Criss-Cross Blessing

Joseph is probably one of the most popular characters in the Bible—Genesis has the most information about his life. Which is funny because I never thought God would want his legacy to be about a teenager wearing a rainbow colored jacket. I’m not going to make any comments on that but there’s a reason his brothers didn’t like him. Let’s not mention the father who sewed that rainbow colored jacket together. I mean, come on—really, this was God’s plan all along—a father who sews rainbow colored clothes together for his teenage son? Whatever happened to playing catch or kill the lion. So we know Joseph’s story. Let me run it down to you expressway style: 1. Had dreams 2. Brothers hated him—sold him to slave traders 3. Worked as a slave to a high government official 4. Government official’s wife tried to rape him, he ran away/got thrown into prison 5. Ran the prison so the warden can work on his golf game 6. Predicted 7 years of wealth in Egypt and 7 years of famine – probably the first economist 7. Got promoted to governor (it’s like the vice president) 8. Could have exacted revenge on his brothers, but didn’t 9. Brought his entire family to Egypt because they were still living in tents This brings us to the criss-cross blessing. You remember what it says in Hebrews – that Jesus was the first born of creation and everything else came after him. Basically this is saying that Jesus was first and always was first and everything else that we see and experience is a result of His love. At the end of Jacob’s life (Israel was his name by then) – let’s read what happens. 13And Joseph took them both, Ephraim in his right hand toward Israel’s left hand, and Manasseh in his left hand toward Israel’s right hand, and brought them near him. 14And Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on the head of Ephraim, who was the younger, and his left hand on the head of Manasseh, crossing his hands (for Manasseh was the firstborn)…. 17When Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand on the head of Ephraim, it displeased him, and he took his father’s hand to move it from Ephraim’s head to Manasseh’s head. 18And Joseph said to his father, “Not this way, my father; since this one is the firstborn, put your right hand on his head.” 19But his father refused and said, “I know, my son, I know. He also shall become a people, and he also shall be great. Nevertheless, his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his offspring shall become a multitude of nations.” – Genesis 48:13-19 In Bible times the blessing, the inheritance, everything went to the oldest son. The oldest son got the land, the cash and usually also had to take care of the mom. So when it was time for Jacob to die, Joseph wanted to make sure his oldest son got the blessing—after all his uncle Esau missed out his birthright to Jacob, or Israel. So he brings his kids Manasseh and Ephraim towards his father and putting the kids where they belong, the oldest, Manasseh gets placed on Israel’s right side and Ephraim on his left because the blessing flows to the right side (don’t ask me why) but it does. Instead, however, Jacob crosses his arms and puts his left hand on Manasseh, the older one who was supposed to get the blessing and instead puts his blessing on the second child, the younger one, Ephraim. This peeved Joseph. The book of Hebrews, which we have been focusing on in our small groups, calls Jesus the firstborn of creation in chapter 1. The Apostle Paul also writes about it in Romans and Colossians. That means if Jesus is the firstborn, and I don’t mean literally like God the father and God the Holy Spirit were hanging out one day and decided, “um, dude, we need a third, let’s create Jesus, a son!” This didn’t happen in some crazy cliché sit-com moment. No, Jesus was always there with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit. I mean that He was the archetype to be resurrected so that we have a model to follow into God’s promised rest, the first born motif is ever present and an exemplar. So the blessing that the older son gets is sort of a blah blessing and Ephraim gets the promise of God. The same thing happens with us. If Christ is the first born of creation then God, the Father gave him the blah blessing and bestowed upon us, his enemies, his creation the great blessing of his promise. Jesus, knowing this and realizing this accepted this in obedience and now we have no fear because of our faith in this act from God almighty. We have nothing to fear because we are not the first born of creation, we are created through Jesus and held together by Jesus for the promises of God and that is where we shall find rest. We need to pray.