Author: Josh King

Oh the tension between the tender and the terrifying that is this passage.

This is not a flannel graph friendly passage.  Sister Sue never taught this in children’s chapel.  If your pastor preaches expository messages and is going through Genesis this might be the only time you hear him say “semen” in the pulpit.  But beware, Moses is not trying to titillate your senses.  Do not use this text as a basis for explicit material as the subject of art.  One could use Moses as a proof for realism, but not sensualism.  Sin is not romanticized here.

So one could misread this text by handling it wrong, treating it more like a romance novel, or a racy drama; or one could misread it by making light of the sins presented here.  Yes, here God’s providence works such that from all this sin comes the Savior.  God’s plan is not thwarted to work all things together for good, not even by the saints own sins.  Yet there is a tension here.  We may not presume upon God’s grace.  Some sinners die, some live.  We are not even clued into the wickedness that was Er’s, God need not give any justification to us.  He would be just to condemn us all to such a sentence for any one minute of our lives.

It is precisely this tension that makes God’s gracious providence so astounding, so outrageous.  God loves and works things, all things, for the good and salvation of such despicable depraved souls.  His providence seems promiscuous.  But alas, these are the only kind of humans for God to love, darkness loving, sin wrecked, cursed, and depraved enemies.  Yet God’s love toward them is holy, for the Son of Perez, our Lord Jesus, would bear the wrath for our sins. 

Here at the cross tension between the terrifying and the tender is revealed most powerfully.  Concerning those crucified beside Christ, one was saved that all may have hope, but only one that none might presume.  It is only in this tension that God’s love truly floors us.  If we lose sight of His terrifying Holiness we may no longer sing that God’s grace is amazing.

We have now entered into the last section of Genesis (37:2-50:26). This book ends the way it began, leaving us in awe of God. The Joseph stories are not primarily written for us to glean trite moral lessons from, they are there to teach us about God. Really this whole section has one unified majestic point – the providence of God. Genesis begins by stunning us with God’s creative power, it concludes stunning us with His power. God not only calls all things into being, He sustains His creation, guides it, and governs it towards His ends. The 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith says the following of God’s providence:

God the good Creator of all things, in his infinite power and wisdom doth uphold, direct, dispose, and govern all creatures and things, from the greatest even to the least, by his most wise and holy providence, to the end for the which they were created, according unto his infallible foreknowledge, and the free and immutable counsel of his own will; to the praise of the glory of his wisdom, power, justice, infinite goodness, and mercy.

How do we know that this is the point of the story? Our initial clue are the prophetic dreams given to Joseph by God. They function as an interpretive gird in this section the same way that Jacob’s ladder (Genesis 28:10-22) did for the eighth section (25:19-35:29). But this is not the only interpretive key we are given. The theological climax of what this section is to teach us is not explicitly stated until the end. The primary cause in sending Jacob to Egypt was not his brothers; it was God (Genesis 45:5-8). What God does is not simply turn his brother’s evil for good, but plan and will his brother’s evil for good (Genesis 50:20).

The great puritan John Flavel said, “The providence of God is like Hebrew words – it can only be read backwards.” The story of Joseph is a story of God’s providence, it must be read backwards. In fact all of the Old Testament is a story of God’s providence, it must be read backwards. Or as Sinclair Ferguson wrote, “…the events, imagery, and language of the Old Testament are like a shadow cast backward into history by Christ, the light of the world.” Later in the same great book, In Christ Alone, he goes on to write:

The invisible is more substantial than the visible;
The future shapes the past;
The new is more fundamental than the past.

What does all this mean?

Simply put, it means that the story of the Lord Jesus, his person and work, is not a divine afterthought, a heavenly plan B hurriedly scrambles together when plan A went horribly wrong. No, the coming of Christ was in the plan before the fall. Everything that preceded it chronologically actually follows it logically.

Jesus is the true and better Joseph. He is the righteous, elect, and anointed Son, lifted up by His Father and hated by men, for He exposes our disobedience. He is sent as a lamb to the slaughter, not ignorantly, but knowingly by His Father. He is handed over to the Gentiles, suffering for our salvation. After going to the lowest depths bearing the wrath of God, His Father raises Him up, sets Him in the position of supreme ruler, and then using this new power Jesus saves those who have so horribly sinned against Him.

This is the supreme story of God’s providence (Acts 4:27-28). All of history centers around it.

If you were to randomly pick this chapter, “the pagan phonebook”, for study I doubt you would receive much nourishment from it.  Not that there isn’t much nourishment to be gained, but it is like handing a whole crab to a child who has never learned how to penetrate the shell.  There is succulent meat for the feasting, how do we extract it?

I think genealogies like this are a great argument for closely studying a book of the Bible and for expositional preaching.  Expositional preaching should teach you how to read your Bible.  If you come to this text in isolation you come to it without the combination to unlock its treasures.  If you come to it having noticed the themes that are developing throughout the book however, its meaning begins to slowly unfold.

Thus far we have seen that it was Jacob who received the blessing not Esau.  Yet Esau is blessed with wives, children, and great possessions.  Edom seemingly becomes a mighty nation much more easily than Israel, driving out the original inhabitants of their land, the Horites (Genesis 36:20-30), well before Israel drives out the Canaanites (Deuteronomy 2:12).  They progress as a nation much more quickly, having kings before Israel does (Genesis 36:31-43).

The pagans often progress more quickly than the saints.  This is nothing new.  In Cain’s genealogy (Genesis 4:17-26) great cultural progress is made in herding, musical instruments, and metal working.  It is the descendents of Cain who are first mentioned as building a city.  What cultural advancements and contributions come from the line of Seth?  None from a secular vantage point are mentioned.  But it is with Seth’s birth that people begin to call upon the name of the Lord (Genesis 4:2).  It is in Seth’s line that the rhythm of death is thrown off (Genesis 5:24).  It is in Seth’s line that a man finds favor in the eyes of the Lord (Genesis 6:8).

Esau seemingly has none of the pain that Jacob had to endure, yet all of the gain.  But notice what is lacking.  There is not a hint of the spiritual blessing.

Esau may be blessed in the lesser sense, but he is cursed in the greatest sense.

We need not envy this passing world that we are just passing through.