Genesis 4: 1-5: “And Israel took his journey with all that he had, and came to Beersheba, and offered sacrifices unto the God of his father Isaac. And God spake unto Israel in the visions of the night, and said, Jacob, Jacob. And he said, Here am I. And he said, I am God, the God of thy father: fear not to go down into Egypt; for I will there make of thee a great nation: I will go down with thee into Egypt; and I will also surely bring thee up again: and Joseph shall put his hand upon thine eyes. And Jacob rose up from Beersheba: and the sons of Israel carried Jacob their father, and their little ones, and their wives, in the wagons which Pharaoh had sent to carry him.”
When Jacob first left his father’s house after he had stolen his brother’s blessing he saw a vision of a ladder reaching up to heaven. He vowed that if God brought him back to his father’s house then the Lord would be his God (Gen 28: 20, 21). When he came back to Bethel he built an altar to the Lord and God appeared to him again, blessed him and changed his name to Israel (Gen 35: 7-10). Since that time Jacob experienced the devastation of having a missing son whom he thought was dead. Now that Jacob was moving down to Egypt he paused at Beersheba, which was really the border of the Promised Land on the way down to Egypt, and offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac again. There was some symbolism in this action; he was showing that he intended to come back to the Promised Land again and that the Lord was still his God. God honoured this action by appearing to Jacob in a vision again and promising him that he would see Joseph before he died. The Lord also promised Jacob that he He would make Jacob’s descendants into a great nation and they would come back from Egypt to the Promised Land. This was a reaffirmation of the promise the Lord made to Abraham as recorded in Gen 15. Even though Joseph’s brothers had acted with malice, the Lord was at work behind the scenes and all His promises were being worked through so that everything that He promised would come to pass (compare this with Josh 21: 45 “There failed not ought of any good thing which the LORD had spoken unto the house of Israel; all came to pass.”) Sometimes we find it hard to understand what God is doing but He is always faithful.
(The view expressed in this blog are my own and should not be taken as inspired in any way.)
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