Comments - journal RecentComments

CR18Day_17 @ nkjv@Genesis:31 @ RandyP comments: "What is my trespass? What is my sin, that you have so hotly pursued me?" Funny how one even when in the right can yet be in the wrong, at least by association. Jacob is right. Unknowingly though his wife Rachel is placing him in the wrong; she has in fact stolen some of Laban's idols. The whole list of everything Jacob has done and endured righteously over twenty years under Laban's idolatrous hands is called into question because of another person's (his bone of bone/flesh of flesh) act say of sentimentality or possible duplicity. This comes from the one person Jacob longingly suffered for the most, the one with whom he was smitten for at first glance. It is an ugly ugly story anytime deception has to be used to keep the greater storyline right side up. It is even uglier when it is the one whom you most love, that is most beautiful in your eyes that brings that unknown cloud knowingly over your head.

CR18Day_19 @ nkjv@Genesis:37 @ RandyP comments: "But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peaceably to him". Was Joseph set up by Jacob's outwardly expression of love to suffer what he later suffered at the hands of his brothers? I have heard many sermons on Father's Day say as much. I think it better to say rather that the brother's propensity towards utter hatred is the prominent consideration. A father cannot always anticipate how his children are going to react. A father cannot always contain his love for one particular child for the sake of those children he certainly loves but not as easily. A father may not even be aware of there being a problem unless the wife or else one of the other children make him aware of it. A father cannot be held responsible for the way his other children react to an outward expression of love especially when it comes to them either leaving as dead or selling that more beloved child into slavery. That occurrence is not the result of child rearing, that occurrence is a result of some very ungodly anger deeply rooted among the brethren. Later on it will be said by Joseph "what you meant toward me for evil" meaning Joseph did not blame Jacob, no, the brothers were directly responsible for this. But, even then he said "God meant it for good". God did not cause this, God simply allowed it to happen so that HIS good might restored (we'll explore that further as the story is recounted). Jacob's love did not cause this. Hatred caused this and surely that hatred existed long before there was a multi-colored coat weaved and given by one God fearing and loving man. Perhaps these preachers should not be so hard on Jacob on a day meant to honor our many Jacob like fathers.