Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #15 in Genesis 35, and I will read Genesis 35:9-15: 

And God appeared unto Jacob again, when he came out of Padanaram, and blessed him. And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name: and he called his name Israel. And God said unto him, I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins; And the land which I gave Abraham and Isaac, to thee I will give it, and to thy seed after thee will I give the land. And God went up from him in the place where he talked with him. And Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he talked with him, even a pillar of stone: and he poured a drink offering thereon, and he poured oil thereon. And Jacob called the name of the place where God spake with him, Bethel.

What we are reading from verses 10 to 15 probably sounded very familiar to you, and it should, because we read of very similar things earlier in Jacob’s life.  This is kind of a compilation of Scripture that we can read in Genesis 28 and in Genesis 32.  For example, let us go back to Genesis 28:1-4:

And Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, and said unto him, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan. Arise, go to Padanaram, to the house of Bethuel thy mother's father; and take thee a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban thy mother's brother. And God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be a multitude of people; And give thee the blessing of Abraham, to thee, and to thy seed with thee; that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger, which God gave unto Abraham. And Isaac sent away Jacob: and he went to Padanaram unto Laban, son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, Jacob's and Esau's mother.

Here, Isaac was sending his son Jacob to Padanaram, which is really another name for Syria.  And we see in Genesis 35 that God appeared unto Jacob again when he came out of Padanaram, and He blessed him.  That means that the blessing given to Jacob before he went to Padanaram by his father was being reiterated.  It was a sort of renewal of the covenant.

Also, Genesis 28 is the chapter where Jacob had the experience when God came to him in a dream, and a ladder was set up that went from earth to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending upon it.  Then we read in Genesis 28:13-15:

And, behold, JEHOVAH stood above it, and said, I am JEHOVAH God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed; And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of.

And Genesis 35 is the account of God bringing him again into the land of Canaan, fulfilling the promise that was made to him.  And of course this happened at Bethel, as we read in Genesis 28:17-19:

And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven. And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it. And he called the name of that place Bethel: but the name of that city was called Luz at the first.

And “house of God” is what Bethel means.  So when we go back to Genesis 35, and we read verses 11-15, it is basically a summary of that information. 

I will read, again, Genesis 35:10:

And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name: and he called his name Israel.

This is just going over what happened back in Genesis 32 at the time when Jacob met a “man,” and he wrestled with him until the breaking of the day, as it says in Genesis 32:24-28:

And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh; and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was out of joint, as he wrestled with him.  And he said, Let me go, for the day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me. And he said unto him, What is thy name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.

God places that first here, and then he tells us in verses 11-15 of earlier events, like the giving of the blessing that was handed down to Abraham, Isaac, and then Jacob.  And now that Jacob has come out of Padanaram, God is letting him know that he has not lost the blessing; the blessing remains upon him.  Of course it was, because it was an eternal blessing.  It is the blessing of everlasting life, and of receiving an everlasting habitation, the promised land of Canaan, and he cannot lose that which is given to him forever.  So the Lord is reiterating the promise, confirming the covenant with Jacob at this point.

Historically, we would think it would have been more appropriate to do so when he first came out of Padanaram back in Genesis 33:17-19:

And Jacob journeyed to Succoth, and built him an house, and made booths for his cattle: therefore the name of the place is called Succoth. And Jacob came to Shalem, a city of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan, when he came from Padanaram; and pitched his tent before the city. And he bought a parcel of a field, where he had spread his tent, at the hand of the children of Hamor, Shechem's father, for an hundred pieces of money.

Why did God not confirm the covenant at that time?  And we know there was a great deal of trouble there due to Shechem taking Dinah, Jacob’s daughter, into his tent and lying with her.  We will not go through all that again, but it indicated there was turmoil, unfaithfulness, and great sin had taken place.  So after they had repented and turned over their idols and earrings, and Jacob had gotten rid of them, then this was the proper time when God would come and confirm the covenant.  Historically, it is understandable.  But spiritually, it was also a very proper time because it was on the heels of learning that Deborah Rebekah’s nurse has died.  And Deborah points to the Word of God, the Word that gave “suck” over the course of the church age, and Deborah’s death was akin to the death of the “two witnesses,” or Jerusalem, the representation of God’s kingdom, being trodden under foot, as it said in Revelation 11:2.  And it was recognized that the covenant of God as far as the blessing of His Word, the Gospel, within the churches and congregations had been firmly established, and the Word of God firmly established that the churches were of God, and they represented His kingdom on the earth.  And God’s Word was there for a purpose as it brought blessing to many over the course of the church age.

But what about the point at the end of the church age?  Was God’s Word still able to bring blessing to the elect children of God, as typified by Jacob and his family?  In other words, when the two witnesses are lying dead in the street of the holy city and they are trodden under foot, was that the end of God’s covenant with His people?  No.  The covenant and its promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob continues for all the seed, and at the time of the end it was God’s plan to save the great multitude, and they would be the vast majority of those that were counted for the seed in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ because they were the great majority of the elect.  The Lord saved His ”best wine” for last.  He saved His best work of salvation for the very end of time, with the tremendous outpouring of the Gospel that went throughout the nations outside of the churches and congregations leading up to May 21, 2011, and God saved a great multitude that no man could number.   this reaffirmation and confirmation of the covenant promises was for us who were alive at the time of the Great Tribulation when the Gospel was going forth outside the churches as the Lord stretched forth His hand the second time to recover the remnant of His people. 

Here it is said in very similar words, and in some cases, it was almost the same words.  And God said to him in Genesis 35:10:

And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name: and he called his name Israel.

If you remember Genesis 32, which I just read, it was the point in time that Jacob was wrestling with God, and it was said in Genesis 32:27-28:

And he said unto him, What is thy name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.

So God told him why his name would be Israel: “for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men,” and it also had to do whim him “prevailing.”  That phrase “as a prince hast thou power” is a translation of one Hebrew word, Strong’s #8280, and it is found a couple of times in the Bible.  The other place it is found is in Hosea 12:3:

He took his brother by the heel in the womb, and by his strength he had power with God:

In this verse it is the word translated as “he had power.”  It could just as easily have read, “as a prince he had power with God,” as it was back in Genesis 35:10.  But notice that this is not referring to Jacob’s experience of having wrestled with God as it was recorded in Genesis 32.  This is talking about Jacob taking his brother Esau by the heel when they were in the womb, and it was then it was said that “by his strength he had power with God,” or, we could say, “as a prince he had power with God.”  So we are amazed.  Then it goes on to say in Hosea 12:4:

Yea, he had power over the angel, and prevailed…

The word translated as “power” here is a different Hebrew word than the previous verse.  This word “power” is Strong’s #7786, and it is only found three times in the Bible.  It is found once here, and it is also found in Hosea 8:4 where it is translated as “princes,” and it is also translated as “reigned” concerning Abimelech’s reign, where it says that Abimelech reigned three years.  So it is translated as “reigned,” “princes,” and “power,” but royalty is in view.  It has to do with royal authority, or royal power.  Again it said in Hosea 12:4:

Yea, he had power over the angel, and prevailed: he wept, and made supplication unto him: he found him in Bethel, and there he spake with us;

So God is tying this to Jacob wresting with God, and it was a wrestling match, was it not?  Remember that their mother pointed out when she had the twins in her womb that there was a lot of “kicking” going on in the womb, which is how we would describe it today in our terms.  It said in Genesis 25:22:

And the children struggled together within her; and she said, If it be so, why am I thus? And she went to enquire of JEHOVAH. And JEHOVAH said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger.

In that particular instance, God is saying that the younger would prevail, and he would receive the blessing rather than the elder.  And that is exactly how it worked out historically.  And Isaac, thinking that he was blessing Esau, was actually blessing Jacob.

How do all these things fit together with the struggle between Jacob and Esau in the womb, and the blessing that God gave Jacob when He changed his name from Jacob to Israel, as well as confirming the covenant at that time?

We will try to lay this out in a clearer, more understandable way, Lord willing, when we get together in our next Bible study.