Beyond the Patriarchs: God’s Covenant Continues

Text: Genesis 35:1-29

Introduction

As Jacob’s story draws toward its conclusion, we are reminded 1) of God’s faithfulness to Jacob individually, and 2) of God’s faithfulness to His larger covenant promises to bring about redemption thru the Promised Seed.

This serves then to reflect a truth for us as readers as well: with Jacob, we are meant to rejoice in the personal faithfulness of God to each of us as believers—but more importantly, we are reminded that we are not the center of the story of God’s redemption.

Even God’s faithfulness to us personally is meant to enable us to play our part in the grander unfolding story of God’s redemption in Jesus Christ.

I. God Calls Jacob to Worship (vv.1-8)

1. v.1 God had appeared to Jacob in Bethel in Ge 28, and Jacob set up a pillar and promised to return there through God’s faithfulness; now Jacob is called to return there, and this time build an altar.
   1. God has been faithful to his promises to Jacob, has brought him full-circle back to Bethel, as God promised to do.
      • And this is a call for Jacob to recognize God’s faithfulness to him
   2. Included in this call is a call for Jacob to uproot himself and his family! Remember, he had purchased land in Schechem.
2. vv.2-4 Jacob understands God’s call to worship as a call, first of all, to purity.
   1. You cannot pretend to love/obey/worship the pure/holy God while embracing known sin in your life.
   2. In v.4 Jacob’s household responds in obedience, gives up their foreign gods and pagan charms; Jacob buries them, and they leave them behind for good.
      • Is there any idolatry you need to surrender to God/to bury, and leave behind?
3. vv.5-9 form an illuminating pattern of what obeying God will almost always involve: both supernatural blessing, and very natural suffering.
   1. On one hand, as the purified/obedient household of Jacob travels to Bethel, God protects them by sending a terror from God upon the cities around them.
      1. God had protected Jacob from Laban & Esau, God now escorts Jacob with such a
         powerful presence that no one dares come near!
      2. vv.5-7 record Jacob’s arriving in Bethel, building an altar, and naming the altar El-Bethel (the God of Beth-el/the God of God’s house!).
   2. Yet, on the other hand, v.8 records how that, in the midst of obeying and worshiping God with singleness of purpose, tragedy strikes Jacob’s household.
      • Even as Jacob is burying his idols, he also finds himself burying loved one

II. God Reconfirms His Covenant (vv.9-15)

1. vv.9-12 God had changed Jacob’s name to Israel back in 32:29; and God had also established His covenant promises to Jacob in Ge 28 at Bethel. But as God had with Abraham numerous times, God here reconfirms his covenant with Jacob.
   1. And in doing so, God reminds Jacob—and us—of the greater story of Redemption that is at work. v.11 God makes the same promise to Jacob, as to Abraham: a company/multitude of nations will come from you.
      • How will this happen? What will this look like? Ro 4:16-17 applies this to the bringing in of Gentiles, through faith in Christ. See also Gal 3:29.
   2. This covenant promise is preceded by this key wording: I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply.
      1. First, ‘I am God Almighty’. Nothing is impossible for me.
      2. Second, based on my being God Almighty: ‘be fruitful and multiply.’
   3. The way God fulfills his sovereign promise to bring a multitude of nations into his covenant of salvation is by the recipients of that promise going in obedience to God and being fruitful and multiplying.
      • The covenant promises of God include the command for God’s covenant people to multiply and be fruitful!
2. In vv.13-15 Jacob receives God’s commission, and displays his faith in the God Almighty, by building a dedicatory pillar to him and then anointing it.
   1. Jacob had first met with God here at Bethel in Ge 28, and set up a pillar to signal his trust that God would fulfill his promises & bring him back here.
      • Now Jacob is building yet another pillar to commemorate God’s further promises.
   2. IOW, just as surely as God led Jacob from Bethe and then back again, just that certainly will God make of Jacob’s family a multitude of nations through faith!

III. Rachel & Isaac Die (vv.16-29)

1. vv.16-21 As Jacob travels on his way to Hebron, where his father Isaac still lives, his wife Rachel goes into labor… and dies giving birth to a son.
   1. Rachel w/ her dying breath gives the boy a name which means ‘son of my sorrow’; Jacob changes his name to ‘son of my right hand’, expressing joy in his sorrow.
   2. Again, Jacob is experiencing both blessing and grief in the service of the Almighty.
      • Soon after setting up a pillar in Bethel to commemorate God’s blessing there, Jacob is setting up a pillar over his wife’s grave.
2. v.22 records the wayward behavior of Jacob’s oldest son Reuben. Why is this sinful failure interjected in the middle of Jacob’s story?
   • This account explains why each of the oldest 3 will be passed over as recipients of the Messianic promise that Jacob has now inherited.
3. vv.27-29 conclude this chapter/section w/ the record of Isaac’s death.
   1. This section was titled ‘the generations of Isaac’ & began back in Ge 25.
   2. Through it all, the Promised Seed has been protected, and thru Him a multitude of nations will indeed be brought into God’s covenant salvation!
      1. God had promised to be faithful to Isaac, and God was. Isaac died 180 yrs old, and full of days.
      2. The patriarch Isaac is no more walking the earth, but God’s promises do.
   3. Even after Abraham, even after Isaac, God’s covenant continues; God has been faithfully saving, and guiding Jacob also. But why?

Conclusion

God has been faithful:

1. Individually: b/c of God’s love for Jacob: according to Jacob’s own testimony.
2. But, on a larger/cosmic scale: b/c of God’s love – not only for Abraham, or for Isaac, or for Jacob – but for all the multitude of nations who would be brought into his covenant salvation thru the Promised Seed/Messiah.

If you are not a Christian, pause and ponder for a moment the arch of history divinely recorded here in God’s ancient Scriptures:

1. The story of redemption, that God has according to his pre-world plan been supernaturally working to bring about the salvation of sinful humans, in the face of every obstacle – including our own hard-heartedness toward our Creator God!
2. Have you ever considered that your place in the great arch of human history is both smaller than you think – the world does not revolve around you – and yet far greater than your ever imagined: God was thousands of years ago removing every obstacle to your salvation, thru the Messiah Jesus Christ!

If you are a Christian, consider both the personal and the larger picture of salvation that we see here in Gen. 35.

1. You, like Jacob, are trusting in the God who answers you in your distress and goes with you wherever you go.
   • His salvation is real, it is constant, and it is personal.
2. Yet, even your being saved is not ultimately about you!
   • Like Jacob, God Almighty is blessing you so that you will be a blessing to the nations.
   • He calls you to ‘be fruitful and multiply’, as God’s means of sovereignly bringing salvation to the nations!