Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #45 in Genesis 37.   We are going to read Genesis 37:34-35:

And Jacob rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days. And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted; and he said, For I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning. Thus his father wept for him. 

The situation was that Jacob believed his son had been rent in pieces by an evil beast.  He has seen the coat of many colours, and it was full of blood.  It was the only thing that was left of Joseph, according to his other sons (with the exception of Benjamin), so he believed his son was dead, and be began to mourn.  It was a very understandable reaction in the historical setting.

But we are interested in the spiritual dimension.  What is going on here?  Through the reference to Joseph being rent in pieces, we have seen how that Hebrew word translated as “rent in pieces” was used in Job 16:9-11 and in Psalm 22:13.  Both of these places are pointing to the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ, and His coming, and His death and suffering under the wrath of God.  So we can see that Joseph being taken away by the Midianite traders after his brothers sold him is pointing to the cross, based on the language that Jacob is moved to use concerning Joseph being “rent in pieces.”

So we wonder about Jacob’s mourning period.  He indicated that he would mourn until he goes to the grave, or until his death.  Is his mourning period also teaching us a spiritual truth?  Yes.  We understand “mourning” to identify with the sending forth of the Gospel.  For example, let us go to James 4:8-9:

Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded. Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.

This is kind of unusual language, but we have to understand who God is talking to, as He is talking to sinners.  And sinners, the unsaved of the world, are viewed as not mourning and weeping for their sins, as they should be.  Rather, they are doing something else, and God tells us what they are involved with in Luke 6:20-21:

And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh.

By the way, this relates to the Beatitudes we read of in Matthew 5:3:

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Compare that to Luke 6:20: “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”  We can see that it is a parallel passage.

Then we read in Matthew 5:4:

Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.

But in Luke 6, it does not use the word “mourn,” but it says in Luke 6:21: “Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh.”  It is referring to those who become saved, who become “poor in spirit,” in a sense, and yet we are blessed that we spiritual eyes to see the true condition of the world.  We are not in ignorance as other men; that is, we are not blind and walking in spiritual darkness.  When people are ignorant, or in spiritual blindness or darkness, they can have a false sense of their own righteousness, goodness, and security in this world.  In other words, they are deceived  into enjoying their present moment, enjoying their sins, and enjoying their lifespan, which is nothing at all compared to eternity, and they are content with this present world and with living seventy or eighty years.  So the people of the world are content to “eat, drink, and be merry.”  They are having a good time while they live, and they say, “You only live once, so let us live it up!”

But that is not the case with God’s elect who have been saved by the Gospel.  They begin to see and understand mortality, and to see the corruption in the world and  corruption in themselves.  They heard the “higher calling” to bring the Gospel and the truth of the Word of God in the day of salvation, and to bring the message that we are sinners and under the wrath of God, and to bring the message of the Saviour to the world.  And that is likened to “mourning.”  The true Gospel “puts a damper” on the world’s fun, to put it another way.  So God is saying, “Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh.”  And that would contrast the day of salvation, the time of weeping, and the Day of Judgment (and eternity future) as the time of laughter.

Then it says in Luke 6:24:

But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation.

Again, there is the contrast because the blessing was upon the poor, but there is woe unto the rich for they have received their consolation.  Then it says in Luke 6:25:

Woe unto you that are full! for ye shall hunger. Woe unto you that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep.

That is, in the day of salvation, they mocked.  Remember the reaction of Lot’s sons-in-law?  “Up, get you out of this place; for JEHOVAH will destroy this city. But he seemed as one that mocked unto his sons in law.” They do not take seriously the most serious declarations of the Bible.  They will not receive it, although God is delivering the warning with all earnestness.  To them, it is all lightheartedness: “Let us go back to the party.”  Unfortunately, they laughed when they should have taken God’s Word seriously, especially when they heard the declaration of May 21, 2011, Judgment Day.  The warning was to go to God while it was still the day of salvation, but they were too busy enjoying the pleasures of sin for a season, and with laughing.  And then came Judgment Day, the period of their “mourning and weeping.”  It is a reversal of fortune.  God’s elect mourned and wept in the day of salvation as we carried the Gospel, and the world mocked and laughed.  But in the Day of Judgment, it is God’s elect who are said to “laugh,” and the world is said to “mourn and weep.”

So Jacob, typifying the elect, heard of the fate of his son Joseph, who typifies Christ, and he was actively mourning and weeping.  And this fits in with the Gospel declaration.

If we go to Matthew 9, we read of “fasting,” and it is tied to “mourning.”  It says in Matthew 9:14:

Then came to him the disciples of John, saying, Why do we and the Pharisees fast oft, but thy disciples fast not? 

Notice that they were not asking about “mourning,” but about “fasting.”  But Jesus responded in Matthew 9:15:

…Can the children of the bridechamber mourn, as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast.

And yet Jesus’ response had to do with “mourning.”  Then He substitutes the word “fast” at the end of the verse.

So this means that “to mourn,” and “to fast” are synonymous.  And what does it mean, spiritually, to fast?  God tells us very directly the spiritual meaning of “fasting,” which according to Matthew 9:14-15 would be the spiritual meaning for “mourning.”  It says in  Isaiah 58:5:

Is it such a fast that I have chosen? a day for a man to afflict his soul? is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him?

But that is what we read that Jacob did in Genesis 37:24: “And Jacob rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days.”  In Isaiah 58, God is doing away with the “shadow of the law” that points to the reality of the spiritual meaning, and He says, “Is this the type of fast I desire for a man to afflict his soul and spread sackcloth and ashes under him?”  No, although that was allowable in the Old Testament.  Remember when the men of Nineveh heard that judgment was coming, and it says in Jonah 3:5:

So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them.

In proclaiming a fast, they were proclaiming a mourning period with putting on of sackcloth, and so forth.  And yet God is giving the spiritual dimension to fasting in Isaiah 58:6-7:

Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house? when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh?

If we were to take the time to look at these things, which we will not do in this study, it points to bringing the Gospel that saves: “…to loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that ye break every yoke…”  It has to do with the Gospel that saves, and that is exactly what happened after Christ went to the cross.  There was the outpouring of the Holy Spirit that began on the Day of Pentecost in 33 A. D., and 3,000 people became saved.  Then over the course of the church age the Gospel went out through the New Testament churches and congregations, and there was salvation.

God uses the figure of “sackcloth” regarding the two witnesses and their period of ministry in Revelation 11:3:

And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth.

The period of time represented here fits in with the period the “woman” was fleeing from the dragon in Revelation 12.  It was the New Testament church age when the Word of God was witnessing in the world’s churches and congregations, and that entire period of time is likened to one of being clothed in “sackcloth,” and we could also add “fasting” and “mourning.”  It is the idea of mourning and weeping as the Gospel would go forth.

Let us look at one more verse having to do with this in Psalm 126:5-6:

They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him.

That is what Jacob was doing, as he was not only mourning, as we saw in Genesis 37:34-35, but look at the end of Genesis 37:35:

For I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning. Thus his father wept for him.

So there was weeping and mourning in the day of salvation.  In the day of salvation that was appropriate for the children of God to do as they brought the Gospel. 

But then came Judgment Day, and the people of God are to no longer weep and mourn, but we are to “laugh” and “dance,” as well as some other figures of speech to indicate great joy or rejoicing.  But this is not so for the world.  In Isaiah 24, a chapter where God is describing the judgment on the world, He spells this out numerous times.  It says in Isaiah 24:4:

The earth mourneth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish.

The earth mourns.  And this is not a reference to the ground or the material world, but it is referring to people.  And we can prove that by going to Isaiah 34:1:

Come near, ye nations, to hear; and hearken, ye people: let the earth hear, and all that is therein; the world, and all things that come forth of it.

Here, the “earth” represents people, the people of the nations.  The earth mourneth.  They will mourn.  “You laugh now,” God told the unsaved, “but you will mourn in the Day of Judgment.” 

By the way, this would fit in with Revelation 18 where “weeping” and “mourning” are joined together at least four times.  It uses the word “lament” and “wailing,” as well as “mourn.”  We read in Revelation 18:9:

And the kings of the earth, who have committed fornication and lived deliciously with her, shall bewail her, and lament for her, when they shall see the smoke of her burning,

The “bewailing” is the weeping, and the word “lament” is the word for “mourning.”

Then it says in Revelation 18:11:

And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn over her; for no man buyeth their merchandise any more:

This is referring to the fall of Babylon (the world), and the judgment on the world.  Those who are weeping and mourning in Judgment Day are not God’s elect, but they are the unregenerate masses of unsaved people of the world, whether they are in the churches or outside the churches.  According to the Bible, that is the time for them to weep and mourn.