loved Dick more than Tommy – but even if she did, after Tommy throws off his signature line – he set his fingers to plucking the bass, and Dick begins to strum the guitar and they make music together.

I don’t know if God loved Jacob more than Esau.  We only know that Rachel did.  And that seems awfully unfair to Esau.  But he stays in the story long enough for us to know that he and Jacob are forever brothers.  Esau prospers, and forgives and reconciles with Jacob.

What we do know is that God does not love Jacob more than Esau.  Or Dick more than Tommy.  Or me more than you.

What we do know is that our achievements and triumphs over our rivals have no standing in God’s eyes – no power to make God love us more or less.

All God’s love is there for me.  All God’s love is there for you.  And whatever failures, character flaws, weaknesses, or temptations we bring to the table – and we all bring some! God takes us as we are, and will, if we are attentive and willing to cooperate – make for us a blessing and a future with hope.

And that’s good news.