Sonship, to which election brings us, (for we are predestinated unto the adoption of children,) was then shown in Isaac.
Discipline, as of a son, (for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?) is now, in its season, to be exhibited in Jacob.
And thus, after this manner, these successive histories not only continue the orderly narrative of facts, but present us with a view of that course or conduct which the grace and wisdom of God is taking with His people.
Jacob was a son as well as Isaac. But he was a son at school, or under correction; not a son, like Isaac, in the care and nurture of the home of his father; not as one given to know the rights and dignities of son and heir, but as one made to know the love, the practical love, that chastens and corrects. This was the child Jacob. But we are never to forget that we are never more distinctly children than when under such discipline. Discipline assumes adoption. The exhortation or correction speaks to us as to children. The discipline may occupy the foreground, but the fatherly love is the secret.
But this notice of Jacob as a son under discipline I give here only as a general characteristic. As to the materials of his history, various and striking as they are, we may distinguish them into four eras:
1. His birth and early life in his father's house in the land of Canaan.
2. His journey to Padan-aram, and his residence there, in the house of Laban the Syrian, for twenty years.
3. His journey back from Padan-aram, and his second residence in Canaan.
4. His journey from Canaan to Egypt, and his residence and death there.
This may be read as a simple, natural table of contents, so to call it, and I would follow it out in its order.