Esau had the birthright given him.
In the olden times this meant not only temporal but spiritual blessing.
One day Esau took this birthright and traded it off for something to eat.
Oh, the folly! But let us not be too severe upon him, for some of us have
committed the same folly.
After Esau had thus parted with his birthright, he wanted to get it back.
Just as though you, tomorrow morning, should take all your notes and
bonds and government securities, and should go into a restaurant, and
in a fit of restlessness and hunger throw all those securities on the
counter and ask for a plate of food, making that exchange.
This was the exchange Esau made.
He sold his birthright for a mess of pottage, and he was very sorry about
it afterward; but “he found no place for repentance, though he sought it
carefully with tears.”
There are sins which, though they may be pardoned, are in some respects
irrevocable; and you can find no place for repentance, though you seek it
carefully with tears. After wasting forty years, you can not get back the
neglected advantages of boyhood and youth.