Genesis chapter 37

2 This is the account of Jacob.
Joseph, a young man of seventeen, was tending the flocks with his brothers, the sons of Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah, his father's wives, and he brought their father a bad report about them.
3 Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons, because he had been born to him in his old age; and he made a richly ornamented robe for him.
4 When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him.

Joseph was his father's favourite and his brothers knew it. Joseph also reported everything they did to their father, and because he told Jacob all the bad things they did, they held a grudge against Joseph. The thing is, though, that if they had not been doing anything bad, then Joseph would only have had good things to report. They obviously perceived Joseph as a tell tale, a goodie two shoes doing everything their father asked and were jealous of his favourite son status.

It is difficult if you love one child more than another to remain impartial, but it is essential to try and do this so as to be fair to each child. I always try to make sure that we treat all our children the same, and I know they watch to make sure one is not getting a better, more expensive birthday present than another, for instance. They keep track of things like this as I know from a discussion they had yesterday….

Joseph here seems to have taken great pride in telling his brothers all about his dreams, a complete difference from later on in Genesis when he gives God the glory. He has the gift of being able to interpret dreams from God, but here, he uses it to score against his brothers, to make himself look good. It is not until he has suffered imprisonment, false accusation and all sorts that he finally learns to trust n God, to give Him the glory. It took suffering for God to be able to use Joseph and it all started with Joseph's brothers selling him into slavery. God then turned this wicked act into something that saved an entire nation.

Sometimes, when we are going through trials, when there is illness, death, financial problems, marital problems, job difficulties, trouble at school/college, it seems like God is far away, that He doesn't care and is leaving us to fend for ourselves. I am sure there were times when Joseph thought about that as he was taken away into slavery and captivity. I know the things that I have been through have made me a more sympathetic person, kinder, more accepting, although I often wanted the things I was going through to magically disappear. God used the troubles we go through to refine us, to make us more like Christ and to turn us into the people he has always designed us to be.

Genesis Chapter 36

This is about Esau and how took wives from the Canaanite women, then married a cousin, and moved away from Jacob so they could both have enough land to support them.

They say you can choose your friends but not your relatives, and this is a classic example of two brothers who did not get along. Esau was his father's favourite and Jacob the favourite of his mother. Jacob, who seems to have been a real schemer, took Esau's birthright in exchange for a bowl of stew and ended up having to flee for his life to Laban.

You would think being family, they would trust one another, respect one another, but not so in this case. Jacob tricked Esau and Esau's descendants became some of the fiercest enemies of Israel and even today, thousands of years later, Esau's descendants surround Israel and are causing trouble and friction to say the least.

Genesis Chapter 35

1 Then God said to Jacob, Go up to Bethel and settle there, and build an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you were fleeing from your brother Esau.

2 So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, Get rid of the foreign gods you have with you, and purify yourselves and change your clothes.

3 Then come, let us go up to Bethel, where I will build an altar to God, who answered me in the day of my distress and who has been with me wherever I have gone.

How can we worship the one true living God when we have idols in our hearts? People, possessions, things that take the place of God in our hearts and put him in second place? Like Jacob and his family, we need to take a good long hard look at ourselves, at our hopes and dreams, our lifestyle, our priorities.

Is there anything in our lives that takes us away from God? That we put above God in our lives? Is work our priority and God second place? Is getting that new job or promotion the thing that occupies our mind to the exclusion of all else? Are we so wrapped up in the lives of our spouses and children that we cannot see God? Are we always worrying about finances, about the bills coming in, the expenses we have to meet? What about church - do we spend more time daydreaming in church, looking around at what people are wearing, who is or isn't there, than in worship and praise? Is our worship half hearted as we keep thinking of the things we have done or need to do, or remembering past hurts and grudges?

We need to get rid of anything like that which is in our hearts, to focus our attention on God and God alone, and take the worries, the cares, the problems to Him.

Genesis Chapter 34

This is the sort of story that is made into a film. There is love (well, passion at any rate), pride, sex, deceit, betrayal, lies, violence, greed, murder - all the hallmarks of what apparently describes a good film or makes for excellent newspaper headlines in the tabloids.

Dinah is raped and Jacob's sons, especially Simeon and Levi, are really upset about this, understandably. They feel that their sister has been defiled and that because they have been set aside by God, they are special, holy, a cut above the others, better than the townspeople of Shechem. So they trick the men of Shechem into getting circumcised - the thought of getting their hands on the flocks and herds of Jacob and his sons persuades the townsmen to undergo this painful procedure. Then when they are still recovering, Simeon and Levi walk into town and kill all the men. The rest of the brothers then follow on, taking the little children and wives captive, looting and plundering everything they could lay their hands on. Jacob is appalled, saying that his name would now be mud and all the inhabitants of the land would join together to destroy him and his household.

It’s a case of two wrongs do not make a right. Repaying evil with evil is not the right thing to do. How can theft and murder be the right response to rape? Yes, it is easy to sit here and take the moral high ground, and if I had a sister , or if it had been my daughter, I may well think differently. I was hearing last night about Christians in Pakistan who are 2.5% of the population. Women believers there are often raped, young girls and women may be kidnapped and forcibly converted to Islam and then married to a much older man. If Christian women work as servants in a rich Muslim's house, they are treated like dirt and often beaten, maltreated, raped. Many are raped and then thrown onto the streets where they have no choice but to turn to prostitution. It is truly heartbreaking to hear of God's people being treated this way, His sons and daughters being persecuted and I just sit here warm and cosy in my nice house, in front of my computer when their faith, their lack of hatred against their oppressors, their warmth, their courage, their smiles in the face of persecution, puts me to shame.

And what about Dinah? She is mentioned only briefly in the bible, firstly to tell us she has been born (Genesis 30:21) and then here where she is raped, given to Shechem and then nothing more is heard of her. Imagine her reaction when after being raped her own brothers agree to give her in marriage to the man who attacked her! She is actually in Shechem's house when the men of the town are killed, and her brothers then take her back to the camp. And Jacob? He is more concerned about what will happen to him and his household than about what has happened to Dinah.

Evil is never the right response. The consequences of this action followed Simeon and Levi and their descendants ended up losing that part of the Promised Land that they had been given. We are told to keep the peace as far as possible though (1 Peter 3:11 Let him eschew evil, and do good; let him seek peace, and ensue it - KJV) and whilst this doesn't mean being a doormat and letting others attack us without taking any steps to defend ourselves, it certainly doesn't mean taking revenge in such a brutal and deceitful way.

I'm back!

I have really been neglecting posting here, so am about to finish Genesis, then move onto Exodus. I have actually already finished these books and am part way through reading the bible in year, so will post my thoughts on those later books (starting with 1 Kings) after Exodus.

Apologies for missing out the books in between Exodus and 1 Kings but real life hit hard earlier in the year when work became impossible (tax return filing deadline in the UK!) and I was just reading, not journaling.

I hope if you do read my comments, you find them thought provoking, even though you may not agree with what I say.

Genesis 33

If Jacob was still worried about how Esau would receive him, the way he split up the group clearly shows his preferences. First in the line of fire were the servant wives and their children, then Leah and her children and finally Jacob and Rachel. Yet the precautions were unnecessary as Esau greeted Jacob with a big hug. Whilst time way from each other had caused the one brother to worry over his reception, the other had come to terms with their disagreement and was no longer bitter.

Sometimes, we can worry ourselves silly over things that happen, or that we think are going to happen, and yet God has everything under his control, in His hands. We can spend a lifetime worrying over every single thing that happens to us, worrying about our jobs (or lack of a job), our homes (or lack of a home), our spouses (or lack of a spouse), our children (or lack of children), the world, the man next door, whether it will rain tomorrow or not, anything and everything. But all this ignores God in our lives, ignores the fact that each one of us believers is filled with the Holy Spirit, our comforter and guide, and that Jesus himself told us to cast all our burdens on him for his yoke is light and his burden easy.

I know I for one need to spend more time in prayer, to take all things to God, not just the big ones, or the ones that seem more important or more worrying. God knows our hearts, knows the things that make us smile, the ones that cause us pain, and through him, we can do anything. The arm of the Lord is not too short to deal with my problems, or even the problems in the world. I just need to learn to talk to Him, to take things to Him and to have en ever deepening relationship with him.

Genesis chapter 32

When Jacob last saw Esau, he had just robbed Esau of his father's blessing and was basically running to Laban to get away from Esau and save his skin. Now, many years later, he returns and is very worried about how Esau will treat him. So the first thing he does is pray to God, which kind of makes my cynicism in the last chapter look misplaced!

It is such an example as well, because how often do problems arise in life and we try and sort them out ourselves, without even mentioning them to God, let alone praying about them? And yes, I know God knows about them anyway since He knows everything about us, but that isn't the point. In any relationship there has to be two way conversation for the relationship to work. You can't be married to someone and not talk to them, you can't have children and not speak to them (imagine the chaos if you did that and let the children do what they wanted, when they wanted!!!) and in the same way, you can't have a relationship with God and not pray.

Prayer should be the first thing we do in an situation, not the one thing we do only after we have exhausted all other options and not come up with a solution ourselves. I have a habit of doing this, trying to sort everything out myself, getting all stressed and anxious, feeling like the weight of the world is on my shoulders and that no one else cares or is bothered, when all I have to do is pray, take it to God and ask Him to handle it. I have learnt that God can be trusted, no matter what the problem. I now He always answers my prayers, maybe not the way I want, maybe not at the time I want, but each one is answered, and when I have doubts, I just remember the 1,000 year rule (a 1,000 years is as a day to the Lord and a day is as a 1,000 years therefore if 1 day = 1,000 years, 14.4 minutes = 10 years!) and try to have patience.

Here, Jacob is reminding God is his promises, of how He said that Jacob would have descendants as numerous as the sand, because after all, if Esau killed Jacob, then Jacob would have no more children so would potentially never be the father of many descendants.