Gen 35:20 The Pillar on Rachel’s Grave 7/31/2005 ßà
- Deborah Died and Rachel Died (Gen 35:1-20)
#1. On the Way to Bethlehem (Gen
35:16)
- On the Way to Bethel
(Gen 28:16-22, 33:18-20, 35:1-2, Ex 32:2, Prov 21:1)
#2. From Luz to Bethel (Gen
35:6,8-9, 24:59, Heb 11:29-30)
- God’s Appearance to Jacob (Gen 35:11-12, Gal
3:16,29, 4:25, 6:16, Gen 35:10)
- Another Memorial (Gen 35:14-20, Col 3:5)
#3. The Call of Jacob
and the Call of Israel (Eph 2:3, Ezek 36:27, Gen 35:10, Rom 9:6, Isa 9:6)
Please open your Bibles to the Prophecy of Genesis, Gen 35:19
(2X). Today I want us to do a study of Gen 35. It contains a section of
the travels of Jacob in the land
of Canaan after he came
back from Padanaram where he acquired two wives, two concubines, eleven sons,
one daughter, and many slaves and many sheep, and goats, and camels, and
donkeys, and cows, and bulls, and so on. Jacob was a rich man. And there in Gen
35:20 we find a very puzzling verse. Let us pick up in verse 19,
Ge 35:19 And
Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem.
Ge 35:20 And
Jacob set a pillar upon her grave: that is the pillar of Rachel’s grave
unto this day.
“That is the pillar on Rachel’s grave unto this day”. In other
words, Jacob erected a memorial on the grave of Rachel to remind all his
descendants of the place where the wife that he loved so much, Rachel, was
buried. Today as we celebrate another memorial, the Lord’s Supper, we want to
take a good look at this memorial that Jacob has set up on Rachel’s grave. Is
there a connection here? That is why the title of this sermon is, “The Pillar on Rachel’s Grave”
(2X). I want to remind the young people here that I may ask you in the future,
“What is the pillar on Rachel’s grave?” Today you might know the answer to this
question, if you pay attention, since this is not an easy sermon. And so, let
us pick up the context beginning at verse 1. The first thing we see is that
death is reigning in this chapter.
- Deborah
Died and Rachel Died (Gen 35:1-20)
Ge 35:1 ¶ And
God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there: and make there an
altar unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of
Esau thy brother.
Ge 35:2 Then
Jacob said unto his household, and to all that were with him, Put away
the strange gods that are among you, and be clean, and change your
garments:
Ge 35:3 And
let us arise, and go up to Bethel;
and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my
distress, and was with me in the way which I went.
Ge 35:4 And
they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hand, and all
their earrings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under
the oak which was by Shechem.
Ge 35:5 And
they journeyed: and the terror of God was upon the cities that were
round about them, and they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob.
Ge 35:6-7 So
Jacob came to Luz, which is in the land of Canaan, that is,
Bethel, he and all the people that were with him. And he built there an altar, and called the place Elbethel:
because there God appeared unto him, when he fled from the face of his brother.
Ge 35:8 But
Deborah Rebekah’s nurse died, and she was buried beneath Bethel under an oak: and the name of it was
called Allonbachuth.
Ge 35:9 And
God appeared unto Jacob again, when he came out of Padanaram, and blessed him.
Ge 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.
Ge 35:11 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;
Ge 35:12-13
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.
Ge 35:14 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.
Ge 35:15 And
Jacob called the name of the place where God spake with him, Bethel.
Ge 35:16-17
And they journeyed from Bethel;
and there was but a little way to come to Ephrath: and Rachel travailed, and
she had hard labour. And it came to pass, when she was in hard
labour, that the midwife said unto her, Fear not; thou shalt have this son
also.
Ge 35:18 And
it came to pass, as her soul was in departing, (for she died) that she called
his name Benoni (Son of my sorrow) but his father called him Benjamin (Son of
the right hand).
Ge 35:19 And
Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem.
Ge 35:20 And
Jacob set a pillar upon her grave: that is the pillar of Rachel’s grave
unto this day.
“Rachel was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem”.
Historically this happened:
#1. On the Way to Bethlehem (Gen
35:16)
And Jacob set up a memorial on Rachel’s grave “Unto this Day”.
When you see those words, “unto this day”, what does it mean? It means that
this memorial is still available today, and tomorrow, and next year, for if you
read this text next year you still read it as “unto this day”. God does not
lie. The principle of this memorial applies until the end of time. But
does it now mean that today you can go to a place near Bethlehem and see this pillar that Jacob
erected in the honor of Rachel? Most likely you will be led to one of the
tourist attractions that were set up primarily to rake in some money from
tourists. Just think of the following odds. The children of Israel were in Egypt for 430 years. During that
long period of time the Canaanites were in the land, and they cared less about
a burial site that this family of nomads had left in the land. 430 years is a
long time. Then the children of Israel
came again in the land and they slowly conquered the land of Canaan
one city at a time. But then the Babylonians overran the land in the year 587
BC. They totally devastated the land and left it to the Samaritans and to the
wild beasts for about 50 years. The remnant of the people who returned was of a
different generation who came primarily to establish Jerusalem and they might not remember where
Rachel’s grave was. But if they did, then in the year 70 AD the revolt of the
Zealots triggered the wrath of the Roman Empire.
The result was that Jerusalem was thoroughly
destroyed and burned to the ground, the countryside was devastated, and the
Jews were scattered throughout the Roman Empire.
Then in about 500 AD the Arabs took over the land, and we do not know what they
did to all the existing shrines. But one thing is certain: The makeshift pillar
of stones that Jacob erected in one day on Rachel’s grave did not survive for
4000 years. What we presently have as Rachel’s grave there in the land of Israel is an artifact and it was
concocted by someone who wanted to make money from tourists. The same can be
said of all the other artifacts that presently draw so many tourists. God does
not preserve artifacts, because God knows that mankind would begin to worship
these artifacts instead of God. But God does not lie. When God said that
this memorial remains “unto this day”, it truly remains unto this day,
regardless what happened to the heap of stones that Jacob made on Rachel’s
grave. We need to remember that God does preserve principles, which He laid
down in the Bible. And thus, instead of looking for a heap of stones, we need
to search for the principle of this memorial. Historically Jacob and his
family and all his flocks and herds traveled from Shechem to Bethel. There in Bethel they stayed for some unknown period of
time. Then they traveled from Bethel to Hebron where his blind
father Isaac was, who was still alive. But on the way, when they were still a
short distance from Bethlehem,
Benjamin was born and Rachel died. Why did they go to Bethel first? And why did they not stay in Bethel until Rachel had
given birth? What business did Jacob have at Bethel? For this we need a little background
on the place called Bethel.
Please turn in your Bibles to your left to Gen 28:16 (2X).
- On the Way
to Bethel
(Gen 28:16-22, 33:18-20, 35:1-2, Ex 32:2, Prov 21:1)
When Jacob fled from his brother Esau, after he had stolen the
birthright, he was on the way to a far country where he was going to buy
himself a wife. And Jacob spend the night on an open place, took some stones
for a pillow, and Jacob dreamed that a ladder was set up from where he
was, which reached into heaven, and the angels of God ascending and descending
upon that ladder. That ladder represents the Lord Jesus Christ, for there is no
other mediator that can give us a way into heaven. Then God spoke to Jacob in
that dream and God repeated the promises He had given earlier to his father
Isaac and his grandfather Abraham. Now let’s pick up the story in Gen 28:16.
Ge 28:16-17
And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely the LORD is in
this place; and I knew it not. And
he was afraid, and said, How dreadful (How fearful) is this place! This is
none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.
Ge 28:18-19
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.
Ge 28:20 And
Jacob vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way
that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on,
Ge 28:21 So
that I come again to my father’s house in peace; then shall the LORD be my God:
Ge 28:22 And
this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God’s house: and of
all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee.
This again is a memorial. Jacob set up a pillar in that place, and
he called that place “Bethel”,
which means “House of God”. And Jacob vowed a vow unto God. But 40 years
later, when he returned from Padanaram, Jacob had forgotten his vow. We
can see that in Gen 33:18-20. That is why Jacob dwelt in a land that is
called Shechem, where he bought a parcel of a field and where he built an
altar. Jacob really planned to stay there, and he planned to give his daughter
Dinah in marriage to the prince of the land who is also named Shechem. Jacob
did not know the murderous plans his sons had. Jacob did not know that God
drove him away from Shechem. You can see the principle: God’s providence
is working through the sins of man. God always accomplishes the counsel of His
will. Because of the murders his sons had committed Jacob had to flee from the land of Shechem. Where could he go? Then God reminded
him in Gen 35:1, “And God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there:
and make there an altar unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest
from the face of Esau thy brother”. Not only had Jacob failed to go to Bethel, but also his
household was defiled by idols. And from the words of Gen 35:2 we see
that Jacob was aware of the corrupt practices of his family. We can also see
here an illustration of the awful spread of the leprosy of sin. At first the
gods of his father in law Laban were hidden by Rachel, and no one in the family
seems to have known of them. But now Jacob commanded “his household and all
that were with him”, including all the slaves, to “put away the strange
gods” which were among them. And then we read in Gen 35:4 that they gave
Jacob not only all their strange gods, but also all their earrings. Why their
earrings? It is because their golden earrings were things which were easily
converted to idols. For example we read in Ex 32:2 that Aaron made the
golden calf from the earrings of the people. Then Jacob buried all that gold
and silver under an oak tree in the land
of Shechem. Why did Jacob
bury them? Jacob did not try to convert these into something more useful, for
Jacob applied the principle that the things of Satan must not be employed in
the service of God. And we can see the hand of God in the readiness of his
household to obey his request to do away the strange gods. In fact the power of
God is evident at every point in this chapter. We can see it in the immediate
effect of God’s word to Jacob to go to Bethel.
We can see it in the unanimous response of his family. We can see it
in the terror of God that fell upon the cities round about them, so that they
did not try to avenge themselves upon Jacob and his company. And so we see here
illustrated the sovereign control which God exercises upon men, even
upon those who are not His people. Not a hand can be raised against the Lord’s
people without His direct permission. This agrees with the word of God in Prov
21:1, “The king’s heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the
rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will”. Then Jacob came to
the city of Luz.
And then the change:
#2. From Luz to Bethel (Gen
35:6,8-9, 24:59, Heb 11:29-30)
Jacob came to the place where he had the dream. That place was near the
city called Luz. And what does Luz mean? Luz means “Departure”. Jacob
had departed from God, because during the 40 years that Jacob dwelt in
Padanaram Jacob had not built an altar to the Lord His God. And only now does
he return to God, to the “House of God” called Bethel, to the altar of his God. And
in order to do this Jacob must retrace his steps and return to the place from
which he has departed. And so it has to be with us. In our process of
repentance we too must retrace our steps and start over at the point from where
we have lost our first love. Can we remember the days when we were enthusiastic
about our new-found faith? Can we remember the days when we did a profession of
faith, and we were full of fire unto the Lord? Can we remember that we were continuing
our fellowship with the saints in the Sunday afternoon Bible study here at the
church? Can we remember that we bought a concordance with the intent to use it
in our personal Bible studies? Where are those days? Have we lost our first
love? It means we must go from Luz to Bethel,
from the point of Departure back to the House of God. We must retrace our steps
and renew our commitment to the Lord, for salvation is not a waning experience,
but a growing experience. And if we do not grow, then is it possible we have
not been saved to begin with?
Let us continue with the story of Jacob in Gen 35. There at Bethel we read, “Deborah,
Rebekah’s nurse died”. Deborah was his mother’s nurse. The only reference
we have is that Rebekah’s nurse traveled with Rebekah many years earlier when
Rebekah left her father’s house to be married to Isaac, as we can read in Gen
24:59. Rebekah had died long ago, and somehow Deborah became attached to
Jacob’s household. Then Deborah died at a very old age and the oak under which
she was buried was called Allonbachuth, which means “the Oak of Weeping”.
She was Jacob’s link to his old unregenerate life, but now she died and was
buried at Bethel,
the House of God, and immediately God appeared to Jacob again. These two
verses, verses 8 and 9 are inseparably connected. The departure and the return
of Jacob are linked together by the mention of Deborah, and that she died. Then
God appeared unto Jacob again when he came out of Padanaram. God had appeared
to Jacob just before he entered Padanaram, and God appeared again after
he came out of Padanaram. All the 40 years spent with his father in law were wasted
time, for Jacob did not live by faith during those 40 years. We find
another illustration of this same sad principle in Heb 11:29-30, where
we read, “By faith they passed through the Red sea as by dry land”, and the next thing we read is, “By
faith the walls of Jericho
fell down”. The intermediate 40 years of wandering in the wilderness is
passed over. Nothing of faith was found in that period of Israel’s
history, and they died in the wilderness in unbelief. Those 40 years were wasted
time. That was tragic for those who died in unbelief. And so, make sure
that you know where you stand. But God had mercy on Jacob and thus God appeared
to Jacob again at Bethel.
- God’s
Appearance to Jacob (Gen 35:11-12, Gal 3:16,29, 4:25, 6:16,
Gen 35:10)
Let us read carefully the words God left us as a heritage, here in Gen
35:11-12,
“And God said unto him, I am God Almighty: be
fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations (a congregation
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”.
Literally “a company of nations” should have been translated “a
congregation of nations”. In other words, not just two or three nations,
but “a multitude of nations shall be of thee”. How can this be if we
recognize only the nations of Judah
and of Israel?
Even if we count the remnant that came out of Babylon
as a separate nation, and if we count the nation that presently occupies the
land there east of the Mediterranean as a
separate nation, we would still not be able to explain this prophecy. What then
is the solution? The solution is found in the next verse where God repeated the
promise He gave to Abraham and his seed. But did God refer to the
physical descendants of Abraham? No! Please turn in your Bibles to the
NT, to the Epistle to the Galatians, Gal 3:16 (2X). You find Galatians
after 1st and 2nd Corinthians. We must remain faithful to
God’s reference to “Abraham and his seed” in the NT. We find a great
deal of information about the seed of Abraham and about the Israel of God in
the Epistles of Paul, and most of it is not complimentary to the physical
descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. For example we read in Gal 4:25
about the present day Jewish state in Jerusalem,
and there we read that “Jerusalem
which now is, is in bondage with her children”. In plain English it means
that most of the present day Jews are still on the way to Hell. And here in Gal
3:16 we read, “Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He
saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is
Christ”. In other words the promise is not to the physical descendants of
Abraham, but to Christ, who is a descendant of Abraham, and thus He is called
the Seed of Abraham. Consequently the promise is also to all those who are in
Christ. And thus we read in Gal 3:29, “And if ye be Christ’s,
then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise”. These were
the promises made to Abraham and to his seed way back in Gen 12, and 13, and
15, and 16, and 17, and 18, and 22. The promises are to those who have been
saved by the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross, which means these promises are for
those who are called the remnant chosen by grace out of all nations and kindred
and people and tongues. Out of all those nations, including the nation of physical
Jews, there is only a remnant chosen by grace. Since the Lord Jesus Christ is
called Israel in the
Bible, this remnant chosen by grace is also called Israel, the Israel of God. Please
turn again to Gen 35:10 (2X). Here in Gen 35:10 God emphasized to
Jacob that his name is not any more Jacob, but he is called Israel. We read, “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 so, the only way
in which a multitude of nations can be the descendants of Israel, according to
verse 11, is if Israel is Christ, and all those who belong to Christ are called
the Israel of God (Gal 6:16).
- Another Memorial
(Gen 35:14-20, Col
3:5)
Ge 35:14
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.
That Jacob was now fully restored to communion with God can be
seen from the fact that he now, once more, set up a pillar in the place
where he had talked with God, and Jacob poured oil on this pillar of stone.
What does this pillar signify? A memorial. And of what is it a memorial?
It is a transition from Luz to Bethel. It is departing from the
old life and it is a return to a strengthened relationship with God in
the House of God. It does not mean that Jacob lost his salvation while he was
at Padanaram for 40 years, but it means that God has drawn Jacob closer to
Himself. “And Jacob called the name of the place where God spake with him, Bethel”. That is the
meaning of this memorial. Next we read in V 16,
Ge 35:16 “And
they journeyed from Bethel;
and there was but a little way to come to Ephrath”.
Ephrath is Bethlehem, and Bethlehem means, “House of Bread”. Spiritually
the House of Bread refers to the Bible. And spiritually what we find in the
House of Bread is Christ, who is the Bread of Life. Verse 16 says: It is
only a short distance from Bethel to Bethlehem. The spiritual
meaning of this verse is: It is only a short distance from the place where the
soul is restored to communion with God to the place where the soul is nourished
and fed with the Bread of life. “And Rachel died” and she was buried in
the way to Bethlehem.
And thus the leading link of Jacob’s life at Padanaram was now cut off. Rachel
was the primary reason why Jacob went to Padanaram, and why he stayed there for
40 years. The strange gods which Rachel brought from Padanaram were now buried
under an oak. Deborah, who represented Jacob’s link to his old unregenerate
life, had also been buried under an oak. And now Rachel is buried. Death
is written with large letters across this scene. We too must have the sentence
of death written on our members, for we read in Col 3:5, “Mortify therefore
your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate
affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry”. To
mortify our members is painful, but it must occur. If we want to walk in full
communion with God and dwell in the House of Bread, it is necessary that we
depart from our old life (Luz) and be renewed in the House of God (Bethel). It was painful
for Jacob to bury His beloved wife. But the pillar which he set up on Rachel’s
grave bears the same meaning as the pillar which he has set up in verse 14. It
is a memorial to the departing of our previous life and a renewed commitment to
a life dedicated to the Lord. I am sure that Jacob did not think all this
out when he buried Rachel and set up a pillar upon her grave. But we can see that
God orchestrated this entire scene, and this entire chapter, to give us a
picture of the process of our sanctification. And it is in this sense that we
must understand why this entire scenario unfolded the way it did, because God
designed it to be a spiritual picture. And is it not wonderful that from the
dying Rachel there came forth Benjamin, the Son of the Right Hand. Let us now
consider some other spiritual analogies between:
#3. The Call of Jacob
and the Call of Israel (Eph 2:3, Ezek 36:27, Gen 35:10, Rom 9:6, Isa
9:6)
Jacob left Bethel,
the House of God, to go to the land of his exile, Padanaram. Likewise we, the
Israel of God, have left the house of God when Adam sinned, and we dwelt in our
house of bondage, the world. “We all were by nature children of wrath, even as
others” (Eph 2:3).
Just as God said to Jacob, “Arise, go up to Bethel”, return to the place
of Divine communion and privilege, even so has He called us, the Israel of God,
to go up to Bethel, to the House of God.
The immediate effect of God’s call upon Jacob was to purge his house from
idolatry and to change their garments, which reflects a change of their ways. The
effect of God’s call upon us, the Israel of God, is that God will make us
change our ways. God says in Ezek 36:27, “And I will put my spirit
within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my
judgments, and do them.”
Just as Jacob acknowledged that
God has answered him in the day of his distress, so the Israel of God
acknowledges that God responds to our cry for deliverance when we are in a
tight spot.
Just as the terror of God fell
upon the Shechemites, and they refrained from pursuing Jacob, even so God keeps
our enemies at bay, for He protects us and guides us even before we were saved.
Just as Jacob returned to Bethel and built an altar
there, so will we, the Israel of God, build a memorial for Him in our home and
make our children bow down and worship the God of the Bible.
Just as now the link with Jacob’s past was cut by the death of Deborah,
so will we, the Israel of God, die to our past life.
Just as God now appeared to Jacob “again”, so will He appear to us again
in the Word of God.
Just as God said to Jacob, “thy name shall not be called any more Jacob,
but Israel shall be thy name” (Gen 35:10), even so does God call us
Israel when He said in Rom 9:6, “They are not all Israel which are of Israel”.
Just as God for the first time revealed unto Jacob His name “Almighty”,
so the Lord Jesus Christ revealed Himself to us as the wonderful Counselor, the
Mighty God (Isa 9:6).
Just as prosperity was promised to Jacob, so shall spiritual prosperity
continue to increase in anyone who belongs to God’s Israel.
Just as Jacob poured oil on the pillar he erected at Bethel, so God will pour the Holy Spirit upon
all who are the Israel of God.
Just as Jacob found Bethel to be but a
little way from Bethlehem, so shall we, the
Israel of God, find the Bread of Life soon after we have arrived at the House
of Bread, our Bethlehem.
Just as Benjamin took his place in Jacob’s household, so shall the Son of
the Father’s right hand be among us when we will come into His Kingdom in the
life hereafter.
AMEN. Let
us turn to the Lord in prayer.