Genesis 48:1-7 – Remembering What God has Done

When Joseph hears that his father is sick, he immediately leaves his work and goes to see him out of respect and love. As Christians we have a responsibility to visit and care for those who are sick both in our own family and in the church family. The sickbed can often be a place of encouragement and godly instruction. Joseph takes his two sons with him, so that they might receive their dying grandfather’s blessing, and that what they see and hear will make an impression upon them. It’s good for young people to have contact and experience with the elderly servants of God and hear their testimony to God’s goodness.

When Jacob hears that Joseph is coming he strengthens himself in order to give him some final instructions. Jacob also, out of love, gives Joseph’s two sons a place equal with their uncles. It is as though he adopts them as his own sons. He recites God’s promises to him: having many descendants and Canaan as an inheritance. Each of Joseph’s sons will have an equal part in Canaan, along with Jacob’s own sons. We should always be reminding ourselves and our children of God’s promises to us.

Joseph’s sons could have inherited positions of power and prestige in Egypt, but Jacob wants them to consider themselves Hebrews, not Egyptians, and value the promises of God more than the things of Egypt. It is better to be a small, seemingly insignificant part of God’s church, than a famous and powerful person outside of God’s kingdom.