In this engaging episode, we delve into the book of Genesis, uncovering the dramatic and soap-opera-like narratives that reveal the tumultuous family dynamics and divine plans unfolding through the lives of biblical figures like Jacob, Rachel, and Joseph. Join Ronald L. Dart as he unpacks these intricate stories and draws connections to modern-day themes of destiny, family, and divine purpose. Discover the pivotal role of Israel as God’s chosen instrument to bring his messages to the world and how these ancient tales continue to influence legal and cultural frameworks today.
00:27:25 Program Conclusion and Sponsor Announcement
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The CEM Network is pleased to present Ronald L. Dart and Born to Win.
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If you ever needed the outline for a soap opera, you can find it in the book of Genesis. Maybe you’d like to do a screenplay for a movie with a great sweep of characters and action. Genesis, you know, has everything. Great dynasties, wealthy and powerful men, murder, sex, intrigue, incest, war. In fact, everything you could hope to find in a modern primetime drama, it’s right there. Some fools look at it and shudder, thinking, why, is this what the God of the Old Testament is like? Of course not. This is what people are like. And that’s where the interesting thing is. You know, I think sometimes movies, they do us a great service in putting the story of the Bible on film so we can sit there in the prime time and look at it and enjoy it. But there’s a funny thing about this. There’s a trap involved in it. They put all these people in the ancient culture with all the robes and special effects and so forth. And then they give them this stilted language of what I suppose they think the language was at the time. You know, the technology back then was different. The circumstances, the culture, all these things were different. But the people were not. Those people are just like us. And they spoke to one another in the vernacular. However we say our little slangy gossipy things today, they said them in, in their language, in their way. They were just like us. Now, for his own reasons, God has decided to work with man toward his own goals. And that brings us to the reason for this series of program. The question we keep asking is, what in the world is God doing? Does he have a plan? Is he going somewhere with this? Or is he just enjoying the soap opera? Fact is, though, God does have a long-term plan for man, and the outlines of it are barely evident in Genesis. But they are there. Someone once called Genesis, after an old radio soap opera, one man’s family. That one man in Genesis being Abraham. And in fact, God seems to be looking for a family. He had a friend. His name was Abraham. He gave that friend a son in his old age, saying that that son and his seed, in that son and his seed, the entire earth should be blessed. The son was Isaac. And that birthright passed on to his grandson, whose name was Jacob. Jacob’s name fades in history as his name is changed to Israel. And the story, the history of God’s greater family begins to be written. You know, it was God’s intent that Israel be an instrument to take his name and his blessing throughout the world. This was a part of the original promise made to Abraham. In you, in your seed, shall all the nations be blessed. You know, if we were to speak of this in modern terms, God intended that Israel be his evangelist in the world. Not just an evangelist of ideas and laws, but an example and a help to the world, a beneficent power in the world, and actually to take God’s message to the world. The sense in which Israel was a chosen people was not in the sense of exclusivism. It was not that, well, we’re the chosen people and you are not. Oh, no. Israel was put in the world. It was chosen to be God’s instrument in the world, to take his word, his ideas, his concept, and to take the knowledge of him into the world, something which they didn’t do very well, I fear. And I’m reminded of this line in Fiddler on the Roof where Tevye is sitting there struggling with all the stuff going on in his life, and he looks up to God and he says, I know we are a chosen people, but Lord, could you choose someone else for a while? I think he had caught, far more than most people do, the vision of what being the chosen people is. Israel was chosen to carry a message, to carry an example, to do a work, not merely to sit there and receive God’s blessings. And you know, in point of fact, a great deal of the legal systems that dominate the democracies of the world arise from the laws of the God of Abraham, which have been passed on through his seed. Oh, yeah, that God gave Abraham laws. There are all kinds of them. He had a whole system of laws that Abraham knew about. And as a result of that, these were all passed down and have found their way into constitutions, bylaws, common law of great civilizations. So they have blessed the world. Now, along the road, God cut certain deals with individuals and with communities. And with Jacob and his 12 sons, the patriarchs of the story 12 tribes of Israel, God took a major step in his plan. After relationships had soured between Jacob and some of the people of the land of the north, it all went really bad because of the rape of his daughter Dinah by some men there and the revenge that his sons took on the cities. Well, to use Jacob’s word, it made him stink in the nostrils of all the people of that region. So God said to him, it’s time to move on. Get up and go up to Bethel. Bethel now was up the mountainside from there, not a steep mountain, but on a higher elevation. Go up and dwell there and make there an altar. I’m the God that appeared to you when you fled from the face of Esau, your brother. Now Bethel was just a few miles north of what is now Jerusalem, less than a day’s walk for an active man. They’re going to move up there and establish a place of worship there. This was the first place that Jacob encountered God and the place where he saw the ladder ascending up into heaven. And he himself at that time says, this is surely the house of God in this place. And oddly enough, Bethel means house of God. And so this location was established as the center of worship for Jacob, all of his family, and for all the Israelites. People habitually, in reading the Bible, always think of Jerusalem as God’s place. That’s Jerusalem is God’s city. But the fact of the matter is that God isn’t married to Jerusalem and never was. He chose his place whenever he wanted to choose his place and put it wherever he wanted it to be. Bethel was the place for a while. And when Israel came back into the land, they camped out up in Gilgal and then again in Shiloh where they pitched the tabernacle. And the tabernacle was for a very long time in Shiloh. And that was the center of the worship of God. In fact, they didn’t even own Jerusalem, didn’t have possession of Jerusalem as a city through much of their history. Well, Jacob said to his household and to everyone with him, Put away the strange gods that are among you and be clean and change all your clothes. Let’s get up and go to Bethel. I’m going to make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress and has been with me in every way that I went. So they gave Jacob all the strange gods in their hands and all their earrings in their ears, and Jacob buried them under an oak that was in Shechem. What’s going on here, basically, is a separation from idolatry, a complete separation and a dedication to the one true God of Abraham with whom they had cut this deal. So they journeyed, and the terror of God was upon all the cities round about them, and they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob. They were scared to death of them, and with good reason, because after the rape of his daughter Dinah, Two of his boys, after that conned the city into getting the men circumcised, two of them went in there and killed every man in the place and took everything, all the people, took it all out of there. So those cities had reason to be concerned about all 12 of these boys. Well, these people might have been pretty well afraid after that small war they had. So Jacob came to Luz in the land of Canaan, which is now called Bethel. He and all the people that were with him. And he built there an altar. He called the place El Bethel because there God appeared to him when he fled from the face of his brother. But Deborah, Rebecca’s nurse, died, and she was buried beneath Bethel under an oak. This is an interesting little side that whenever he went up there and got his wife, her nurse came with him. I don’t know what that meant exactly in the ancient world, whether she had been the child’s nurse from the time she was a little girl, but this nurse of Rebecca’s had come with her. She had been with her before she ever married the man. And now this elderly woman dies in Bethel. And God appeared to Jacob again, and he blessed him. And he said, Your name is Jacob. Your name is not going to be called anymore Jacob. Israel shall be your name. That basically means Prince of God. And it’s interesting because right here at this point is where the change, the real change in history takes place. If we look back, the name Israel is familiar to everybody. It’s imprinted on our maps in the Middle East. Everybody knows who Israel is. Not everybody does know, however, where the name came from and how it was originally given to a man named Jacob. And God said to him, I am God Almighty. In Hebrew, El Shaddai. Oh, it has a good sound to it. Be fruitful and multiply. Be a nation and a company of nations. Kings are going to come out of your loins. And the land which I gave to Abraham and to Isaac, I’m going to give it to you and to your seed will I give the land. So the original real estate contract that God made with Abraham is affirmed and confirmed one more time. And God went up from him in a place where he talked to him. And Jacob set up a pillar in this place, a pillar of stone. He poured a drink offering on it and poured oil on it. And he called the name of the place where God spoke with him, Bethel, house of God. And shortly thereafter, there comes a blessing and a tragedy. I’ll tell you about those after this message.
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So Jacob and his family continued on south from Bethel. There was but a little way to come to Ephrath, and Rachel went into labor. And she had a hard labor. They had to all stop. Rachel, you know, was Jacob’s, the love of his life. She was the woman for whom he worked 14 years. He made a deal to marry her after working seven years, and her father gave him Leah instead and said, you’ll have to work another seven years for Rachel. And he did it because he loved her so much. Well, it came to pass that while she was in this really hard labor, the midwife said, don’t be afraid. You’re going to have this boy also. And it was a boy. It came to pass as her life was departing because she died. She called his name Ben-Oni, but his father called him Benjamin. And thus was born number 12 of the patriarchs of the 12 tribes of Israel. And poor Rachel died. and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem. And there’s a location down there. They tell you this is where Rachel was buried. And one never knows about some of the traditions that go back through time, but it’s possible that you could actually go to the spot. Certainly, traveling from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, You must somewhere along that road going into Bethlehem or just out the other side pass the tomb of Rachel. And Jacob set a pillar on her grave. That’s the pillar of Rachel’s grave to this day. And so Israel, that’s Jacob, journeyed, and he spread his tent. It came to pass that when Israel dwelt in that land, and here’s the soap opera quality, and I mentioned this earlier, that what we’re dealing with here is a different culture, the technology is different, the circumstances are different, the family business is agriculture, but the people, the people are the same. It came to pass that when they were dwelling in that land, that Reuben, that’s Jacob’s firstborn son, went in and lay with Bilah, his father’s concubine, And his dad heard about it. And in a family like that, you know he would hear about it. Now, in order to keep our soap opera straight, the sons of Jacob were 12. The sons of Leah were Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn, Simeon, Levi, who ultimately his sons would form the priesthood, Judah, who basically would be the ruling family, Issachar, and Zebulun. The sons of Rachel were Joseph and Benjamin, and these were, because I guess Rachel was his favorite wife, these were his favorite sons. And the sons of Bila, Rachel’s handmaid, were Dan and Naphtali. This is the woman that Reuben, his firstborn, went in and slept with. We don’t have a lot of idea about the time between these items, but I suspect that this woman was rather a lot older than Reuben. Must have been something of a dish anyhow. The sons of Zilpah, Leah’s handmaid, were Gad and Asher. And these are all the sons of Jacob, and they make up the twelve tribes of Israel. Now, do you see what I was driving at when I talked about a soap opera or an epic movie? I don’t think anyone’s actually done this one, but the story that we’re reading here, I mean, this could actually inspire a whole series of evening primetime television specials. In fact, you could have a little parlor game deciding who gets to play which part in this incredible soap opera. I, for one, at this particular time, would suggest Mel Gibson should be the guy who played the role of Jacob. And after that, well, get your friends together and have a little fun with it. But this is really strong stuff. In fact, I think a lot of screenwriters borrow from the Bible and never bother telling anybody about it. Well, they came on south from where they were going. They had started south, coming through what would have been Jerusalem at that time. They came on down to Bethlehem and went on through to Hebron. And there they met the boy’s grandfather. Yeah, Isaac is still alive. Isaac is a very, very old man, but he lives in Hebron at this time. And Hebron, well… If you watch your news, you know that this is the focal point of a lot of hatred between the Jews and the Arabs in the area. You know this is where the cave is, where Abraham is reputed to be buried. It’s an important city. The days of Isaac were 180 years. And he gave up the ghost and died and was gathered to his people, being old and full of days. And his sons Esau and Jacob buried him. I guess they were able to bury the hatchet long enough to bury their father together. A 180-year-old man. And he did see his grandchildren. who would be one of the dominant influences in the world for generation after generation to come. Esau decided, I guess, to get separate from this, seeing the ongoing soap opera that existed there, and also probably not wanting to go up against those 12 sons. He took his wives, his sons, his daughters, and his whole house, his cattle, his animals. He took his herds, everything he’d gotten, and he moved across Jordan into the country away from the face of his brother Jacob, which might have been one of the smartest things Esau ever did. The book of Genesis tells us in chapter 36, verse 7, it says, Their riches were more than that they might dwell together. And the land wherein they were strangers could not bear them because of their cattle. So thus dwelt Esau in Mount Seir. Esau is Edom. And if you check your biblical maps, you’ll find it across the Jordan and to the south. Now, what follows is a story that’s told, and like I said, they borrow from the Bible again and again. But you may have seen the musical, Joseph and His Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. The musical was funny. The story, well, the original story is not quite so funny. I’ll tell you about that when I come back after this message.
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Time passes in this soap opera, and Joseph, the favorite son of Jacob, comes to age 17. 17, you know, is that’s the age when you think you know a whole lot more than you do. He was feeding the flock with his brethren, and the lad was with the sons of Bila and the sons of Zilpah, his father’s wives. Now, there’s an interesting aspect to this. You wonder, well, how does this happen that this particular set of boys is working together? Well, if you think about it very much, you’d realize that a family, 12 sons, you know, some of them being born by the first wife, some by the second wife, some by the handmaids, that those sons of the handmaids probably had a lesser status in the house. It’s just the way things are. Nobody may have talked about it. Nobody may have made an issue out of it, but it probably happened. But what happened is that he saw these young men do something, we don’t know what, that they shouldn’t have done. And Joseph went straight to his father with their evil report. So, from that day forward, Joseph would be viewed by these brothers as a snitch. Now, Israel loved Joseph more than all his children because he was a son of his old age, and he doted on him, and he made him a coat of many colors. And if you haven’t seen Joseph in his amazing Technicolor dream coat, you probably should. When his brethren saw that their father loved him more than all his brethren, they hated him, and they couldn’t bring themselves to speak peacefully to him. I told you, this is great primetime soap opera material. The intrigue, the hatred, the attitudes, the working toward or against one another, it’s all there. Now Joseph, very young and a little lacking in discretion, had a tendency to say whatever was on his head. He dreamed a dream, and he told his brethren. and they hated him more. He said to them, Oh, hey, guys, hear this dream I’ve dreamed. Look, we were out binding sheaves in the field, and my sheaf arose and stood upright, and your sheaves stood around about and bowed down to my sheaf. Isn’t that incredible? Well, his brothers didn’t think so. They were furious. And they said, are you going to reign over us? You think you’re going to be the boss? You’re going to have dominion? And they hated him more for his dreams and for his words. Like I said, some dreams you’re probably better off keeping to yourself. But Joseph, he’s 17. He dreamed another dream and told it to his brethren and said, I’ve dreamed another dream. I had another one. Look, the sun and the moon and the 11 stars made obeisance to me. And he told it to his father. And he told it to his brothers. And his father, having a little age and the wisdom on him, rebuked him. He says, what is this dream you’ve dreamed? Do you think I and your mother and your brethren indeed are going to come and bow down to you to the earth? And his brethren envied him. But his father, his father filed that away in his memory. There’s a little side note here. That’s worth paying attention to. Those people at that time immediately recognized the significance of the sun and the moon and the 11 stars. Now, if you have a computer in your house, by now you probably know what an icon is. The icons on your computer screen are all those little old shaped things that tell you what it does. And for example, there’ll be a little printer up on the top sort of your screen. And if you click on that printer, it’ll bring up your window that tells you how to do the printing. And you click another one and bang, it goes off and prints. I was looking on one of my screens one day and just out of curiosity said, how many icons are there on this screen? And I counted 40 on that one screen, different icons, which was all the different things that I could do from that point on the screen, all represented by little icons, which take up less space. There’s no need for explanation. You just click and go and it does it. Well, the sun and the moon, in this sense, in those icons, everybody immediately recognized as father and mother. And so when you make your way through the Bible and you find sun and moon used in a symbolic sense, realize that while they are reading words on a page, that to the ancients, these were icons, and they meant something. You click on the sun, you get the father. You click on the moon, you get the mother. And you find these same symbols make their way out into paganism as well. And the symbolism of the sun and the moon and all that’s involved with that has enormous significance in some pagan religions. Well, his father, as I said, wasn’t impressed, but he did try to remember what he said. His brethren went to feed their father’s flock in Shechem. And Israel said to Joseph, Your brethren are down in Shechem feeding the flock. I want to send you down to them. And he said, You go down there and see whether it’s well with your brethren and you and well with the flocks and bring me back word again. It’s quite a distance down to Shechem and Jacob didn’t want to go down himself. So he sent him all the way from Hebron down to Shechem to check on the state of the flocks that were down there. He might have thought twice about that. A certain man found him, and behold, he was wandering in the field. And the man asked him, he says, what are you looking for? He says, I’m looking for my brothers. Tell me where they feed their flocks. He said, oh, they left here. I heard them say, let’s go to Dothan. So he followed after them and found them in Dothan. And they saw him coming over the hill. I imagine his coat gave him away. Long before he was close enough, they were all sitting around, and they conspired against him, and they said, look, this dreamer is coming. Let’s kill him. Let’s cast him into some pit. We’ll tell our dad, we don’t know, some evil beast has devoured him, and then we’ll see what comes of his dreams. Now, Reuben, sitting not right too close, heard it. And he said, no, no, we don’t want to do that. Let’s don’t kill him. Let’s don’t shed blood. if you want to do this, let’s cast him into a pit in the desert out here and don’t lay any hand upon him. Now, Reuben’s point in doing this was, Reuben says, let’s don’t kill him, put him in the pit, because what he intended to do was to go back and get him and send him back to his dad. Reuben was acting honorably in all this and doing his best to save the boy’s life. It came to pass when Joseph came up to his brethren without any fairly well, they stripped him out of his coat, they took it off of him, they took him away and cast him into a pit. The pit happened to be empty. There was no water in it, which Joseph was lucky. And they all sat down to have a meal. And they lifted up their eyes while they were eating, and they said, Look here. Here comes a company of Arabs down from Gilead with their camels. They’ve got spices and balm. I bet they’re on the way to Egypt. And Judah said, Hey, what’s it going to profit us if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? Let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites. At least we’ll get some money, and our hand won’t be upon him. He is, after all, our brethren, our brother, our flesh. Let’s don’t kill him. Let’s sell him. And they all thought, well, that’s a pretty good idea. They passed by these merchantmen. As they drew up, they pulled Joseph out of the pit, sold him to the Ishmaelites for 20 pieces of silver, and they took Joseph into Egypt. Reuben was not there when this happened. He had gone away and came back to the pit. When he got there, Joseph was gone, and he was devastated. Reuben was not in on the deal to sell Joseph. And he returned to his brother and said, the child’s gone. What am I going to do? They took Joseph’s coat. They killed a kid, dipped the coat in the blood. And they sent the coat of many colors and brought it to their father and said, This we have found. We are not quite sure whether it’s Joseph’s coat or not. Well, Jacob knew. He said, It’s my son’s coat. An evil beast has devoured him. Joseph is without doubt rent in pieces. He couldn’t even bury his son. So he tore his clothes, a sign of mourning. He put sackcloth on his loins, and he mourned for his son many, many days. What these boys did to Joseph was unforgivable. What they did to their father is unspeakably cruel. But the rest of the story will have to wait till later. Until next time, I’m Ronald Dart, and you were born to win.
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The Born to Win radio program with Ronald L. Dart is sponsored by Christian Educational Ministries and made possible by donations from listeners like you. If you can help, please send your donation to Born to Win, Post Office Box 560 White House, Texas 75791. You may call us at 1-888-BIBLE44
