All right, if you would, turn to Genesis chapter 46. We're still in our study on the stories in the Old Testament, and in particular on the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For some time now, we've been looking through the life of Joseph, Jacob's son, was sold off into slavery in Egypt, who is now the governor of the land, who's second in command under Pharaoh. They're in the middle of a drought. We saw, I think it was last time, where they were two years into a seven-year drought. His brothers have come to him twice now. The second time, he revealed himself to them, let them know who he was for certain. And we saw that in the last chapter. He had requested that they bring their father and all their families and all their livestock, everything they own, to Egypt. And Joseph has promised him the land of Goshen. Now, in the beginning, he didn't seek Pharaoh's advice or Pharaoh's permission for this. He just did it. But we see, we saw in the last chapter, we'll see again more this time, where Pharaoh is okay with this. He hasn't, Joseph hasn't spoken out of place or over bounds or anything here. He, being second in command, would have had the authority to do so. The problem is he, remember Joseph is not an Egyptian, he's a Hebrew. And there's some contention there. And it goes all the way back to Abraham and Sarah. We'll see today where the contention rises again, or at least talk of it does, and we'll get to that towards the end of the chapter. Let's start with verse one, in Genesis chapter six, verse one. And Israel took his journey with all that he had and came to Beersheba and offered sacrifices unto the God of his father Isaac. Now, he's called Israel here in the first two verses. In a moment, we'll see where he referred to Jacob again. Again, I believe there is a purpose for this in these passages where his name is gone back and forth between the two. Again, I think the name Israel here, the Lord is signifying him as the head of the family, not only the head of the family, but the head of the nation of Israel. He came to Beersheba, and we've heard that name before in this study, haven't we? Jacob has stopped there and prayed before. He built an altar there, if you remember, on his way to the land of Haran, where he found his wives, where he met his father's family, where his mother's family, Laban, his mother's brother. He stopped on the way back. He stopped there again and worshiped. This is a place of worship, a special place for Jacob. So as he's leaving Canaan again, second time in his life that he's left Canaan, this of course is the last time he will leave Canaan. The next time when he comes back to Canaan, it will be for his burial. But this time, he's leaving to go to Egypt to see his son. and to live there at least until his death. He 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. Now, I want to point out something here. There's much talk in certain circles today about visions and dreams and all that. I believe there is a difference between visions and dreams. Dreams are those things that come to us in our subconscious while we sleep. We're not awake, we're not, for all practical purposes, other than in our thoughts, we have no control over. Visions, and I'm not saying that we have control in visions, and I don't know, personally don't know of anyone who has had a vision, in my lifetime anyway, but visions in the scripture anyway, was normally when God came to a man, or an angel of the Lord came to a man, whichever, and they conversed back and forth to each other usually. It was usually at night, but not always. Sometimes it was during the day that a man would have a vision from the Lord, depending on the situation. And so it was not in that subconscious state of sleep or as a dream, but it was actually a vision, something that he could actually, it was like he physically was there when the Lord was talking to him. It's a difference. And he said, I am God, the God of thy father. Fear not to go down into Egypt, for I will there For I will there make of thee a great nation. Now all this time, the promise from God has been that he was going to make the descendants of Abraham through Isaac and through Jacob, he was going to make a great nation. As far as I knew from what God's promise was, they were promised the promised land, the land of Canaan. Remember God had told Abraham and Isaac to sojourn in the land of Canaan so that they would see what he was going to give their descendants. Jacob would have known about this promise also, but now we see God tells Jacob in this dream, fear not to go down into Egypt. Why would he have a fear of Egypt? Because of the stories of Abraham and Sarah. Everything that they've known so far about Egypt was scary. It was a place you didn't want to go. Why? Well, I believe it's because of what Abraham and Sarah had done there. Abraham had not only sinned against God, but he had sinned against the Pharaoh there. He had portrayed Sarah as his sister and not his wife. And Pharaoh was about to marry her. He thought she was a very beautiful woman and about to marry her. And this was before Isaac was born. So if that had happened, and we know that it couldn't have happened because of God's plan, but if it had happened, God would have been proven false, wouldn't he? There's no way that could have happened. Because that happened, the pharaohs had made decrees and had laws and everything restricting certain things concerning the Hebrews. That's just how it was. But he says, fear not, go down into Egypt, for I will there make of thee a great nation. He's going to make a great nation out of the descendants of Jacob in Egypt. Now, that's not what they understood the promise to be, was it? They understood it was going to happen in Canaan, not in Egypt. This is not different than what God told them. Okay, don't misunderstand. God had made these promises to them, but he didn't give them all the details. Now as time goes on, he's given them a few more details along the way. So here's more of the details. You're going to go down to Egypt, and I'm going to make a great nation out of you there. Your descendants are going to become a great nation while they're in Egypt. They're not going to be part of Egypt. They're going to live in Egypt. What's the example of that? What are we told? We're to be in the world but not of the world? The same way with them. They were to be in Egypt but not of Egypt. They were to stay separate, especially when it came to marriages. when it came to their religion, their worship and their sacrifices and all, they were not to intermingle any of that with the Egyptian gods. They were to stay true to God. Verse 4, I will go down with thee into Egypt, and I will also surely bring thee up again. What's God telling him? I'll go with you. I'll be there with your people. And when it's time, I'll bring them back to Canaan. That was the promise. And when they come back, they were supposed to inherit the land. And Joseph put his hand upon thine eyes. And Joseph shall put his hand upon thine eyes. And Jacob rose up from Bathsheba, 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. And they took their cattle and their goods, which they had gotten in the land of Canaan, and came into Egypt, and Jacob and all his seed with him." Notice one thing here. They took their cattle. Do we see anything about their sheep or their goats? Chickens? We don't see anything else. Remember, they had all that. They had, I don't know about chickens, but they had sheep and goats when they were in Canaan. They were shepherds. It was their main job. They did have a lot of cattle. We'll get to that again before we get to the end of the chapter, because there's a reason why they only brought cattle. or at least at this time. His sons and his sons' sons with him, his daughters and his sons' daughters, and all his seed brought he with him into Egypt. Now, remember Jacob didn't have any daughters. He had one, Dinah, but I don't see anything else mentioned about her. In this chapter, we'll see her mentioned, but nothing in detail about her. Whatever happened to her after what we read in earlier chapters, or in an earlier chapter, but we never see anything from her again. We don't know if she died during that time, or if she was sent away, or if she was privately with the family, and they just never mentioned her again. We don't know. But when he says his daughter's here, he's talking about his son's wives. his son's daughters, his granddaughters. And all his seed brought with him into Egypt. He brought everybody, the whole family. And these are the names of the children of Israel which came into Egypt. And we're not going to read all these names, okay, but we'll touch the highlights. Jacob and his sons Reuben, Jacob's firstborn. Reuben was the firstborn from Leah, remember? And he names the names of those sons of Reuben. And then the sons of Simeon. Remember, Simeon was the one that was held captive back in Egypt when Joseph sent him back to bring back his father and Benjamin. And notice, remember, Simeon had one wife who was a Canaanite woman. He mentions that here in verse 10. And Shaul, Shaul, the son of a Canaanitish woman. And, well, page stuck together, sorry. And the sons of Levi. He names the sons of Levi and the sons of Judah. And notice in the sons of Judah, Ur and Onan. He says, but Ur and Onan died in the land of Canaan, the sons of Phares or Hezron and Hamuel. So, Ur and Onan, if you remember, they both died because they didn't please the Lord. They had done wickedness in the eyes of the Lord. They died back in Canaan. The sons of Iskar, the sons of Zebulun, these be the sons of Leah. These were all the sons of Leah and their offspring, which she bare unto Jacob in Paddan-aram with his daughter Dinah. So Dinah, there's Dinah that is mentioned, but that's all we see. All the souls of his sons and his daughters were 33. So he's got 33 sons, daughter-in-laws, and grandchildren from Leah. The sons of Gad, the sons of Asher, These are the sons of Zilpah, verse 18, these are the sons of Zilpah, whom Laban gave to Leah, his daughter, and these she bore unto Jacob, even sixteen souls. So, Zilpah, remember, was the handmaiden that Laban had given to Leah, and she had given to Jacob for another wife, because Leah could no longer bear, or Leah, I'm sorry, Leah. Leah could no longer bear any children. And then Rachel was not, was barren at the time. So he's got 16 in that part of the family. And unto Joseph, well let me back up, the sons of Rachel, Jacob's wife, Joseph and Benjamin. He's got those two. And unto Joseph in the land of Egypt were born Manasseh and Ephraim, which Asenath, the daughter of Potphara, priest of Om, bear unto him. So here's his two favorite sons from his favorite wife. Joseph has married an Egyptian. Remember, Pharaoh gave him a daughter of one of the priests there, an Egyptian priest, on the city where he would have lived was in the land of Goshen. Do you see why Joseph wanted them in Goshen? Because some say that that's where Joseph's house was. It was close to his father-in-law. So he one of them close to where he was. The sons of Benjamin, he lists those here. And these are the sons of Rachel, which were born to Jacob. All these souls were 14. So out of these two sons, he's got these two sons and their children, he's got 14. Rachel, of course, is dead. She passed away already, so we don't see her. The sons of Dan, the sons of Naphtali, these are the sons of Bilhah, which Laban gave unto Rachel, his daughter, and she bare these unto Jacob. All the souls were seven. So here is the other handmaiden that he had married, who was Rachel's handmaiden, and her children. All the souls that came with Jacob into Egypt, which came out of his loins, besides Jacob's sons, wives, all the souls were threescore and six. And the sons of Joseph, which were born him in Egypt, were two souls. All the souls of the house of Jacob, which came into Egypt, were threescore and 10. He's got 70, 70 members of his family that are gonna be in Egypt with him. And he sent Judah before him unto Joseph to direct his face unto Goshen. And they came into the land of Goshen. And so he basically just asked for directions. Where do you want us to go? And Joseph made ready his chariot and went up to meet Israel, his father, to Goshen. and presented himself unto him, and fell on his neck, and wept on his neck a good while." Had a good family reunion. And I'm sure they both had a lot to talk about. I'm sure Joseph wanted to know how his father was doing, what all was going on with the family. And Jacob, of course, had missed out on a whole lifetime of Joseph's life. Remember, Joseph was a young man when he was taken captive. And a lot has happened in Joseph's life. And wouldn't you think, with these two men, that they were giving God the praise for all of it? You know? They wasn't feeling sorry for each other. They were giving praise to God for what they had been through. And Israel said unto Joseph, Now let me die, since I have seen thy face, because thou art yet alive. Jacob's ready to die. He's done. His life is filled, is full now. He's of old age. He's over 100 years old now. I believe he was 130 something, 34 or something like that at this time. He tells Joseph, now that I know you're okay, let me die. Let me go. And Joseph said unto his brethren and unto his father's house, I will go up and show Pharaoh and say unto him, my brethren and my father's house, which were in the land of Canaan are come unto me. And the men are shepherds for their trade hath been to feed cattle. and they have brought their flocks and their herds and all that they have. And it shall come to pass when Pharaoh shall call you and shall say, what is your occupation? That ye shall say, thy servant's trade hath been about cattle from our youth even until now, both we and also our fathers, that ye may dwell in the land of Goshen, for every sheep herd is an abomination unto the Egyptians. Now if you've ever studied any history at all of Egypt or seen any pictures of the hieroglyphics they have from over there and all that. Cattle seem to be the main animal as far as livestock that they would have had over there, especially in this day. And he brings that up here and some say that the reason that every shepherd is an abomination under the Egyptians was because of Abraham. Because Abraham was a shepherd, remember? Now, he had cattle also, but his main occupation as a shepherd was sheep. And because of what Abraham had done to Pharaoh, and because Pharaoh had fear of the God of Abraham, and was afraid that the God of Abraham was going to strike him dead, he banished Abraham from Egypt. anybody else that came along that was a shepherd. That's how spooked they were of people who were shepherds of sheep. So Jacob intercedes for his brothers here and tells Pharaoh that they are, or tells his brothers that when they come to Pharaoh to tell him, you're cowboys, in other words, you're cattle. you take care of cattle. You don't have anything to do with sheep. That way Pharaoh will accept you. Well, if we get into the next chapter, in chapter 47, then Joseph came and told Pharaoh and said, my father and my brethren and their flocks and their herds and all that they have are come out of the land of Canaan and behold, they are in the land of Goshen. And he took some of his brethren, even five men, and presented them unto Pharaoh. So he took five men. Some say he was probably the five oldest. I don't know. But he took them to meet Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said unto his brethren, What is your occupation? What is your job? What do you do for a living? And they said unto Pharaoh, Thy servants are shepherds, both we and also our fathers. You notice his brothers didn't lie to Pharaoh. They told him the truth. We're shepherds. We brought our flocks with us. They said moreover unto Pharaoh, for to sojourn in the land where we come, for thy servants have no pasture for their flocks, for the famine is sore in the land of Canaan. Now therefore we pray thee, let thy servants dwell in the land of Goshen. Notice they say they're there to sojourn. What does that mean? That means you're not there to stay. They're nomads. They're there to, just for temporary purposes, to stay until the famine's over with, until the land of Canaan is restored with grass and whatever else they needed to feed their cattle and their flocks. They've asked to dwell in Canaan, or I mean in Goshen, until they're ready to go back. They have no intentions of staying in Egypt forever or for a long period of time. We know later we find out where they stayed longer than they should have. Now I say that but we know that they stayed as long as God permitted them to stay. When it was time, in God's time, He took them out. But they did They did go against God and try to stay longer than he had planned for them to. The land of Egypt, oh let me back up, verse 5. And Pharaoh spake unto Joseph, saying, Thy father and thy brethren are come unto thee. The land of Egypt is before thee, and the best of the land make thy father and brethren to dwell in the land of Goshen. Let them dwell. And if thou knowest any men of activity among them, then make them rulers over my cattle. Here's the real reason Jacob mentioned to his brothers to tell them, to tell Pharaoh, they knew about cattle. Because cattle was a big thing in Egypt in that day. Remember, Egypt, because of Joseph, Egypt had plenty of grain. their cattle were doing well. If they didn't have enough grass, they certainly had enough grain. We also know that Goshen, one of the reasons Joseph, other than the fact that he lived close to Goshen, one of the other reasons he suggested Goshen for them was because it was a fertile area. Because it was in part of the Nile River Delta, It was covered with pastures of grass. Their cattle, their sheep, everything would have had plenty to eat. They would not have been as dependent upon the grain of Egypt as others were. So Pharaoh tells him, let them live in the land of Goshen. If you know of one of your brothers, who is very good with the cattle, make him a ruler over the cattle. Why would Pharaoh offer that to a Hebrew? Because that's how much respect he had for Joseph. And Joseph brought in Jacob his father, and set him before Pharaoh. And Jacob blessed Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said unto Jacob, How old art thou? And Jacob said unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my pilgrimage are 130 years. Few and evil have the days of the years of my life been and have not attained unto the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their pilgrimage. In other words, I'm not as old as Abraham and Jacob were at the end of their lives, but I'm still pretty old. 130 years. He notices his pilgrimage. It's just been a journey. Isn't that what we're told? We're just on a journey here. We're not here to settle. We're not here in this life. This world is not our home, is what the Bible tells us. We act like it is, but it's not. We've got a better place waiting for us. And Jacob understood that, and that's what He tries to get across to Pharaoh. I've been sojourning for 130 years. And Jacob blessed Pharaoh and went out from before Pharaoh. Now this blessed does not mean that he worshipped him. He just placed a blessing upon him. Why? Because Pharaoh had been so good to Joseph. That's why. And because Pharaoh had been so good to Jacob and his family. Pharaoh didn't have to follow what Joseph had said, did he? He was the king, remember? He was over all the land. He was over Joseph. Pharaoh could have banished him from the land and told Joseph, no, I don't want him here. But he didn't. He welcomed him in. And we know, again, we see where God softens the heart of a pharaoh. Do we not? This is not the typical response by the pharaohs to Hebrews, to the Jews. Normally, in most cases, even in this day, in the day that we're talking about here, the pharaoh would not have been in favor of a Jew. For one, he would not have put a Jew or a Hebrew in command of the land, is governor of the land, like he did Joseph, but because he was so impressed with Joseph's godliness is why he did. He was not a believer. I don't believe this Pharaoh was saved, but he understood that the God of Joseph and the God of Jacob was more powerful than the gods of Egypt. Verse 11, And Joseph placed his father and his brethren, and gave them a possession in the land of Egypt, in the best of the land, in the land of Ramesses, as Pharaoh had commanded. And again, the land of Ramesses is just another word for the land of Goshen. It's the same area. But the land of Ramesses was a certain portion of the land of Goshen. And Joseph nourished his father and his brethren and all his father's household with bread according to their families. We're going to stop there and we'll, because we jumped to a different part of the story. And we'll finish the rest of this chapter. We'll pick up with verse 13 next time, and we'll finish the rest of this chapter and chapter 48 for next time, because they kind of run together there. But just know that through all of this, and it's always amazed me throughout this whole story that we've been going through, the name of God is not mentioned that often. We see God's hand in everything that takes place. Everything that takes place. Humanly speaking, we look at these things and we stand in amazement at why weren't these people wiped out? Here's Pharaoh's, if you want to get down to it, here's Satan's opportunity to wipe out the beginnings of the nation of Israel. He could have used the Pharaohs, he could have used some of the other countries around Canaan, even the nations within Canaan, at any time they would have outnumbered Jacob's family. We saw where there was only 70 people in his family. Now we know some say he had servants. I don't know. It doesn't mention those. It only mentions that he brought with him His family. It never talks anything about the servants they would have had back in Canaan. Possibly, were they with him? I don't think so. I think this was just his family that he brought. Those, if they had servants, would have been Canaanite servants. They stayed in the land. But we see God's hand playing out here. Everything that he promised. Now, again, as we saw today, there were certain things that were included in God's promise to Abraham, but he didn't give Abraham all the details. Each generation gets a few more details. So, like, Abraham was given the promise of the promised land. His people were going to become a great nation. would eventually conquer the land of Canaan and that would be where they would live. Isaac was given the same promise, but a little bit more was added to it. It's going to come from your son Jacob. It's not going to come from Esau. Esau's not even going to have the birthright, remember. Jacob took the birthright from Esau. And then when you get to Jacob, Jacob had no idea that his family was going to have to move from Canaan to Egypt until just before his death, that they were going to have to go to Egypt. And God made a promise to him then that I'll bring your family back out of Egypt at some point. He doesn't tell him when, but they'll be leaving Egypt. And they're under the impression that it's going to be soon because they're just there to sojourn until the end of the famine. but it's gonna be much longer than that. Again, it's gonna be in God's timing and not theirs. Same way with what we see today and what we've seen in the New Testament times, I should say, since Christ, where we're promised that he was gonna return. We're here sojourning, waiting for his return. He hasn't come yet. Some people have given up. You know, you have those people who, like our Sunday school teacher talked about today, that Christ is not coming back. Well, we know He is. He tells us He is. If He told Jacob that He was going to bring His people out of the land, and He did, it wasn't in their time, it was in His time, certainly He is going to come back and take us out when it's His time. So we'll stop there for today.