When Fiery Trial Comes

Well, after a few weeks, we return this morning to our study in the book of Genesis, and we come to a somewhat challenging section of Genesis, and I didn't want to pass over it. I just found that in these sections where there is so much, I guess you might say, not mystery, but where we don't fully see immediately when we read it what's happening, there's so much the Lord is really saying to us. And so in verses 16 through 29 this morning, we conclude chapter 35, which is really a conclusion of Jacob's whole journey all the way back around now. And there'll be still a little bit more in the life of Jacob as the book concludes, but the proper study of his life, we have a transition out of this this week, and then we'll start looking at Israel, the development of the nation of Israel after Esau's descendants next time. This is the Word of God, beginning at Genesis 35, beginning first book of the Bible, beginning at verse 16. Then they journeyed from Bethel, when they were still some distance from Ephrath. Rachel went into labor, and she had hard labor. And when her labor was at its hardest, the midwife said to her, do not fear, for you have another son. and as her soul was departing for she was dying she called his name ben-oni but his father called him benjamin so rachel died and she was buried on the way to ephrah that is bethlehem and jacob set up a pillar over her tomb it is the pillar of rachel's tomb which is there to this day israel journeyed on and pitched his tent beyond the tower of edir while israel lived in that land Reuben went and lay with Bilhah, his father's concubine, and Israel heard of it. Now the sons of Jacob were 12. The sons of Leah, Reuben, Jacob's firstborn, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun. The sons of Rachel, Joseph, and Benjamin. The sons of Bilhah, Rachel's servant, Dan, and Naphtali. The sons of Zilpah, Leah's servant, Gad, and Asher. These were the sons of Jacob who were born to him in Paddan Aram. And Jacob came to his father Isaac at Mamre, or Kiriath Arba, that is Hebron, where Abraham and Isaac had sojourned. Now the days of Isaac were 180 years, and Isaac breathed his last, and he died, and was gathered to his people old and full of days, and his sons Esau and Jacob buried him. May the Lord bless the hearing of his word. One of the things that we are all trying to avoid at any cost in our lives is adversity and conflict. We're all trying to avoid that. We really do live in fear. We live in fear about our health. We live in fear with regard to homes and futures and belongings. Ultimately in the U.S., this is what we have been taught to do. This is what we're taught to do every night we turn on the news, live in fear. And it's tough because we have a course all mapped out that we're going to go in life. Work until we get to a certain point where I don't have to do that anymore. I said to my wife the other day, you know, I said, we're just trying so quickly to get through all of this. To get to what? To get to what? So that I can go hit a little ball around the rest of my life? you know is that what i think this is so i can become a great bowler we're all taught to live maximizing pleasure that that's how we're taught that's how we're taught that's how i guess that's just ingrained in us it's of course in all of us a form of hedonism you'd be amazed at how much this pursuit drives and fills your own lives and because of it because of that we're all trained we're all trained and we all live for pursuing earthly happiness in this life that that's what we're all trying to do and and what do you think then happens when adversity comes conflict trouble well we we live just trying to get through it and doing everything we can to avoid it, dealing with it. We run from it. We run from these things. And what we don't realize is we're never really escaping conflict in life. You'll never escape conflict no matter how hard you're trying. Adversity is going to strike you. It comes and runs. It comes all at once, and it'll strike your health. It's going to strike your homes. It's going to strike the church. And that's the last thing you want to hear this morning. I get it. I don't want to say it. But what people don't realize is, is that when we're running from conflict, when we're running from doing what we should do, when we're running from adversity, when we live in fear, when we lead in fear in our homes, in the church, and go right down the line, when we have all this fear and we avoid going through what we should do as God calls us to do, you're only making matters worse for yourself. you're making a situation that is bad, it's going to get a lot worse. Conflict and adversity come. Avoiding these things in fear paves the path for it to get a lot worse for you. Fear. That's our sort of default way of handling these things. And then we run. And then we run. I raised this this morning because that's what we've seen with the life of Jacob, haven't we? That's been our study. It's been a massive conflict in his life. His whole life has been a massive conflict. It's been a conflict with God. And then it spilled over in his life and it began with a conflict with dad. And it spilled over to a conflict with his brother. And his whole life has spilled over and continued conflict and conflict and conflict. So at the beginning of his life, we had this awful scene of dad and brother and Jacob amassing a conflict that was so out of control, he had to run from it. He had to get out of Dodge, which he shouldn't have done. He should have gone to his brother and asked for forgiveness. 20 years the man's been running. 20 years we've seen and studied the life of somebody who ran the opposite way. His life has been pictured as such. his life has been pictured this way when the mess happened instead of dealing with it he ran to haran and because of that life has not been easy for this man it's not been easy at all here's what i love about this morning what has cod been doing for the last 20 years bringing him home bringing him home what we've been studying the last weeks in genesis especially chapter 35 which was sort of a highlight chapter here at the very end of the study of Jacob's life is what a repentant life looks like what a turned life looks like that was Genesis chapter 35 that does and and it was beautiful we'll look at that here in a minute but the question that you have as you look at that do you expect now that Jacob turned around and went the right way and is where he should be and is moving forward do you expect life then to get easy he's He's heading to the retirement years. He now hits some of the greatest adversity of his life. And in it, you see a different man. And that's what I want you to see this morning. I love this chapter. You see a man who's hit with some of the greatest adversity he's ever faced in life. Now, after repentance. And I don't see the same figure. God this morning brings him full circle. He walks right back through adversity, reconciling what needs to be reconciled, going and being where God called him to go and to be. And this is meant to be a huge encouragement for you. This is meant to be a passage that should greatly encourage you not to avoid conflict, not to run from conflict, but to go through it. And to see that as you go through it, none of it can destroy you. None of it can hurt you. None of it can derail. None of it can annul what God has done and will do and will see to completion. I mean, you're going to see this morning God's perfect plan work out through the greatest adversity and conflict that we see in the life of Jacob. And that's an awesome experience to go through. So don't run too quickly around it or away from it. So what we have here is Jacob moving forward. And God shows us how he is fulfilling his promise and the same is true for us. How are we responding to what God has called us to go through? And God inspires a section here that is the long end of this narrative of his life and now what we have is the beginning of a new era. You have a lot of death in this section. And what do you expect from the Lord through this? What do you expect in the times of adversity when you're going through it as he has called you to go through it, not when you're doing it because of your own foolish choices, as in the Dinah incident. It's a beautiful section. At the beginning of chapter 35, as we open up again, chapter 35, we add the description of a changed life. We have the description of Jacob's life of repentance. He had finally come back to Bethel. And the scene was showing us his return to his God. He had cried out, we've got to go back. We've got to go back to Bethel, the God of the house of God. And he said, we've got to go back because he has answered me in the day of my distress. He has been with me the whole way. Whatever he said in his promise, through my whole little run here, through my whole little stunt, through my whole running when I shouldn't have run, He didn't abandon me. And I'm taken by that. I've got to go back to him. I've got to get back to him. He did everything he said he would do. And so what does Jacob do in chapter 35? He buries his idols. They're wearing them. That's it. I'm done with the idolatrous life. They took him off. And they buried them, which was the whole New Testament's message we looked at of burying the old and putting on the new. I promised way back earlier in my life when I made a profession of faith. Remember? I said if he would do all that for me, he would be my God. He purified himself. He changed his clothes. The last scene left us. I mean, think of the mountaintop experience. To all the high schoolers who went to RYS, you went to a mountaintop experience last week, right? You're all pumped up. He had a mountaintop experience. Verse 15 ends with, God talked to him. Can you imagine that? He was renewed in God's steadfast love. The covenant mercies of the Lord were restated to him that were made to Abraham. God said, I'm going to do this for you, Jacob. I'm going to fulfill everything. I mean, you talk about, after a long run in rebellion, hearing that? That's one of the greatest moments in life. Someone's life is turned around. You know, the greatest moment is when they turn to the Lord, isn't it? I mean, this is what we get excited about in the life of the church. This is what the angels rejoice over in the life of the church. When someone's life is turned around, they repent of their sin, they hear, they're finally able, they want to be in church. They don't want to go out and do the party stuff anymore. They want to be in church. Promise is renewed. Grace, they're strengthened in grace. They go forward and they're mesmerized by what the Lord has done for them. Mountaintop. It's at this point, Genesis is showing you that the pilgrimage was not done. He still had somewhere else to go. I'll come back to that. Before we get there, as soon as he comes down from Bethel, Bethel was at a height, he comes down off the mountain, and he moves forward. And the text brings us to this major period of adversity. I mean right out of the mountain gates, right off the mountain. And the text shows us that Jacob enters a serious period of adversity. I mean it. The text comes on the heels of his repentance comes this. And I can't help but stop and think about that for a moment. You know, when we think everything's great and, you know, we've got the good old life and everything's wonderful, we've got everything where we want it, it's just come so great for us, we've all achieved what we want in life, we've got there. Just then, notice what happens. Tragedy. And I'm not talking about just one. Notice here. Three deaths fill this last section. Three deaths. Everyone look up at verse 8 in chapter 35. In the middle of it. And Deborah, Rebecca's nurse, died. And she was buried under the oak below Bethel. So he called its name Alon Bacuth. In the middle of the narrative with no apparent connection. I mean, this just doesn't seem to fit. You say, well, why did the Holy Spirit inspire it this way? In the middle of the narrative, with no apparent connection, with a name we've never heard before in Genesis, all of a sudden, a woman is mentioned, whose name is Deborah, never mentioned before, and we find out a little bit of information about her. This was a woman who had left Haran with Rebekah years ago when she was brought back to be the bride of Isaac. This woman had been a faithful servant in the house of Abraham for 150 years. And I had to ponder and think about why is this woman being mentioned here? And I believe the answer to that was that she was a mother-like figure to Jacob when he didn't have Rebekah and after she had died. And it was such a big moment in the life of Jacob. Did you notice that name, Alam Bacuth? It means oak of weeping. Everyone stopped and wept over this no-name woman in Genesis. I don't know if you've ever had a figure like this in life, but the Lord brings motherly-like figures into our lives and maybe they filled some kind of void and you have no idea of the blessing of the Lord with that kind of person until they're gone it happened it then progresses as we come to verse 16 we read that as they journeyed to bethel journey from bethel verse 16 they all journeyed when there were they were still some different uh distance from ephrath rachel broke out she went right on into labor she had hard labor and it says in verse 18 that her soul was departing for her from her for she was dying and she dies at Bethlehem you know how hard this was for Jacob you know we don't have a lot said here but when Jacob later will rehearse his life at the very end of Genesis he's going to say to Joseph something about Rachel and this is what he says in the middle of the story it just stops as he's recounting his life and he almost stops It's right here with the spotlight. And he says, as for me, when I came from Paddan, to my sorrow, Rachel died in the land of Canaan on the way. While there was still some distance to go to Ephrath, and I buried her there on the way to Ephrath, that is Bethlehem. This was overwhelming sorrow to me. Overwhelming sorrow, Joseph, your mom. He loved her. And he had worked for her years, remember. It was the greatest sorrow, one of the greatest sorrows of his life. His wife was taken. And I think what moves me about it is as I read it in Genesis chapter 35, you can feel the blow of it. And what emotion comes over you when you read this passage. That makes no sense. I mean, her life expires giving birth. That's it. And then the chapter moves. And by the end of the chapter, you have the death of Isaac, who Jacob has been gone from for how many years? That's a lot to take. A mother-like figure, your wife, and your father. gone death strikes you're never ready for it it's a valley of weeping and when it rains it pours when it rains it pours we all know that well if that wasn't enough then you have this disturbing scene in verse you'll notice here right as chapter 35 moves on in verse 22 this disturbing scene that Reuben goes in and lays with his concubine bilhah awful scene ugly scene messy scene down from bethel have i painted the picture for you you step back from this and you ask what does that produce in people by the way what is this these kind of experiences begin to produce in people i mean this is a man being buffeted he's being beaten he's being beaten back late in life look you have enough bitter experiences in life what happens to people like this? They become bitter. How many older people do you know who are bitter and who are miserable? I've seen my share of some who have been so hardened by where life's turns went and where it all went that by the end of it, they are just hard as rocks. You have enough adversity, enough sorrow isn't that the outcome we fear going through all this right now nobody likes hearing this first part of genesis 35 i mean the second half i mean this is this is hard we're taught to do everything we can in life to fix all of this so that we don't have to deal with it and we avoid it and instead of going through it here's what we do we run but chapter 35 shows you something else and that's why i love this when adversity struck jacob what did he do did you notice he keeps being called israel now israel did this and israel did that and god wants you to say i changed his name remember in this chapter israel israel israel as you look at this repentant life of this man each event what's he doing at each event he's moving he's going forward and you see it in the way that he handles each adversity as rachel dies what does she do she cries out and she's in sorrow and she's she's she's in pain she's dying Ben-oni, son of my sorrow, is what that means. This is the son of my sorrow. I'm dying. And Jacob says, no, no, no, Rachel. No. His name is Benjamin. Son of my right hand. Wow. I won't accept that. That will not be his name. When Rachel had Joseph, she said something. Do you remember? She said this, Lord, the Lord will give me one more son. You can go back and look at that. The Lord will give me one more son. And what is Jacob seeing? He answered his prayer. Her time is fulfilled. How many of you have seen life and death? How many of you have seen when death strikes, all of a sudden there's life right in front of you? A new baby. It's a wonderful addition. I've seen that my whole life. Jacob buries her in sorrow. He gets up and he moves on, and he moves on. And where does chapter 35 end? Here's what I want you to ponder for a minute. Where does 35 end? So Jacob came to his father Isaac at Mamre, Hebron, where Abraham and Isaac had dwelt. We read that Isaac's days were 180 years and he dies fulfilled. And there, standing at his deathbed, are who? Jacob and Esau. Now I don't know how much that strikes you, but after this whole run, where does the scene end? Jacob and Esau are standing there reconciled before the death of Isaac. That's an amazing moment in Genesis. God brought him full circle. The scene of his life began in Genesis with him deceiving dad on his deathbed. Isaac's been laying there a long time to see this. Couldn't bring it about, of course. Jacob swindles Esau. How many years ago was that? Isaac sat there a long time and the entire scene now at the very end, he breathes his last, it's reconciled. What a blessing for Isaac. A life so troubled, a scene that ends in peace. And you see the Lord working here behind all this. You see the Lord working behind all this. At the end of the journey of life proper here in Jacob, sure, we're going to look at a little bit more of him, But it's not the focus anymore. We really transition out of his life now. He has come full circle. He's reconciled. And we move to a new period, the changing of the guard. Now life moves on to the next generation. Israel really begins after this. And I love to say this. I love to acknowledge this this morning for you to think about. The repentant life, the Christian life, is never won free from adversity, even though you're all trying to create it. In fact, it's probably going to get worse. because you're going to have to face dealing when you've repented with your past. You're going to have to face going forward and realizing how negligent you've been with your life. You've probably not loved your wife the way that you should. You've probably not led in your homes your children the way that you should. How you failed, how your sins have found you out, and you've got to deal with the hardships of that, which is what this chapter is showing us. Sins residuals in a man's life later on. And the Lord never calls us to run from these things. He's taking us through them to come home to him with all the way through immense blessing. You know, this is how Paul described his own life. Listen to this. This was a man killing Christians. Brethren, I don't count my life to have apprehended. But one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead. I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Did you hear that? I struggle in the same way looking at the past. I struggle with the same temptations. I struggle with the warfare. I, like you though, have said, I'm not going to look back. We're runners of a race. Our aim is not to hit a golf ball. A prize is set out in front of you. Run for it. And I'm thankful He never called us to live off the past. We look back to the trials of life and we try to run around them. And we look back to the part of the race that was really smooth. This is what we do. The past always, sometimes, when you're in the midst of present conflict, it may even look better in the past and we always glorify the past and we look at the smooth times and the times maybe when husbands and wives were still living and we look back to the point along when the race was enjoyable and it's as if now when we've come to the stumbling block or the hurdle in the track, we don't go forward. I've seen that. They've stopped the race and they turn around and they say there the light once was but it's no longer here. And Jacob's moving forward. Forward, forward, forward, forward. I want to encourage Mark this morning who stood up and professed his faith. I said earlier he's known nothing as a young brother but a lot of adversity in his life and his family has known a lot of adversity in life and here he is at Bethel worshiping and you're called to go forward no matter what it is. But the Lord promises to be with you and to sanctify you in it. And I love what he said to me. He says, well, if this is the adversity, what a better time than to come to my Lord and profess faith right now. That's right. Best time. Come to him. Here's what overjoys me about the passage this morning. What is really being shown to you through the messy life of this man? The Lord has brought him home to enjoy what? Peace, reconciliation, so powerful. What is by far the ugliest scene in this event, in this section? It's the Reuben scene. Ugh. Disgusting. Now I've studied Lot and his daughters in the cave with you. I've studied the Dinah incident. You should know by now when you get something like this, you're going to find a real powerful working of the Lord here. that's why we preach these things it empties us of us and it turns us to him when God came and made a promise to Abraham and to Sarah what did they do? they laughed they laughed who's buried in this chapter? laughter that's his name that's what it means and who's mentioned in the midst of this chapter at the very end The 12 tribes of Israel are now mentioned. Notice that in verse 22. All of a sudden, you have a record of what's happened. Whoa, whoa, whoa. All this mess, and now God presents Israel. Where did they come from? The whole way he's been building. Now the sons of Jacob were 12. The sons of Leah, Reuben, Jacob's firstborn, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun. The sons of Rachel, Joseph, and Benjamin. The sons of Bilhah, Rachel's servant, Dan, and Naphtali. the sons of Zilpah, Leah's servant, Gad, and Asher. You say, look at the mess of that and look who's standing there. These were the sons of Jacob who were born to him in Paddan Aram. The entire nation now is mentioned. That's what God promised to Abraham. Through all the adversity of this man's life, through sorrow, pain, and now all this death, Who stands there? The holy nation. Right there. None of the strife that he went through could prevent that. None of it. None of it hurt him. God remained faithful. God fulfilled his promise to Abraham. Sarah's laughter is buried as the 12 tribes of Israel stand there. I think that's awesome. But what's really remarkable about God's blessing on this man, where do you see him working? When you come to the Reuben incident, you think, what a twisted thing. Did you notice how Jacob responded? He heard about it. And he's silent. And I thought about that. I thought, why is Jacob silent? What Reuben did was not just some lustful thing. Reuben, this was not a fling. Bilhah was Rachel's maid. And everyone recognizes that when he went and did this, he eliminated and prevented Bilhah from becoming the chief wife of blessing in the family. Reuben is strategic. Reuben is targeted. Reuben wants the blessing himself, but he wants to exalt Leah to that place. Reuben is Leah's son. Leah was the unloved wife. He's securing the place of preeminence for Leah. For unloved mom. Trying to make himself the heir of Jacob. And I believe Jacob saw this adversity and he stopped. And he realized something. Sins have great consequences in life. And sin has residuals, as one pastor said. Leah was unloved. The Lord didn't want her forgotten. God cared for her, and Jacob was to care for her also. But that's not it, totally. There's something else he realized. When he blesses the sons at the end of his life, who does the right of the firstborn go to? Look at the chronology and how it's presented to you, just for a minute. The sons of Leah were Reuben. What happened to Reuben? Because he did this event, here's what 1 Chronicles 5 says. Listen to this. The sons of Reuben, the firstborn of Israel, for he was the firstborn, but because he defiled his father's couch, his birthright was given to the sons of Joseph, the sons of Israel, so that he could not be enrolled as the oldest son. Reuben's out. That's what it just said. Reuben's out. Who's next? Simeon and Levi. What do they do? They slaughtered Shechem. Jacob curses them. They're out. Who's next? You've got Judah and you've got Joseph. Now, listen to the law just real quickly. If a man, this is Deuteronomy 21, if a man has two wives, the one loved and the other unloved. And both the loved and the unloved have born him children. And if the firstborn son belongs to the unloved, then on that day, when he assigns his possessions as an inheritance to his sons, he may not treat the son of the Loved as the firstborn in preference to the son of the unloved. Only the Holy Spirit would inspire that, by the way. Who is the firstborn? But he shall acknowledge the firstborn, the son of the unloved, by giving him a double portion of all that he has, for he is the firstfruits of his strength. Judah is the man. Judah is the line. Let me explain that. Jacob had no right to give the blessing to the sons of the wife he loved. But the right was based on chronology. Who is the rightful heir? Judah. And if you know your Bible, who is Judah? In Matthew chapter 1, when you open up Matthew 1 and you read where that line traveled, Judas mentioned, and then in the very place of Rachel's sorrow, Bethlehem, where she wept for her children, in the place of her death came forth the Son who would redeem Israel, the Lord Jesus Christ, the lion of the tribe of Judah. And God is showing you here, look at my workings through these messes. I worked it just out according to my decree. I worked it perfectly out according to how I wanted it all to go in the midst of your very messy lives. And through these messes, through all of your failures, through all of your adversity, through all of your trial, through the death of your loved ones, through all of the hardship, through all the affliction, one prevailed who came forth. In all of that, who is my son. He is the promised seed of Abraham. He is the Christ. So that all the nations of the earth can be blessed in him. God fulfilled his word. And there is a line through whom God would send his son, his beloved Christ, who would give his life so that today in all of your adversity, you can know what? Joy and happiness. True joy. True happiness. I say to you in closing then this morning, why are you downcast, oh my soul? You know, that's Psalm 42. Why are you downcast, oh my soul? Put your hope in God. You don't have to be discouraged about all the problems of Russia shooting down planes, by the way. It's awful, awful, awful, awful. they opened a spy base in Cuba this week again that hadn't been opened since the Cold War. You look at Israel and Gaza and everything's in turmoil right now. The world is filled with turmoil. Your lives and your hearts have the same turmoil. Same turmoil. But the Lord says to you today, don't fear. Don't run. The Christian life is learning not to walk around these things or to rule and lead in fear in these things, but to go through them. To not run away from the Lord, but to the Lord. And the Lord wants you to know today in whatever He tries you and tests you with, He'll be faithful. He'll be faithful. He'll never waver. In the greatest of messes, He fulfilled His word and saves all of those who come to Him at Bethel. So I ask today, have you called upon his name? Do you believe? Have you fled to Jesus for refuge? Go forward to him, forgetting those things which are behind you. Press forward. Press toward the goal. Press forward in the upward calling that he's given you and don't lose heart. One day you're going to stand back and you're going to look over the long path of life, how He preserved His saints and preserved you. And when you stand in glory, you're going to bow forever in praise of this God who kept His promises to you and never, ever, ever wavered. Let us today, in the midst of the affliction, receive those promises in faith and you'll have all the strength you need to go forward. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank You for instructing us like this from a text like this. And we repent that we have bought into the American ideal of, as Martin Luther once said, it's not fit that our Christ should wear a crown of thorns and His members ride on into the kingdom in cushions. You've not ordained it that way. But that's hard for us living here because this is all we've known. And when you've only known this kind of prosperity and this kind of living, it's really hard for us. And we confess that. We don't know death like this. We don't know suffering like this. But we ask that whatever it is you have for us, that you would give us your strength and your power to go forward in it. That we would not look back, but we would remember in all of that to those things that are behind but pressing forward to those things that are ahead for you have prepared for us a glorious kingdom that cannot be shaken. And so fix our eyes on the Savior and thank you that through life's messes your perfect will is accomplished and that when we screw up so badly you never waver and you fulfill every last word that you've spoken praise belongs to our God who lives and reigns forever and ever Amen