Genesis 49
Jacob Blesses His Sons
1 Then Jacob called his sons and said, "Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you what shall happen to you in days to come.
2"Assemble and listen, O sons of Jacob,
listen to Israel your father.
3"Reuben, you are my firstborn,
my might, and the firstfruits of my strength,
preeminent in dignity and preeminent in power.
4Unstable as water, you shall not have preeminence,
because you went up to your father’s bed;
then you defiled it—he went up to my couch!
5 "Simeon and Levi are brothers;
weapons of violence are their swords.
6Let my soul come not into their council;
O my glory, be not joined to their company.
For in their anger they killed men,
and in their willfulness they hamstrung oxen.
7Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce,
and their wrath, for it is cruel!
I will divide them in Jacob
and scatter them in Israel.
8"Judah, your brothers shall praise you;
your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies;
your father’s sons shall bow down before you.
9Judah is a lion’s cub;
from the prey, my son, you have gone up.
He stooped down; he crouched as a lion
and as a lioness; who dares rouse him?
10The scepter shall not depart from Judah,
nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet,
until tribute comes to him;
and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples.
11Binding his foal to the vine
and his donkey’s colt to the choice vine,
he has washed his garments in wine
and his vesture in the blood of grapes.
12His eyes are darker than wine,
and his teeth whiter than milk.
13 "Zebulun shall dwell at the shore of the sea;
he shall become a haven for ships,
and his border shall be at Sidon.
14 "Issachar is a strong donkey,
crouching between the sheepfolds.
15He saw that a resting place was good,
and that the land was pleasant,
so he bowed his shoulder to bear,
and became a servant at forced labor.
16 "Dan shall judge his people
as one of the tribes of Israel.
17Dan shall be a serpent in the way,
a viper by the path,
that bites the horse’s heels
so that his rider falls backward.
18I wait for your salvation, O LORD.
19 "Raiders shall raid Gad,
but he shall raid at their heels.
20 "Asher’s food shall be rich,
and he shall yield royal delicacies.
21 "Naphtali is a doe let loose
that bears beautiful fawns.
22"Joseph is a fruitful bough,
a fruitful bough by a spring;
his branches run over the wall.
23The archers bitterly attacked him,
shot at him, and harassed him severely,
24yet his bow remained unmoved;
his arms were made agile
by the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob
(from there is the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel),
25 by the God of your father who will help you,
by the Almighty who will bless you
with blessings of heaven above,
blessings of the deep that crouches beneath,
blessings of the breasts and of the womb.
26The blessings of your father
are mighty beyond the blessings of my parents,
up to the bounties of the everlasting hills.
May they be on the head of Joseph,
and on the brow of him who was set apart from his brothers.
27 "Benjamin is a ravenous wolf,
in the morning devouring the prey
and at evening dividing the spoil."
Jacob’s Death and Burial
28All these are the twelve tribes of Israel. This is what their father said to them as he blessed them, blessing each with the blessing suitable to him. 29Then he commanded them and said to them, "I am to be gathered to my people; bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite, 30in the cave that is in the field at Machpelah, to the east of Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite to possess as a burying place. 31 There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife. There they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife, and there I buried Leah— 32the field and the cave that is in it were bought from the Hittites."33When Jacob finished commanding his sons, he drew up his feet into the bed and breathed his last and was gathered to his people.
Genesis 50
1Then Joseph fell on his father’s face and wept over him and kissed him. 2And Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father. So the physicians embalmed Israel. 3Forty days were required for it, for that is how many are required for embalming. And the Egyptians wept for him seventy days.
4And when the days of weeping for him were past, Joseph spoke to the household of Pharaoh, saying, "If now I have found favor in your eyes, please speak in the ears of Pharaoh, saying, 5My father made me swear, saying, 'I am about to die: in my tomb that I hewed out for myself in the land of Canaan, there shall you bury me.' Now therefore, let me please go up and bury my father. Then I will return." 6And Pharaoh answered, "Go up, and bury your father, as he made you swear." 7So Joseph went up to bury his father. With him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his household, and all the elders of the land of Egypt, 8as well as all the household of Joseph, his brothers, and his father’s household. Only their children, their flocks, and their herds were left in the land of Goshen. 9And there went up with him both chariots and horsemen. It was a very great company.10When they came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond the Jordan, they lamented there with a very great and grievous lamentation, and he made a mourning for his father seven days. 11When the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning on the threshing floor of Atad, they said, "This is a grievous mourning by the Egyptians." Therefore the place was named Abel-mizraim; it is beyond the Jordan. 12Thus his sons did for him as he had commanded them, 13for his sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field at Machpelah, to the east of Mamre, which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite to possess as a burying place. 14After he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt with his brothers and all who had gone up with him to bury his father.
God’s Good Purposes
15When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, "It may be that Joseph will hate us and pay us back for all the evil that we did to him."16So they sent a message to Joseph, saying, "Your father gave this command before he died, 17'Say to Joseph, Please forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, because they did evil to you.' And now, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father." Joseph wept when they spoke to him. 18His brothers also came and fell down before him and said, "Behold, we are your servants." 19But Joseph said to them, "Do not fear, foram I in the place of God? 20As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today. 21So do not fear; I will provide for you and your little ones." Thus he comforted them and spoke kindly to them.
The Death of Joseph
22So Joseph remained in Egypt, he and his father’s house. Joseph lived 110 years. 23And Joseph saw Ephraim’s children of the third generation. The children also of Machir the son of Manasseh were counted as Joseph’s own. 24And Joseph said to his brothers, "I am about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob." 25Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, "God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here." 26So Joseph died, being 110 years old. They embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt.
Pastor’s Commentary:
“Judah, your brothers shall praise you; your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies, your father’s sons shall bow down before you… The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples.”
Jacob takes up his prophetic mantle and blesses his sons with prophesies about their future. Ruben, Simeon, and Levi were rejected for their violent acts, but Judah was accepted as the leader of the twelve tribes. With the exception of Saul (who was of the tribe of Benjamin), all of the kings of Israel were from Judah. David and Solomon were of the house and line of Judah. Rehaboam was Solomon’s son. The dynasty would last until Judah was finally destroyed by the Babylonians. And even then, the descendants of Judah would live on.
The ruler’s scepter will not depart from Judah. There is still a kingdom where the descendant of Judah rules today. To Him every knee will bow and every tongue confess that He is Lord. His Kingdom is not like the kingdoms of this earth. His Kingdom is a reign of forgiveness and peace through His work.
“He has washed his garments in wine and his vesture in the blood of grapes.” There would come a time when those garments would be washed in real blood. It is the blood of the Lamb of God that cleanses us from our sin.
Jacob goes to his death and is buried with his father. The people mourn for him. It was not because they didn’t know any better that they mourned so much. They had hope in the resurrection too. God calls Himself the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He is not the God of the dead but the God of the living, for all are alive to Him.
But they mourned because death is an enemy. I know that many people talk about death as a blessing, a release from suffering, or even a victory. But such sentiments seem to me like lots of flowers. Those sentiments wither and fade. The truth is, God never made us so that we would die. He wanted us to live on forever in bodies untouched by sin. But when sin entered the world, so did death. The one that sins shall surely die. The wages of sin is death. That’s why we should mourn death.
But we do not mourn as those who have no hope! For Jesus Christ our Savior has paid for our sins in full! His suffering and death and resurrection have destroyed our sin and our death. And that is very good news! The victory is in Jesus. He lives. Because He lives, so will I, and so will you!
Did you note the forgiveness theme that came up again in the last part of chapter 50? “Your father gave this command before he died, say to Joseph, Please forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, because they did evil to you.” Did Jacob really say this? We can be sure that he wanted Joseph to forgive. But it seems to imply that the brothers thought this up because they were afraid of Joseph’s power.
Joseph is a theologian of the cross. This means that Joseph sees the hardships and trials of life through the cross of Jesus Christ. God can work blessings out of these trials and hardships. “You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good.” May we have this same kind of faith when we endure trials and hardships. There is evil in store for us, but God means it for good. He brings good out of evil. It’s exactly what He did for us through the cross of Jesus. There, the most evil thing in the world, the son of God dead on the cross, brought the most good for us. Forgiveness and life and salvation are from the One who hung on that cross.
This ends the book of Genesis, but this is just the beginning of the story! Joseph’s bones were left waiting for 400 some years. But they would be carried up out of Egypt and buried in the land of promise. God’s plan is ongoing!
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