Highlight:

“By faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed both the sons of Joseph; and worshipped, leaning upon the top of his staff.”

Hebrews 11:21

Explanation:

“By faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed both the sons of Joseph; …”

Jacob sure did do many things that lived up to his first name- supplanter or deceiver.  Yet, one of the great things to read in his life is a growing maturity and spiritual sight with age.  As his physical sight dimmed, we see that his spiritual sight and his character grew more and more clear.  Though the outward man perishes, the inward man is renewed day by day.  This is certainly seen in the life of Jacob.  One writer put it this way, 

The close of Jacob’s career stands in most pleasing contrast with all the previous scenes of his eventful history. It reminds one of a serene evening after a tempestuous day: the sun, which during the day had been hidden from view by clouds, mists, and fogs, sets in majesty and brightness, gilding with his beams the western sky, and holding out the cheering prospect of a bright tomorrow. Thus it is with our aged patriarch. The supplanting, the bargain-making, the cunning, the management, the shifting, the shuffling, the unbelieving selfish fears,—all those dark clouds of nature and of earth seem to have passed away, and he comes forth, in all the calm elevation of faith, to bestow blessings, and impart dignities, in that holy skillfulness which communion with God can alone impart.  (C.H. Mackintosh, from the Believers Bible Commentary).

At the end of his life we read the account in Genesis 48 where he was blind, sick, and on his deathbead.  He called for Joseph to see him.  Joseph brought his two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, to see their grandfather.

Both Ephraim, the younger, and Manasseh, the older, were born to Joseph in Egypt.  At one point in the conversation between Jacob and Joseph, Jacob states wonder at the grace of God in seeing the boys.  The scripture records it by saying, 

Genesis 48:11

11 And Israel said unto Joseph, I had not thought to see thy face: and, lo, God hath shewed me also thy seed.

Jacob first tells Joseph about the Abrahamic Covenant that God had promised to him at a point in his life.  He would be part of the line of many nations, and would have the land of promise for his seed.  Jacob tells Joseph something incredible about the future of his sons.

Genesis 48:5

5 And now thy two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, which were born unto thee in the land of Egypt before I came unto thee into Egypt, are mine; as Reuben and Simeon, they shall be mine.

This was a formal proclamation of the adoption of Jospeh’s two sons as equivalent to their uncles in the inheritance.

When Joseph brings the boys up to Jacob’s bed to be blessed, Jacob puts his right hand on the younger lads head, Ephraim, and his left hand on Mannaseh’s head, to Josephs protest.  Joseph explains that both of the boys will be blessed, but that Ephraim, though younger, would receive the blessing of the firstborn.  This seems to be a pattern in Genesis.  Jacob was served by Esau.  Seth was blessed while Cain was cursed.  Isaac was the child or promise, while Ishmael, though blessed, was not.  Ephraim was more influential as seen in the fact that the whole nation was called Ephraim at times.  Similarly in this chapter, the writer uses the name Israel instead of Jacob after he declares the special place Joseph’s sons would enjoy.  

“…and worshipped, leaning upon the top of his staff.”

This phrase is a reference to Genesis 47:31, and is a quote from the Septuagint, a greek translation of the Old Testament.  

Genesis 47:31

31 And he said, Swear unto me. And he sware unto him. And Israel bowed himself upon the bed’s head.

When it says that he bowed himself upon the bed’s head in Genesis 47, why does it say something different in Hebrews.  The two words for bed and staff in Hebrew have exactly the same consonants.  Old Testament Hebrew manuscripts were copied without vowels, and so some interpret it as bed and some as staff.  Either one could be factually true, though the writer of Hebrews seems to use the greek translation of the Hebrew text known as the LXX or the Septuagint which translated the word as staff.  

How was all of this a matter of faith?

1. Jacob grew to trust God over time by seeing God be faithful and gracious to him.
2. Jacob prophesied what was revealed to him by God in this blessing even though He knew that Joseph, and his other sons may not like everything that he did.
3. Jacob worshipped the invisible God that He did not see, but that He heard from and began to know.
4. Jacob trusted that God would do for his offspring what He had promised to himself, and Abraham and Isaac before him.

Application:

1. God can be trusted.
2. God will do what he promises to do.
3. God deserves worship.  When we do worship Him we are expressing our faith because we believe that He hears us and that He is pleased with the praises of His people.
4. We ought to bless our kids by declaring to them the promises of God as well.  The heritage of faithfulness is more important than the gifts of substance.

Response:

• Today, I’m going to try to find a way to pass along some love and faith to my kids when they get home from school.