Reshaped by God

Nothing quite upsets the  Christian like the realization that she is not her own.  The mental assent of it is comfortable and in ways pleasing but the working out of it is discombobulating.  As soon as you give Christ your life it is His and He may not work it out the way you want it.  Like a ball of clay in the hands of a master, you will be reshaped until the Lord is satisfied; not until you are fine with how things are.  Esau was "hated" by God not because he was such a foul person but because he never had God in mind as he went about his business.  He lived for his own today and not any further.  Jacob in his complicated passion, wanted all God had and more.  Jacob could work for Esau if he might have the birthright and lose his father's affection if he could get the blessing. In the perversity of his scheming, always Jacob had at the front the vastness of God and the Lord blessed Him in his madness.  Before we see something in God and Jacob that was never there; it must be reminded that Jacob was clay and the reshaping of him took a lifetime.  While Abraham had the faith to give at God's command his son Isaac freely, the Lord stripped Jacob without warning of each delight he treasured.  First it was his mother, then his sweetheart Rachel and finally his beloved son Joseph.  At each point Jacob could do nothing to take back the lamb on the altar.  His hands were tied and he was left to wait out the terrible reworking of his heart until God was finished with him on it.  Jacob was not his own and this became dreadfully clear to him with each lamb God took from his grip.  You can wallow in self pity over the shape God is pounding into you or you can be satisfied with the mercy God has to not leave you as an Esau "hated" but reworked like Jacob "loved".

...so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.   Jeremiah 18:4 NIV