The end of Genesis

Reading: Genesis 23-50

Firstly, I would like to welcome anyone new to this blog who found it through the Salt and Light newsletter sent out yesterday. I recommend you start at the bottom of this page with the first entries then work your way up. An understanding of the first few chapters of Genesis is important for the rest of our study

Although there is not anything specific I wish to focus on about today's passage I would like to point out how often God uses the environment to bless his people. In Genesis 30 God blesses Jacob by making Laban's sheep and goats conceive streaked, speckled and spotted offspring. In doing so He makes Jacob a rich man. Later, when Joseph is in Egypt; God uses a famine and a dream predicting it to make Joseph the second-in-Egypt and allowed him to save his family (who were also reunited with him through the famine). Lastly, when Jacob blesses his sons (Genesis 49) he uses the imagery of nature; "unstable as water", "a lion's whelp", "a strong donkey", "a serpent by the way", "a deer let loose", "a fruitful bough", "blessings or the deep that lies beneath blessings of the breasts and womb", "a ravenous wolf".

All of nature is God's servant, and though He often chooses to bless us through it; as we will see later he also uses it to punish us.