This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

Hi, I want to welcome you to Day 4 of Week 10 of the Book of Genesis, Chapter
49, second to the last chapter of this book, and we began talking yesterday
about blessing, the importance of passing on a dream by blessing others. Passing
out a God-given dream means you pass the dream along. It's God's dream, and one
of the great stewardship of life is passing it along to others.

And we learn a lot about life, and about faith, and about blessings in the way
that Jacob blesses his sons. Chapter 49, he's going to bless his twelve sons,
he's going to add some in in his blessing of Joseph and Ephraim and Manasseh in
the last chapter, and as he blesses these sons, we learn some things about how
God's at work in our lives. I want to just sort of walk through this chapter,
read a few verses, and note some things that God is doing.

Chapter 49 begins with these two verses, "Then Jacob called for his sons and
said, 'Gather around, so I can tell you what will happen to you in days to come.
Assemble and listen, sons of Jacob, listen to your father Israel. ' And then he
begins to bless his children.

The first blessings that he gives are not exactly blessings. They are
recognitions of what God is doing. In verses three and four, he talks about
Reuben, his firstborn, and then he talks about Simeon and Levi in verses five to
seven.

Listen to what he has to say to these sons, "Reuben," he says in verse three,
"you are my firstborn, my might, the first sign of my strength, excelling in
honor, excelling in power, turbulent as the waters. You will no longer excel,
for you went up into your father's bed, into my couch, and you defiled it. " And
then he talks about Simeon and Levi beginning in verse five, "Simeon and Levi
are brothers.

Their swords are weapons of violence. Let me not enter their council. Let me not
join their assembly, for they have killed men in their anger, and hamstrung oxen
as they pleased, cursed be their anger, so fierce, and their fury so cruel.

I will scatter them in Jacob and disperse them in Israel. " That's quite a
blessing, isn't it? Reuben, Simeon, and Levi.

Remember we read just that one verse as we were reading through the book of
Genesis that Reuben went into his father's concubine's bed. Just one verse that
noted it happened. You might thought that Jacob had forgotten it, that God had
forgotten it, but they hadn't.

We're reminded also of Simeon and Levi and how when their sister was raped,
instead of asking God for direction and bringing justice and anger, they just
brought angry consequences, selfish consequences. And so instead of expressing
God's justice, they just acted like everybody else in this world and just went
for revenge. In these verses, the consequences come.

In these verses, Reuben and Simeon and Levi are told by their father that our
decisions have consequences. And those consequences might not come in the
moment, but they're going to come in your life. Now, I like to fool myself.

I bet you do too. There are decisions that I want to make that are selfish
decisions, that are sinful decisions. And I like to fool myself in that minute
to thinking, "Ah, this won't have any consequences.

No one will ever know. Even if someone knows, it's only going to be for a
moment. " It's not true.

You never know the consequences. God is a forgiving God. God will forgive our
sins.

But God is a God also who in His justice allows us to face the consequences. And
Reuben and Simeon and Levi are reminders of the fact that in the life of faith,
our decisions still have consequences. And then Jacob turns to Judah and he
says, beginning in verse 8, "Judah, your brothers will praise you.

Your hand will be on the neck of your enemies. Your father's sons will bow down
to you. Your alliance come, O Judah.

You return from the prey, my son. Like a lion, he crouches and lies down, like a
lioness who dares to rouse him. The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the
ruler's staff from between his feet until it comes to whom it belongs.

And the obedience of the nations is His. " You know who that last verse is
talking about? Until it comes to Him to whom it belongs, it's talking about
Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ came out of the tribe, the Lion of Judah. Not the lion, the Lion of
Judah. But Jesus is called the Lion of the tribe of Judah.

This very picture that we see here, Judah, out of his family tree, is going to
come the Messiah, the Savior. He didn't know that. Jacob didn't know that.

But here he blesses his son in such a way that he looks forward by faith to what
God is going to do. He was saying so much more than he knew. And that's what I
learned from Judah.

God is doing so much more than we can see. From Reuben and Simeon and Levi, I'm
reminded that there are consequences that I may have hoped I wouldn't have to
endure. But these verses remind me that God is doing so much more than we can
see.

Judah was not perfect, just as his brothers were not perfect. But remember, a
couple of chapters ago, we reminded ourselves that even though he wasn't
perfect, he made the decision to admit his imperfections and to move ahead in
God's strength. That's what the lion's strength is in our lives.

Judah reminds me of what God is doing. And then, quickly, Jacob goes through
some other sons. Listen to what the Bible has to say about Zebulun and Issachar
and Dan and Asher.

Zebulun, in verse 13, will live by the seashore and become a haven for ships.
His border will extend towards Sidon. Issachar, in verse 14, is a raw bone
donkey lying down between two saddlebags.

When he sees how good is his resting place and how pleasant is his land, he will
bend his shoulder to the burden and submit to forced labor. Dan, in verse 16,
will provide justice for his people as one of the tribes of Israel. Dan will be
a serpent by the roadside, a viper along the path that bites the horse's heels
so that its rider tumbles backward.

Verse 18, Jacob just says, "I look for your deliverance, O Lord. " I love that
simple verse in the midst of this blessing. Jacob reminding us that it's all
about God, not about us.

Then he gets back to his sons in verse 19. Gad will be attacked by a band of
raiders, but he will attack them at their heels. Asher, in verse 20, Asher's
food will be rich.

He will provide delicacies fit for a king. Verse 21, Naphtali is a doe set free
that bears beautiful fawns. Verse 27, Benjamin is a ravenous wolf.

In the morning he devours his prey, in the evening he divides the plunder. Here
in these sons, Zebulun, Issachar, Dan, Gad, Asher, Naphtali, Benjamin, here
we're reminded of another truth, the truth that God has uniquely shaped and
uniquely placed you to glorify Him. Every one of us have a unique shape for
glorifying God.

As you read through these verses, you see that one son is called a haven,
another a place for justice, another place where deliverance would come. But
then come words like, "This is a son who will attack. This is a son who will
provide delicacies.

This is a son who's like a doe set free. Here's a son who's like a ravenous
wolf. " Entirely different from each other.

They came from the same family, same upbringing, but they're entirely different
because God has uniquely shaped them to glorify Him. We all have a unique shape
for ministry. Even in the same family, that shape is going to be different.

So the question isn't, "Who can I become more like in my family? " The question
is, "What does God want me to be like? How does He want me to live out who He's
made me to be?

Am I a doe set free? Am I a ravenous wolf? " Either one of those can be used,
even one of those attitudes of life, pictures of who a person is, can be used to
glorify God.

The question isn't, "What's my shape so much? " as, "How do I glorify God with
the shape that He's given? " Once you've determined to glorify God with the
shape that He's put into your life, who He's made you to be, you're going to get
clearer and clearer on who He's made you to be.

I know a lot of people who want to discover who God's made them to be, and they
don't really have any intention to glorify God as yet. Why should God show you?
Why should He reveal that to you?

It's when you decide to glorify Him that He's going to reveal to you who He's
made you to be. We all have a unique shape for ministry, and we also have a
unique place that God has put us in for ministry. It's interesting that our
shape of who we are, that can't change, and we are who we are.

But our place of ministry often changes. So the question for you is, does God
have you in the place of ministry that He wants you right now, the place of
glorifying Him? Remember we're all ministers.

That's not a word just for pastors. We're all made to serve God, that's what the
word ministry means. Does God have you in the place of glorifying Him that He
wants you right now?

Are you satisfied with being in that place that God has for you? It's not the
place He has someone else. Are you looking at someone else's place?

Like I wish I was over there. We all tend to do that sometimes. Are you
satisfied with the place that God has put you to live out the shape of ministry
that He's put into your life right now?

Because in the end, all the questions we have about places and in the end, it's
going to be, was God glorified? That's the only question. There's one more son,
and that is Joseph.

In verses 22 down through verse 26, Jacob says of his son Joseph, "Joseph is a
fruitful vine, a fruitful vine near a spring whose branches climb over a wall.
With bitterness, archers attacked him. They shot at him with hostility, but his
bow remained steady.

His strong arm stayed limber because of the hand of the mighty one of Jacob,
because of the shepherd, the rock of Israel, because of your father's God who
helps you, because of the Almighty who blesses you with the blessings of the
heavens above, blessings of the deep that lie below, blessings of the breast and
of the womb. Your father's blessings are greater than the blessings of the
ancient mountains and the bounty of the age-old hills. Let all these rest on the
head of Joseph, on the brow of the prince among his brothers.

" Joseph, as Jacob's father blesses him, we learn, we're reminded of the
important truth that it's all because of the hand of the Almighty. These are
verses. This whole chapter is about the blessing of God in your life.

Are you experiencing God's blessing in your life? Blessing of God, by the way,
is not necessarily material. It's usually not material.

He might give you some material things to use in serving Him. If so, do so. But
the true blessing of God goes to the depth of who you are, the depth of where He
has placed you to honor Him.

And when you see that you're in that place, you're able to sit back and say,
along with Joseph, "This blessing, it's because of the hand of the Almighty. "
These are verses about God's blessing in your life, but don't forget one final
thing. There are also verses about you passing God's blessing along to others,
to your very own family.

The Bible says in verse 33, "When Jacob had finished giving these instructions
to his sons, he drew his feet up into the bed, he breathed his last, and he was
gathered to his people. " Let's pray together. God thank you.

Our Father, we thank you for your blessings, for the blessing of life, for the
blessing of salvation, for the blessing of shaping and placing us in spots where
we can glorify you, Jesus. We thank you, God, for your blessings. And we pray
that you give us the privilege not only of seeing your blessing, of recognizing
blessing in our lives and taking joy in you, but also passing that along to
someone else so that someone else, someone we love, someone that's close to us,
can see God's blessing in their life.

God use us to do that. Help us to know the right words, the right time, and if
it doesn't seem like we have the right words at the right time, help us to
stumble through what might seem the wrong words at the wrong time so that we try
to pass it along. Help us not to give up on your blessing in our lives, and help
us not to ever come to a place where we're not able to pass it on to other
people.

Lord, thank you for your blessings. In Jesus' name, amen. Join us tomorrow.

We're going to finish our study of the book of Genesis together.