Home's Precarious Beginnings

The Reading today is from Genesis 32, 33, 34.

32 and 33 recount the story of Jacob moving his family towards the land and the encounter he has with his brother Esau. By this time, 20 years has past, but Jacob has no idea of what he is going to encounter when he sees his brother. When they last left each other, Esau had vowed to kill him, for his deception in getting the family heritage conferred on him (Isaac's blessing).
Now he returns with two wives, two servant women, and 11 children born to them. Not only that but he has hundreds of cattle, sheep, goats, and other animals such as camels...i.e., he is a wealthy man.
The encounter with Esau goes above and beyond what Jacob imagined. Esau is welcoming and there is no hint of the hatred that had consumed him twenty years before. Esau's offer to accompany Jacob is met with more of Jacob's style - deception. He tells him he'll join him in Seir, a land in the south and east of Israel (as we know it); but in fact, he does not go that way at all, but ends up in Succoth - an area to the east of the promised land, and here he sets up booths (Sukkah's) and altar and calls upon the name of the Lord.
Perhaps what is most significant in the early section of these three passages is the development of his relationship with God. In chpt. 32, the night before he meets his brother, he "wrestles" with God during the evening. It's a wrestling match that leaves him with a permanent injury and a limp that will serve as a visual reminder of that night. Here God speaks and changes his name, giving him the name we will always relate to the 12 tribes - Israel.

Then the man said, "Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome."

Finally, chapter 34, tells the story of the beginning of struggles that are going to accompany the Israelites as they live in the land. They now have moved across the Jordan and in the land in a place called Shechem. Dinah, Jacob's daughter is raped by a Canaanite, and he then pleads for her hand in marriage. The deception of Jacob is learned well by his sons, and Levi and Simeon. These are sons of Leah, and Dinah is the youngest child. It is a sad story of deception that leads to murder. More than anything is signifies both the "separateness" of the Israelites from the Canaanite culture - which was a good thing - and, the precarious relationship that the Israelites would have in claiming this land of promise. It seems to be a history of struggle and pain - never easy.

Maybe that in the end is the lesson: this world is full of suffering, and the creation groans, waiting for redemption. This is not our final home, and it will never make peace with God's purposes until redemption in Christ is come.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad