04-Genesis 31 – Exodus 1
Jan. 17, 2009
In the beginning of Chapter 31 six years have passed since Jacob took control over the flocks of his father-in-law Laban. The Lord blessed Jacob and through his selective breeding of the flocks became extremely wealthy. Laban had become very angry with Jacob and jealous of his good fortune. The Lord told Jacob to gather his family and return to the land of his father Isaac. Jacob justified the move to his wives by reminding them of his 20 years of dedicated service to their father, and his anger with him over how the Lord had blessed them. Jacob also blamed the Lord for his deception of Laban over the breeding of the flocks. They gathered their belongings and left for Canaan unannounced. When Laban was told three days later that they had left, he gathered his men and pursued Jacob and his family. Laban and his men caught up with Jacob’s party as they traveled in the Hill Country of Gilead. Laban confronted Jacob and wanted to know why he had left Haran unannounced. Laban was upset that he was unable to even kiss his daughters and grandchildren goodbye. Laban’s manner was somewhat subdued because the night before the God of Jacob had come to him in a dream and told him to neither speak good or bad to Jacob. Even though Laban did not worship God, he feared Him for what he had done for Jacob. He did manage to accuse Jacob and his family of the theft of his own household gods. Jacob allowed Laban to conduct a search throughout all his possessions for his gods, and swore that he would put the thief to death if found in his group. Laban was unable to find the idols in Jacobs’s goods because his daughter Rachel took them and was sitting on them while Laban was searching. She deceived her father into not standing up and revealing the idols by telling him it was her time of the month. Jacob and Laban agreed on a covenant between their two families to separate them from each other. They swore an oath to each other that neither would enter the other’s territory from that day forward, thus protecting both of them from harm. In Chapter 32 Jacob and his family continued on their journey until they came upon his brother Esau. Scouts from his group told him that Esau was coming to them with 400 of his men. Jacob still feared his brother because of what he had done to him 20 years ago. He told his servants to prepare a large gift of livestock for his brother, and go ahead of them and present it to Esau. Jacob helped his family to cross the river at the ford Jabbok and returned back to the other side by himself and camped for the night alone to spend time in earnest prayer. Jacob wrestled with the Lord the entire night and would not let Him go until he received a blessing. By the time of daybreak he still had not let go, and the Lord did finally bless him. As this time the Lord changed Jacob’s name to Israel and put his hip out of joint to remind him of the change. From the time of this event on in God’s Word Jacob will be referred to by the Lord as Israel when he is acts in God’s will and as Jacob when he does things on his own and acts like the deceiver he was known to be. Jacob looked up from the events of the night and saw his Brother Esau approaching. He gathered his nerve and lined up his family from least favored to the most favored, then went ahead to meet his brother. To Jacobs surprise Esau was happy to see him. Esau had prospered during Jacob’s absence and had forgiven him after all these years. Jacob, I believe out of guilt, insisted that Esau keep the gift his servants had prepared for him. Again, similar to the way he did with father-in-law Laban he left the area with his family unannounced instead of telling his brother that he was leaving. Years later, at the end of Chapter 33, Jacob settled with his family in the city of Shechem. While living there his daughter Dinah went about with the women of the town. Shechem, the son of Hamor the Hivite, saw Dinah and wanted her. He took her, and forced her. He fell in love with Dinah and asked his father to get her for him as his wife. Jacobs’s sons were outraged with Shechem because he had defiled their sister. The brothers convinced their father Jacob to allow the marriage only if the men of Shechem would consent to be circumcised and join with them. The men agreed because they believed the marriage of Shechem and Dinah would help them to prosper. Three days after the men had been circumcised, and incapacitated with pain; Jacob’s sons Levi and Simeon came to the city of Shechem and killed all the weakened men to avenge their sister’s honor. This act angered Jacob in that he could not save face with the other people in the area because of the massacre. He was more worried about how he would be viewed by the Canaanites in the land then he was for the feelings of his daughter, and that his sons were the murderers of an entire town. Jacob then moved his family to Bethel in Chapter 35 and purified them in the sight of the Lord by removing from them, all of their false idols, their earrings and all other symbols of false worship in their possession. God then appeared to Jacob and renewed His covenant with him. They then continued towards Ephrath, which is now called Bethlehem, and stopped because Rachel had become pregnant and was about to give birth. She had trouble in childbirth and did not survive. She did however deliver a son who Jacob named Benjamin. Jacob buried Rachel there near Bethlehem. After this time Reuben, Jacobs’s firstborn, went in to his father’s concubine Bilhah and had relations with her. Bilhah was the birth mother of some of his brothers. Jacob found out what he had done, and this shameful act would have consequences for Reuben later. Jacob and his family continued their journey and finally arrived in Mamre before his father Isaacs’s death. Both he and his brother Esau buried Isaac there in Mamre at the age of 180 years. Chapter 37 now shifts to the story of Joseph. Joseph was the firstborn of Jacobs’s first love, Rachel, and was the favorite son of his father. His brothers resented him for this and Jacob made things worse by giving Joseph a coat of many colors to represent his favored status. Joseph further increased his brother’s hatred for him by telling them of several dreams of his that had shown them and their parents bowing down to him and also serving him. The brothers plotted to kill their younger brother Joseph at the earliest opportunity. One day Jacob asked Joseph to go and check on his brothers who were away from home tending their father’s goats and sheep. Joseph found them in Dothan. The brothers thought that this was the right time to do away with their problem, Joseph. Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn, and oldest son did not agree with their plans and wished to protect Joseph from his other brothers. He had them put Joseph into a pit and then he went away. After Reuben had left, the other brothers removed Joseph from the pit and were going to kill him right there until Judah came to Joseph’s defense. They took Joseph and sold him to a band of passing Ishmaelites heading towards Egypt. Reuben returned and found Joseph missing and was afraid of what his father would blame him. The brothers decided to solve this problem by killing a goat from the flock and splatter its blood on Joseph’s special coat and tear it so that their father would think Joseph was killed by a beast. Jacob identified the coat as the one he gave to his son, believed the brothers deception and went about in mourning over the death of his favorite son Joseph. The Bible in Chapter 38 now turns from Joseph’s life to a story in the life of Jacobs’s son Judah. Judah married outside of his own people to a woman of the Canaanite people they were living near. His wife bore him three sons, Er, Onan, and Shelah. Judah gave the woman Tamar to Er, his firstborn, to be his wife. Er was evil and displeased the Lord so much He killed him before Tamar was able to give birth to an heir. Judah gave Tamar to his second son Onan to produce an heir as was the custom of the time. Onan refused to have relations with Tamar because he wanted the inheritance for himself. This displeased the Lord also and He killed him like his brother Er. Judah promised to give Tamar his youngest son Shelah to produce the heir when he was grown. Tamar became tired of waiting for Judah to give her Shelah to provide her with her inheritance. She wanted an heir and decided to take things into her own hand. She disguised herself as a temple prostitute and waited for her father-in-law Judah to come by. Judah did not recognize Tamar and was wishing for some female pleasure after the death of his wife went in and had relations with what he thought was a prostitute. He gave the girl his staff, bracelets, and signet ring until he could return with a kid goat from his flock as payment for her services. Tamar had changed back into the mourning clothing she normally would wear and left the area. Judah returned with the goat and was confused that the prostitute was no longer there. Three months later he was informed that his daughter-in-law Tamar was pregnant through prostitution. He had her brought forward to be killed for her transgression. She showed to him his belongings that he left with the prostitute as payment and realized that she had every right to be upset with him because he had not given Shelah to her as he had promised. She gave birth to twin boys. The importance of this story is that the name of one of the twins, Perez, appears in the Book of Matthew 1:3, and also Luke 3:33 as part of the genealogy of our Lord Jesus Christ. In Chapter 39 we get back to Joseph’s story. When the Ishmaelites arrived in Egypt they sold Joseph into slavery to Potiphar, an Egyptian, and the captain of Pharaoh’s bodyguard. Joseph served Potiphar in his house and was blessed by the Lord. Potiphar realized this and promoted Joseph to be the overseer of all his possessions. In time Potiphar’s wife had become enamored with Joseph and wanted to sleep with him. Joseph refused to dishonor God and Potiphar with this act and would not go in to Potiphar’s wife. In her anger she falsely accused Joseph of acting inappropriately towards her so that Potiphar had no choice but to put Joseph into prison. By the end of the Chapter we are told that the Lord continued to bless Joseph even as an inmate in the prison. As it was with Potiphar, the Lord’s blessing on Joseph was so great the keeper of the prison placed Joseph in charge over all the prisoners in the jail. The cupbearer and the royal baker to Pharaoh had offended the ruler in such a way they were both thrown into the same prison that Joseph was being held in. In Chapter 40 both of the two men had dreams they were not able to interpret. After the two men were brought before the overseer and spoke of not knowing the meaning of their dreams, Joseph told them that such interpretation belongs to God then he asked them to tell him the dreams. The Lord interpreted the dreams to Joseph and he revealed to the men what he was told. Joseph told the cupbearer that in three days he would be free and restored to his former job. Joseph relayed to the cupbearer his story of false imprisonment and asked him to remember him to Pharaoh when he was released. Joseph then told the baker that in three days he would be executed. These things came to pass exactly as Joseph had said, but the cupbearer did not remember Joseph when he returned to his duties for Pharaoh. Two years later in Chapter 41 Pharaoh had a strange group of dreams about some cows and grain. He called for all the magicians and wise men of Egypt to interpret his dreams, but no one was able to tell him what the dreams meant. The King’s cupbearer then remembered a young Hebrew boy in the jail he was in two years before who was able to interpret dreams. Joseph was cleaned up and brought before Pharaoh and told the dream. God revealed to Joseph that the both dreams indicated seven years of plenty followed by seven years of severe famine in the land. He told Pharaoh the interpretation and encouraged him to locate a wise man to oversee Egypt and store up grain during the years of plenty. They could find no one in all of Egypt that possessed the qualifications to do this. But Pharaoh being a wise ruler himself realized that Joseph, the only man in all of Egypt wise enough to correctly interpret his strange dreams would be the perfect choice. Pharaoh then placed Joseph as ruler over all of Egypt under him. Joseph had the Egyptians store up grain during the years of plenty and when the years of famine came Egypt had an abundance of food. People from all around would come to Egypt to buy grain from Joseph. The famine had also spread to the Land of Canaan where his father and brothers were living. Jacob sent his sons to Egypt to buy some grain. Joseph recognized his brothers even though they did not recognize him. Joseph was now older and dressed in the finery of a royal Egyptian. Joseph remembered his dreams and realized it was God’s appointed time to bring his brothers to repentance. The text describes the trials Joseph caused his brothers to endure while supplying them with grain until finally revealing himself to them. They feared him because of what they had done. Joseph told them not to worry that God in His wisdom had sent him ahead of them in order to save their lives. Joseph was then reunited with his father and he had the family move away from Canaan and settle in Egypt to be near to him. Pharaoh heard of this and was pleased. He said he would give the Hebrews the best land in all of Egypt to settle in. The Lord came to Jacob and also told him to go to Egypt with his family. They settled in the land of Goshen, an abundant region of Egypt on the eastern part of the delta of the Nile River. By the end of Chapter 47 Jacob had grown old and sick and was ready to die. He asked his sons not to bury him in the Land of Egypt. In Chapter 48 he began to bless his sons with their inheritance. He began by breaking established tradition and blessing Joseph with the double portion of inheritance meant for the firstborn and adopting his two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. His firstborn Reuben had forfeited the rights of the firstborn when he slept with his father’s concubine Bilhah after Rachel had died. Levi and Simeon also forfeited the rights of the firstborn because of their massacre of the men of the city of Shechem. The physical and spiritual leadership of the family was passed on to Judah. It is through Judah that the unbroken line of genealogy passes to Jesus Christ. The text shows that the blessings of Jacob to his sons are full of prophecy concerning things that would happen, and characteristics his descendants would have in the future. The Book of Genesis ends in Chapter 50 with the death of Jacob. Joseph also dies, but before he does he tells his brothers that although they meant what they did to him for evil, that God meant it for good. He also made them promise not to bury his bones in Egypt. The Book of Exodus begins many years later after the Children of Israel had multiplied and prospered in Egypt. A new Pharaoh came to power that did not remember Joseph. The new Pharaoh saw that the Hebrew people had become many and powerful in the land, and decided he needed to do something about it. He issued a command, to the Egyptian midwives assisting the Hebrew women about to give birth, to kill any newborn male Hebrew child when he was born. He believed that this would control their numbers and slow their power. The midwives feared the God of the Hebrews more then they feared Pharaoh and refused to do this evil thing. Pharaoh, unable to control the midwives, issued a command to all of Egypt that every Hebrew boy must be thrown into the River Nile and be drowned. This ends our study for this week. Next week we will continue in the Book of Exodus and meet Moses, Aaron, and the Children of Israel, and learn of their deliverance by God from their bondage in Egypt.