All right, everybody ready to get started tonight. Just glad you went and got your Bible, brother. We are in Genesis 46 tonight. Had to remind myself again today, are we really already to Genesis 46? And we really are to Genesis 46. We get a little closer to the end. I'll share some thoughts, some things I'm kind of praying about is where we'll go to next. I have a couple of things in my mind. Genesis 46, so when we finished 45 last week, Joseph's brothers had gotten back to the father, had let him know that Joseph was alive, that who he was, the position he was in, and that they were to come to see him. Had doubt at first, but as we talked, probably went outside and saw all that Pharaoh had sent with them, all these chariots and the food and the horses and the donkeys and whatever, and it's kind of hard to deny it at that point that that was true. Remember, before we jump into verse 46, Verse 28 said this, and Israel, Jacob, said, it is enough, my son Joseph is still alive. I will go and see him before I die. And that's how we closed last week. And we talked about how glorious it was to read this chapter of this joy and this exuberance after all these things we've been reading about going on with this family and all the struggles and the trials and all these things, and to kind of have this joyous thing happen. Now, as you might imagine, that means tonight as we turn the page, this long-awaited reunion, this reunion that he thought would never take place, is gonna start to come to fruition in the pages of Genesis 46. Let me pray because this is broke, I wanna kind of break this up a little bit different. There's some pretty big just reading sections of this. Let's pray. Father God, we thank you again for this day you've given to us, Lord. A couple of times today I was just in awe, just looking at the changing of the seasons and beautiful array of colors and the trees around us this time of year and watching the leaves fall just thinking about your your great goodness and how the changing seasons should remind us so much about the changes of life but how you're always there steadfast unmoving and you walk with us guys we look at this text tonight again as we mentioned this is a A joyous text in most regards. This family that you preserving and preserved is about to be totally reunited. God, I pray that you would open our eyes to see and our hearts to take in what you would have us to see before us in the text this evening. As these things and we come in this time to you, Lord, in Christ's name, amen. I wrestled with how does this break up and not a real smooth way to do it. So let me read the first few verses and I'll just stop when I feel like it's a good time to stop. So Israel set out with all that he had and came to Beersheba and offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac. And God spoke to Israel in visions of the night and said, Jacob, Jacob. And he said, here I am. And he said, I am God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt for I will make you a great nation there. I myself will go down with you to Egypt. And I myself will also bring you up again. And Joseph will close your eyes with his hand. Probably goodest place to stop as any, to start chewing on what's going on here. So he tells us that he set out with all that he had. Again, we see that, we saw that transition last week, remember, in between the last verse and the next to last verse of, we all see this back and forth between Jacob being called Jake, we're being called Israel. When he shifts over to Israel in the last verse of last chapter, we're gonna see that pretty consistent here. Why do you think that is? We didn't really touch on it deeply last week. We mentioned it in passing. Why is the author, as inspired by the scripture, has really shifted, instead of calling him Jacob here, to calling him Israel? Thoughts? In the transition of where we are in the text, what's going on here to the future nation of Israel? We're seeing these preservation works of God on display in this preparation for what's to come. And I think that's why we really see that transition in naming. This is about not just a man. This is about not just 12 other men, for that matter. This is about the preservation of the nation of Israel. And before it even really got started, this is about the preservation of the nation of Israel. I think that's important for us to understand as we think through this, and the promises God has made. He came to Beersheba. What is it about Beersheba? This is one of the places that Malia and I were able to go to when we were in Israel a little over a year ago. What is it about Beersheba? Do you remember? Jacob wouldn't have started there. He was up in Hebron. He comes down to Beersheba. It's on the natural route. He didn't have to go up his way to get there from where he was to where he's going. It's on the path. But it's an important life, important location, especially in the life of Isaac, Jacob's father. That's where God appeared to Isaac in the night and spoke to him the words of promise and comfort back in Genesis 26, just to remind you of those. And he went up from there to Beersheba, and Yahweh appeared to him that night and said, I am the God of your father, Abraham. Do not fear, for I am with you. I will bless you and multiply your seed for the sake of my servant, Abraham. What was going on that trip, y'all remember? What was Isaac doing? He was running away, getting away from his brother, getting away from all that stuff to head north. It was close to there, yeah. Yep. He did too. It's an important place in the patriarchal era and time place because The very next verse, after what I read to you in Genesis 26, we read this. After God comes to Isaac, he says this to him, or I'm sorry, Isaac does this. So he, being Isaac, built an altar there and called upon the name of Yahweh and pitched his tent there, and there Isaac's servants dug out a well. Quite possibly, as Jacob, Israel, is coming back and stops there, he may have went to this very place where this was set up that Isaac had built and called upon the name of the Lord. And who comes there to him? The Lord comes to him there in that very place. Maybe the same altar. The patriarch is afraid to go to Egypt. We learn that by the inverse of what's being said here, right? What does God say to him? Jacob never says he's scared to go here, but it's inferred pretty strongly Because he tells him, do not be afraid. Do not be afraid. Why would he be afraid to go there? Long, difficult journey. And he's an old man. God had told him not to go. What else? He would have known about the incident involving Abraham and that land. I mean, his forefathers had some pretty bad experiences there too, hadn't they not? And to the point, Miss Edith said, God had previously told Isaac not to go there during the time of famine. Remember, back in that same, in chapter 26, he was gonna go down there. He said, no, you're not going to Egypt. Jacob may have been fearful what to expect there. He hesitates. God comes to him in a night vision. He calls him out and he says, Jacob, Jacob. Now that's interesting. The biblical author is calling him Israel at this point. God calls him Jacob, Jacob. And God's the one that gave him the name Israel. Why call him Jacob here and now? Is there any connection here to, for instance, like when Jesus would call out the disciples and he would, you know, call them out by their name and not the name that he had been calling them, but the difference in how they were acting, what they were feeling, what they were thinking there, possibly. What about the fact that he says, here I am? What do we have there? We have that Tetrarch grammaton again, right? We have that God, the ego I am me, the I am God. And he goes on further, I am God, not just any God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt. Why not be afraid? For I will make you a great nation there. So the promise will be fulfilled. So that might be another fear of Abraham, I mean of Jacob, right? God had made this promise. He would put us in this land. We're in this land that God promised to us. Am I reneging on some kind of promise here? If I go to this other land, God said, no, I'm gonna make you a great nation there. The promise is with you. So that could have been a legitimate, that would be a more legitimate fear, wouldn't it? That God has promised us this land, we're here on this land. It says, no, you go, and I'm gonna go with you. And I'm gonna do, fulfill the promises there. Now, there's another promise in this. I will bring you up again. I'll go with you, and I'll bring you up again. That's not where you're gonna stay. The promise is, part of the promise is the land, right? I'm gonna bring you back. But I'm going with you. and make you a great nation there, what does that mean? That just means that the family's gonna continue to grow there. And we know, how long will Israel end up being there? It's a long time. 400 years, yeah. Which was also prophesied. So, we can understand a little bit of fear. If Joseph were not alive and in Egypt, I don't think there's any way they could've got him to go. humanly speaking, practically speaking, Joseph was the reason he would go. And then, of course, at this point, though, once he's to Beersheba and God speaks to him, of course, that would have, you know, he'll go. But there were still some doubts there. But there's another promise mixed in that. He had heard from his boys that Joseph was still alive. Catch this in verse, don't let this slip by, I myself also bring you up again." So the nation will come back out and Joseph will close your eyes with his hand. If there was any doubt at all, a little smidgen of a doubt that Joseph wasn't alive, that these boys had concocted something, God himself says, Joseph, not only is he alive, but what is he saying there? He'll be there at your death. That he will close your eyes. That's a euphemism for death. And Jacob believed him. He saw God in this image. That just blows me away. I mean, back then, God would speak to them in a vision. They must have trembled to do that. Yeah. Well, we see elsewhere in scripture when men come face to face with an angel who is a holy angel, but they're, It's not like they're like God, but a little lower. They're completely different than God. When people have seen angels in scripture, they fall on their face worshiping or in fear and trembling. Some of them freeze. They can't say anything. So yeah. Let's pick up verse five. Then Jacob arose. So now we'll go back to Jacob again. Then Jacob arose from Beersheba, and the sons of Israel carried their father Jacob and their little ones and their wives in the wagons which Pharaoh had sent to carry them. And they took their livestock and their possessions, which they had accumulated in the land of Canaan. And they came to Egypt, Jacob and all his seeds with him, his sons and his grandsons with him, his daughters and his granddaughters, and all his seed he had brought with him to Egypt." Why this continual, this repetitive language of everything, everyone, his seed, he brought them all. He left nothing. He left nothing. He did exactly what Pharaoh told them to tell him to do, right? He said, don't bring anything with you. Except for your livestock and stuff, yes. But don't pack the wagons with all the furniture, if we might say, for these days and all that stuff. They're going to be taken care of when they get there. That's a tremendous amount of faith involved in that. Tremendous amount of faith involved in that. It makes you think about when Abram, the journey of Abram from Haran to Canaan, he brought everything with him back in Genesis 12, five, every one. So it talks about Jacob traveling with his daughters. The text seems to indicate Jacob has one daughter. A little bit later on here, Dinah, when we get down to verse 15, is the one mentioned, but this is a plural noun. It could mean there's more daughters not named, because we know Dinah already. Remember, she's part of the account we read back a few chapters ago. She was the one that was raped by those guys, and then the brothers went in and killed the whole clan of them. So we know her already, so maybe there's no reason not to bring her back up. It could mean that there's more, they just don't name them, or it could mean simply the daughters-in-law and grandchildren and all these kind of things too. So, the, where'd we stop at, verse seven? So now we're gonna get into some of this. We haven't dealt with this in a while. Y'all always really enjoy this part of scripture, I think, when we read all these names off, so, here we go. Verse eight. Y'all enjoy it a lot more than I do, I think, because I'm having to, these names aren't quite as bad, though. Now these are the names of the son of Israel, of Jacob and his sons, who were coming to Egypt. Reuben, Jacob's firstborn, the sons of Reuben, Hanak and Palu and Hezron and Carmi, the sons of Simeon, Jemuel and Jamin and Ohad and Jachin and Zohar and Shaul, the son of a Canaanite woman, notice he's called out, the sons of Levi, Gershon, Kohath, and Merari, the sons of Judah, Ur, and Onan, and Shelah, and Perez, and Zerah. But Ur and Onan died in the land of Canaan. And the sons of Perez were Hezron and Hamul. We'll stop there for just a minute. Let me pick, let me read two more, three more. The sons of Issachar, Tola, and Puva, and Ayob, and Shimron, the sons of Zebulun, Zered, and Elan, and Jalil. These are the sons of Leah, whom she bore to Jacob, and Paddan Aram, with his daughter Dinah, all his sons and his daughters, numbered 33. So we can start this genealogical list. We see this a lot. This is not, Always the order of birth of the sons because he goes basically by the birth mother in the way the genealogy is listed out here. there's some discussion that's had here. This is one of those places in scripture, when you get down to the finite details as God does here, of these names, individual names, this is a place where a lot of your more liberal biblical scholars will try to say, well, there's a chronology over here in 1 Chronicles that doesn't align perfectly with this one, or et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. that's usually quite easily remedied by considering some of these names are very similar and there's just a different way to spell them. We got the same thing today, right? The different spelling of a name, this, that, or the other. We have a genealogy in numbers 26, four through 62, that is more expansive because it includes all the other generations that take place during the time they were in Egypt. There are a few differences between the list though. Most of them can be explained by just these dialectic type variations. So I'll give you a couple examples of these so you kind of know what I'm talking about. The first son of Simeon is called Jemuel, the way we read it in your scripture in verse 10, the very first son of Simeon, Jemuel. If you flip over to Exodus 6.15, I'm sorry, also in Exodus 6.15, but if you see the name The same name and the same chronology in Numbers, it says Nimuel, N. There's an N there instead of a J. It's talking about the same person, okay? There's no contradiction there. There's differences, I guess, what you said, but they can be explained. They can be explained, yeah. Okay. Yeah. And also in First Chronicles, so two places it's Jimuel, two places, Numbers and First Chronicles, it's Nimuel. It's not a scribal error, it's just a variation in how the name's pronounced or spelling, or 400 years later, they may have said it a little differently and spelt it a little bit differently. We do that in our own language, right? There's certain names that are spelled three or four different ways. And there are people that just make up ways to spell names these days in our culture, so. The last son of Simeon is called the son of a Canaanite woman. Did y'all catch whenever I pointed that out that they called this one out? Why would that one be called out like that? What's that? Disapproval for sure. Just a rebuke of Simeon again. Ironically, Simeon and Levi were the ones who've already been in hot water because they're the ones that went and killed the Shechemites. And they did it in a quite dishonorable way as well. Remember, those are the guys that told them to circumcise herself, and we'll intermarry with you and everything else. And after all the males did it, that's when they went in there and killed them all, because they're all laid up tending to the wounds that they all have. I mean, it's kind of low down, but in the tactic of war, it was pretty effective, if we're being honest. Now, here's where there's other people, other places that people may have a, if you were to go back and do the counting there, what does it say there? All of his sons and his daughters numbered 33. 33. The problem is if we include Dinah in the list, then it numbers 34. So probably she is probably included because the text says his sons and daughters added up to 33. However, if we eliminate those two that it just told us died in Canaan, then it changes the number again. Y'all catch that in the parentheses there, that Ur and Onan died in the land of Canaan. But that still doesn't help things, because that makes it an even number again. We're at 32. Maybe there's an unnamed daughter or son in the list. I think probably an unnamed daughter is in the group, and she's just not named. Again, that's not something I get hung up on. They didn't always list the females' names. I mean, that's just the fact of the matter. There's one family name in there that is important for multiple reasons, Judah. Do we see a name there that, well, actually two names there may jump out to us, the sons of Judah. What we'll be looking for if we're looking back to the sons of Judah? The line of David, the line of Jesus, right? You may know off the top of their head which one of those that comes from right there. Perez. Perez. Verse 16. The sons of Gad, Ziphion and Haggai, Shuni and Esbon, Eri and Erodi and Ereli, the sons of Asher, Emna and Ishva and Ishvi, and Berea and their sister Sarah, and the sons of Berea, Heber, and Malkiel. These are the sons of Zilpah, whom Laban gave to his daughter Leah, and she bore to Jacob these 16 persons." So again, the number there. I'm trying to see what I had here. The difference there is you see there's a son named Esbon, If you go over to the other chronology in 1 Chronicles, it's Osni, just a couple of letters changed, probably the exact same guy, though. Ishva is omitted, but he's back in 1 Chronicles, so. Verse 19. The sons of Jacob, Jacob's wife, Rachel. We'll stop there for a minute. We went through three of these ladies already. What's different about when Rachel gets brought up? Jacob's wife, it says. Jacob's wife, Rachel. They had another wife in here though, didn't he? Now, why this point made? Any significance to this, again? That's the one he loved, yeah. Yeah, let's not forget that whenever he volunteered to work for his uncle for seven years, it was for her hand. And that night there was some trickery that happened and he ends up with Leah, but then he works for seven more to get her hand. And she's the only one of these ladies that's dead at this point too. The sons of Jacob's wife, Rachel, Joseph and Benjamin. Now to Joseph, in the land of Egypt, were born Manasseh and Ephraim, whom Asenath, the daughter of Potiphar, a priest of Ahon, bore to him. The sons of Benjamin. This is where y'all gonna really be confused a little bit, considering we've been going through this verse by verse. The sons of Benjamin, Bella and Becker and Ashbel, Gera and Naaman, Eha and Rosh, Mupin and Hupin and Ard. How many kids does Benjamin have? He's got 10 kids. Did we have a thought in our mind that Benjamin was still a little boy at this point? Obviously not. That's where we, yeah, we miss, sometimes we forget about that. How long Joseph had been gone. And that Benjamin was born when Joseph was still part of, you know, back there. So, it does look like it's an issue because the way we've been reading, if you just sit there and read the Genesis, you see that you're like, wait a minute, isn't Benjamin still a little guy? Obviously not. Now, How could he have so many children if he was still a lad? Remember Genesis 43, 8 calls him a lad. Well, he's the youngest. Multiple wives is another part, but dealing with the fact that his age has to be dealt with too. There's no problem with it calling him a lad or young or anything like that because of these, all of these boys, he is the youngest one. And some people are still called the baby, even when they're in their twenties, thirties, forties. Now, it's not as difficult as it seems. Benjamin was born before Joseph. I'm sorry, Benjamin was born before Joseph was sold into Egypt back in Genesis 35. If you go back to Genesis 35, we know Benjamin has already been born. Joseph went to Egypt when he was how old? Do you remember? 17. He was 17. If you want to look that up or fact check myself or Miss Mary, that's in Genesis 37. How long had he spent in slavery or prison? 13 years. Genesis 41, 46. Seven years have passed of plenty. Two years of famine. That's nine more years, right? Joseph's at least 39 years old at this point in the story. Just 11. Benjamin is at least 21 years old. But again, still a lot of kids at 21, but they started a little bit earlier. And there are probably multiple mothers. It's not as hard as it looks. When we hit that, though, if you're really reading it, you might pump the brakes and be like, wait a minute, he's 21 years old. And that's hard for the Western mind to really take in this concept of multiple marriage. Yeah, well, I mean, God never, he allowed it, obviously, but he never ordained it and never, but yeah, the multiple marriages, the concubine taking, the, The giving of the handmaid and all this kind of stuff is so foreign to our thought process, certainly. That makes a good point if I didn't hear that Jacob may have encouraged Benjamin to have a large family, to have a lot of children, because he's of that line from Rachel. Well, and he was the son that he loved. Joseph probably wouldn't have flowered with the same stuff had he stayed longer. At this point, you're exactly right, Diane. I think he was definitely trying to make sure that line through Rachel continued. And he probably would have found the choices, wives, women, whatever, to bring into the family to have children with him for that line. Because remember, there's so many weird things in regards to how this Hierarchy is not quite the right word. We don't see any indications of, so we know the firstborn, Reuben, had done some things he shouldn't do. We get down to Judah before we see somebody step up, and he's what, third in line, if I remember right, or fourth. And then you've got, if Jacob would have had his druthers about it, he would have rather it be Joseph in charge of everything. And in a way, in this certain portion of their life, he is an absolute, God has given him all this authority and power, and it's not Joseph, then Benjamin, but it ends up being Judah at the end of all of it. And we know because that is the line for which our Savior comes. Now, just keep in mind, when we get to this point, Benjamin's at least 21 years old. Verse 23, the sons of Dan, Husham, the sons of Naphtali, Jazeel, and Guni, and Jezer, and Shalem. These are the sons of Bilhah, whom Laban gave to his daughter Rachel, and she bore these to Jacob. There were seven persons in all. I don't think there's a whole lot to dig into there. Verse 26 and 27. All the persons belonging to Jacob, who came to Egypt, who came out of his loins, including the wives of Jacob's sons, were 66 persons in all. And the sons of Joseph, who were born to him in Egypt, were two. All the persons of the house of Jacob, who came to Egypt, were 70." Have we got another problem with the math there? Miss Bonnie? I should have said excluding the wives. I misspoke. Thanks for pointing that out. Y'all catch what Miss Bonnie's talking about in verse twenty-six. I said including the wives but it should be excluding or not counting the wives. We got another math problem then? Sixty-six and two but he says there's seventy. I mean, common core math they're teaching these days might say that but that's not, you know, the math I grew up with or any of y'all grew up with. The first figure is all those that came from Egypt, and then you add the others. Jacob is one of them as well. Now- One possible explanation is that Joseph was not in the previous count, was he? No, he was not. Well, he wasn't in the 33 count, but he was in the seven count as it related to, from Rachel. Then you add his son, you add Jacob, you add his sons and you add Jacob in, then you get to that number. So, you could also take the other two out of the die, but anyway, not including his son's wife's an example of a figure, that's how you get the math right, not including the wife. So, there's an application piece here before, because the next set of verses kind of It kind of flows from 46 into 47, so I don't, maybe we'll read them because I promised y'all that we'd see this reunion before we close tonight. We haven't got to that reunion yet. We spent all this time on the genealogy, so we may go a little bit further. So what about, this is a redemption too, is it not? I mean, it's a physical redemption because they're getting out of this place that they would die in. and bringing them down to Egypt. But what's gonna happen to them in Egypt? We've already touched on this. What's gonna happen to them in Egypt, eventually? Yeah, they're gonna be slaves. For how long? 400 years. 400 years. He's gonna make a great nation while they're there, isn't he? What is one of the big fears the Egyptians, and I know we're stepping off into Exodus a little bit here, but what's one of the big fears that the Egyptians have? Why were they afraid that they'd overtake them? There were so many of them. God prospered His family so much and they just grew and grew and grew and grew from these 70 people. So much so that the leadership of Egypt in 400 years, it's a long time for us, but in generational speaking, it's not as far, not as many years as it seems like. We think in these small increments of time, I don't want to get on a soapbox here. This really jumped out to me when we were in Israel, though. You know, and our guides were like, you put a shovel in the ground over here, you might flip over 3,000 years worth of history right there, and we've got to stop everything. He said most of the world thinks of history, even Europe, not quite like the Middle East, but most of the parts of the world think about history in a much larger increments than what we do. Americans, for Americans, something that happened 70, 80 years ago, that's a long time ago. It's nothing. It's a drop in the bucket. Yes, brother? When we were in Europe, somebody said to us that in America, 100 years is a long time. And in Europe, 100 miles is a long trip. That's a good point. Did you hear what Roy said? He said when they were in Europe, that in America, 100 years is a long time. In Europe, 100 miles is a long trip. We routinely drive a couple of hundred miles just to go to the beach for a couple of days, right? Or to go to the mountains or whatever. That's a good point. That's a good point. But yeah, our concept of time, what's long, in this country's, we go by the signing of the Declaration of Independence, as I mentioned in a sermon a week or two ago, I think, we're just at 250 years. I mean, it's not that long. It's not long at all. It's not far, not long, not long. But we know what's gonna happen to these guys. They're delivered now, but they're gonna have 400 years of struggle. God's gonna deliver them out of it. I found a comment on this section that says this, by a guy named Dr. Bose. Isn't this how God often works? Why does he work his way? First, it's obviously for the benefit of his people. Bose goes on to remark, there's no saint in the Bible of whose history we have any length in period or any length in record who was not called to endure trouble in some form. And very frequently, the most eminent saints were most tried. Those who were called to important services were generally trained in the school of affliction. We've probably heard that quote before. Secondly, and most importantly, it is so that God would be honored as the matchless sovereign Lord of the universe The truth is that nothing happens in heaven or on earth apart from His decreed of will. The wise, the winds, the what's, and the how's all proceed from His sovereign hand. And He will receive His glory. Let's jump into these last couple of verses then. Verse 28. So we've got the list of people coming. They're on their way. They're leaving Beersheba. Now he, this is Jacob, Israel, sent Judah before him to Joseph to point out the way before him to Goshen. And they came into the land of Goshen. Let's stop there because the next two verses kind of get us into this reunion. I don't want to stop there for a minute. Notice what we said. Jacob's the head of the whole tribe, the whole clan, the whole fledgling nation has entered into Egypt. He stops. Now catch that in the text. He stops and sends Judah ahead. Now, we don't know where this transition took place. Probably in my mind, with Judah kind of assuming this mantle of leadership, it's back to whenever he tells his dad, the second time they come to him about having to go back to Egypt, that they have to take Benjamin to go back, and he's in my, I'll protect him with my life. I'll protect him. Now, and that's who he sends forward. So it's not just that Judah assumed leadership, it seems as if, at this point in their lives, that it's been given to him as well by his father at this point. So he sends him ahead. The literal translation means to point out, and it really means to teach, instruct, or direct. Judah's given this task. So let's read on. And Joseph harnessed his chariot. Now Joseph probably didn't literally do it. Someone probably harnessed it for him being who he was, but I digress. And went up to Goshen to meet his father Israel. As soon as he appeared before him, he fell on his neck and wept on his neck a long time. Then Israel said to Joseph, now I can die since I have seen your face that you are alive. So this is, you can go so many places and pull so many books off a shelf and read so many stories, some true, some not true, some fiction, some nonfiction, but there's always some opinion mixed in all that. The story of the Bible and how God has been at work since the beginning is, you're not gonna find anything better read to show you all these things. And just imagine, how long had he thought he'd been dead now? Remember we said he left when he was 17. Almost 25 years he'd been gone. And thought dead. The literal language, I had to go look at the literal language on this, about him weeping and this kind of thing. This is a joyous crying that's almost indescribable in our language. Our language does it quite injustice of this outpouring of emotion that would have happened. Israel, Jacob's response. Finally speaks, break the silence of this crying, loving, seeing each other for the first time in all these years. Now I can die. That is an amazing statement to make when you really think about it. Now I can die. So what's he saying there? Since I have seen your face that you are still alive. His joy has been made complete at this point, right? He has a joy that he thought he would never feel again because of this great loss. I can die. It's interesting that this language, this verb is used here and any places in Hebrew to express self-encouragement. That's not really what that looks like here, self-encouragement, but that's what he's saying is that I can die now and do so joyfully. His heartache of these 22 years, 23 years is gone. It's come to an end. He's ready and willing to die. And I might say here that he probably thought that Joseph was the one who's gonna take up the man on lead, this going forward. Verse 31. And Joseph said to his brothers and his father, now we've got one, this is that white space I talked about, the space between verses. Between 29 and 30, there was a space of time for sure. Between 30 and 31, there was probably a space of time. And verse 31 picks up. And Joseph said to his brothers and to his father's household, I will go up and tell Pharaoh and say to him, my brothers and my father's household who were in the lands of Canaan have come to me. And the men are shepherds for they have been keepers of livestock. And they have brought their flocks and their herds and all that they have. And it will be when Pharaoh calls you and says, what is your occupation? Then you shall say, your servants have been keepers of livestock from our youth. And until now, both we and our fathers, that you may live in the land of Goshen, for every shepherd is an abomination to the Egyptians." We've talked about a couple of those things already in previous weeks, what they thought about shepherds, about what they thought about Those who tend flocks and stay out there in the wilderness and those kind of things. So the total question of where they were settling was not completely finalized. Remember, Pharaoh said he was settling in the good part of the land, but that nailed down the exact location. This is where this gets really interesting. Maybe I should, maybe I shouldn't have gotten into this, but this gets very interesting. Joseph needs permission from Pharaoh to settle them in this part of the land, in Goshen. Now when we get into Exodus, for y'all biblical historians, what part of the land will the Egyptians, or will the Hebrews be in then? They're still in that land, that part of the land, okay? Joseph is preparing them what to say. He rehearses the speech kind of here, and he tells them how to respond to the question. He knows Pharaoh's gonna say, what do you do? That's very important to know where to settle them out at, right, is what do you do? If you're farmers, you need to go, I need to settle you here. Whatever it is, try to make accommodations to put you in the land best suited for your skill set. That's very practical, makes a lot of sense. But the Egyptians don't like those kind of people. And they don't like outsiders anyway. So this is a family of outsiders. that also do a profession that is an abomination to the Egyptians. I don't think it had anything to do with what they ate so much as just that kind of work. Do what? It does. It does. They had livestock. Those were not people very high in the societal... They were just menial workers. They were just providing the service that we needed, but we don't care a whole lot for. I mean, that shouldn't be too surprising for any of us today with the way we deal with some people, not us. You're exactly right, Lori. The shepherds in Israel weren't treated with a whole much... The only ones that had a modicum of respect were the ones who were in the land of Bethlehem, the shepherd's fields, that were to provide the sacrificial animals. But even they weren't thought of as highly as you think they would. Yeah, he thought very highly of them. That's who he used over and over and over again. And he calls pastors shepherds, and Jesus is the great shepherd. He announced to the shepherds the arrival. Yeah. These are just guys that are just head down, out in the field day and night, protecting, knowing nobody respects or encourages or thinks anything of them. Probably the reason that God calls pastors shepherds too. But just plowmen, just doing what needs to be done because they need them immensely It's like a lot of our country thinks about farmers and stuff like that today, how much we need them, but yet people think they're just dumb old whatever. We know better. Most of this country doesn't. Good honorable work. It's extremely good honorable work. I mean, Adam and Eve were tenders of a garden. Good point there too, Marty. Yeah. But why Goshen? Why Goshen? Why this place? Well, It's on the border, so it'd be possible for the brothers to go back if they needed to. Again, they don't know, at this point, they don't know about what's coming. Go back if they needed to. But it really looks ahead to the Exodus narrative because it was later possible for Israel to escape Egypt easier because of where they were located in Egypt 400 years later. Y'all picking that up? The fact that they were where they were in proximity to the Red Sea and getting back, they didn't have to travel all the way across Egypt to get out of Egypt. Based on where God settled them out through Joseph and Pharaoh and all these machinations going on, he planted them exactly where they were gonna be for 400 long hard years. But when God called them out, not that far away. And they were just far enough away from Pharaoh most of the time. It's just, yeah. Let's close out with this, though, at 33 and 34. When Fayetteville College says, what's your occupation? You tell him. You've been a livestock from your youth to now. Both we and our fathers, this is the place where herdsmen should live at, to kind of help draw that hand. Now, again, There's something else here. And this plays into the exodus events too, guys. By saying their lives, they're herders, they're shepherds, and the way that the culture didn't think much of them, that would try to tamp down any worry about them being a threat at all. Because this is the people that are not really good for anything except staying out in the field all night long watching. They don't understand everything that goes into being a shepherd. It keeps them, I mean, there's so much going on here. That's why I said I almost was afraid to step off into this, but there is the intermingling with the other Egyptians, getting closer to these cities and towns. It's staying out here, out in the wilderness area. It's exactly the way God lined it out, for sure. But don't forget, this is Joseph. God working through Joseph at this point. And again, his intellect and his thinking is way up there. Very intelligent, strategic mind. So he's thinking from the practical standpoint of keeping them away. Because again, he has no idea about the 400 years they're about to be in subjection there. Keeping them away and being closer to home. That's probably a big point. What we know that Joseph knew for sure was that there was five years left of his famine, probably thinking after the five years of famine, they could go home. We don't know how much God showed him. Go ahead, Diane. That too. I mean, everything else about being secluded and being away from the prying eyes of not, Pharaoh's not gonna be out there spying on them all the time, but he would have had spies assigned to him. And all the Egyptians, remember, he's not just dealing with them, he's got to deal with the general population too, and Egyptians hated this kind of people. So another reason to keep them away from everybody else. There's so many reasons why, from the human standpoint, practically speaking, and politically speaking, and all these things, but ultimately, it's for 400 years later. God's plan and purpose. So. Any other thoughts, sir? Made it through another chapter in a day. Made it through another chapter in a day, yeah. I almost stopped short, but I've been promising this reunion, so I wanted to get to the reunion at least. Yeah, yeah. 400 years later, though, they don't even know why they're there until Moses comes. How easy we forget. Think about the, I mean, Think about these, I'm not big into these dystopian future.