I would invite you to open up your Bibles to Genesis. Look at Genesis, specifically today we're gonna be going over Genesis chapter 48. We'll be doing the entire chapter. As you know, we are getting very close to the end of Genesis, having gone through it. And as we've come close to the end of Genesis, we will be seeing the end of the lives of both Jacob and Joseph, who have been so very important to the narrative. But now let's go before the Lord who was so gracious and faithful to them, who made covenant promises that he kept, and who has kept all of his covenant promises to us as well. Let's go before him. Sovereign Lord, as I stand to preach, I confess, Lord, that I cannot preach in my own power and hope to have any effect on those who hear. I know, O Lord, that I may be able to reach ears, perhaps, and maybe command attention for a few minutes. But, O Lord, I know that only you can do real good to those who hear. And I pray, Lord, that you would. I pray, Lord, that you would work in hearts this evening, that you would help us who do not yet know you to know you by faith. And those who already have closed with you, I pray, Lord, that they would be comforted and that as we all get closer to that day when we must leave this mortal coil, as Shakespeare put it, and go to our eternal reward, may it be that we are as prepared as Jacob was to go before his maker. He knew you by faith, he believed your promises. May we do the same, and may we gain confidence as we read about the way that you blessed him and his offspring. And we pray this in Jesus' holy name, amen. Genesis chapter 48, and I'll be reading verses one through 22. I remind you this is the word of the Lord. Now it came to pass after these things that Joseph was told, indeed, your father is sick. And he took with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim. And Jacob was told, look, your son Joseph is coming to you. And Israel strengthened himself and sat up on the bed. Then Jacob said to Joseph, God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me. and said to me, Behold, I will make you fruitful and multiply you, and I will make of you a multitude of people and give you this land to your descendants after you as an everlasting possession. And now your two sons Ephraim and Manasseh, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, are mine. "'As Reuben and Simeon, they shall be mine. "'Your offspring whom you beget after them shall be yours. "'They will be called by the name of their brothers "'in their inheritance. "'But as for me, when I came from Padan, "'Rachel died beside me in the land of Canaan on the way, "'when there was but a little distance to go to Ephrath. "'I buried her there on the way to Ephrath.'" That is Bethlehem. Then Israel saw Joseph's sons and said, who are these? Joseph said to his father, they are my sons whom God has given me in this place. And he said, please bring them to me and I will bless them. Now the eyes of Israel were dim with age so that he could not see. Then Joseph brought them near him and he kissed them and embraced them. And Israel said to Joseph, I had not thought to see your face, but in fact, God has also shown me your offspring. So Joseph brought them from beside his knees, and he bowed down with his face to the earth. And Joseph took them both, Ephraim with his right hand toward Israel's left hand, and Manasseh with his left hand toward Israel's right hand, and brought them near him. Then Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on Ephraim's head, who was the younger, and his left hand on Manasseh's head, guiding his hands knowingly, for Manasseh was the firstborn. And he blessed Joseph and said, God, before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked. the God who has fed me all my life long to this day, the angel who has redeemed me from all evil. Bless the lads. Let my name be named upon them, and the name of my fathers, Abraham and Isaac, and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth. Now when Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand on the head of Ephraim, it displeased him. So he took hold of his father's hand to remove it from Ephraim's head to Manasseh's head. And Joseph said to his father, not so, my father, for this one is the firstborn. Put your right hand on his head. But his father refused and said, I know my son, I know. He also shall become a people, and he also shall be great, but truly, his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his descendants shall become a multitude of nations. So he blessed them that day, saying, by you Israel will bless, saying, may God make you as Ephraim and as Manasseh. And thus he said Ephraim before Manasseh. Then Israel said to Joseph, behold, I am dying, but God will be with you and bring you back to the land of your fathers. Moreover, I have given to you one portion above your brothers, which I took from the hand of the Amorite with my sword and my bow. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever. Well, when the author of Hebrews was trying to decide as he was going to put, obviously, Joseph in the Hall of Faith, by inspiration he determined that it was this particular scene that he would record for the Jewish people in the Diaspora, those Christians who needed sustaining grace to go on following the Lord despite persecution. He records in Hebrews 11, 21, in that section that we often call the Hall of Faith. By faith, Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph and worshiped, leaning on the top of his staff. Now, we have seen fathers blessing their sons in Genesis before. And we saw how, in the case of Isaac with Jacob, he ended up blessing the son that he did not intend to bless. Here, Jacob blesses the sons that he intends to bless. And once again, we have a father who is very upset when the younger son receives the greater blessing. One of the things that we are going to see again and again, and I'll discuss this in a bit in the Bible, is that the Lord determines who's going to get the blessing. Not the fathers, not simply by age, not by merit or time served or any of those things. It is the Lord who determines. Now, when Joseph had heard that his father Jacob was dying, he went to visit him with his sons Manasseh and Ephraim. You remember that at this point in time, Jacob has been living in Egypt for 17-plus years. He has seen his life lengthened. He has had a long and an eventful, to say the least, life, and one in which the Lord had preserved him along the way. And now he is not going to fool around, as I said before, last week. He doesn't seek to argue with his son. I'm not really dying. Perhaps with some sort of vigorous potion or maybe some energy drinks, I'd be able to get up. You know, that kind of thing. Rather, he accepts the fact that his life is coming to its end. He's ready. He's ready to go. and to meet with his maker who has made those promises to him. He knows where he's going. He's going to an even greater inheritance. He desires to be laid with his fathers so that in the resurrection they will be brought together once again. They will rise up, but he knows that he is going to rest with his fathers. He is going to the bosom of Abraham. He is going to heaven. He is going to inherit the blessings that the Lord had vouchsafed to him spiritually as well. But before he does that, he wants to bless his posterity. He wants his heritage. the sons of Joseph, his favorite son, to enjoy his blessing as well. And he starts out by acknowledging whom blessings come from. Now we can, it's a wonderful tradition when you have an older member of the family. This is something that unfortunately has passed away from us as a people. It used to be the case that when the patriarch in a family was dying, that he would give his blessings to his sons. And he would call upon them. These would be the ones who would inherit his name, inherit the family. and he would call them, charge them to do great things, and he would give them words of advice and his blessing before he passed away. We do not do that any longer, but in this case he does. But it's not just a well-wishing for the children who are gonna come after you here. Joseph and Jacob and Isaac and Abraham, all of them knew that the blessings that they would have to give to their posterity, they must come from God or they would be empty. It would just be so much well-wishing, so much, I hope, But in this case, his hopes are founded upon the sure promises of God. And so he says to him, El Shaddai, the Lord God Almighty, in your translation, met with me at Luz, that is Bethel. And he says, God is the blessing, the source of all of these blessings, and he will be the blessing upon the children of Joseph and their children. Now, God had made promises to Abraham that had seemed impossible when they were first given way back in Genesis 11 and 12. You remember we had been introduced to the family of Abraham and then we had heard that amazing blessing given to this old man and his old wife past childbearing years. that they would be the fountainhead of a mighty generation, a people so numerous that the world would not be able to number them like the sands of the sea. And now that blessing has come to pass. Not only that, God had promised that his children would inherit the promised land, and we're beginning to see the foreshadowing of that happening as well. Already, despite this, all the things that seemed to be against them at the time, the Lord is arranging providence so his people will be released and they will take up their land, the land of Canaan that he was giving them for their possession. Now, it's interesting that despite, isn't it, he's dying, he's on his deathbed, but he's in the middle of Egypt, and he's in a very exalted position. Why is he in an exalted position in Egypt? Well, it's because Joseph, his son, is the prime minister, second only to Pharaoh. And yet he doesn't say, you're going to live a very comfortable life here in Egypt because the Lord loves you. No, he doesn't say anything like that. He keeps reminding him that the place where they are supposed to be is in Canaan. He keeps reminding them, this is not our home. When I die, I want you to carry me to Canaan, and I want you to understand this, that the time will come when you will go out of this place, out of this nation, as a mighty nation yourselves, and then you will take up the possession of Canaan. Now, this is what a good man of God does. He reminds those around him who are also followers of the Lord that this world is not their home. I hope I hope that that is something that I will always do well. I still have power to to raise my head. I will remind not only my children, but you as well. This world is not our home. This is not our possession and no matter what kind of exalted possession or position that we hold in this world. Whether we be heads of industry, or titans in our particular trade, or whether we be officers, or whatever, this world is only a meager thing, and it's passing away. No matter how much we have in this world, it is so many sandcastles. And time will surely wash them all away. He does not, therefore, point him to the promises of Pharaoh or the promises of princes. He points him to the everlasting promises of God. And that is something that we must do with our children as well, because the world will attempt to captivate them with all of the baubles and all of the honors and all of the doodads and everything that it can throw at them. Here, this is more important, and so on. But we must continue to point them even in a dying breath to the promises of God, and say, no, these are the things that are real. The stuff that we have here on Earth, this seems real, mortgages, titles, and so on. And yet, it isn't. It's fleeting. It's ephemeral. And it can be taken away in a moment. How many revolutions have there been in this world where entire families have lost everything that they owned? It's interesting. I was listening to the story of the man. All right, what's my favorite condiment? What do I put on everything? Sriracha, of course. Sriracha, interestingly enough, was created by a Vietnamese refugee. Now, he did not come from a poor family. His family in Vietnam had been very, very wealthy. They had had rice plantations. And yet, when the Vietnamese came in, he, as part of the hated capitalist oppressor class, he and his family also, they were of Chinese descent, which made them even more hated, they were essentially, they were wiped off the face of Vietnam. All of their land was taken away and redistributed, most of it to the state, of course. And he ended up having to stow away on a ship as one of the boat people. And if you look at the bottle, it says Hoi Fong is the name of the company. That was actually the name of the ship that brought him to Hong Kong. And so on. He had to begin again from nothing. Everything that you have, brothers and sisters, in this world that is not yours by covenant, can be taken away in just a moment. We don't think of it, but it can. Everything, all of them, they're very, very, very fleeting. We may have the joys of family, but how many people have discovered to their horror that their families have disappeared in a moment? the writer of It Is Well With My Soul, Bliss, I've forgotten his first name. What was his first name? It was Horatio Spafford, you're right, absolutely. The music, I'm sorry, was Bliss. He received a telegram informing him that only his wife had survived a shipwreck. His beloved daughters were gone in an instant. His family was devastated. That kind of thing happens again and again. Here on Earth, Our gains are very perishable. But with God, we remember that his promises are imperishable. They are everlasting. The treasure that is vouchsafed for us there goes on forever. Thieves can't steal it, rust can't corrode it, nothing can take it away. The promises and the gifts of God go on forever. And therefore, that's where we should put our trust. So, we see that Jacob is pointing Joseph and his sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, in the right direction. He also, at this point in time, we see he actually adopts Joseph's sons as his own, and therefore he brings them to the same status as the other sons, like Reuben and Simeon, and they're exalted, therefore, from not simply being the members of one tribe, Joseph, they become heads of tribes themselves, and he says to Joseph, your other sons will be included under their tribes if you have them. He also then mentions Joseph's mother, Rachel, and he mentions how she was buried at Ephrath, Ephrath that would become Bethlehem, Bethlehem, the house of bread, and of course that was the place where David and David's greater son, Jesus, would in due time be born. There are so many reminders, you see this, of the fact that the people are supposed to be going back to Canaan, that that is where their ultimate heritage lies. And also, it's a reminder to Joseph, don't forget to bury me there. I don't wish to be buried here in Egypt. I don't wish to dwell or have my bones rest in this pagan land. Bring me back to the place where the bodies of my fathers and my beloved wife, Rachel, were laid. Then he looks, and he can only see dimly. His eyes are probably occluded with cataracts. I mean, give the man a break, he's 147. My eyesight's fading, and I'm only 53. So he says, who are these? His eyes are dimming with age, as the Bible puts it. He cannot tell the difference between the people in the room. He hears the voice of his son Joseph, but he doesn't recognize the two other, the other forms that are there. And we're reminded, aren't we, of Genesis 27, and how Jacob himself, had at one time deceived his blind father, Isaac, so that he, the younger, the less favored son, would receive the birthright. But now things have come full circle. Now it is Jacob who's giving the birthright. Joseph could have, of course, attempted to deceive him at this point in time, but he does not. Now, there is that desire once again for a father to put the birthright upon, or the blessing upon, the child who he sees as more important. In this case, Joseph thinks of the firstborn son, Manasseh, as more important. He should get your primary blessing. So he guides the boys towards Jacob. He knows he's going to bless him, and he puts Manasseh, the older, at his right hand, and he puts Ephraim at his left hand. And so he expects him to put his hands on their heads like that and give his blessing. But what does he do? He crosses his hands and Manasseh, or rather Joseph, becomes very angry and attempts to move his hands back. Jacob tells him, don't get angry, my son. I know what I'm doing. Now, one of the things that we need to remember, and there's been many paintings of this scene, Jacob blessing the sons of Joseph, including one of my favorite Bible painters, Rembrandt. Inevitably, it's always these two little waves, these two little boys who are standing before him. But of course, these were not little boys when they came before Jacob. In Genesis 41, 50, we read, and to Joseph were born two sons before the years of famine came, whom Asenath, the daughter of Potiphar, priest of An, bore to him. Joseph called the name of the firstborn Manasseh, for God has made me forget all my toil and all my father's house. Here we have the two boys, okay, they're born before the years of famine came. You remember that it was seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine. So we've had actually at least, there were several years that had passed before Jacob came into the land. And then he, it's 17 years after he came into the land. So the boys are at the very earliest in their late teens, probably in their early 20s. But regardless, Joseph wants his older son Manasseh, I'm sure Manasseh wanted to receive the greater blessing, but Jacob crosses his hands and he gives the greater blessing to Ephraim, knowing that God had chosen him for a greater blessing. The lesson that we, at this point in Genesis, I hope we've learned this lesson, that it's God who decides who gets the blessing, and the size of the blessing as well. He's the one who determines it. It's interesting, Joseph, of course, was a prophet, but he's ignorant of what's going to happen to the boys. Jacob knows. Joseph thought that his father's eyesight was the problem, but Jacob was following the instructions of God, so he placed his hands where God's blessing was going to go. Now, we read in Matthew Henry, he makes a comment on this, something very important to us. He says, speaking of this as one of the main themes of Genesis, and indeed one of the main themes of the Bible, he says, of God, he often gives most to those that are least likely. He chooses the weak things of the world, raises the poor out of the dust. Grace observes, not the order of nature. Nor does God prefer those whom we think fittest to be preferred, but as it pleases Him. It is observable how often God, by the distinguishing favors of His covenant, advanced the younger above the elder, Abel above Cain, Shem above Japheth, Abraham above Nahor and Haran, Isaac above Ishmael, Jacob above Esau, Judah and Joseph, but were preferred before Reuben, Moses before Aaron, David and Solomon before their elder brethren. Again and again in the Bible we see it's not primogeniture, which is a word that simply means the oldest gets the most. It is rather the Lord who blesses and who determines how the blessing is to be divided. Now, in the blessing itself, obviously we see a reiteration of the blessings that were given to Abraham and Isaac. What is really interesting to me in this particular version of the covenant blessings that are being transferred to the posterity is verse 16. Take a look at it for a moment. Here we have Jacob saying this, he says, the angel. Now, what do you note about the word angel in your translation of the Bible there? They capitalize it. Why do they capitalize it? We've learned this again and again and again. It's like, ah, once again. Yes, whenever you see that capital A angel, it's the angel of the Lord. And it's an indication that the translators are absolutely certain that this is speaking of a theophany. It's speaking of Hamalak, the angel, not merely as an angel of God, but rather as Jesus, the son of God, the pre-incarnate one who acts as a messenger. The angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads. Let my name be named upon them. And the name of my fathers, Abraham and Isaac, and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth. Now, the angel there, as I said, is a reference to Christ himself, pictured using a word that shows up for the first time in the Bible, but which will be very important later on, and that word is goel. Goel, sometimes you'll hear it translated as kinsman, redeemer. It becomes the most critical word in the entire book of Ruth, for instance. The idea that Ruth needed this Redeemer to save her and Naomi, her mother-in-law, from the calamity that had befallen them. And of course, the great Goel in the Book of Ruth is? Boaz, very good, but the great Goel in the Bible is Jesus, our Redeemer, the one who is our Savior, our Deliverer. That's what Goel means. Kinsman Redeemer is one way of putting it, but Redeemer and Deliverer, that's another way of translating it. It speaks of the way that God miraculously redeems his people from situations that seem absolutely impossible. And Jacob had seen God's redeeming hand in his life again. Remember, Jacob had been saved, redeemed from the wrath of his brother. And then he had again been redeemed or saved from the wrath of his uncle. He had been saved from the anger of the Canaanites after the massacre of the city of Shechem. And this was an angel whom he had met with, hadn't he? He had wrestled, literally, with the angel of the Lord, Peniel. And he himself had seen this angel, in a sense, face to face. He had met with the angel of the Lord. And now he knows the same angel who had redeemed him, would redeem his descendants from Egypt. And then more importantly, would redeem all of his descendants and redeem him as well. from sin. This is the kinsman redeemer that all of God's people know and need. And so he gives him this final reminder that God will bring them in due time to the land of their fathers. And there we're closing out the verses. But then there's one verse at the very end of 48. This is the most actually convoluted verse in the entire section. It's verse 22. Moreover, I have given to you one portion of your brothers which I took from the hand of the Amorite with my sword and my bow. And many commentators at this point in time, when they reach that verse, they kind of go, wait a minute, what? When did you take a portion from the Amorites with your sword and your bow? This is not recorded anywhere, as far as we can tell, within the book of Genesis. There's no mention of it anywhere else. in the Bible. So what does it mean? Well, Shechem is the area that obviously the city of Shechem was in. It's also the city, the area where the cave of Machpelah, the only place where they had actually bought land within Canaan, that was also there. But it's also the place where Manasseh and Ephraim would have their territory. where these two great Joseph tribes would live. So Derek Kidner, who's a great expositor of the Old Testament, he kind of hedges his bet, and he says, the allusion may be to some incident otherwise unrecorded. That's a, that's a, well, I just don't know. Well, what do I think? Well, as far as I can tell, it was having purchased the cave of Machpelah as the area where he would bury his dead. And having also claimed the area of Shechem after his sons, although without his approval, had wiped out the city, the Amorites had probably moved in and seized both areas. And so it had become necessary for Jacob and his sons to take it back by force. And this is probably something that happened after Joseph was taken into Egypt, so the story had shifted its focus to Egypt, and we're no longer getting much information about what happens in Canaan at that point in time. And so this is probably something that happened. He had seized that particular area. It was counted as his by his sword and his bow. Already they have a little piece of Canaan, and he says, that will go to you in due time. Now, what do we learn about all of this? Well, it's kind of simple. I've made most of the applications already. And it's this, God's sovereign. And we are saved, not because of our own choices, but because of God's choosing, God's particular grace that he bestowed upon us. He picked us. I don't know why he picked us. In fact, Deuteronomy 7, when the question is posed by Moses to God's people, why did he choose you, O Israel? You're not the biggest of the nations. You're not the most important. He chose you because he loved you. And why did he love you? He loved you because he loved you. Why did he pick me? I wouldn't have chosen me. I would have passed over me in a heartbeat. a wretch. It was completely unworthy of salvation. And if you know your own hearts, then you know that's probably true of most of you as well. I'm sorry. I love you all dearly, but by yourselves here. All totally depraved and sinners, yeah. There you go. Our hearts are filled with sin, and there is nothing within that is worthy of the redemption that God chose to bestow upon us through his son. And yet he makes that choice, not because we deserve it, I mean, grace is, after all, what is it? It's an unmerited favor, unmerited mercy. God makes that choice. And here's the thing to remember. This is the thing that we forget. Okay, we're willing to accept the sovereignty of God until we come to a place where we want our will to prevail. And then we forget at that moment that his decisions are better than my or your decisions. that God's ways are always best. But often we can stop after we haven't gotten something that we want and think to ourselves, this isn't how it was supposed to be. God has somehow made a colossal mistake. After arranging everything in the universe and governing it, down to where birds land, where the hairs of your head, not my head, but your head fall out and land or end up. He decides all of those things and yet he didn't suddenly make a mistake when it came to one of the major turning points in your life. Now, I have to tell you, there were many turning points in my life where I thought the wrong decision had been made, or something had gone colossally wrong in the universe before I acknowledged the sovereignty of God, before I even knew God. For instance, my wife knows about this. At one point, I desperately wanted to join the RAF, and I tried out for the university RAF squad, and I have no doubt that I had a chance to fly modern fighter jets, even in a semi-ROTC setting. I would have gone on. And I mean, I've flown a few times. I love flying. It's amazing. But it would have changed the entire direction of my life. Had that decision that I wanted so very much come to pass, I have no doubt that I wouldn't be standing here today. And there are, as I look back in my life, all of these places where I wanted this, I didn't get it. I wanted this, I didn't get it. And yet every single time it turned out to be better than what I wanted. Ultimately, looking back, oftentimes what happened instead of what I wanted hurt. I did not enjoy it. And yet ultimately now I can look back with that 20-20 hindsight and say the Lord has done well. He has done all things well. Not just most things well. Countless decisions where my will was thwarted, and yet here we are today, tonight, hearing the word of God from Genesis together. Why is that? Why are you here? Why am I here? because God made those decisions. He made the right decisions again and again. Your mind, your soul, your heart at times may rebel against that, but it's the fact. Why are you in the family that you're in? Because God wanted you there. Why are you in the church that you're in? Because God wanted you here. Why are you at the job that you're in? As much as you may hate it on Monday morning, because God wants you there at that moment in time. There are things that you need to learn, ways you need to be molded and crafted, decisions that he has made in weaving together the patchwork, that wonderful quilt, that wonderful, not quilt, tapestry is a much better word, of redemption that he is even now weaving and including you in it. It had to work out that way. And that should help us not to grumble quite so much when things don't go the way that we want them to go. But still to know that God has not made any mistakes and he will not make mistakes. That he includes every part of our lives in his ultimate plan. And that all things ultimately will work for good. the difficulties that we encounter in our jobs, the difficulties we encounter in our relationships, including marriage or relationships to mothers and fathers and so on, siblings, all of these things are used by God ultimately in the life of the Christian to make us more like Christ. Joseph certainly would not have picked slavery and jail as part of the options that he wanted. When he went to find his brothers in Dothan, had you laid before him. Here are two different selections, Joseph. You can find your brothers. They'll be tending the sheep. You go with them, and you tend the sheep for a little while, and then you go back to your father's house. Or they can sell you into slavery. Which would you prefer? Oh, I mean, that's a no-brainer. I go with my brothers, and then we go back to my father's house. What 17-year-old wouldn't choose that? Again and again, he would have made choices against what God chose. And yet, the Lord brought him to this place that we just read about, through those steps. So be remembering that. When things occur in your life that hurt, that you don't understand, that you would never have chosen for yourself, understand that there is one who knows the end from the beginning, and he is making those choices. and ultimately in heaven you will be able to stand back and say he has done all things well. Let's go before him now. God our Father, I do thank you that you do make the right choices again and again and again. Sometimes you overrule our decisions. There are things that we want for our children that don't come to pass. We're terribly disappointed, but ultimately we know you're in charge. Help us then not to grumble against your providence. Help us not to be bitter. So often we allow bitterness to consume us like a cancer. We act as though the entire world is against me. Oh, Lord, that isn't true. We know if Christ is ours by faith, if he has saved us, then everything ultimately is for us and that we merely need to go through this time of probation, this brief time of affliction and difficulty. in order to enter into a glory that's beyond our comprehension. Help us then to be patient. Help us, O Lord, in our times of difficulty to be willing to say, as Christ said in Gethsemane, thy will not mine be done. And to thee,