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I’m going to invite you to Genesis chapter 48 together. Genesis chapter 48. And we’re going to call this chapter the chapter for the Stubborn People. Okay. And I want I thought about opening up, saying, how many of you are stubborn? But then I thought that would be useless because if I know anything about stubborn people, they’re not going to raise their hand. They’re too stubborn to do that. Right. So that’s Genesis 48 is a chapter really for for all of us, but especially, we’ll say, for stubborn people, because this is the chapter where Jacob is at the end of his life and he’s reflecting on his life in order to encourage us in the faith, as if to say, don’t learn your lessons the hard way like I had to do, right? There’s a couple ways you can learn life lessons. You can learn it through others, which is the best way. Or you can learn it the stubborn way, which is you don’t listen to anybody and you got to take the lumps yourself. And the hope this morning is we look at Genesis chapter 48 is we learn the lessons from Jacob’s life the easy way that as he gets to these final moments of his life and he reflects back on the importance of what life is about that we take we’re going to look at these, these four important life lessons on how to to live a godly life through the story of Jacob.
And so Genesis 48 is all all of that for us. But if you’ve followed the the life of we’re really looking at Joseph towards the end of Genesis, but he takes this moment at the end of Jacob’s life to to talk a little bit about him. And if you follow the life of Jacob, you’ve noticed that Jacob’s life has not been a perfect life. There have been moments where he’s been faithful to the Lord, and there have been moments where he’s struggled. In fact, his name is very reflective of his early nature in life, which was a deceiver. And part of the reason he found complications in his life is because, well, he tried to deceive his brother out of his birthright and blessing. Brother got angry, chased after him. He had to run for his life. And that decision led to him to another place where someone took advantage of him. It was his father in law and he had to run from that scenario. And and so he had some challenges that certainly followed him. Moments where, where he walked by faith, moments where he struggled. But what’s interesting as you think about the summation of Jacob’s life, as I want to toss out this obscure verse to us in Hebrews chapter 11, and you don’t necessarily have to turn there because we’re going to look at all of chapter 48 in just a minute.
But in Hebrews chapter 11, there’s a verse where the author of Hebrews summarizes a life of Jacob as being a life of, of, of faith. And he takes this one particular part of Jacob’s life in order to tell that story. And if I were to say to you, if you’ve known anything about the life of Jacob, and you were just to highlight one aspect of his story that demonstrated a person of faith, I mean, I would ask, what would that be? And it could be something like, you know, the moment where he was on the run from his brother who wanted to kill him, and he called out to God for help or or the next time he was on the run from his father in law, Laban. And and again he wrestles with God or or maybe that pinnacle moment where he thought his son was dead, only to find his son was alive. Like there are these these bigger steps of faith that these faith stories in the life of Jacob, that we see that surely when you’re going to talk about Jacob, that you would share a story like that. But but when you get to Hebrews chapter 11, Hebrews chapter 11 is known as the faith chapter. And you see the story of of Abel by faith, trusting in God, you see the story of of Noah by faith, building a boat in the middle of dry land, like he was a crazy person for 100 years.
I mean, you see the story of Abraham who packs up and moves away from his country, the place he’s familiar to at 70 years old, to go on this journey with God. And he didn’t even know where he was going. It tells you in Hebrews or Sarah who’s trusting in God to give her a kid at 90 years old, I mean these spectacular faith stories. And then after it tells these faith stories in Hebrews chapter 12, it then tells you to now you run your race, right? God’s called you to live for his glory in this world. But before you get to that, it shares this little story of Jacob’s life in verse 21. And it’s an interesting thing out of all the things they could share about Jacob, this is what the Hebrew writer says. It says, by faith Jacob, when dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, bowing and worship over the head of his staff. That is such a weird verse, isn’t it? Like you look at that and think, out of all the things you could share over Jacob’s life, why is it this one, when he’s to the point of life where he really can’t do much of anything? The thing that the writer wants you to know is that while he’s dying, he blesses his sons or his grandsons, and then that’s it.
Like, out of all the things, why is why is this the verse they want us to know? Well, as we look at Genesis chapter 48, I think we’re going to we’re going to discover the answer to why the author chooses this verse, or at least we’re going to discover why I think the author chooses this verse. But but most importantly, in in this chapter, we’re going to look through this, this verse and all that follows for lessons for for living a godly life. And in Genesis chapter 48, verse one, you see here we are at the the end of Jacob’s life. And after this it says, Joseph was told, behold, your father is ill. So he took him and his sons to Manasseh, his his sons Manasseh and Ephraim. And it was told to Jacob, your son Joseph has come to you. Then Israel summoned his strength and sat up in his bed. And here you are at the end of of Jacob’s life. And you know, the beauty of this story is it tells us what Jacob is thinking about as he comes to to his son and his grandsons. And I love how this story begins for us here at the end of Jacob’s life, because I think here in America, we’re often we’re often sanitized to the reality of death. Not that we have an experience in life, but it’s not uncommon for me as a pastor to talk to people 30, 40, maybe even 50 years old, and they’ve never even been to a funeral.
You know, there are places in life where life expectancy is still in the early 40s. The countries where medical care is is not that great. And and so life expectancy isn’t that long. And they’re from more familiar with death than, than we are necessarily. But there’s something about the end of life. And walking through that with someone that helps us recognize the importance of the life that we have. And I love hearing these final moments that Joseph is taking his sons to, these final moments to spend with their grandfather, knowing that that death is imminent. Death has this way of. While it’s wonderful to know that Jesus is ultimately defeated. Death. Death has this way of reminding us of the importance of life. And I’ve even I had a friend from Europe was talking to recently and he said, you know, it’s interesting with with Americans that you will spend in the final months of your life, you will spend as much on health care just to have one extra day as you will culminate and culminate, culminating the rest of your life. Like you’ll spend the final months more on health care than maybe the rest of your life combined just to cling to life. And he said, you know, it’s interesting in my country, in particular European countries, we don’t necessarily do that.
We embrace death more. And I thought, well, I asked him, why do you think that is? And and his only answer was, I think it’s mostly because Americans, you’re kind of across the pond and you’ve been away from a lot of the suffering of human history. Not to say American hasn’t. America hasn’t had suffering, but we’ve been kind of isolated. That and other countries in this world, they kind of have gone through the struggle of wars and and famine and disease. And, you know, here in America, even with Covid, you know, at the very beginning of that, when when people thought it was going to lead to death for all of us, you know, it was it was on the other side of the pond, right? You’re like, let’s just keep it over there, slow the curve. That was the theme. Right. And and so for us, we kind of had this sanitized way. Even the point when someone comes to the end of their life, you kind of sometimes you might send them off to the hospital, and that might be the last time that you see them until there’s a funeral. And so those final stages, we’re not always familiar with. But but here in the story you have, you have Joseph coming to his father at the end of days. And it’s it’s reflecting on the end of life that he uses this moment to teach his son, his grandsons, and even us the important lessons of learning what a what a faith journey should be about.
And point number one in your notes is this I am blessed because of God’s grace. I am blessed because of God’s grace. That should be the most obvious answer to any Christian in this room. I am blessed because of God’s grace. But but let me let me help clarify that, because I think oftentimes the way that we hear it, we confuse the purity of that statement. And what I mean is, sometimes when we hear the word, I am blessed because of God’s grace. We we, we build on that. And we think that the blessing is not not that we get God, but what we get from God. Does that make sense? Meaning, it’s not necessarily that you’ve received God himself, but rather you might be here simply because, well, you want to make God happy in order that you can get things and to make life comfortable for you. Right. And there’s there’s certain rewards, you know, monetary or or physical rewards in this earth that we might get. And so when we often talk about blessing as Christians, if we’re not careful, that’s usually all that we could mean. Or the fact that we might mean that alone could rob us of what is the greater blessing. And the greater blessing isn’t the things that you get from God.
The greater blessing is that you get God Himself. And the reason for that is everything in this world is going to pass away. Heaven and earth will pass away. But but the thing that will always remain constant in life is the consistency of God’s grace and presence over you, if you know him. The prize of life is not the things, it’s God Himself. And I hope for all of us this morning that that that is our understanding of who God is. Sometimes we we have this religious way of thinking about God that, you know, he’s this Zeus in heaven, this this absolute killjoy that’s only there to zap me with lightning bolts when I mess up. And I better not screw up because, well, I don’t want God angry with me. But when you understand the story of the gospel, it’s this. This God that has pursued you even in your sin. He didn’t give up on you, and he loves you, and there’s nothing you’re going to do to make him love you more. There’s nothing that you’ve done to make him love you less. He has given everything that you might know him, and that is the prize of life. The the fact that I am blessed because of God’s grace. And sometimes it takes us, looking at the end of our life to recognize that. And the reason I say that is because this is exactly what Jacob is doing.
We understand what he’s thinking about in the final moments of life, because he tells us that in verse three, look at this, he says. And Jacob said to Joseph, God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan, and blessed me. You know, when you think about what this moment, this moment of Luz was for, for, for Jacob in order to say that he was blessed. There is an incredible moment because this happened in Genesis chapter 28 And in this chapter, Jacob is on the run from his brother, having stolen his birthright and blessing from him. And at the end of chapter 27, his mother looks at him and says, your brother said, he’s going to kill you. You better run right? And so Jacob runs and in chapter 28, verse ten, you find him in this place called Luz, and he’s lost. He’s in this lost land, and he’s absolutely destitute to the point that he just goes to bed that night on a rock. He is literally hit rock bottom. He has he has nothing. And in this moment he cries out to God. And in crying out to God, what does he discover? Not that God hates him, not. Not that God wants to destroy him, but rather God wants to bless him. And you see this picture that takes place that in these moments the heavens open up and there is this ramp to heaven and the angels of God ascending and descending on, on Jacob in order to to bless him.
The presence of God made known in in his life when he didn’t deserve it. And yet God made himself revealed to to Jacob in order that Jacob could walk with God. Now here he is at the end of his life, and out of all the things that he tried to war for, in his own effort he’s come to realize that the greatest blessing in all of it wasn’t the things he tried to achieve in his own strength, but is that he had God himself with him wherever he went. The blessing of life is the grace of God. And here’s the beauty of this story is that this isn’t this isn’t a story that’s just exclusive to Jacob. In fact, when you turn to the Gospels in John chapter one, verse 50, this is where this is where Jesus encounters Nathaniel, and he talks to Nathaniel and says, says to him things about his life that should have been a mystery, because Nathaniel was by himself, and Nathaniel was impressed by this. He says to Jesus, how could you even know these things about me? And this is where Jesus says in John chapter one, verse 51, if that’s impressed you, greater things than this, you’re going to see the Son of Man. He says, you’ll see the, the, the heaven opened and a ramp to heaven, and the angels ascending and descending on the Son of Man, as if Jesus is saying to Nathaniel, not just to Nathaniel, all of us, that God didn’t just come for Jacob, but he came for you and for me, that we could know him and have relationship with him.
And sometimes thinking about blessing being something that you receive monetarily or physically, we often equate heaven that way. We think in terms of heaven as being this destination. I can’t wait to to be in heaven one day, but can I tell you what makes heaven? Heaven isn’t isn’t necessarily a location. What makes heaven? Heaven is the presence of Jesus and and his grace forever. Wherever Jesus is, that’s where your promise to be, and that’s where heaven is. It’s not about getting to a destination, it’s about getting to a person. And the beauty of that is, in the midst of this broken world, you have the presence of God now, and you also have the hope of knowing God forever. That is the blessing. And the Bible tells it like this to us faith, hope, and love. And the greatest of these is love. And you think about what that means in relationship with the Lord. The idea of being able to put faith in God is saying, Jesus has taken care of your past, and you look at what the beauty of what Jesus did on the cross.
He said, father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. And then he cries out, it is finished, paid in full. You’re not here to impress God with who you are, but to embrace him for who he is. The grace of God made known that you could have a relationship with him, your past forgiven. Not only that, you have a hope, a future, and as you look forward to that future, that hope, knowing this world can not rob you of what you have in him because he is always faithful. You also have faith, hope, and love in these moments. To be able to walk with him, to know him. And here’s Jacob at the end of his life and saying, and of all the things that I battle for out of all the things that I thought were important. Do you know, as I look at the end of my life, do you know what I recognize is really the most important? It came to me at Luz. When God’s grace washed over me. When I was a deceiver and a broken man. I had hit rock bottom and God was there and he blessed me. And not only has he blessed me, God’s desire is to bless you. Point number two in your notes, then, is this I’m able to bless because I have been blessed. I’m able to bless because I have been blessed. And and this is to say to all of us, look, God wants to use you where you are.
And it’s not because you’re great. It’s because he’s great. You don’t have to wait for your life to be perfect in order to be a blessing. In fact, in the midst of our mess, it’s where God often uses us to bless others. And even when you think about Jacob in these moments, I mean, he’s he’s a man capable of very little. And it tells you in verse two, he basically uses all of his remaining strength in order to set up to talk to his family for the last time. And what is he capable of doing except imparting from him what the Lord has done in him? He’s sharing the goodness of who God is. It’s not about impressing people with who he is, but helping them discover the greatness of who God is. And and therefore he’s always able to bless because he has been blessed. And you see this in verse four, it says, And God said to Jacob, behold, I will make you fruitful and multiply you, and I will make of you a company of peoples, and will give this land to your offspring after you for an everlasting possession. And now your two sons, whom were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, are mine. Ephraim and Manasseh shall be mine, as Reuben and Simeon are.
And the children that you fathered after them shall shall be yours. They shall be called by the name of their their brothers in their inheritance. So he’s taking this moment, and he’s he’s blessing his his grandsons, Ephraim and Manasseh. In fact, the word blessed is, is used in verse nine. That he is, he is imparting to them what God has given to him. And this idea of blessing is very much a word that is reflective in in really what Scripture is all about, that when you understand the goodness of who God is, that God wants to use you as his representative in this world to bless others too. In fact, I said to you in recent weeks, the word blessing is used over 70 times in the Book of Genesis to recognize that only is a God, that a God that desires to bless you, but also to to deliver his blessing through you. That’s how the Bible begins in Genesis chapter one, verse 26 to 28, when he creates us in his image, male and female. He tells us then that you are blessed in verse 28, and to go into this world and multiply that blessing that God wants to, to work through your life, that you would impart to others what he has imparted to to you. And so in these moments, Jacob is is demonstrating how this is possible. And he’s he’s talking about the faithfulness of God from one generation to the next, that not only has God been faithful to me and Luz, he’s saying, but we’ve seen how God’s faithful hand has been given to Abraham and to Isaac and to Jacob, and that promise is to continue through the children of Israel that the ultimate blessing would come, which is Jesus, that all of us could be blessed because of it.
And look, as Jacob is saying this, he’s acknowledging in verse seven that life hasn’t always been perfect, that the curse of sin has impacted his life. And so for us as Christians, we don’t follow God because it makes life easy. We follow him because it’s true. There’s certainly blessing that can happen in that. But but to not lose sight of the greatest blessing which is in the Lord. Because as we go through life, the sin, the impact of sin can affect us, whether it be our own sin or someone’s sin against us, it affects us. And look at verse seven, as for me, when I came from paddan to to my sorrow, Rachel died in the land of Canaan, on the way, when there was still some distance to go to Ephrath, and I buried her there on the way to Ephrath, that is Bethlehem. So he was saying, even in this moment where he was in transition of his, uh, of his life, his life’s going through this transitional period, his wife passed away, but it wasn’t even passed away at a time that it was convenient for the family.
It’s never convenient for someone to die, but. But especially in the middle of a move. She just passed away on the journey. But when you look at Jacob’s life, Jacob’s life certainly was not an easy life. I mean, even from the beginning, it tells you his father didn’t love him. His father loved his brother Esau. He he was sought after from by his own brother to kill him. And when he got to a new land, his father in law cheated him over and over again. And if not for the grace of God, he would have been destitute without anything. He was forced to to marry a lady he didn’t love or tricked to marry a lady he didn’t love. And when he finally married the woman that he did love, she just lived a few short years and she passed away. It wasn’t an easy life, but the one constant that he discovers at the end of his life is that God was always faithful to him, even when he wasn’t faithful to the Lord. I am blessed because of God’s grace. I’m able to bless because I have been blessed. And he goes on from there and and he shares just how he’s seen God’s grace work in his life in different ways. In verse 11. And Israel, who is Jacob? Said to Joseph, I’ve never expected to see your face.
And behold, God has let me see your offspring also. Then Joseph removed from from removed them from his knees, and he bowed himself with his face to the earth. And Joseph took them both, Ephraim and his in his right hand toward Israel’s left hand, and Manasseh and his left hand towards Israel’s right hand, and brought them near him. We’re going to talk about this in a minute. This time of blessing, the oldest is supposed to be in the right hand of favor, which that’s what Jacob’s doing. But in verse 14, and Israel stretch out his his right hand and laid it on his, the head of Ephraim, who was the younger, and his left hand on the head of Manasseh, crossing his hands. For Manasseh was the firstborn. But here in this story Jacob is saying, look, you know, I’ve seen God’s faithful hand. And one of the things that I’ve seen just graciously God’s given is my son, I thought was dead, was alive. And God let me not only see him, but also his grandsons. And so Jacob is appreciating this. And and he goes on and he remarks in verse 15 just how he seen God’s grace in his life. He says, and he blessed Joseph and said, The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has been my shepherd all my life long to this day, the angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the boys and in them.
Let my name be carried on, and the name of my fathers, Abraham and Isaac, and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth. And so he’s saying the promises of God, it’s going to be fulfilled in future generations, not because of us, but because of the consistency of who God is. He is always faithful. He is always faithful. And that’s the beauty of Romans eight for those in Christ, it tells you there’s verse one, no condemnation in Christ, that you’ve been adopted in chapter eight into his family. And then it says in verse 37, you are more than conquerors in Christ. And verse 39 of Romans eight, there is nothing that can separate you from the love of Christ Jesus because of the consistency of who he is, not the consistency of who you are. You always have the opportunity of coming to the Lord and and being renewed in the goodness of who he is. I mean, even this morning, if you’ve just fallen on your face, if you just fail, the the reason that you can have hope is not because of who you are, but because of who he is. God’s grace blessing me and then giving me the opportunity to bless. And I love the way that he describes God here.
He says it like this my shepherd. The idea of my meaning personal and the picture of Shepherd. As Christians, we should hold that word endearing in our minds. I think of all the things God could be described as rather than angry. Zeus in heaven. The picture of what a shepherd is, caring for the sheep, watching over them, protecting them, leading them, guiding, guiding them. That’s a very endearing word to Christians. I mean, some of the best passages of the Bible describe God as shepherd, right? In Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want we. We love that passage as Christians or or in John chapter ten, the story of the good Shepherd who lays his life down for his sheep. I mean, those are incredible descriptions of God, but can I be honest? Not when you put it in context with Jacob’s life. Because if you think about this in the book of Genesis, this is the first time in all of Scripture God has been described as a shepherd. And just previous to this, we’ve had shared with us the view of what a shepherd and sheep were at the end of Genesis chapter 46, the last verse of chapter 46. It tells us that that shepherds were considered an abomination to the Egyptians. But in these moments, Jacob didn’t care, because he knew the kind of provision that God gave to him. And for him. This picture of Shepherd not only described helps, helps capture for us the idea of who God is.
It also is a little bit maligning towards who we are because if you know anything about sheep, they’re probably the most unimpressive, underwhelming animal that God has ever created. Maybe next to the cat, right? I’m just kidding. I’m just kidding. But there’s a reason. When you drive down the road and you’re in the. You’re looking in the wild. You’re like, oh, look at that. There’s some wild sheep. They can’t they cannot support themselves, right? Sheep cannot make it on their own. They are helpless creatures. They are requires someone to look after them constantly because, well, sheep are dumb, right. And so for in order for Jacob in this moment to call God his shepherd, he’s also painting a picture of something about us as people and what we need in our lives, right? And how much we need the consistency of the Lord. Even when you think about, you know, having a pet in your home, if you’ve got a dog and the dog gets out, the dog will come home. I hope if you’ve got a cat, cats, they tend to come home, right? You let a sheep go and the sheep’s like, I don’t even know where I live. They just they just disappear. In fact, there was this. This famous sheep that was discovered in 2004 that made headline news across the world, because this sheep managed to survive in the wild for a number of years.
It’s like, you know, it’s it’s got to be pretty unique for for a sheep to survive in the wild at all in order for the story to be told around the world. But there was this particular sheep referred to as as Shrek in New Zealand in 1998, at four years old, Shrek decided, I’m going to just go out on my own here and see what that’s like, right? It’s six years later. Shrek was discovered in a cave in New Zealand, and you can see the state of his life at this particular moment, right? Like it’s it’s it’s miraculous he was able to survive. But you can see by his current state that he is lucky to survive. He happened to find a cave. And I guess if any wild animal ventured in there, they couldn’t figure out how to bite through £60 of wool. But. But he managed to survive, but just barely. I mean, what kind of life is that? He can’t even see. I don’t even know how the sheep bent down to drink. Somehow he made it. And so the story is told. But but, you know, for us, it’s a similar idea that when we abandon God, where does that put our life? And how foolish it is for us to to run from him. To understand the intention of of of of the importance of what God has done for us.
He has pursued us in our sin, that he didn’t give up on us, that he sustains us and gives us a future and a hope. I’m able to bless not because of me, but because I have been blessed by him. Point number three I may not always understand God’s ways. But I can trust him. I may not always understand God’s ways, but I can trust him. And if failure to see how important it is that he is a shepherd over us, that can lead us sometimes to rather try to trust in ourselves and failure to to rest in God’s grace. Honestly, as people, it leads us to anxiety and ultimately lost in our own efforts. And Jacob in the story he he’s reminding us of of the importance of this. It goes on and says in these verses it says, oh, excuse me, I’ll read that in just a minute. It talks about Joseph and the story. But, but but Jacob, for, for years he has he has tried to fabricate his own success in trusting in himself. That’s why he carried the label of deceiver. Right? It’s all about his self-made efforts and what that could produce for him. And and ultimately, all it led to was an angry brother who wanted to kill him, which led him on the run into the life of another individual, Laban, who just took advantage of him, his father in law.
And finally, when he gets away from his father in law, he has his own family. And he he reproduces what his father taught him, which was to to to love one son above the others, which which he loved, Joseph above the other others, his other sons, which created this hatred, and those sons hearts that they ultimately led his their brother Joseph into slavery because of it. Over and over again, Jacob just living for himself and what he wanted it, it led to this place of of despair, this place of anxiety, this place of hopelessness. But Jacob’s now getting to this place to understand. While he may not always know God’s ways, he can trust him. Even in the story with Joseph, you’re seeing him bring his sons before his father for a blessing. And what’s interesting about about Joseph’s life in these moments is, as we’ve read about Joseph, Joseph has seemed to be like this stalwart in in faith in the Lord. No matter what happened to him, he seemed to always remain faithful to God, consistent in his walk with the Lord. When he was sold into slavery. He was faithful to the Lord when he was accused of something that he didn’t do and put in prison. He was faithful to the Lord when he was brought before Pharaoh, and he interpreted the dream and given second, the second most powerful position in all of Egypt.
He didn’t leverage that power for his own glory. He continued to be faithful to the Lord. But now, in this moment, there seems to be a little bit of rockiness in Joseph’s faith. But. But here’s what’s interesting that Rockiness in his faith didn’t come because of because of his personal relationship with God, but rather it came in a moment where he’s learning to trust his children to the Lord. And I think, you know, as a father, I might say things like, you know, do whatever you want to me, but leave my kids alone. I can take it. But to see it happen to my children, that’s that’s something completely different. And Joseph, in these moments, he’s bringing his children before his father to be blessed. But Joseph reacts to this moment because he’s he’s doubtful. And how God’s blessing is going to be made known in the way Jacob is doing it. And because now it involves his children, you see this kind of rockiness in in Joseph. I think the same is true for you and for me. Right? It’s one thing to trust God with your life, but then to entrust your children to him. And in verse 17, when Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand on the head of Ephraim, it displeased him, and he took his father’s hand to move it from Ephraim’s head to Manassas head.
And Joseph said to his fathers, not, not, not this way, my father, since this one is the firstborn, put your right hand on his head. So we have the tendency of doing that in our own struggle with with the Lord. Of learning what it means to trust him in every season of life, because there is this expectation we have, in a sense of worldliness, of what blessings should look like. You do the right thing. You get the right blessing. Obviously, Manassas should be blessed over Ephraim because, well, he’s older, he’s he’s taller. He’s he’s wiser because he’s further in years. You need to bless the one that obviously by the world should be blessed, right? Not Ephraim, but Manassas. Dad, you’re messing it up. Or in a religious sense, right? We might look from a religious standpoint. In Jesus’s day, religious leaders looked at this, that God blesses those that can help themselves. And if you haven’t, you haven’t done too much messiness in your own life. Of course, God can bless you. And and well, if you’ve messed up, God can still bless you, but just not as much. This kind of in a religious sense, how it happens. But that’s not a biblical gospel sense at all. The the way God blesses us is not based on what we do, who we are, but rather who he is. That’s why we say in Christ there, there there is neither male nor female.
There is neither slave nor free. There is neither young nor old, rich or poor. God doesn’t care about that, because we’re all equal in him. And so the blessing of God looks different than the things of this world. And and this is what Joseph is learning in this story, that while while he might be anxious in his own soul, I may not always understand God’s ways, but but I have learned I can trust him, which is point number four in your notes. Resting in God’s grace brings peace and hope. Resting in God’s grace brings peace and hope. Jacob’s learned through the inconsistencies of his life that God has always been faithful. I’m not here to impress God with me. I am here that my life would be filled with the goodness of who he is. When Jesus said it was finished on the cross, he meant it for my life, past, present, and future all wrapped up in him. And so as it’s not this trying to achieve or attain any status before the Lord, but rather receiving what I have in him, and therefore, because of that, I can rest in in the goodness of who he is with peace and hope. And in this story you see this as as Joseph is a little shaky in this moment. It says to you in the next verses it says, but his father refused and said, look at this.
I know my son. I know. It’s in these moments as if Joseph represents who we are. But Jacob really, in a way, is representing who God is. I know my son. I know, yeah. When I think about walking through adversity in this life. I do want to know my past is taken care of in Christ. It has, I do. I need a hope. I need to know there is a future and in Christ there is. And I need to know right now that someone cares. And the reality is Christ does. That’s what Isaiah 53 says a man of sorrows acquainted with grief. Jesus knows the path you walk because Jesus is already walked it before you. I know my son. I know he knows right where you are. He knows exactly what you need, and he promises to reconcile all brokenness in this world, in him, for you. I know, my son. I know he is the shepherd. He goes on and says in these verses, he also shall become a people, and he also shall be great. Nevertheless his younger brother shall be greater than he, and he is. His offspring shall become a multitude of nations. So he blessed them that day, saying, by you Israel will pronounce blessing, saying, God make you as Ephraim and as Manasseh. What Jacob is helping us understand is that at the end of his life, I think he’s finally grasps the magnitude of God’s grace over him.
I think this is exactly why the writer of Hebrews chose this obscure chapter to declare what he declared in verse 21, because when you think about the lessons we’ve learned about God, as we’ve told these stories throughout Genesis, that God chose the weaker things of this world to confound the wise. He didn’t choose to work through Hagar, who could have children, but rather barren Sarah. He didn’t. He didn’t work through Esau, but rather the younger brother Jacob. He didn’t work through Rachel, who Joseph loved, but rather brought the Messiah through the unloved Leah. He’s working through a people who are dying in a famine to bring a greater hope in Jesus, and apart from the Lord providing for them in this chapter, they would not have survived. It’s about the the goodness of who God is over us. In fact, in Deuteronomy chapter seven, talking about why did God choose the nation of Israel, it says, verse six, for you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his own treasured possession. And we could ask, man, why did God pick them out of all the people that God could have picked? I mean, what made them so special? Well, it goes on and says, out of all the peoples who were on the face of the earth, it was not because you were more in number than any other people, that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you are the fewest of all peoples.
But it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery. What he’s saying is, it’s not because you were great. In fact, you were pretty underwhelming in comparison to other people. But it’s because the greatness of who God is made known in your life. That’s what makes us special. It’s not us, but rather it’s because of him. And in the story, this is exactly what the writer of Hebrews is saying. It’s finally at the end of Jacob’s life where he gets it. And the reason we know he gets it is because he’s choosing to put the blessing on the weaker, the younger rather than the strong, because this is exactly the way God works. We could read throughout Scripture and see all the promises of God. And oftentimes as people, we think that we’re the exception to the story. But what we discover is we are exactly the one that Jesus came to pursue, that we could find our freedom in him, that we’re able to live the life that God has called us to live, not because of the strength found within us, but because of the strength found within him.
One of my favorite figures in all of church history I love reading about church history. Is this this young lady named Mary Bunyan. Mary Bunyan. She might be my favorite figure in all of church history, but the reason she is my favorite is not because of anything that she did. Impressive. Impressive in her own strength. It’s how she chose to serve the Lord in her weakness. Mary Bunyan is just was just a child when the Lord used her to make a significant impact in Christian history. Because Mary Bunyan is the daughter of John Bunyan. And if you know anything about John Bunyan, John Bunyan was a preacher in the 1500s who was sent to prison for preaching the gospel for over a decade. His wife stayed at home and raised four four children on her own. Mary Bunyan, who was the oldest, was also blind, and she would walk miles almost daily in order to go to the prison where her father was held to bring him his lunch, and she would carry his lunch in that jar in the center of the screen. She would carry that jar to her father almost daily, walking miles blind in order that her father could live. But the thing that makes John Bunyan such an impactful character is John Bunyan went to write one of the greatest works of literature ever recorded. Some say it’s the most influential book outside of the Bible ever written in English, and may have may be the the most purchased book in all of history outside of the Bible.
Pilgrim’s Progress The story of Pilgrim’s Progress is the journey of a one man’s relationship with God, and the Lord has used that book to to lead many people to Christ. But that book would have never happened if this little girl who was blind, did not step out in faith, out of love for her father, to take that trip to the prison, that he could sustain life. It’s not about impressing people with who you are. It’s about allowing your life to be overwhelmed with the gracious presence of God. When we think about life lessons that are important for us, I hope this morning that we don’t wait till the end of our lives to think about the importance of what God wants to do in us right now. But the only way that happens is given our lives over to the cross of Christ. I am blessed because of God’s grace. He pursued me even when I’ve turned my back on him. That, that that through that we’re able to bless because we have been blessed. That I may not always understand God’s ways, but I can trust him. And resting in God’s grace brings peace and hope.