The Firstborn Blessing | Selvin Cortez

In this message, Pastor Selvin dives into God's Word to reveal how His blessing is built on grace, not status, background, or qualification. 

Discover how the Firstborn Blessing finds its fulfillment in Jesus and what it means for your identity and inheritance as a child of God.

REFERENCE: Matthew 1

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

It's a pleasure to be with you. Thank you so much for joining us this Sunday afternoon. There are so many other places you could be, but I believe that God has called you to be in this place today for this exact moment, for this moment where where he wants to speak a truth into your life. And that's where we're going. We're continuing on in our series, My Family and Me. And in today's message, I really need you to really focus in and tag along to everything that God is going to say to us because it's going to be so powerful. I want to get to the punchline already. But as soon as before I get there, I'm getting all excited and I'm going to start talking super, super fast. So I got to slow it down. I got to slow it down. And I want to say this during uh the announcements, MJ did announce that we are a fast-growing church. We are part of a multi-site uh um uh environment of churches with Nouvelle V. And today we have the honor of having Pastor Seb Brunel with us from Drummondville, another church that God is doing amazing things at. Pastor Seb has to do three services on Sunday, and he came here today to be with us. And so we thank you. Two, two, but we're praying for the third one. In September, it's see, those are the meetings that I shouldn't say stuff too much about. Um, but in September, we're praying, and we know that God is moving them towards three services. God is doing awesome, awesome things throughout all of our sites at Nouvelle Vie. And that's the that's the blessing that we have to be part of such a united, unifying church that God is calling. And in that unif in that unity, uh, we're gonna we're gonna continue into our series, which is my family and me. And and as I was preparing for this service, there's there's a couple of races uh that I like to watch. And one of them is the Kentucky Derby. Have you guys seen the Kentucky, the Kentucky Derby, the the The Horses? Yes, okay. The horse racing. Um, and in the Kentucky Derby, uh the only reason why I'm remotely interested in it is because uh we during COVID uh we did we did this thing at my family where we would we would have movie theme weeks. Movie theme weeks, which means for for a whole week we would watch every movie there was available on dogs. And then after that, we would watch every movie available on World War II, and then we we would we would watch all the movies available on horses, and the best movie of the whole the horses that we watched was Secretariat. Have you guys seen this? Secretariat, the movie? Great, great movie. Um, and it it just it's so inspiring. Uh, Secretariat the Horse won the triple crown, um, and and that's nearly impossible to do. And it's super, super fast horse. Well, get guess guess what? Since 2022, since 2022, all the horses that have won the Kentucky Derby have been the offspring of Secretariat. So 2025, sovereignty won. 2026, this year, Golden Tempo won. And they are a direct descendant of this amazing, under uh estimated horse, Secretariat. And even today, these horses um uh and horse owners, what they do is they they pay incredible amounts of money to get the lineage of secretariat into their horses because they want to win the Kentucky Derby and why not the triple crown. And and they pay they spend so much money uh uh on the genealogy of this horse. Because if you get the right DNA mixed together, you're gonna get a powerful horse on the other end. It's almost guaranteed that the genealogy of secretariat is gonna win you the next Kentucky Derby. Isn't that awesome? That's how DNA works, that's how genealogies work, except in the Bible. And when we open up the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew chapter one, we see the genealogy of Jesus. Look at this. This is the genealogy of Jesus all the way back to Abraham. In fact, the very first verse of the New Testament, you see how important genealogy is? The very first verse of the entire New Testament is this. This is the genealogy of Jesus, the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Now, there are so many implications to this verse, and and and when you read it, it's very simple. This is the genealogy of Jesus, the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham. It lists David and Abraham, and he does that for a very specific reason. You see, in the year AD 70, AD 70, so so AD 70, not 1970, AD 70, the Romans came in and they they they ransacked all of Jerusalem. They took everything and burnt the city down, and they burned all of their genealogical sources dating back to the king, except Matthew. And so, Matthew, for Matthew, it's really, really important, imperative that this document gets saved, gets gets protected, because it outlines the genealogy of the Son of Man, Jesus the King of Israel. And so he says this: this is the the genealogy of David and of Jesus, the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham. And it goes back 42 generations, three sets of four teens. We go back all the way from Abraham, we see Jacob, we see Isaac, we see Judah, we see David, and and the one question that comes up is as we're looking at this genealogy, we're going all the way back to Abraham, and something is being passed on to Isaac, something is being passed on to Jacob, and Jacob, Jacob, we learned last week, Jacob has 12 sons. And of the 12 sons, the oldest son, his name is Reuben. But look at the genealogy according to Matthew. Instead of going Jacob Reuben, it goes Jacob Judah. And so today's message is about the firstborn blessing. Something in this genealogy is broken, but something keeps getting passed on. Just like we've been seeing the last couple of weeks. We pass on to our children our stories. We pass on to our children our DNA. We pass on to our children our fears. We pass on to our children our prayers. We pass on to our children our worship. We pass on to our children more than just DNA. There is a string of blessing that is uniting all of these persons. There's a string of blessing, and that's where we're going into today. Today's message is the firstborn blessing. The firstborn blessing. It is so important to God that the firstborn receive a blessing. And so in the Bible, the the Bible says in Deuteronomy chapter 21, verse 17, it says this, he shall acknowledge the firstborn. See, the blessing belongs to the firstborn. And Deuteronomy says he shall acknowledge the firstborn by giving him a double portion of all that he has, for he is the first fruits of his strength. The right of the firstborn is his. So the right of the firstborn, how many firstborns are in this room right now? Raise your hand. Okay, let me tell you this. There is a double portion. No, hold on a second, because then all of the all of the secondborns are gonna be like, I'm uh well, guys, guess what? I'm number two. I'm number two in my family, and uh, and my sister's number three, so she's not getting any blessing. Um, I'll tell you that much. Um, but but no, no, no. Um there is there is uh there is a blessing that is associated to the firstborn. And the firstborn carries these four things. The firstborn carries identity, inheritance, authority, and a future. These four things: identity, inheritance, authority, and future. That's the blessing of the firstborn, and the firstborn son would take on the father's identity, the father's name, would inherit a double portion of the blessing, and that means twice as much money, twice as much sheep, twice as much herd, twice as much home, twice as much land, a double portion was was instigated, was received by the firstborn. Didn't do anything, just was the firstborn. And then, if we go back, go back to the slide, and then we've got authority. So the the firstborn male would receive the authority of the family over the family. He was the one that was in charge after father dies. It's on him, and it's on him to secure the future of the family. And if you remember, again, going back to movies, we're to today's movie night. Today's movie night. If you remember uh a great war movie, again, during the COVID time, we watch all the war movies. Um, uh, one of the greatest war movies that we watched was Saving Private Ryan. And in that story of saving Private Ryan, these these soldiers have to go through hell just to go save the brother of a family, the youngest brother, because all of his other brothers had passed away. And so there was a rule that you have to, if you are, if you are a son, and no matter what your position is in the family, if your brothers die, you cannot go to you cannot go to war. You have to stay home. You are the last one in the family that can take on the future of the last name. And so this firstborn blessing is what God establishes over the children of Israel. But there's a problem. And we've been what we've been talking about this all these weeks. The problem is that throughout scripture, the firstborn almost never receives the blessing. If you think about Cain and Abel, Abel received the blessing, Cain was the older one. If you think of, if you think of Isaac and Ishmael, Ishmael was the older one, Isaac receives the blessing. Jacob and Esau, Esau is the older one, Jacob receives the promise and the blessing. In Jacob's own family, Jacob's oldest son is Reuben, but Joseph receives a double portion of the blessing. So throughout scripture, we see what is going on. Two weeks ago, we saw that Ephraim and Manasseh. Manasseh is the older one, and Ephraim gets the blessing. David is the youngest one of his brothers. And yet he gets the blessing. So what is God doing? People are still searching today. These same questions, questions of identity, purpose, authority, and what is my future. That same question is is plaguing our society today. Today we see we see people questioning their own identity. Who are they? People question their future. Where am I gonna go? It's a billion-dollar industry to know what your future is. There are these, and don't go looking them up, and I shouldn't even mention this, but there are there are even apps that can that can predict when you're going to die. Like, no, thank you. Um, the app has no power over God and over what we just celebrated. And so I will I will bless him with long days. The app doesn't say that. Because the app can't know. But people will pay to know, people will pay to be intrigued over this this idea of knowing the future. This is is is what's plaguing our society, identity, purpose, future, authority. And and and let me say this that the good news for our society, the good news for us today is that God isn't held back by your uh your background, he's not limited by your family history, he's not limited by the position in your family that you hold. He's not limited by any of that. God is is a God that sees beyond the natural order. He sees purpose, he's looking for someone to carry his promise. And so throughout throughout the whole genealogy that we saw, when we see that there's a jump between the firstborn to the secondborn or to the youngest of the family, it's because God is looking for someone that would carry his promise forward. God is looking for someone that would carry his promise into the next generation. And it is my strong belief that God allows us children because the calling over your life, the purpose over your life is so great that it that it over overshadows, that it overwhelms, that it that it overflows into your children. Because that's his promise over your life. The promises that God has for my lifetime, my lifetime are not is not enough. The promise that God has for your life, your life is not enough. It gets overflowed into your children, and and if for whatever reason you didn't have the chance to have uh children, God still calls you a father or a mother because you can still have and teach and pass on blessing. And in the genealogy, there is this woman, her name is Naomi, and Naomi loses her sons, and Naomi is left with her daughter-in-law named Ruth, and Ruth is a Moabite woman, and just for a little bit of context, the Moabites were a people that were cursed by God, and yet Ruth marries into Naomi's family, and her her husband, her Naomi's son, Ruth's husband, dies, and so now she's left widowed. And in that moment, she decides this, and she says to her mother-in-law, your God will be my God. And wherever you go, I will go to. You see, Naomi had no more sons, but she passed on the promise of the of the Messiah onto a Moabite woman. And you know what's crazy? There's Ruth in the genealogy of Jesus. Jesus has Moabite blood in him from his genealogy. Like his his bloodline traces back to Ruth, to Rahab, to Tamar. These women that that received this promise of God and that were faithful to God and said, I'm gonna keep the lineage going. And Jesus comes from that lineage. The promise gets passed on and on. And through scripture, we see this. We see how God is is moving. God is moving. And then the question that I have is why does God keep giving the blessing to someone else? Why does God keep giving the blessing to someone else? And I believe the answer is this that God builds his family through grace. God builds his family through grace. The covenant law. The covenant law stipulates that you must bless the firstborn. God's grace is not limited to natural law, and he chooses whom to bless. And so now it's not a question of your position in the family, now it's a question of God's grace over your life. And the firstborn blessing still exists, but now God is transferring that to somebody who is willing to carry the blessing, somebody that's willing to carry the promise. And so in this genealogy, we see Judah, the brothers who sold Joseph. We see Tamar. Let's go to the slide again. We see Tamar. Now, now grace. God, let's just go back to our definition of grace. God defines grace as being the unearned, unmerited favor over your life. What does that mean? That means you did nothing to earn it. You can do nothing to get it. It is God's free gift to you. So it's not about your position in the family, it's about God's mercy over your own life and his grace. Now, watch this. In the Bible, the word grace is also associated to the number five. In Hebrew, numbers and words are the same thing, and the only way you know the difference is with its context. So if we count one, two, three, four, five, they're counting in Hebrew until they get to five. And I don't know how to count in Hebrew. Um they're counting in Hebrew until they get to five, and when they get to five, that number five is also the word for grace. And so a moment ago, we saw that there were four verbs that brought about our destruction. And Jesus adds a fifth verb. Grace. And why do we see, why do we receive those blessings? We didn't earn them. We can't do anything to get them. But his grace is enough. His grace is sufficient to overshadow all of my weaknesses, all of my infirmities, all of my destruction, all of my sin. His grace is enough. And so watch this. Tamar, the woman who was denied justice, the fifth time we hear and read her name, the Bible says that Judah says, of her, she is more righteous than I am. The fifth time you read the name Tamar, she is more righteous than I am. The fifth time that you read Rahab's name, you see Rahab right there? The fifth time that you read her name, the Bible says Joshua saved her. Joshua is a picture of Jesus. Grace saved her. Rahab. The fifth time you read the name Ruth the Moabite, the Bible says that Ruth, watch this, Ruth found grace in the eyes of Boaz. The fifth time you read the name David in the Bible, the Bible says that David found grace before the Lord. The fifth time you read the name Noah in the Bible, the Bible says that Noah found grace in the Lord. And so we see the number five, we see God's grace. God is moving his genealogy, God is moving his promise through all of these people by grace. And Matthew leaves these names there on purpose so that we would study them, so that we could identify with them, so that you would know that it doesn't matter what your genealogy is. It doesn't matter what your past is, it doesn't matter where you're coming from. It doesn't matter who your parents were, it doesn't matter who your brother is. If you're the older brother, younger brother, middle brother, it doesn't matter where you're coming from. God's plan and his purpose over your life is given to you by his grace. That is the blessing of the firstborn. Grace over achievement, calling over qualification, God's choice over human decisions, God's choice over human status. And that is what the genealogy, Matthew chapter one, refers to. That's what Matthew is trying to get at. And Jesus continues. If we look into this, there are there are so many names here in the genealogy. In fact, it's 16 verses of genealogy. Ready for this? Azor. Azor. If you're looking for names, looking for names. Here's another one that I Zadok. That sounds like a warrior name. You know, that's that's a name that you want on the list. Eliakim. That's another name. These are warrior names. So if you're thinking about it, Matthew chapter one is all yours. Just pick a name out of there. But what's interesting is that the blessing of the firstborn son continues on because in Matthew, as we continue on to read, it says chapter 17, thus there were 14 generations in all, from Abraham to David, 14 from David to the exile of Babylon, and 14 from the exile to the Messiah. This is how the birth of Jesus, the Messiah, came about. So the genealogy, this is this is God's secret. He is showing us that the genealogy doesn't end, doesn't continue into Jesus. It ends at Jesus. You see, Jesus is the fulfillment of the blessing of the firstborn. Jesus is the one that can carry the authority. Jesus is the one that can carry the inheritance. He's the one that can carry the identity. And that is what Matthew is leading us to. He's saying that the firstborn blessing is still active. It's just not active in the natural firstborn, it's active in the actual firstborn. And we see this throughout the scripture. We see that God calls his son, the Father calls his son the firstborn. If we go to Colossians chapter 1, verse 15. Speaking of Jesus, Colossians, the Apostle Paul writes this He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. Now, before we take one more step forward, this is a verse that a lot of people will use against the Lordship and the divinity of Jesus. They will point to this verse and they will say, You see, Jesus is created. Because it says right there that he is the firstborn of all creation, because they don't understand that firstborn is no longer a position in the body in the family, a natural position. Firstborn is an authoritative position. Firstborn means that he holds all power, that he holds all authority, that he holds all inheritance, that he holds all the future in his hands. The firstborn blessing is now a position. Instead of being a natural occurrence in the family, it is now a rank in the family. And as rank, Jesus is above all. He has authority over all. The Bible says that Jesus was given all authority. That Jesus is given the inheritance. He is the heir of all things. That's what the Bible says of our Jesus. If we go into John 1, chapter 1, verse 1, it says, In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. That just shows us that Christ was not created. If we go into Hebrews chapter 1, verse 3, it says, The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Father in majesty in heaven. Firstborn speaks of supremacy, identity, authority, inheritance. All position and power and authority belongs to Jesus. Every blessing carried reaches the fulfillment in Jesus. So what does that mean for me? What does that mean for us? That means that Him being firstborn means that his father becomes my father. His inheritance becomes my inheritance. My future is secured in him because he is the firstborn. And what Jesus does, that no other firstborn in his geography, why did I just forget the word? Genealogy. What no firstborn in the genealogy of Jesus does, none of them share their blessing. Jesus is the only one, the true firstborn who receives all the blessing of the Father who is the first to share his blessing with us. So if you're not the firstborn in your family, I want you to know that your inheritance is not determined by your position in your earthly family. Your inheritance is determined by your relationship with Jesus. And so for the last couple of weeks, we've been in this series called My Family and Me. And I think today, I think those are actually the words of Jesus. And if we flip the script around and we stop saying my family and me, and see Jesus on his throne, saying, This is my family. And because of me, they are coming to see me. Because of the sacrifice that he shed, we have access to him, and he is declaring over us today, you are my family. And it is something so special, so crazy to be a part of this family. It's it's wild. Um look, let me just show you. Jonathan is in the back somewhere. John, if you can hear me, can you come out, please? Uh Josue, where's Josue? Josue, could you come? Could you come please? There's Jonathan, there's Josue. Just come right here. Right up here. That's fine. Simon, can you come, please? Thank you guys. This is awesome. Joshua, where's Joshua? There's Joshua. Take your time, don't worry. There's Joshua. I want to tell you something. These four men, and and I'm missing a couple. These four men right here. I have known them for about two years. That's it. Josh? He grew up 20 minutes away from where I grew up. That's wild. Crazy. Grew up in Grimsby. I grew up in Thorald. That's like I have friends in Grimsby Grimsby. In fact, I actually think we could have we could have seen each other back then. And if I would have known Josh back then, I'm telling you right now, he would have been my best friend. And John, from the moment I met John and his family, I just fell in love with all of them. And and there's a special heart in him that I see God moving so powerfully in your life. And I want to thank you for allowing God to move in your life, for being here. And Josue, Josue and I, I mean, we text almost every day. He was on vacation this week. Like he asked me, I had to say yes. Okay, you can go. Josue works with me, and I had to say yes. And it was tough for me to not text him because I knew he was on vacation. And and and he's become a brother of mine. Two years, two years. Simon, I've known for two years. And Simon has become a voice in my heart, a voice in my path that I need for guidance, that I need for maturity, that I need for help. He's become that voice. And these men I've known for a total of two years, a little bit more. And yet I would answer the phone at three o'clock in the morning if any one of these called. If they call me up and say, Salvan, I'm in trouble. Uh my question is, do I take the shovel? Do you want me to bring a shovel? Is that is that what is that the trouble we're in? If if if they call me at any point, I would go to war with these men. And I've only known them for two years. And that's the power that God brings to a family like us. That's the love and the unity that binds us together. You see, Simon doesn't know much of my past, none of these men do. But what they know is that they love Jesus as much as I do, and that they are bound to the love and the purpose of God for their lives as much as I am. And it doesn't matter what position we are coming from in our families, what matters is that there is a thread of promise, of purpose, of divine calling over our lives, and that's what joins us together, and that's what joins all of us as a family together. Thank you guys. Thank you. That's what joins us together, that's the power of when Jesus says, Me and my family, that's the power of Jesus coming together in a community like ours. Let me tell you this: you are not alone. There is somebody in this room that loves you, that doesn't need to know you, that doesn't need to know your family background, that you don't have to be ashamed, that you don't have to be secluded, that you don't have to be that set apart. Somebody in this room loves you for who you are because of who is in you, and I want to be that somebody for your life, and my family wants to be that somebody for your life. And can I say this? You are that somebody for my life. I brought up these four men, but there are more. Just looking around this room, there are so many more. The blessing that you have that you give to me is far beyond anything I could ever give back to you, and that's the power of the family of God. You're not alone, do not live any pain alone, do not live any hurt by yourself, do not live loneliness by yourself, do not live, do not live anxiety by yourself. If you're a single mother here, there are about two hundred fathers in this room right now. If you're a single father, there's about two hundred mothers in this room right now. If you're a young person looking for a father, there's about 200 fathers in this room. If you are a business person, there's about 400 business partners in this room. Now you may not pay them all. But you know what you can get? Prayer from them all for your business, for God to prosper you, for God to provide for you. If you are sick in this room, there are 400 nurses. We can't all go to your bedroom beside you, but we can all pray for you. And we're gonna create prayer chains, we're gonna pray for each other. And right now, there's this word that God has given to me the last two weeks, and that word is very simple someone is missing, someone is missing, and so today I know there's a World Cup and Germany's playing, and all of this, I know the World Cup is going on, but today I've got a special assignment for you. I want you to look around and before you leave this place, get somebody's phone number that you don't know and make sure that they're here next week. And if they're not here next week, somebody is missing. Call them, ask them, how are you doing? I didn't see you at church. Is everything okay? You don't have to tell me, but if there is a prayer request that you have, I will pray with you. And in fact, I'm not only gonna pray with you, I've got a whole team of people that are praying for me that I can tell them to pray for you. Because it's not about me. I need prayer, yes, but I know that you need prayer. If you weren't here last Sunday, that's okay. Um I want to pray for you. Is there something that I can help you with? And let's start creating chains of prayer, chains of connection, and that is what Jesus is calling over our lives. That is the blessing of the firstborn that is being spread out over our lives, the blessing to do to have authority, the blessing. I keep messing up with this paper, uh, the blessing for identity. You now have an identity in Christ, you now have an inheritance in Christ, you now have authority to pray over the sick and to heal and to cast out demons and to pray and to and to launch people into their futures. You have a future in Jesus Christ, that is your blessing, that is the blessing that Jesus passed on to us, and so I want to invite you to stand to your feet, identity, inheritance, authority, and a future. You don't have to wrestle with your identity anymore. You don't have to worry what position, what order you were in your family, you don't have to worry if brother or sister got blue eyes and you got brown eyes. My sister got green eyes. I wanted green eyes. The Bible says that grace is a person, grace and a truth came in the person of Jesus, and so the grace of God is over your life. What does that mean? That means you don't have to strive anymore. Can I say it this way? When you work, he rests. When you rest, he works, and he's working over your life. So let's cease striving and working and trying to gain. We can't. It is by his grace, his overwhelming grace, that you are blessed, and it is but what but by what he did on the cross for our lives that you are blessed. You are blessed. There is this promise over your life, it is the firstborn blessing, and it is the blessing of Jesus, our true firstborn. We're gonna bless his name, and we're gonna sing his name, and we're gonna worship his name as our firstborn Savior. The blessing of God is over our lives, the blessing of God is over your life to carry the promise, to carry the purpose, to carry the strength, to carry the calling of God over your life. And if you are hurting today, let me tell you: He took on your hurt, he took on your pain, he took on your suffering, he took on your weakness, he took on your sickness, so that you could be blessed, so that you would be strong, so that you would be healed, so that you would live long days. His grace is over your life, his grace is over your life, his grace over your life.