Birthright

"Was not Esau Jacob's brother?" the LORD says. "Yet I have loved Jacob, but Esau I have hated, and I have turned his mountains into a wasteland and left his inheritance to the desert jackals." (Malachi 1:2-3)
Jacob and Esau (as you undoubtedly know) were Isaac's sons, grandchildren of the great patriarch Abraham. Despite being twins, they were totally unlike each other, both in appearance and in temperament. Esau, the older of the two, loved the outdoors and became a skilled hunter, endearing himself to his father who liked the wild game the boy brought home to cook. Introverted Jacob preferred to stay indoors and help his mother Rebekah in the house, making himself beloved of her.
Esau cut a pretty sorry figure as a little story about him showed. He went out hunting on one occasion. He must have been gone for a few days and not had much luck in snaring anything, because when he returned he was empty handed and starving. As chance would have it, Jacob had just cooked a pot of stew. Eagerly Esau asked for a serving, but Jacob, a schemer if there ever was one, told him that he could have it only in exchange for his birthright. In a remarkable act of idiocy, Esau agreed to the trade, instantly damning himself in the eyes of God.
To understand why this act provoked God's intense displeasure, you have to understand how important the birthright was. The birthright—the inheritance of the firstborn—consisted of leadership in the family, a double portion of inheritance, and the title to the covenant blessing promised to Abraham. It was given by God himself. By "despising his birthright" as the Book of Genesis states he did, Esau effectively thumbed his nose at God. (Many Christians today are guilty of the same thing, selling their birthright thoughtlessly by trading eternal blessings for momentary pleasures.)
"I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion." (Exodus 33:19)
1. it's not your fault: homosexuality is just an alternative lifestyle, drunkenness is a disease
2. evil is really good: white lies keep you from hurting other people's feelings, I'll be like God if I eat the forbidden fruit
3. justification: if everyone else is cheating, I won't be graded fairly; that company cheats it's customers, so I can steal from it.
4. denial: a loving God won't punish anyone, nothing bad will happen if I do it just this once