Genesis 49:23 Commentary and Bible Study

Jacob is addressing Joseph, but begins by speaking in the third person, moving to the second person, and then back again. The use of the second person shows how personal this is, and how much love Jacob has for his son. He rejoices to be able to speak of the blessing of God on this son who has endured so much, and yet remained true to God. The Lord has forgotten none of the things Joseph has suffered in his long and taxing course through life. His faith had to go on believing in the goodness of God and that he had not forsaken him. His trials had to be interpreted as having some good outcome, perhaps as training for the future. His enemies were given permission for a time to do him harm, but their time would come to an end, and Joseph would come out of all these trials with increased strength and instrumentality for the Lord.If only you and I could have faith like that! ‘The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him.’ Joseph was hated by his brothers on account of his faith, and the church is hated by the world. Do we remember the promises that we will be brought through all these things, and stand with Christ in the last day; that we will overcome the world?‘But his bow abode in strength.’ Joseph is an archer too. He is made strong, even when arrows of the enemy thudded into him. We can take any amount of persecution if God strengthens us. Our strength comes because we know we belong to the Lord, and we know he will not leave us in trouble forever. Joseph was an overcomer, ‘and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob.’ His arms had to engage, but the strength to do so came from the Lord. ‘From thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel’. This is not just an incidental thought that happens to come into Jacob’s mind, but is a reference to the Messiah, through whom Joseph’s victory over the world will come – the Good Shepherd, the Rock of Israel. ‘Shepherd’ should have a capital S and so should ‘Stone’. Christ will be the ultimate Shepherd, and the cornerstone of his church, and of his people, and the rock at Horeb from which the water flowed. ‘Even by the God of thy father, who shall help thee; and by the Almighty, who shall bless thee with blessings of heaven above’, as well as all conceivable material blessings. The patriarchs were promised blessings in the material realm, for God was going to bless the nation in ways that even unconverted people – the majority of Israelites did not have spiritual life – could understand and recognise. The sons of Joseph, Manasseh and Ephraim, were each to become tribes in their own right, with Ephraim prevailing over his brother (Genesis 48:19-20). But these material blessings were only types of heavenly blessings, for the heavenly will endure long after this fallen earth has passed away and been made new. Joseph in the person of his sons will receive blessings of the deep, the deep springs that supply the wells which are vital for their flocks and herds. ‘Blessings of the breasts, and of the womb’ – for us, offspring correspond to those who are won for Christ through the gospel.‘The blessings of thy father have prevailed above the blessings of my progenitors [ancestors] unto the utmost bound of the everlasting hills.’ I have been blessed, says Jacob, more than Abraham and Isaac, more than my forebears. Yes, but he is including the blessings of Joseph when he says that. Abraham did not have a son who became first lord to Egyptian Pharaoh, and master of all the land. So materially speaking – when you consider that Jacob was the father of Joseph and so he may claim his accomplishments also – the blessings of Jacob were unprecedented. ‘They shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him that was separate from his brethren.’ Of course, Joseph would never have been in office for Pharaoh but for the troubles he endured. If he had never been sold into slavery, he would never been sold ultimately into the household of Pharaoh, or one of Pharoah’s senior staff, and nothing would have developed as it did. So also, if Christ, of whom Joseph was a type, had not come and suffered and died on Calvary, he would never have secured the salvation of the people of whom he is Lord and King. The parallels run constantly. Joseph has the privilege of being typical of Christ. The fullness of the blessing comes with the Saviour and Joseph stands for him.