Genesis 46:8-23: a reflection

8These are the names of the children of Israel, who came into Egypt, Jacob and his sons: Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn. 9The sons of Reuben: Hanoch, Pallu, Hezron, and Carmi. 10The sons of Simeon: Jemuel, Jamin, Ohad, Jachin, Zohar, and Shaul the son of a Canaanite woman. 11The sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari. 12The sons of Judah: Er, Onan, Shelah, Perez, and Zerah; but Er and Onan died in the land of Canaan. The sons of Perez were Hezron and Hamul. 13The sons of Issachar: Tola, Puvah, Iob, and Shimron. 14The sons of Zebulun: Sered, Elon, and Jahleel. 15These are the sons of Leah, whom she bore to Jacob in Paddan Aram, with his daughter Dinah. All the souls of his sons and his daughters were thirty-three. 16The sons of Gad: Ziphion, Haggi, Shuni, Ezbon, Eri, Arodi, and Areli. 17The sons of Asher: Imnah, Ishvah, Ishvi, Beriah, and Serah their sister. The sons of Beriah: Heber and Malchiel. 18These are the sons of Zilpah, whom Laban gave to Leah, his daughter, and these she bore to Jacob, even sixteen souls. 19The sons of Rachel, Jacob’s wife: Joseph and Benjamin. 20To Joseph in the land of Egypt were born Manasseh and Ephraim, whom Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera, priest of On, bore to him. 21The sons of Benjamin: Bela, Becher, Ashbel, Gera, Naaman, Ehi, Rosh, Muppim, Huppim, and Ard. 22These are the sons of Rachel, who were born to Jacob: all the souls were fourteen. 23The son of Dan: Hushim.

This passage lists the names of Jacob's family, son by son, as they go down into Egypt, the whole household that would settle in a foreign land during the famine. It is a roll call of a single family, named and counted. But it is also the record of a pivotal moment: this small family, going down into Egypt out of need, is the seed from which God will grow a great nation. The names in this list are the beginning of the people of Israel.

Notice what God is quietly doing in this move. On the surface it is a family relocating because of famine, driven by hardship into a foreign land. But underneath, God is at work: preserving this family through the famine, and positioning them where, over the coming generations, they will multiply into a nation. What looked like a desperate move driven by need was, in God's hand, the means of preserving and growing his people. And each of them is named; none is an anonymous number to God.

There is reassurance in that about how God works through our own hard, need-driven circumstances. The moves we make out of necessity, the relocations forced by hardship, the paths we would not have chosen, can be, in God's providence, the very means by which he preserves us and works his larger purposes. Jacob's family went to Egypt because they had to; God used it to make them a nation. When hardship drives you somewhere you would not have chosen, remember that God can be at work in it, preserving you and advancing purposes you cannot yet see. And know that, like every name in this list, you are named and known by him.

Lord, Jacob's family went down to Egypt out of need, and you used that hard, driven move to preserve them and grow them into a nation, each one named and known by you. When hardship drives me somewhere I would not have chosen, help me trust that you can be at work in it, preserving me and advancing purposes I cannot yet see. Thank you that I am not an anonymous number to you, but named and known, as every name in this list was. Work your good purposes even through my necessities.