“And Israel beheld Joseph’s sons, and said, “Who are these?” And Joseph said unto his father, they are my sons, whom God hath given me in this place. And he said, bring them, I pray thee, unto me and I will bless them. Now the eyes of Israel were dim for age, so that he could not see. And he brought them near unto him; and he kissed them, and embraced them.”

It is the sovereign will and purpose of God to bless the whole house of Israel. They are all chosen vessels set apart by an eternal election of grace and predestinated unto the adoption of sons by Jesus Christ according to the good pleasure of his will. I am not referring here to his literal sons, though some are certainly included in the promise, but of spiritual Israel; the body and church of the living God.

As I studied this chapter I began to see a picture. Israel stands in type of the church, God’s elect and Joseph a type of Christ. Joseph having suffered for his people and then raised by the hand of God to be lord of all now brings his sons to be blessed. I see in this beautiful picture the sovereign purpose of God to bless his chosen sons through the preaching of the gospel of Christ. Joseph did not view his children as just children but “as children given to him of God in this place.”

Egypt called, “the land of Ham,’ is a clear type of this fallen world. All of God’s sons are born in this place and have need of being blessed. As it was then and is now the good pleasure of God to save his sons through the preaching of the gospel of Christ.

Another thing that God revealed to me in this chapter is that the one who was the instrument in the blessing had no vision to distinguish who he was blessing. “Now the eyes of Israel were dim for age, so that he could not see---(Genesis 48:10)” As I minister to my generation I know that I am shut up to the sovereign will and purpose of God in this thing of blessing. I know by the scriptures that all that the Father gave to the Son he will bring to the Son. I also know that preaching is the means that he has chosen. So, like Israel of Old, this dying man waits for Christ to bring his children to me and then I pray and ask of him to guide me so that I put the right hand on the right head.