61 JACOB MOVES TO EGYPT

Proverbs 3:5, 6 say, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.” Jacob now faces a major life-changing and momentous decision. This is not only a journey, but an international move, to settle in another country. This was a change which was very surprising to him since he never had any other thoughts than to live and die in Canaan. This change would be of great significance to his family for a long time to come. And in this situation, Jacob left Hebron and acknowledged God this way. “So Israel set out with all that was his, and when he reached Beersheba, he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac.” He chose that place possibly remembering the communion his father and grandfather had had with God there. Abraham called on God there as recorded in Genesis 21:33.“Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba, and there he called on the name of the Lord, the Eternal God” And so did Isaac, as recorded in Genesis 26:25. “Isaac built an altar there and called on the name of the Lord. There he pitched his tent, and there his servants dug a well.” So therefore Jacob also made it the place for prayer in his weighty decision and because it was on the way south towards Egypt. In his relationship with God, he thought of God as the God of his father Isaac, that is, a God in covenant with him; for by Isaac the family inheritance and covenant with God has been passed on to him. God had forbidden Isaac to go down to Egypt when there was a famine in Canaan as Genesis 26:2 says. “The Lord appeared to Isaac and said, ‘Do not go down to Egypt; live in the land where I tell you to live.’” Perhaps Jacob calls that to mind when he consults God as the God of his father Isaac. He wanted to make sure he ws supposed to go to Egypt. It is a good idea to make certain each of our moves are right.

But there is another factor, ‘Lord, though I am very eager to see Joseph, yet if you do not want me to go down to Egypt, as you instructed my father Isaac, I will submit, and very contentedly stay where I am.’ He offered sacrifices, extraordinary sacrifices, besides those at his stated times; these sacrifices were offered perhaps by way of thanksgiving for the recent blessed change in his family, for the good news he had received concerning Joseph, and for the hopes he had of seeing him. If we can do so without presumption, we should give God thanks for the beginnings of mercy, even before they are fully received. This might be a decent way of pleading for further mercy. Jacob petitioned God for His presence with him in his intended journey. He possibly wanted by these sacrifices to make certain his peace with God, to obtain the forgiveness of sin if necessary, that he might take no guilt along with him in this journey. Sin is a bad companion. By Christ, the great sacrifice, we must reconcile ourselves to God, and offer up our requests to him. Jacob consulted God. The heathen consulted their false gods by sacrifice. Jacob would not go until he had asked the living God’s permission and favor. “Shall I go down to Egypt, or back to Hebron?” It is wise to be tentative and therefore enquire, as David also did, in doubtful cases. Though we cannot always expect immediate answers from heaven, yet, if we diligently attend to the directions of the Word, conscience, and providence, we will find it is not in vain to ask counsel of God.

Notice how God directed his path. Very possibly that night or soon after God answered. Verse 2 says, “And God spoke to Israel in a vision at night and said, ‘Jacob! Jacob!'” God did this for Solomon too as recorded in 2 Chronicles 1:7. “That night God appeared to Solomon and said to him, ‘Ask for whatever you want me to give you.’”  Anyone who sincerely wants to keep up communion with God will find that it never fails on His side. If we speak to Him as we ought, He will not fail to speak to us. God called him by name, by his old name, Jacob, Jacob, perhaps to remind him of his low estate; his present fears were not appropriate for an Israel. Jacob, like one well acquainted with the visions of the Almighty, and ready to obey them, answers, “Here I am, ready to receive orders.” And what has God to say to him?

God renews the family agreement, the covenant, with him. Verse 3 says, “‘I am God, the God of your father,’ he said. ‘Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for I will make you into a great nation there.’” “I am what you know me to be: you will find me a God, a divine wisdom and power involved in your life and you will find me the God of your father, true to the covenant I also made with him.”

God encourages Jacob to move his family. “Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt,” It seems, though Jacob, upon first becoming aware that Joseph was still alive and lived in grandeur in Egypt, resolved, without any hesitation, I will go and see him; but now on second thought, he saw some difficulties in it, which he did not know how to manage. Even those changes that seem to have in them the greatest joys and hopes, yet have an mixture of cares and fears, There is no unmingled pleasure. We must always rejoice with trembling. Jacob had many careful thoughts about this journey, which God noticed. He was 130 old. It was a long journey, and Jacob was unfit for travel, and perhaps remembered that his beloved Rachel died in a journey.  He may have feared lest his sons should be tainted with the idolatry of Egypt, and forget the God of their fathers, or get caught up with the pleasures of Egypt, and forget the land of promise. Possibly he thought of what God had said to Abraham concerning his family living in Egypt. He surely knew what God had told his grandfather as recorded in Genesis 15:13, “Then the Lord said to him, ‘Know for certain that for four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and that they will be enslaved and mistreated there.'” That did not sound at all enticing or inviting. Jacob was wise. Present satisfactions should not make us forget prospect of future inconveniences, which possibly may arise even from something that seems most promising. Let’s not be short-sighted. He could not think of laying his bones in Egypt. But, whatever his many discouragements or negative reasons may have been, this, from God, was enough to answer them all: “Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt,”

God promises him a great comfort in the move. In the place you now fear, “I will make you into a great nation there.” He will multiply in Egypt: “I will, there in the place you now fear your family will sink and be lost, rather make it a great nation. That is the place infinite wisdom has chosen for the accomplishment of that promise.” He will have God’s presence with him: “I will go down to Egypt with you, and I will surely bring you back again. And Joseph’s own hand will close your eyes.” Anyone who goes where God sends them will certainly have God with them, and that is enough to assure them wherever they are and to silence their fears. We may safely venture even into Egypt if God goes down with us. Neither he nor his family should be lost in Egypt. I will surely bring you back again. Though Jacob died in Egypt, yet this promise was fulfilled in the bringing up of his body to be buried in Canaan as Jacob dearly wanted and in the bringing up of his descendants to be settled in Canaan. Whatever low or dark valley we are called into at any time, we may be confident, if God goes down with us into it, He will surely bring us up again. If He goes with us down to death, He will surely bring us up again to glory. God also told him that living and dying, his beloved Joseph should be a comfort to him: “Joseph’s own hand will close your eyes.” This is a promise that Joseph should live as long as he lived, that he should be with him at his death, and close his eyes with all possible tenderness and respect, as the dearest relations used to do. Probably Jacob, in the multitude of his thoughts within him, had been wishing that Joseph might do this last expression of love for him: Let him close my eyes; and God answered him in the letter of his desire. In this way God sometimes gratifies the innocent wishes of His people, and makes not only their death happy, but its very circumstances agreeable.

Little did Jacob think of ever leaving Canaan; he expected, no doubt, to die in his nest, and to leave his family in possession of the promised land: but God’s plan orders it otherwise. Anyone who thinks himself well settled may yet be unsettled in a little time. Even old people, who think of no other move than to the grave sometimes live to see great changes in their family. It is good to be ready, not only for the grave, but for whatever may happen between us and the grave.

Jacob was conveyed; not in a chariot, like his son, Joseph, was but in a wagon as verse 5 says, “Then Jacob left Beersheba, and Israel’s sons took their father Jacob and their children and their wives in the carts that Pharaoh had sent to transport him.”  Jacob had the character of a plain man, who did not affect anything stately or magnificent. His son rode in a chariot as Genesis 41:43 says, “He had him ride in a chariot as his second-in-command, and people shouted before him, ‘Make way!’ Thus he put him in charge of the whole land of Egypt.” But a wagon was good enough for Jacob and could hold more. The transporting of what he had with him included his effects, cattle and goods. These he took with him so he might not be dependent on Pharaoh for a livelihood, and that it might not afterwards be said that “they came beggars to Egypt.” His entire family, came with him. It is probable that they had continued to live together in common with their father; and therefore when he went they all went, which perhaps they were the more willing to do, because, though they had heard that the land of Canaan was promised them, yet, to this day, they had none of it in possession.

We have in Genesis 46 a particular account of the names of Jacob’s family, but it is comprised mostly of mere names of Jacob’s children and grandchildren. These are simply family records which we will skip over with the exception of Issachar (in verse 13) who called his eldest son Tola, which mean a worm, possibly because when he was born he was a very little weak child, a worm, and no man, not likely to live; and yet there sprang from him a very numerous offspring as is recorded in 1 Chronicles 7:2, “. . . During the reign of David, the descendants of Tola listed as fighting men in their genealogy numbered 22,600.”

The whole number that went down into Egypt was sixty-six to which we may add Joseph and his two sons, and Jacob himself, which brings the total number up to seventy. It was now 215 years since God had promised Abraham to make of him a great nation and yet that branch of his seed to which the promise was applied had increased only to seventy. In the years to come the power of God to multiply these seventy to so vast a multitude even as slaves, even in Egypt, demonstrates the power of God. When God pleases, a little one shall become a thousand as Isaiah 60:22 says,“The least of you will become a thousand, the smallest a mighty nation. I am the Lord; in its time I will do this swiftly.”

The meeting between Jacob and his son Joseph was very emotional and joyful. Joseph demonstrates great respect for his father, Jacob. He went in his chariot to meet him, and, in the interview, showed, that time did not wear out the sense of his obligations, but his tears which he shed abundantly on his father’s neck for joy to see him, were real indications of the sincere and strong affection he had for him. Tears and crying in sorrow and joy both give release to strong emotions that cannot be otherwise expressed. When Joseph embraced Benjamin he wept on his neck, but when he embraced his father he wept on his neck a good while; his brother Benjamin was dear, but his father Jacob must be dearer.

Jacob was greatly satisfied in this meeting: “Israel said to Joseph, ‘Now I am ready to die, since I have seen for myself that you are still alive.’” (30). He had so much pleasure and satisfaction in this first meeting that he thought it too much to desire or expect any more here, where our comforts must always be imperfect. Jacob was ready to die immediately yet lived seventeen years longer. Death will not come just when we call for it, whether in a passion of sorrow or joy. Our times are in God’s hand, and not in our own. We die when God pleases, and not just when we are blessed with the pleasures of life or are overwhelmed with its griefs.

Joseph gave prudent care concerning his brethren’s settlement. It was fair to Pharaoh to let him know that such a colony had come to settle in his dominions. If others place a confidence in us, we must not be so base and disingenuous as to abuse it by imposing on them. Joseph took care to pay his respects to Pharaoh, as verse 31 says, “Then Joseph said to his brothers and to his father’s household, “I will go up and speak to Pharaoh and will say to him, ‘My brothers and my father’s household, who were living in the land of Canaan, have come to me.” Joseph was open with his family and with Pharaoh.

Time was when the  brothers were contriving to get rid of him; now he is arranging to settle them to their satisfaction and advantage. This is rendering good for evil. He thoughtfully wanted them to live by themselves, separated somewhat from the Egyptians, in the land of Goshen, which lay near to Canaan, and which perhaps was less populated by the Egyptians, and well furnished with pastures for cattle. This way they would be in less danger of being infected by the ungodly influence of the Egyptians and of being insulted by any unkindness of the Egyptians.

Shepherds, it seems, were an abomination to the Egyptians, that is, they looked on them with contempt, and scorned to converse with them; and he would not bring his brothers to Egypt to be insulted. He wanted them to continue as shepherds and not to be ashamed to acknowledge that as their occupation before Pharaoh. He could have employed them under himself in the corn-trade or arranged a high place in the king’s ranks, but such preferments would have exposed them to the envy of the Egyptians, and might have tempted them to forget Canaan and the promise made to their fathers. It is generally best for people to remain in the vocations to which they are accustomed. 1 Corinthians 7:14 says, “Brothers and sisters, each person, as responsible to God, should remain in the situation they were in when God called them.” Whatever employment or condition God, in His providence, has allotted for us, let us accommodate ourselves to it, and satisfy ourselves with it. It is better to be successful in a lowly career than to experience shame in a high one. Moses and David, too, were shepherds, but Oh! What wise and great shepherds!!

This lesson shows the practical result of God’s answer to Joseph’s and Jacob’s prayers and desires.