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Genesis 37
1 Now Jacob dwelt in the land where his
father was a stranger, in the land of Canaan.
2 This is
the history of Jacob.
Joseph, being seventeen years old, was feeding the flock with his brothers.
And the lad was with the sons of
Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah, his father’s wives; and Joseph brought a bad
report of them to his father.
3 Now Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, because he was the son of his old age. Also he made him a tunic of many colors. 4 But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peaceably to him . . . (Genesis 37)
Genesis 37: 2 says “This is the history
of Jacob.”
By this point Jacob was an old man, the
father of 11 adult sons, some with wives and children of their own. Grandfather Jacob had been to foreign
countries, wrestled with angels, and buried the woman he loved. But never mind
the previous decades, the history of Jacob, also called Israel, only REALLY
begins here with the story of his favorite son: Joseph.
It’s touching to think how a child can mark the beginning of its parents’ real
story. But if you have 13 (or more)
kids, and your story didn’t get started until the 11th son, it’s not
so much sweet as sad.
Sadly, Jacob played favorites with his
children . Actually “played” isn’t an
adequate word because Jacob seriously loved his two sons by Rachel and seriously
disdained all his other kids. Jacob’s
favoritism was apparently so deeply etched into the family history that the
written record in Scripture reflects the patriarch’s partiality.
Or maybe the author of Genesis 37:2
didn’t mean Jacob, aka Israel, the man, but Jacob, aka Israel the nation.
THIS is the history of Israel.
It is a history of jerks.
Jacob was a jerk. His oldest sons were jerks. His favorite son Joseph was a jerk. The mass of their collective buttholery nearly
destroyed the messianic line.
Jacob enforced his favoritism with no
regard for the harm it did to his children.
When 17 year old Joseph snitched
on his siblings, Father Jacob publicly rewarded him by making him
supervisor of the older, more
experienced brothers.
Jacob assigned his 10 oldest sons to life
in the pastures. They spent months at a time away from their wives
and children, exposed to the elements, and in peril from predatory animals and
more viciously predatory people. . They
slept under the sky, or in caves, or in tents stitched and re-stitched to keep
out the rain. They clambered up mountain
paths looking for that darn stupid goat.
They pulled night watches wrapped in old cloaks, and their father didn’t
care, but here came little Joseph, precious Joseph in a brand new coat,
expensively dyed in multiple colors.
. . . they hated him and could not speak
peaceably to him (Genesis 37: 4).
. . . they hated him even more (Genesis
37: 5).
Literally, everything Joseph said pissed
off his brother more.
And then Joseph started having dreams.
He said, “Please hear this dream which I
have dreamed: There we were, binding sheaves in the field. Then behold, my
sheaf arose and also stood upright; and indeed your sheaves stood all around
and bowed down to my sheaf” (Genesis 27:6-7).
Joseph also dreamed that their parents,
represented by the sun and moon and his brothers, represented by 11 stars, all
bowed down to him.
Now don’t forget that Joseph’s mother was
dead. So, the moon in Joseph’s dream
represented Jacob’s OTHER wives. Joseph
basically told his brothers, “Your mama’s gonna bow down to me. And your mama’s gonna bow down to me. And YOUR mama’s gonna bow down to me.”
Now I don’t know if Joseph was
insensitive or just stupid. Seventeen
year-old males tend to be both. His
brother were older than him, stronger than him, regularly braved conditions
their dad thought were too dangerous for him, had literally murdered an entire
city before, and they didn’t like him --- at all. But, Joseph actually told THOSE dreams, out
loud to THOSE men.
So yeah, next time Joseph came around in
his Armani coat “supervising” they seriously considered murdering him.
Now when
they saw him afar off, even before he came near them, they conspired against
him to kill him. Then they said to one
another, “Look, this dreamer is coming! Come
therefore, let us now kill him and cast him into some pit; and we shall say,
‘Some wild beast has devoured him.’ We shall see what will become of his dreams!”
(Genesis 37:18 – 20)
Ultimately they didn’t kill him, but
what they did brought about 13 years of suffering for everyone in their
family. 13 years of pain because each man involved
chose to be a jerk.
Reuben could’ve stood up to his siblings
when they wanted to get rid of Joseph.
He could have been a genuine hero, but he decided to double-cross his
brothers and ended up deeper in his father’s disfavor.
But
Reuben heard it, and he delivered him
out of their hands, and said, “Let us not kill him.” And
Reuben said to them, “Shed no blood, but
cast him into this pit which is in
the wilderness, and do not lay a hand on him”—that he might deliver him out of
their hands, and bring him back to his father. . . Then Reuben returned to the
pit, and indeed Joseph was not in the
pit; and he tore his clothes. And he returned to his brothers and said, “The
lad is no more; and I, where shall I go?” (Genesis 37:21-30).
Judah could have used his influence to
redirect his family away from violent dysfunction but he wanted to make money
off his little brother’s misfortune so he continued on a path mean-ness and
betrayal that his own sons followed to their deaths.
So Judah
said to his brothers, “What profit is
there if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? Come
and let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for
he is our brother and our flesh.” And his brothers
listened (Genesis 37:26-27).
Jacob could have ended the 3 generation
old cycle of parental favoritism and sibling rivalry. Instead he perpetuated and exacerbated the
cycle costing him decades of anxiety, depression, paranoia, and absence.
Then
Jacob tore his clothes, put sackcloth on his waist, and mourned for his son
many days. And all his sons and all his daughters arose to comfort him; but he
refused to be comforted, and he said, “For I shall go down into the grave to my
son in mourning.” Thus his father wept for him (Genesis 37:34-35).
And Joseph. Good ole Joseph. In later days he would become a great man. God would take what was meant for evil and
use it for good. But at this point in
the history of the family and nation Israel, all they have is the self-inflicted
evil. From this point in the history
Joseph spends the next 13 years as a slave and prisoner in the equivalent of solitary
confinement in a federal penitentiary because he was obsessed with his favor, his
authority, and his dreams with no empathy for the dreams, authority, or needs
of anyone else in his family.
Being jerks cost them more than they could
have imagined.
And the moral of Genesis chapter 37
is: DON’T BE A JERK.
You may have been bullied and mistreated,
but DON’T BE A JERK.
You may have been passed over for a promotion
that was rightly yours, but DON’T BE A JERK.
You may have been denied love and
forgiveness, but DON’T BE A JERK.
You may have prophetic dreams of a great
divine destiny, but that’s no excuse for being a jerk.
It may in the end all work out for good
because you love the Lord and are called according to His purpose. Cool.
But that won’t undo the suffering that your buttholery causes in the meantime.
Just, DON’T BE A JERK.
--Anderson T. Graves II is a
writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership
development.
Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME
Church in Fairfield, Alabama. He writes a blog called A Word to the Wise at
www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com
Email atgravestwo2@aol.com
Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves
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