Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #7 of Genesis 33, and we will read Genesis 33:5-7:

And he lifted up his eyes, and saw the women and the children; and said, Who are those with thee? And he said, The children which God hath graciously given thy servant. Then the handmaidens came near, they and their children, and they bowed themselves. And Leah also with her children came near, and bowed themselves: and after came Joseph near and Rachel, and they bowed themselves.

I will stop reading there.  We know that in this historical parable, Jacob is a type of Christ, and when he says that these are “the children which God hath graciously given thy servant,” it is true, historically.  They were his children, the sons of Jacob.  It is also true that when God gives men children, it is a blessing of God, and we could say it is according to the grace of God.  We read in Psalm 127:3-5:

Lo, children are an heritage of JEHOVAH: and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.

The word “happy” means to be “blessed,” and happy is the man who has his quiver full of children.  If God has granted you children, it is a blessing, and it is a favor of God.  And grace and favor are closely related.  God has done a good thing in your life if He has given you a child or children.  So Jacob is acknowledging that when he responded to Esau that these are “the children which God hath graciously given to thy servant.”  It is a wonderful moment between these brothers.  When Jacob left Canaan, he had no wives or children, so now Esau could see his wives and children, and Jacob is correctly noting that he has these wives and children because of God.  And that is the truth.  Wives are a result of God’s goodness and favor toward men, as we read in Proverbs 18:22:

Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favour of JEHOVAH.

So both the wives and the children are from God.  The wife is according to God’s favor, and the children are also from the hand of God.

But we are mainly interested in the spiritual teaching of this passage, and when we look at the spiritual dimension, we find that the children of Jacob represent the elect of God.  They are the ones that have become saved.  The Lord has had mercy upon them, and He has given them to His righteous servant, the Lord Jesus.  If we turn to Isaiah 53, we see in Isaiah 53:11:

He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities.

The Lord Jesus is God’s servant, and God gave Christ the people of God.  All those that would become saved are the children of God.  If we go to Ephesians 1, we can see this in an amazing Scripture that reveals to us the salvation program of God that began before this world was created.  It says in Ephesians 1:4-5:

According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,

Here we see the children that God graciously gave to His Servant, “the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will.” 

Or we could also go Galatians 3:7:

Know ye therefore that they which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham.

Then it says in Galatians 3:26:

For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.

That is, the faith of Christ Jesus.  It is not the faith we put in Him, but it is the faith that resides in Him because He is the essence of faith.  That is how all of us who are truly saved and born again become children of God.  It is the faith of Christ that has saved us and caused us to be adopted into the family of God.  Of course God connects grace and faith in Ephesians 2:8:

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

Going back to Genesis 33, it said, “The children which God hath graciously given thy servant.”  These are the ones who are in view spiritually.  It is very clear when we search the Bible and view the whole spiritual situation in Genesis 32 and Genesis 33, with the sending of the presents (offering) that were sent before to appease Esau, and then Jacob going before his wives and children, bowing down seven times because He was worshipping and in submission to the Law of God which is magnified above all of God’s name.  Then afterwards, we find the wives and children coming into view.

If we go to Hebrews 2, we will see language there that fits extremely well with this idea.  It says in Hebrews 2:11-12:

For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee.

The One saying this is the Lord Jesus.  We are His brethren.  That is another figure that is used (as well as children), as it declares in Romans 8:29:

For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

Christ is the firstborn from the dead, and the many brethren follow as we experience the resurrection of our souls to begin with, and then on the last day there will be the resurrection of our bodies, and we will come out of the “grave,” as the world has been turned into the condition of hell or the grave.  Those of us who are alive and remaining will also receive new resurrected bodies, and be lifted up.

Jesus is in view, and, again, it said in Hebrews 2:12:

 Saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee.

This would be the eternal, spiritual church consisting of everyone God has saved, the elect children of God.  However you want to put it, it has to do with those God has saved.  We are His brethren.  Then notice what it says as Christ goes on to say in Hebrews 2:13:

And again, I will put my trust in him. And again, Behold I and the children which God hath given me.

And He did  His trust in God the Father, as He was commanded, “Go forth and bear the sins of many at the foundation of the world, and you will be smitten (and die), but I will raise you up.”  And Christ was obedient unto death at the foundation of the world, and then He did it again when He entered into the world, being obedient to the Father’s command unto death, even the death of the cross, to show forth the things He had done before the world was created.

Again, it says in Hebrew 2:13:

And again, I will put my trust in him. And again, Behold I and the children which God hath given me.

Jacob presented His children to Esau, who represents the Law of God, and later Jacob would say, “I have seen thy face, as though I had seen the face of God,”  and he presents the children that God had graciously given to him.  All that have been saved have been given to Christ.

And we do not read that only here, but let us turn to John 17 where we read this same truth repeatedly.  It says in John 17:6:

I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.

And it says in John 17:9:

I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.

And it says again in John 17:11:

And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are.

And we see it one more time in John 17:24:

Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world.

God gave to the Lord Jesus children, the elect adopted into the family of God, as we read in Ephesians 1:5:

Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself…

The children were adopted unto Him, and they are His children.  And, of course, Jesus is God, so they are also children of God.  So this is the spiritual meaning that is clearly seen back in Genesis 33:5.  It is the presentation of those Christ has saved.  They have been delivered from what?  They are delivered from the wrath of God.  And how is the wrath of God expressed?  It is through the condemnation of the Law of God.  It is the Law of God that condemns the sinner.  It is the Law of God that takes vengeance as a man in the day of wrath, as we are told in a proverb.  It is the Law of God, the Word, that pours out the wrath.  It is the Law of God, the Word, that reveals the wrath in the Day of Judgment, “the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.” (Romans 2:5)  The Law is that which finds fault with the ones who have transgressed it.  Of course, as God saved His people, it was the Lord Jesus who came before as the Intercessor, the One who satisfied the Law’s demand for vengeance and death.  He is the One who bore the wrath of the Law, or the wrath of God, for the sins of His people.

So the Law and Christ meet together meet together, after Christ has sent forth the atonement to appease the Law, just as Jacob sent the present (offering) before him to Esau, who is a type and figure of the Law in this passage.  And now Jacob, typifying the Lord Jesus Christ, can present his family or his children: “…The children which God hath graciously given thy servant.”

Then it says in Genesis 33:6-7:

Then the handmaidens came near, they and their children, and they bowed themselves. And Leah also with her children came near, and bowed themselves: and after came Joseph near and Rachel, and they bowed themselves.

They represent the children of God.  The brides of Jacob are coming near, after Jacob had made the way, and they approach the Law of God and His Word.  And they are humble.  They bow themselves, and they worship.  The word “bowed” is the same word for “worshipped.”

I mentioned this earlier, but it is always better to read the verse.  It says in Psalm 138:2:

I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name.

The word “worship” is Strong’s #7812, and it is the same word translated as “bowed,” which we have found used repeatedly.  Remember that it said back in Genesis 33:3:

And he passed over before them, and bowed himself to the ground seven times, until he came near to his brother.

This is pointing to the tremendous humility of Christ as He emptied Himself of His glory, and He took upon Himself a human body, which He did at the foundation of the world.  And then He bore the sins of rebel creatures that He had created, but they went astray and turned against Him, and  He took upon Himself the sins of certain of them.  Nonetheless, to take the sins of any of them was an incredibly gracious, kind, and loving thing to do, and He did that for His people.  And it brought Christ low, and He had to submit Himself to the will of His father.  As I mentioned earlier, the Lord Jesus became obedient to the will of God, even unto death, the death of the cross.  So He bowed Himself and worshipped before the Law, the Word of God, which is magnified above all.

And then come His children and wives at the time of presentation, and each of His wives and children bow themselves because they have a heart after Christ’s heart.  That is the heart that God has given to His people.  He has not given us just any heart, but it is a broken and contrite heart, the heart of the Lord Jesus Christ.  He causes us to have a heart like unto Him, as did David, and this heart is broken and contrite because it is in total submission to the Law of God, and the will of God is expressed through His Law, the Bible.  The heart of the one that God has saved perfectly keeps the Law.  It does so without sin of any kind, and it has that ongoing desire to do the will of God, which must be worked out in the life of each individual, even though we are still in our fleshly bodies.  But, nonetheless, we are in complete submission to the Law. 

So, here, this is a picture of you and me, and each and every child of God that the Lord Jesus has saved and transformed and made new, giving us that new heart.  And as we come to the Bible, the Law of God, we no longer come to it thinking we are above the Law or above the Word, nor thinking we know better than God and have greater understanding.  We now realize our pitiful condition as sinners that have transgressed the Law and deserve nothing.  It was only through God’s grace and mercy and the saving faith of Christ Himself that we have been given an unfathomable gift.  We deserve nothing, but God, according to His own purpose and good pleasure, “saw” us before the world was, and He kept that everlasting gaze upon us throughout the history of world, watching and watching, until we were born, and watching still until He would bring His Word to us and save us through the hearing of that Word.  He has given us the unspeakable gift of salvation.  What a glory!  What a wonderful, beautiful, and glorious thing it is that God has had mercy upon us.  And not one of us deserve the slightest bit of God’s mercy.  We have only earned wrath.  It is all unmerited favor.