Tawa Baptist

Hands

Scriptures:   Psalm 128:2, 90:17, 28:2, 141:2, 17:7 & 138:7,

Proverbs 10:4 & 12:24, Exodus 17:11-13, 1 Timothy 2:1+8,

Leviticus 1:4, John 20:24-28 & 10:27-30

Video Link: https://youtu.be/1sAi6TtXn1I

Audio Link: Stream Sermon – 26 Jul 2026 – Hands by tawabaptist | Listen online for free on SoundCloud

Structure:

  • Introduction
  • Hands are for work
  • Hands are for prayer
  • Hands are for saving
  • Conclusion

Introduction:

Good morning everyone.

What do these four words have in common: chandler, handkerchief, shorthand and handsome? [Wait] That’s right, they all contain a hand.

A chandler was originally someone who made candles by hand. But it can also be someone who handles the purchase of supplies for ships. A handkerchief is a cloth you hold in your hand for wiping your nose and shorthand is an abbreviated form of handwriting.  

Handsome first meant ‘easy to handle’, in the sense of being convenient or well-crafted to fit the hand. But it has since evolved to mean aesthetically pleasing or beautiful. It can also mean generous, as in openhanded.      

There are literally hundreds of words in English which contain a hand or derive their meaning from the hand.

Today we continue our new sermon series on body parts, this week focusing on the foot. No. Just kidding. We might do the foot another week. Today’s focus is the hand. Apparently, the hand is mentioned around 1,800 times in our English Bibles, which is a lot.

Our message today explores the purpose of our hands. The purpose of our hands is to make things happen. Hands get things done. In the Bible, we read how hands are used for work, for prayer and for saving. Let us begin then with hands at work…

Hands are for work:

There are 27 bones, 29 joints and at least 123 ligaments in each human hand.

This gives human beings the dexterity to do a whole variety of different kinds of work; from writing, to sewing, to changing light bulbs and chopping wood. Where would we be without our hands.

I have a confession to make. Two Sundays ago, I skipped church. We were in the Franklin district visiting one of our daughters. It was a beautiful day and there was work to do.

Among other things, I spent about an hour picking up pony poo. I needed my hands to do that. The horse doesn’t belong to our daughter. She was looking after it for one of her flat mates. The horse wasn’t that interested in me, because I didn’t have any food, but I did get on well with Cookie, the goat.

Now you might be wondering, why pick up the pony poo? What difference does it make? The horse is just going to undo your work by pooing all over the field again. Well, it’s not a pointless exercise.

Picking up the poo helps to keep the horse healthy. It’s not good for animals to eat from the same place they defecate. And, in the case of horses, taking their poo away breaks the lifecycle of worms and other parasites.

In Psalm 128 we read: “When you eat the labour of your hands, you shall be happy, and it shall be well with you.”

The labour of your hands is a poetic way of saying the produce of your work.

If you are a dairy farmer, then to eat the labour of your hands is to drink the cows’ milk. Or if you are a wheat farmer, then to eat the labour of your hands is to eat the bread made from the wheat grown in your field.

And if you pick up poo for a living, then eating the labour of your hands does not mean eating the poo. It means having a healthy horse, free of worms and parasites. The psalmist is saying that what we produce by working with our hands feeds us, body and soul. Without our hands we would be hungry and sad.

While I wouldn’t want to pick up poo fulltime, I did enjoy working with my hands that day. It fed my soul to do something different and to help someone I love in a practical way. I felt closer to God and his creation.

Working with your hands gets you out of your own head. It helps you to stop overthinking and it grounds you in the natural world. Despite the new blister,

I was happy and it was well with me.

There is wisdom and folly in our hands. The book of Proverbs has this to say about how we use our hands…

A slack hand causes poverty, but the hand of the diligent makes rich.

Also, Diligent hands will rule, but laziness ends in forced labour.

These verses are saying the same thing really. When you put your hands to work in a diligent way, with careful persistent effort, then (other things being equal) you put yourself in the driver’s seat. You have more control in your life.   

It should be noted that working with diligent hands does not automatically guarantee riches and success. We need a measure of God’s grace too.

If God didn’t send rain to grow the grass or enable the horse to produce a foal safely, then it wouldn’t matter how diligent you were at picking up the horse’s poo. As we read in Psalm 90…

Let the favour of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands for us; yes, establish the work of our hands!

These words are attributed to Moses, that great man of God. Moses worked with diligent hands most of his life. He spent 40 years caring for sheep in the wilderness and another 40 years working as Israel’s shepherd.

Moses knew that hard work was not enough by itself. Without the Lord’s favour, without God’s grace to establish what his hands had worked diligently to produce, all his work would be in vain.   

It is instructive to remember that Jesus worked with his hands most of his life. He was a carpenter longer than he was a preacher. His hands were skilled, strong and most likely calloused. At the same time, they were gentle hands, not clenched in anger nor used in violence.  

The apostle Paul also worked with his hands as a tent maker. He put great stock in it. His advice to the fledgling church in Thessalonica was this…

Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody. 

A quiet life doesn’t sound very ambitious and yet Paul saw dignity in it. He saw it as an essential part of our Christian witness.

Now in saying that, I don’t think Paul means that all Christians should become tradespeople. We are not all good with our hands. The point is, to work diligently for the glory of God.

The work of our hands, whether that be taken literally or metaphorically, is part of our public witness and worship. This means the work we do (whether in the church or in the world) is a sacred thing.        

What is the work of your hands? Do you see your work as part of your worship of God and witness for Christ? Or has it become something else?

We need to avoid two extremes. On the one hand, the work of our hands should not become an end in itself; it should not become an all-consuming idol which replaces God.

By the same token, we don’t want the work of our hands to be emptied of its meaning either. As Albert Camus once said, ‘When work is soulless, life stifles and dies.’ But (as the Bible indicates) when the work of our hands is done as an act of worship for God and witness for Christ, it feeds our soul.        

Hands are for prayer:

We are talking about the purpose of our hands. Hands are for work and hands are for prayer. Let me tell you a story…

Albrecht Dürer was born into a German family in 1471. He was one of 18 children. Albrecht and his brother Albert both wanted to become artists, but their parents could not afford to send them to art school.

So the brothers made a commitment to each other. They tossed a coin. The loser would go to work in the coal mines for four years to pay for the winner to go to art school. Then, four years later, the roles would be reversed. This way both brothers would support each other to become artists.

Albrecht won the coin toss and went to art school while Albert dutifully went to the coal mines. Albrecht thrived at the art academy in drawing, painting and woodcutting. He proved to be better than his teachers.

After four years, Albrecht returned home. On seeing his brother, Albert broke down in tears. He showed Albrecht how almost every bone his hands had been broken by four years labour in the mines. Albert had lost the dexterity to do the fine work of an artist. He could not go to the art academy.

Deeply moved by his brother’s sacrifice, Albrecht asked Albert to pose in prayer for him. He then drew the famous ink and pencil sketch of what we know today as the “Praying Hands”.

Albrecht Dürer became one of the greatest artists the world has ever known because of the silent sacrifice of his brother Albert. God established the work of both brother’s hands. Hands are for work and hands are for prayer.

Sometimes you see people raising their hands in church, usually during sung worship. This is not a new idea. It goes back thousands of years. Lifting open hands to God is an act of prayer. It’s a way of aligning your body with your heart and spirit. We come across raised hands in the psalms.

For example, in Psalm 28 we read: Hear my cry for mercy as I call to you for help, as I lift up my handstoward your Most Holy Place.

And in Psalm 141: May my prayer be set before you like incense; may the lifting up of my handsbe like the evening sacrifice.

Don’t be afraid to lift your hands in church while we are singing songs of worship, if that feels right to you. It is the ancient posture of prayer. A way of reaching out to God. A way of physically demonstrating our openness to God’s will and our dependence on him for all that we need.   

In Exodus 17, Moses famously raised his hands in prayer as the Israelites defended themselves in battle against the Amalekites.  

11 As long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning, but whenever he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning. 12 When Moses’ hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it. Aaron and Hur held his hands up… so that his hands remained steady till sunset.

13 So Joshua overcame the Amalekite army with the sword.

Raising hands in prayer isn’t just an Old Testament thing. In the New Testament letter to Timothy, Paul writes…

I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people… 8 Therefore I want the men everywhere to pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or disputing.

Hands raised in prayer are more effective than hands raised in anger.

Hands are for work and hands are for prayer. Hands are also for saving others, but salvation doesn’t come cheap. It comes at a cost. Let me tell you another story.

Hands are for saving

An orphaned boy was living with his grandmother when their house caught fire. Sadly, the grandmother was overcome by smoke and perished in the blaze. The boy’s cries for help were answered by a man who climbed an iron drainpipe and came back down with the boy hanging tightly to his neck.

Some weeks later, a public hearing was held to determine who would receive custody of the child. A farmer, a teacher, and the town’s wealthiest citizen all came forward offering to take the boy in. But as they talked, the lad’s eyes remained focused on the floor. He didn’t want to go with them.

Then a stranger walked to the front and slowly took his hands from his pockets, revealing the scars on them. The boy cried out in recognition. This was the man who had saved his life. His hands had been burned when he climbed the hot pipe. The boy threw his arms around the man’s neck and held on tight.[1]

The same marred hands that saved the boy from the fire, also gave him a home and security. We are reminded of someone else whose hands were marred in saving us. As the song goes. ‘Hands that flung stars into space, to cruel nails surrendered.’

The Psalms are peppered with this idea that God’s hand saves and delivers.

For example, in Psalm 17 we read: 7 Show me the wonders of your great love, you who save by your right hand those who take refuge in you from their foes.

And from Psalm 138: 7 Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life. You stretch out your hand against the anger of my foes; with your right hand you save me.

This is poetry. The psalmist is using the hand of God as a metaphor for the Lord’s skill and power to save him from those who meant to do him harm.

Nothing is beyond the reach of God’s hand. Nothing is too difficult for the power and skill of God.

God’s hand to save reminds us of Jesus who used his hands to heal and restore; to save people from the enemies of sickness and death…

Jesus healed lepers by touching them with his hand.

Jesus raised Jairus’ daughter from the dead by taking her hand.

And Jesus reached out his hand to Peter to save him from drowning.

God’s hand doesn’t just save us from physical harm. God’s hand saves us from spiritual harm too, that is from our sins. But God’s salvation doesn’t come cheap. It comes at a cost.

In Leviticus chapter 1 we read God’s instructions for burnt offerings to make atonement for sin: 4 You are to lay your hand on the head of the burnt offering, and it will be accepted on your behalf to make atonement for you.

By laying their hands on the head of the animal to be sacrificed, the Israelites were symbolically transferring their sin onto the animal so that when the animal was killed and burnt, their sins were done away with as well.

These ritual sacrifices pointed to Jesus, the Christ, who would atone for our wrongdoing by taking our sins upon himself. All our sins were transferred to Jesus on the cross so that when Jesus died, our sins died with him.

On the third day after his death, God raised Jesus from the dead. When Thomas (one of the disciples) was told about Jesus’ resurrection by the others, he had a hard time believing Jesus was alive. Thomas said, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.” 26 A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” 27 Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.” 28 Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!”

Our salvation by the hands of Jesus did not come cheap. It was costly but also effective. God established the work of Jesus’ hands.

Conclusion:

This morning we have heard about the purpose of our hands. Hands make things happen. They get things done.

Hands are for work. The work of our hands nourishes us (body & soul), it gives us more control in our lives. Better than that, the work of our hands is to be a public expression of our worship of God and witness for Christ.  

Hands are for prayer. We are not to rely solely on our own efforts but lift our hands to God in prayer, depending on him. Our hands raised in prayer should mirror our hearts open to God’s will.

Hands are for saving. Nothing is too difficult for God’s hand (his skill and power). But we need to remember, our salvation by the hand of Jesus comes at a cost. We value Jesus’ salvation of us by trusting and obeying him.

Let us pray…

God of wisdom and compassion, establish the work our hands for the praise of your glory. Through Jesus we pray. Amen.

Questions for discussion or reflection:

  1. What stands out for you in reading this Scripture and/or in listening to the sermon? Why do you think this stood out to you?
  2. Have you ever injured your hand, so you were not able to use it? How did it feel not being able to use your hand? How did you adapt?
  3. What is the purpose of hands? How did Jesus use his hands? How do you use your hands?
  4. What are some benefits of working with your hands? Why is it important to work with diligent hands?
  5. What is the work of your hands? Do you see your work as part of your worship of God and witness for Christ? Or has it become something else? Does anything need to change for you, where work is concerned?
  6. Why do people raise their hands in prayer? What does this posture demonstrate?
  7. What does the Bible mean by the hand of God? Have you experienced the hand of God’s deliverance in your life personally? If so, how?
  8. How might we value our deliverance by the hand of Jesus?

Outtakes

In John chapter 10, Jesus says this…

27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one.”

To be in the hand of Christ is to be in the hand of God who loves us. Jesus is our security. There is no better place to be.

[1] I’m not sure where the story, about the boy rescued from the fire, comes from?

Tawa Baptist

Blessed

Scripture: Genesis 48:13-20

Video Link: https://youtu.be/a4dc1e1e3Rs

Structure:

  • Introduction
  • Words of blessing
  • Hands of blessing
  • Conclusion

Introduction:

Good morning everyone.

“A bell is no bell ‘til you ring it. A song is no song ‘til you sing it. And love in your heart wasn’t put there to stay. Love isn’t love ‘til you give it away.”

Who can tell me what stage musical that song line comes from? [Wait]

That’s right, The Sound of Music. ‘Love isn’t love ‘til you give it away.’

This morning we continue our series in the life of Joseph. Last week we heard how Jacob adopted Joseph’s sons. In today’s reading Jacob blesses Joseph and his sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. We could say, “A blessing isn’t a blessing ‘til you give it away.” From Genesis 48, verse 13, we read…

13 And Joseph took both of them, Ephraim on his right toward Israel’s left hand and Manasseh on his left toward Israel’s right hand, and brought them close to him. 14 But Israel reached out his right hand and put it on Ephraim’s head, though he was the younger, and crossing his arms, he put his left hand on Manasseh’s head, even though Manasseh was the firstborn.  15 Then he blessed Joseph and said, “May the God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked faithfully, the God who has been my shepherd all my life to this day, 16 the Angel who has delivered me from all harm—may he bless these boys. May they be called by my name and the names of my fathers Abraham and Isaac, and may they increase greatly on the earth.” 17 When Joseph saw his father placing his right hand on Ephraim’s head he was displeased; so he took hold of his father’s hand to move it from Ephraim’s head to Manasseh’s head. 18 Joseph said to him, “No, my father, this one is the firstborn; put your right hand on his head.” 19 But his father refused and said, “I know, my son, I know. He too will become a people, and he too will become great. Nevertheless, his younger brother will be greater than he, and his descendants will become a group of nations.”  20 He blessed them that day and said, “In yourname will Israel pronounce this blessing: ‘May God make you like Ephraim and Manasseh.’” So he put Ephraim ahead of Manasseh.

May the Spirit of Jesus illuminate God’s word for us.

In these verses Jacob (also known as Israel) uses his words and his hands to bless Joseph’s sons. Let’s begin with Jacob’s words of blessing.

Words of blessing:

When I think of what it means to bless someone, I imagine some kind of tangible action which makes another person’s life better, or at least less difficult. For example, mowing their lawns or cooking them a meal or listening with understanding or doing some act of service to support them. In my mind, a blessing is a practical expression of love.

But this is not exactly the kind of blessing we find in Genesis 48. Jacob doesn’t do anything practical to make Ephraim and Manasseh’s life less difficult. Jacob simply speaks good words over their lives and places his hands on them. In this process though, something unseen yet powerful & lifegiving is communicated.

At the end of the service each week, someone (usually me) speaks a benediction (or a blessing) over the congregation. The word benediction has Latin origins. ‘Bene’ means well and ‘diction’ means speaking. So, a benediction is literally, ‘speaking well’ or ‘saying good things of someone’. [1] 

Our society today tends to discount words. We often use words carelessly or cheaply. But words have a certain power of their own, like seeds planted in our soul. We need to be sowing the seed of good words in people’s lives.  

Some years ago, when I was training for ministry, I spent a summer working as a chaplain at Greenlane Hospital, visiting patients. There was one man there, around my age, who was recovering from a stab wound.

He told me he was from Maketu, in the Bay of Plenty, not far from where I used to live. Sadly, he believed he was cursed. When he was young, an old woman pointed the bone at him and said some bad words over his life, the opposite of a benediction. Since then, he had been in and out of prison.

Words can be powerful things. What he needed was a blessing. What if that woman had spoken good words over his life, words of peace conveyed with warmth and love.

In verses 15 and 16 we read the words of blessing Jacob speaks over Joseph’s sons and, by extension, Joseph himself.

What we notice with Jacob’s blessing is the way God is front and center throughout. Four times God is referred to in the space of two verses. Jacob does not try to bless Ephraim and Manasseh in his own strength. He calls upon God Almighty to bless them.

Sometimes we Christians carry a heavy burden. We may feel like the weight of responsibility for blessing others rests squarely on our shoulders. It doesn’t. Any blessing (whether in word or deed) is done by God’s grace and in his power. We are simply vessels for carrying and imparting God’s blessing.

If the blessing is the tea, then you are the tea pot. The pot does not make the tea.  The pot merely holds the blessing while it brews. God makes the tea (or the blessing) and pours it out at the right time. 

As Paul says in his letter to the Corinthians, we have this treasure in jars of clay to show this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.     

In verse 15, we notice how Jacob’s words about God are not an abstract theory with no grounding in life’s realities. Jacob’s blessing comes from his own experience of God and the experience of his fathers.

Jacob begins by saying, ‘May the God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked…’

This speaks of a God who transcends time and geography. The God who blesses people through Jacob was around a long time before Jacob came on the scene, and he will continue to be around long after Jacob has gone.

What’s more, God is not fixed in one place like a statue or a building.

God moves around with his people. He walks with them wherever they go.

When Jacob talks about his father and grandfather walking faithfully before God, he is probably alluding to God’s covenant with Abraham. God’s covenant called for loyalty and trust. Jacob wants Ephraim and Manasseh to understand that being blessed carries a responsibility to honour the covenant with God.  

In the next line Jacob gets personal saying, ‘…the God who has been my shepherd all my life to this day…’

Jacob, who made his living as a shepherd, talks about God being his shepherd.

I wonder if David took inspiration from Jacob when he wrote the 23rd Psalm. ‘The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…’

The image here is one of security. To be blessed by God means having God lead, feed and protect you, like a shepherd. This means, for the blessing to be effective, Joseph’s sons must trust God enough to follow where he leads.

In verse 16, Jacob talks about the angel who has delivered me from all harm.

Most commentators think the angel here is a poetic way of referring to God. The key word though is delivered. It can also be translated as redeemed.

As in the ‘kinsman redeemer’. The close relative who gets you out of trouble, who redeems your life from slavery and financial ruin. Boaz (in the story of Ruth) is the classic example of a kinsman redeemer.

Jacob knew God’s deliverance and redemption on more than one occasion. God delivered Jacob from Esau who wanted to kill him. God delivered Jacob from Laban, who wanted to cheat him. And God delivered Jacob from grief and despair by redeeming Joseph’s life.  

What we notice here is the way the God of Jacob closely resembles Jesus.

Jesus is the good shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep. Jesus is our kinsman redeemer.

Jacob frames God’s blessing of Ephraim and Manasseh in terms of great increase on the earth. This probably means having lots of descendants, which did happen over the centuries that followed.

The underlying principle at work in God’s blessing is abundant life. Abundant life may blossom in a whole variety of ways. Often ways that transcend the physical.   

When we think of Jesus, we note he died relatively young and had no biological children. Nevertheless, he has millions of spiritual descendants.

Jesus came that we may have life in all its fullness. Jesus was all for abundant life and fruitfulness. However, the path to life and blessing is not always smooth or pleasant. Jesus turns our understanding of blessing on its head.

Jesus described those who are poor in spirit as blessed because the kingdom of heaven belongs to them. Likewise, those who mourn are blessed because they will be comforted. And so on.

To be poor in spirit and to mourn is obviously not an ideal state of being.

But, as painful as it feels, being emptied by suffering and grief prepares us to receive God’s blessing. ‘A heart that is broken is a heart that is open.’ [2]

Okay, so those are Jacob’s words of blessing for Joseph’s sons. What about Jacob’s hands of blessing.

Hands of blessing:

Are you left or right-handed? Historically the left hand often carried negative connotations. The Latin word for ‘sinister’ means ‘on the left side’. And in English the word ‘left’ comes from the old Anglo-Saxon word for ‘weak’. In contrast, the right hand is associated with virtue and honour and being right.

In the Middle Ages lefties were, at times, thought to be cursed and in league with the devil, which resulted in burning at the stake.

The stigma and superstition of being left-handed carried over into the following centuries. King George the sixth, who was monarch of England from 1936 to 1952, was left-handed but his father (king George the fifth) forced him to write with his right hand.

Even today there is a certain negativity attributed to the left hand. For those who are familiar with the dating app, Tinder, you swipe right (so I’m told) if you like someone and you swipe left if you don’t. Right for accept’. Left for reject. Sounds quite brutal.  

Perhaps all this prejudice and superstition is because left-handed people are in the minority. It is thought that somewhere between 85-90 percent of people are right-handed, with only 10-15 percent being left-handed.

Now let me say, there is nothing wrong with being left-handed. You are not bad or cursed or anything else if you happen to be left-handed. Our handedness is simply a product of the way God makes us, like eye colour or being good with numbers or preferring savoury to sweet. God likes diversity.

In verse 13 we read how Joseph took great care to line his sons up correctly for Jacob. Joseph made sure his eldest son, Manasseh, was positioned to receive the right hand of blessing and Ephraim, the younger son, was positioned to receive Jacob’s left hand. Joseph believed (like most people of his time and culture) that the right hand of blessing was somehow better than the left hand.

But Jacob upset Joseph’s careful arrangement by crossing his hands over,

so the right hand of blessing went to Ephraim (the younger son) and the left hand of blessing went to Manasseh. Jumping ahead to verse 17, we read how Joseph was displeased by this.

The English translation is a bit soft here. The original Hebrew is stronger.

It says more literally that what Jacob did was evil in Joseph’s eyes. [3] 

It was like using the wrong name at a wedding.

Do you remember that episode from the TV show, Friends, when Ross is getting married to Emily but instead of using Emily’s name in his vows he uses Rachel’s name. (Rachel was one of Ross’ old girlfriends.) What Jacob did, in blessing the younger son with his right hand, was like that. A major faux pas. 

Joseph, who we know by now is very proper and righteous in all his ways, tries to correct his father, Jacob. Joseph tries to move Jacob’s right hand off Ephraim’s head and onto Manasseh’s head. Maybe Jacob is confused. Maybe his blindness has caused the mistake.

But the old man, Jacob, knows what he is doing. This is no mistake. Jacob says to Joseph, “I know, my son, I know. He too will become a people, and he too will become great. Nevertheless, his younger brother will be greater than he, and his descendants will become a group of nations.”

The text does not explain why Jacob crosses his hands. His actions are inexplicable just as God’s actions are often inscrutable. The hand of God is free to move and bless and shape history as he wishes.  God’s reasons do not bow to our cultural norms or traditions. God does not need to explain himself.

Jacob is not startled or angry with Joseph for interrupting him.

Jacob understands Joseph’s concern, without changing the decision.

The blessing is irreversible.

To his credit Joseph, now the ruler of Egypt, does not force Jacob’s hand.

In faith Joseph humbly accepts the father’s will, even if he cannot understand it. Note though that Ephraim and Manasseh both get the same words. Both brothers are blessed for the sake of Joseph. Only the younger is put first. 

In verse 19, Jacob talks about the younger brother (Ephraim) becoming greater than his older brother. What is greatness?

I’m reminded of the request of James and John, in Mark 10, to sit on Jesus’ left and right in his glory. It seems James and John had ambitions of greatness.

Jesus is not angry or impatient with them. Jesus graciously points out that they don’t know what they are asking. Then the Lord goes on to define greatness…

“…whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 44 and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. 45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

According to Jesus the greatest is not the most powerful or the most successful or the most popular. Rather the greatest is the servant of all.

Joseph was the Prime Minister of Egypt and yet that did not make him the greatest. Joseph was the greatest among his brothers because he was the servant of all. God blessed many thousands of people through Joseph.

Conclusion:

Love in your heart wasn’t put there to stay. Love isn’t love ‘til you give it away.

On hearing that again we might focus on the giving it away part. But before we can give love away, we must first have it put there by someone. We must be open to receive love.

Jacob puts his love in Joseph’s heart by giving Ephraim and Manasseh his blessing. And, to their credit, they receive Jacob’s blessing in an attitude of quiet trust, just as they humbly accepted Jacob’s adoption of them.

It’s quite difficult in kiwi culture to properly receive words of love and blessing. When people speak good words to us, we often deflect or minimize their comments. Good words raise a red flag. Can I trust what they say or is this a sucker punch? Tall poppies get cut down in New Zealand.

As difficult as it may be, we need to learn to accept the blessing God wants to give. We cannot give to others something we have never experienced or received ourselves. We cannot conjure up blessings out of thin air.

If the tea pot refuses to let the tea and water in to brew, it will have nothing to pour out. Before you can bless others, you must be open to receiving God’s blessing. You must let God put his love in your heart.   

God’s blessing is often communicated by the power of his Spirit, through ordinary people. So, receiving God’s blessing means letting honest, trustworthy people speak good things into your life, into your soul.

May you be blessed this week with knowing and feeling God’s love and grace for you personally, deep in your heart. Amen. 

Questions for discussion or reflection:

  1. What stands out for you in reading this Scripture and/or in listening to the sermon? Why do you think this stood out to you?
  2. What do you think it means to bless someone? What does it mean to be blessed by God?
  3. What difference have good words (or bad words) made in your life? What was said to you and how did that affect you?
  4. What is Jesus’ take on blessing? With Jesus’ beatitudes in mind, are you on a path to blessing?
  5. Are you left or right-handed? What difference does it make?
  6. Why does Jacob cross his hands over when blessing Ephraim and Manasseh? What might this reveal about God’s ways? 
  7. What is Jesus’ take on greatness? Why was Joseph great?   
  8. Why is it important to receive the blessing God wants to give? How might we remain open to receive God’s blessing?

Outtakes

When Jacob says, in verse 16, ‘may they be called by my name’, he means may Ephraim and Manasseh be reckoned among the twelve tribes of Israel, with a share in God’s covenant promises to Abraham. This is an affirmation of Jacob’s adoption of Joseph’s sons, which we heard about last week.

[1] Refer Henri Nouwen’s book, ‘Life of the Beloved’, page 56.

[2] This is a lyric from a U2 song, by Bono.

[3] Refer Bruce Waltke’s commentary on Genesis, page 600.