Genesis 43:1-14 (Read it, Mon! And believe it!)Not too long ago I was feeling sorry for Joseph. You remember Joseph! He was one of the youngest sons of the great patriarch, Jacob (Israel). Benjamin was THE youngest, as our Bible story tells us, but Jacob, the Father of all these, was himself a man to be pitied. He was the one who lost Joseph, as he had thought. Jacob, like any dad, felt responsible for his family. And now he had run out of food for all of them in his homeland of Palestine. He had had to send his sons down to Egypt to purchase food from the Egyptians. The Egyptians had food, because (unbeknownst to Jacob and the other sons), they first had this really wise man -- Joseph in the flesh! The latter had risen up the “the latter of eminence” to become second only to Pharaoh due to his divine skill in explaining Pharaoh’s dream, and then suggesting what ought to be done in light of that dream’s meaning. So now, under Joe’s direction, Egypt had carefully reaped and stored wheat and grain harvests for years. So Jacob’s sons, like no doubt, hundreds of others, made the journey to the Egyptian Delta where they could purchase food out of the Egyptians’ great stores.
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But finally that first shipment of food ran out, and the rains had not come in sufficient force. So, if you read this far in Genesis, you know that now it is high time to stop feeling sorry for Joseph and time to start feeling sorry for his dad! Let me spell out why.
Joseph’s dad had still not gotten over the loss of Joseph. And now, his family was hungry again. That meant a return trip to Egypt to buy yet more grain. But there was a big problem with doing that. The (dumb!) brothers could not return to Egypt without bringing along Benjamin.
That is because they had (stupidly, as Jacob himself noted) admitted to the “mean man back in Egypt” that they were originally twelve brothers, and that one was lost, and the youngest was back home with their father. It is because they blabbed out that bit of truth that the “mean man who spoke roughly to us back in Egypt” suddenly decided that they could never return unless they brought with them this youngest son. By this he would know that they were not a bunch of miserable, lying spies, but truthful men from the Land of Canaan. As if this were not enough, the “mean man back in Egypt” had required that they leave behind a brother (Gen. 42:24) just to make sure that they did in fact return to him! (Oh, that Joseph was clever!) And there is no doubt that the loss of Simeon, however temporary it might have been, also caused Jacob no end of dismay. I say again, “poor Jacob!”
But now it was time to decide, it was time to act. Their very survival (the Bible would have us believe) was at stake. You could even diagram Jacob’s dilemma by listing all of the bad conditions which had accumulated for him up to now: 1.) His people were hungry and had to eat. Yet to get food to eat meant sending trustworthy messengers (his sons?!) to a foreign country to spend hard earned money or other goods to buy that food. 2.) The first trip down there had brought food to Jacob’s clan but at great cost! His sons would be accused of stealing since they still had their money with them; and their return was an unhappy one since they were short one of their number. 3.) Because their food was again running out, a return to Egypt was nowbecoming necessary. But this was a terribly unhappy prospect since it meant taking away Benjamin, the other young son of Jacob’s favorite wife. You can even picture poor Jacob numbering on his fingers the sons he had lost or was to lose. 4.) Yet to do nothing meant starving for all, for sure. 5.) To appease that unseen Egyptian man, Jacob had the other brothers go back to Egypt at even greater cost to himself: they were to take with them the treats unique to his land (the balm, the honey, spices and myrrh, pistachio nuts, and almonds), plus the money they had brought the first time, which now left him in greater poverty and therefore more vulnerable. 6.) And of course the gamble was that the horrible man down in Egypt who had detained Simeon might well decide to
keep Benjamin as well – and what then? It would bring Jacob’s old, gray head down to Sheol! But since time was of the essence, Jacob reached a decision to do that which he did not want to do. He did it because he felt crowded and constrained by the need to do decide, so he decided. He took what seemed the only way out, even though it was a choice which was exceedingly distasteful to him. So he sent his ten sons back to Egypt – with their youngest brother, Benjamin, in tow. He had no way of knowing the marvelous, miraculous way by which God was using all of these events to save him and his sons. But this trip back to Egypt would be the means by which Jacob would learn of God’s salvation for him, and for all. He was to learn that his decision made in fearful resignation was also a decision of faith that would be divinely vindicated with a great redemption.
And there is God’s point for you as well. What about those times when you are like Jacob: you feel trapped between a rock and a hard place. It seems whichever way you turn there is simply no good solution to any of your problems – or none that you can see or that makes sense to you, anyway. None of the choices looks appealing, and all of them seem filled
with risk and negative consequences. “If I do this, then this might happen. But if I don’t do this, then this horrible thing might happen!!” (you say). So what do you do? You take the path that appears to lead most securely to survival. It also is fraught with risk, but it appears to be the only way out.In other words, sometimes as people of Christ, life itself, the life that God has given us compels us to take the least popular, or highly undesirable choice. We do it not knowing if it is truly the best or the safest. We do it not knowing if all those around us will come out all right. We do it because life itself – the life God has placed before us – compels us to believe, to have faith. Sometimes God’s life for us quite simply forces us to believe! We are compelled to believe in Him. To walk down a dark path, seemingly into a very dark night – but we go that way, because He has shown us it is the only way to go. And by this, Jesus our God, saves us, even as He saved Jacob.
Consider Jesus, the Son of God: His own life was like that too. He followed the path marked out for Him by God His Father. That path led to his moments of semi-private prayer and contemplation in the Garden of Gethsemane. He found Himself there without wakeful friends and faced with a horrible and unjust death on the Roman cross. He was constrained by the conditions of the life God His Father had given to Him. That last journey was shortest
geographically for Jesus, but the longest in that in that it was down the dark, sorrowful path to the unknown. The only thing He did know about the path to the cross was that it would please His Father. And so He did. He did so not knowing what would come of it all, and only knowing that this was the path that would please His God and our God. He moved in the direction of faith, believing that “this only way out” was the true one. So in modeling Jacob’s faith for us, Jesus saved us to live out this faith in lesser measures, and to do so in our own time. We will think on this again, and often, when we find ourselves in “Jacob’s Canyon”, caught between many rocks and equally hard places. We will go forward with Christ, even though we may do so in fear. We will move in the direction of faith, and it will be by faith that we walk. And we shall live to see there is that most unusual solution to the whole problem of life. For there is Jesus Himself walking with us or even carrying us. And the God who saved Jacob, and raised Jesus again, lives to save us fully and completely in life, and beyond.
PRAYER: FATHER OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST, WE FACE DARK AND DIFFICULT TIMES LIKE YOUR SERVANT JACOB. We also do know always where to turn or which choice is the best. But we trust in the descendant of Jacob to save us in all such times; for He has been through the worst of them, and He knows us. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Bible Text to use: Genesis 43
1 Now the famine was severe in the land. 2 And it came to pass, when they had eaten up the grain which they had brought from Egypt, that their father said to them, “Go back, buy us a little food.”
3 But Judah spoke to him, saying, “The man solemnly warned us, saying, ‘You shall not see my face unless your brother is with you.’ 4 If you send our brother with us, we will go down and buy you food. 5 But if you will not send him, we will not go down; for the man said to us, ‘You shall not see my face unless your brother is with you.’”
6 And Israel said, “Why did you deal so wrongfully with me as to tell the man whether you had still another brother?”
7 But they said, “The man asked us pointedly about ourselves and our family, saying, ‘Is your father still alive? Have you another brother?’ And we told him according to these words. Could we possibly have known that he would say, ‘Bring your brother down’?”
8 Then Judah said to Israel his father, “Send the lad with me, and we will arise and go, that we may live and not die, both we and you and also our little ones. 9 I myself will be surety for him; from my hand you shall require him. If I do not bring him back to you and set him before you, then let me bear the blame forever. 10 For if we had not lingered, surely by now we would have returned this second time.”
11 And their father Israel said to them, “If it must be so, then do this: Take some of the best fruits of the land in your vessels and carry down a present for the man—a little balm and a little honey, spices and myrrh, pistachio nuts and almonds. 12 Take double money in your hand, and take back in your hand the money that was returned in the mouth of your sacks; perhaps it was an oversight. 13 Take your brother also, and arise, go back to the man. 14 And may God Almighty give you mercy before the man, that he may release your other brother and Benjamin. If I am bereaved, I am bereaved!”
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