Two Funerals and a Resurrection

Last week we saw how Jacob finally made it to Bethel, where he had promised to return and build a place of worship for the Lord.

And there was a sense of "finally!" He finally made it back to where he should have gone all along. He finally followed through.

But Bethel wasn't actually the final stop of Jacob's return from his exile in the east. Remember, Bethel was on the way from his father's house. When he was at Bethel the first time in Genesis 28:21, he spoke about coming "again to his father's house in peace."

And now that he's reconciled with Esau, there's nothing standing between him and his father's house now. Just the 55 km-or-so journey to actually get there.

1. Death by Birth (vv. 16-21)

And so, in the final stages of his long pilgrimage, Jacob sets out yet again. Pulls up his tent pegs, loads up the animals, rounds up the sheep, packs up all of the stuff and heads out.

One of the stops on the way would have been Ephrath, or Bethehem. And while they were some distance—maybe, depending how we understand the Hebrew, two hour's distance—Rachel, Jacob's favourite wife, goes into labour.

That's how we find out that Rachel is pregnant. This is a big deal, because for years, Rachel was unable to have children. At this point she's only given birth to one son—Joseph. We haven't been told at all about her pregnancy, and so this is a surprise that comes out of the blue.

Not only is she in labour, but this is "hard labour" (v. 16) or "difficult" labour. She's really struggling. And verse 17 says that “when her labor was at its hardest, the midwife said to her, ‘Do not fear, for you have another son’” (Genesis 35:17).

This had been Rachel's prayer. Remember her demand to Jacob? "Give me children, or I shall die!" (Gen 30:1). She was never content with just one. When her first son was born, “she called his name Joseph, saying, ‘May the Lord add to me another son!”’” (Genesis 30:24). Joseph means "may he add." Joseph's existence, every time his name was used, was a living reminder of his mother's prayer for another son. Rachel had not been content with one son.

And at the hardest point of her labour, the midwife comforts Rachel with the news that her desire has been granted: she has another son.

But could this be a case of "be careful what you wish for"? Because Rachel has another son, but she will not get to enjoy or even know this son. Giving birth to him is the last thing she'll do. Verse 18: “And as her soul was departing (for she was dying), she called his name Ben-oni; but his father called him Benjamin” (Genesis 35:18).

"As her soul was departing" could be translated "as her life was running out." Through one of the many possible complications involving childbirth, Rachel's life, her breath, her soul, is leaving her body.

This is a helpful place to remember just how risky the act of giving birth was for most of human history. In 18th Century England, for example, one mother died for every 40 babies born. [https://obgyn.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1479-828x.2007.00691.x] That means every few families would have lost their mother in childbirth at some point.

God told Eve that her pain in birth would be multiplied because of her sin. And we should see a reflection of that here in this passage. Rachel's hard labor is a reminder that we are still east of Eden, longing for redemption.

And with some of her last breaths, Rachel, daughter of Eve, names her son Ben-oni.

Ben-Oni means one of two things: either "Son of My Sorrow," or "Son of my Strength." And as if often the case in Hebrew, we shouldn't be surprised if both of these meanings are implied. Rachel has great sorrow in her death, and yet as she has poured the last of her strength into this son could she also be longing for him to carry on and live out her legacy in strength?

And yet, in the only time we find this kind of situation in Scripture, Ben-Oni's father overrules his mother's naming of her and gives him his own name: Benjamin, or Bin-Yamin in Hebrew.

The meaning of Benjamin is similarly uncertain. It could mean "Son of My Right Hand," suggesting protection, or power, or good fortune. It could mean "Son of the South," given that Benjamin was the only son not born up north in Paddan-Aram. It could also mean "Son of My Old Age."

Once again, all of these possible meanings are appropriate for Benjamin, Jacob's youngest son and the final son of his first love.

But Benjamin's birth is not actually the main point here. Verse 19 does not say, "So Benjamin was born." It says, "So Rachel died." The girl he fell for at the well all those years ago has died in the process of getting the one thing she wanted more than anything else. Death by birth.

Verses 19-20 recount how she was buried and memorialized with a pillar that was still present at the time when Genesis was written, hundreds of years later.

But not surprisingly, Jacob didn't want to stay in that place too long. He journeyed on a bit further to the tower of Eder.

2. A Failed Coup (vv. 22a)

And while he was in that location, another significant event happened. Verse 22 tells us that "Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father's concubine."

The scene has shifted from Jacob's youngest son to his oldest. We've moved from the innocence of birth to a crime that's almost too terrible to describe—a man sharing a bed with his half-brother's mother.

As always, though, there's more than meets the eye here. What Reuben does here is a crime, no doubt, but it's probably not a crime of lust. It's a crime of another sort with very specific aims.

First, remember who Bilhah was: Rachel's servant. After being with her in this way, Jacob would almost certainly never share intimacy with her again, a pattern we see later on with David and Absalom (2 Sam 16:22, 20:3). What that means that Bilhah will bear no more children in Rachel's name. Which means that Leah will be the only wife and the only mother of any future children.

In a weird, twisted kind of a way, Reuben seems to be doing what he can to preserve the status of his own mom, Leah.

More significantly, taking a leader's concubines as your own was a power move. It's how you asserted that you had taken over leadership. Again, this is what Absalom did with his father's concubines (2 Sam 16:20-23).

In other words, it looks like Reuben is trying to grab the steering wheel from his dad. Perhaps he's seen his father's weakness and lack of action with what happened in Shechem, and he thinks now is the time that this growing people had a real leader.

That's why we should understand this as a coup, which is a political term for seizing power from an existing government.

Initially, it seems like Jacob's streak of not doing anything continues. Verse 22 ends with, "And Israel heard of it." This is similar language for when Jacob heard about what happened to his daughter Dinah. And it appears that, similarly, he does nothing.

But time will prove that this is a failed coup. Nobody recognizes Reuben's leadership. In fact, the opposite happens. By sinning in this disgraceful way, Reuben forfeits his role as firstborn and leader of the people, something 1 Chronicles 5:1 explains. He lost the birthright.

At the end of his life, Jacob says to him, “you shall not have preeminence, because you went up to your father’s bed; then you defiled it—he went up to my couch!” (Genesis 49:4). Moses said of Reuben's tribe, “‘Let Reuben live, and not die, but let his men be few’” (Deuteronomy 33:6).

The tribe of Reuben ended up settling on the far side of the Jordan river, removed from the power centres of Israel and Judah. It was one of the first territories to fall to the Assyrians, and by the time of Jesus would be a part of Perea, just another Roman territory.

Asserting yourself and grabbing at power, especially through wicked means, doesn't work, does it?

3. The Next Generation (vv. 22b-26)

After this brief report of Reuban's failed coup, our passage moves into the third section, where it gives a full listing of Jacob's sons. Now that Benjamin has been born, the number has grown to twelve.

Verses 22-26 give us a listing of these sons, listed according to their mothers. First are Leah's sons: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Isssachar, and Zebulun. Next, Rachel's sons: Joseph and Benjamin. Next are the sons of Bilhah, Rachel's servant: Dan and Naphtali. Finally the sons of Zilpah, Leah's servant: Gad and Asher.

There's a few things we should notice here. First, the author here is not trying to hide the messy situation in which Jacob's sons were born. We don't just get a straight list, but a full accounting of the two sisters and their two servants who gave birth to these tribes. This account would be written by a people who would know the law of Leviticus 18:18: "You shall not take a woman as a rival wife to her sister." Nevertheless, through this unlawful mess comes the twelve sons of promise.

Second, by listing these twelve sons here, the author is setting us up for the next part of the story. Right now, we're still in the book of the generations of Isaac, which we began back in 25:19. Remember that's how this whole section of Genesis began? “These are the generations of Isaac, Abraham’s son” (Genesis 25:19).

And you've probably noticed that the generations of Isaac have actually mostly been about Isaac's sons. Just like Abraham's story actually took place in the book of the generations of Terah, Abraham's father. So, Isaac is about to die, and the book of his generations will come to an end. After a brief look at Esau, Genesis will pick up with the generations of Jacob. And who do you think will be the main characters in that book?

These twelve sons. Jacob himself will fade to the background in the book about his generations. And so this listing of the twelve sons is a preview of the cast of characters who will take the stage in the next act.

Third, the way that the sons are listed—birth order according to each mom, and each mom listed according to the order Jacob married her—means that this list shows the order of legal inheritance. This is their legal order in terms of who would inherit the birthright.

And this is important because hasn't Genesis told us, more than once, that the firstborn doesn't necessarily get the birthright? Isaac, nor Ishmael. Jacob, not Esau. Reuben was Jacob's firstborn but, like we've seen, he lost his position because of his sin. Who is next in line? Simeon and Levi, the war criminals. Their crimes at Shechem have shown neither of them are fit to lead. So who is next in line? Judah.

And certainly in the next section of Genesis, we'll see Judah rise to prominence as the leader among his brothers. And before Jacob dies, he says “Judah, your brothers shall praise you; your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies; your father’s sons shall bow down before you... The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples” (Genesis 49:8-10).

Ad yet, there's a bit of tension there, because Judah's role as leader is played off against Joseph's position and power. And remember that Joseph was the firstborn of Rachel, Jacob's favourite wife.

And at times it almost sounds like Jacob wants Joseph to be the firstborn. He says of Joseph's sons, "In them let my name be carried on, and the name of my father's Abraham and Isaac" (Gen 48:16), and he gives a special blessing, special prominence, to Joseph's son Ephraim.

This tension between Judah and Ephraim lays the groundwork for a power struggle that blows wide open when Jeroboam, an Ephraimite, leads ten tribes in rebellion against Rehoboam, son of Solomon, of the tribe of Judah.

But God has his way, and it is from Judah, son of unloved Leah, of whom his mother said "This time I will praise the Lord," that the Messiah comes and brings blessing to the nations.

The history of Israel—and the hope of the world—is bound up in the relationships between these brothers listed here in Genesis 35.

4. Death by Life (vv. 27-29)

And with that we arrive to the final stage in this passage. Jacob comes to his father Isaac at Mamre in verse 27. This is the same place Abraham had sojourned. Jacob has finally come back in peace to his father's house, the place he ran away from so many years ago. And not only is his journey done, but his father Isaac's life journey is done.

“Now the days of Isaac were 180 years. And Isaac breathed his last, and he died and was gathered to his people, old and full of days. And his sons Esau and Jacob buried him” (Genesis 35:28–29).

Isaac lived for a long time—a lot longer than he thought he would. But eventually he took his last breath.

According to Google, the average human takes 7.5 million breaths in a year. That means that in Isaac's 180 years, he took around 1.35 billion breaths. And from one perspective his whole life was a series of little moments sustained by the oxygen that kept him alive one breath at a time.

But there came a time when the last breath was taken in, and no more breaths came, and he died. Nothing killed him but life itself. Death by life.

I love this phrase "was gathered to his people" in verse 29. This is a common Biblical phrase for dying, and it is best understood as meaning that Isaac joined his family in Sheol, in the place of the dead. That's where your people, the people who went before you, are, and when you die you are gathered to them.

This phrase points to an early understanding of life after death, of the continuance of the soul after the body has breathed its last.

But this week this word "gathered" really stuck out at me. It's one thing to say that Isaac, like Abraham before him, "went to" his people or "was laid with" his people, but this word "gathered" is so interesting.

We don't think of a single human as being "gathered." "Gathering" is what you do with a group of things. It would make sense to say that his people were gathered to him, but what does it mean to say that someone was gathered to his people?

In this connection it was fascinating to learn that this word "gathered" is often used of a harvest—as in, gathering in the grain. Is there a chance we should see it in this way? That someone's life is like a season of planting and growing, and their death is a harvest?

Job 5:26 seems to picture things this way. “You shall come to your grave in ripe old age, like a sheaf gathered up in its season.”

Farmers will know that when wheat is ready to be harvested, it's because it's actually dead. Its life has been literally spent producing fruit, and that fruit is finally ready when the plant's life is over.

And I think that this picture of being "gathered to our people" is a beautiful picture that points to the fruit of our life being harvested and brought in and carried with us into the next world.

And yet, we don't want to romanticize this. In the Hebrew Scriptures, Sheol, the grave, the place of the dead, is not a place you want to go. Yes, it is the place where you go when you are gathered to your people, but it is also described as a place of darkness and shadows and forgetfulness. Think of how often in the Psalms the Psalmist begs God not to let him go there, not to let him die.

The idea all throughout the Old Testament is that while there is some form of life after death, it's not the life you want. This life is where we experience God's goodness. This is our best life now. This is where we want to stay. For Isaac to experience 180 years of life is a gift.

But this life can't go on forever. Since the bite of the fruit in Eden, death always finds a way. The ground always wins. And after holding off death one breath at a time, Isaac finally succumbs to the inevitable and...

I didn't finish that sentence on purpose because something really poignant happened as I was typing this sentence into my manuscript yesterday. Right as I got to that point I got a text that my 105-year-old-grandmother had just passed away.

Like Isaac, she lived a long life. Like Isaac, she died, old and full of days. And like Isaac, no matter how long she put it off, no matter how many odds she seemed to defy, she still died after taking one final breath

Her story ended the same way Isaac's story ended, the same way Rachel's story ended, the same way that every story ended. With death seeming to hold all the cards.

5. Reflections & Resurrection

Dying in Faith

Now, as we reflect on this, we know that while Isaac's part in the story is over, the story is not over. Isaac was promised much, and lived to see just the littlest taste of it.

And Hebrews 11 is quite clear on the fact that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob all died in faith—not seeing the things they were promised, but believing that God would bring them to pass long after their death. “These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar” (Hebrews 11:13).

The God of Isaac is not finished just because Isaac is, and Isaac died believing this. The big story continues.

The End of Every Story... But One

And yet, if every story does end up ending the way Isaac's ends, the way Rachel's ends, what is the point? What is "the big story" other than a long series of short stories that all end the exact same way?

That seems to be the perspective of the author of Ecclesiastes, who muses at the way that death levels everything out.

“The wise person has his eyes in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. And yet I perceived that the same event happens to all of them... How the wise dies just like the fool!” (Ecclesiastes 2:14, 16a).

“For what happens to the children of man and what happens to the beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity. All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return” (Ecclesiastes 3:19–20).

“It is the same for all, since the same event happens to the righteous and the wicked, to the good and the evil, to the clean and the unclean, to him who sacrifices and him who does not sacrifice. As the good one is, so is the sinner, and he who swears is as he who shuns an oath. This is an evil in all that is done under the sun, that the same event happens to all” (Ecclesiastes 9:2–3a).

Yes, Isaac died in faith, but he who dies with the most faith still dies and goes to the same place as the man with no faith. Yes, Isaac died with lots of blessings, but he who dies with the most blessings still dies like everybody else. Yes, Isaac died with lots of covenant promises from God, but he who dies with the most promises still dies like everybody else.

What truly is the point of everything if every story ends up ending the same way, no matter what we do?

That is the question of Ecclesiastes. And it's a good question, one we should think deeply about, because death is the end of every story, isn't it?

Isn't it?

Not quite, right? Death is the end of every story, but one.

“Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, ‘Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold, he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him. See, I have told you.’ So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. And behold, Jesus met them and said, ‘Greetings!” And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, ‘Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me’” (Matthew 28:1–10).

Jesus' story is the first story to end like this, because it's the first story to not end. Jesus is the first person to never take a last breath. Yes, there was a pause in the grave—there was a stillness through Friday and into Saturday and Sunday morning where Jesus' body took no breaths and it looked like a corpse, as dead as Rachel, as dead as Isaac.

But then his chest lifted. He breathed in and out. In and out. In and out. And He sat up and He took the cloth off of his face and he rolled away the stone and he rolled up his sleeves, as it were, and got to work building His church which He's been doing ever since and is doing up to this present moment.

Jesus is alive, never to die again. “We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him” (Romans 6:9).

Issac's Hope, and Ours

And because Jesus' story didn't end in the grave, it means that none of these other stories end in the grave either. Because Jesus' story didn't end in the grave, Isaac's story didn't end in the grave either.

“These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city” (Hebrews 11:13–16).

“But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:20–23).

Christ's resurrection guarantees Isaac's resurrection—and your resurrection. History is not just a series of short stories that end in death. For those who know Christ, it's one great story with the happiest ending imaginable—together, inheriting the New Creation together, living together in God's presence forever.

That's what the promises to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob were ultimately about. It was never just about a few short years of being blessed and having kids on that part of land. Doesn't Hebrews 11 make that abundantly clear? They were seeking an eternal country. They were “looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God” (Hebrews 11:10).

Isaac died in faith, hoping in that heavenly country. And here's the wonderful, mysterious truth—Isaac is still waiting. He has not yet seen the full number of his offspring gathered in through the Messiah. He has not yet opened his eyes to the eternal day and filled his resurrected lungs with the clean air of the new creation.

Though we believe he is with the Lord, having been rescued from Sheol by the death and resurrection of Jesus, yet he still waits. As Hebrews 11 finishes, “all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect” (Hebrews 11:39–40).

And so friends, the resurrection of Jesus calls us to take our place among the company of the faithful who have seen so much and yet wait, and die, in faith that the God of covenant, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God who did not let David's son see corruption—He will send again His anointed one to rescue us and resurrect us and redeem us, finally and fully and forever.

And until then, we press on in faith together, through grief and disappointment and trial and temptation, holding each other up, exhorting each other day by day, and going into this dark world as witnesses to the truth that people so desperately need to hear—that Christ has died, Christ has risen, and Christ will come again.