Jacob was the son of Isaac and grandson of Abraham. After God changed Jacob’s name to Israel, the descendants of Jacob’s 12 sons became the biblical nation of ancient Israel. God made specific promises to the people of Israel in terms of their behavior: Blessings for obedience, but if Israel failed to obey God, then the status of power and wealth God promised to bless them with would be removed.
In Deuteronomy there is a beautiful description of what God promised He would do for the descendants of Abraham:
“And of Joseph (Jacob’s 11th son, first born of Rachael) he said: ‘Blessed of the LORD is his land, With the precious things of heaven, with the dew, And the deep lying beneath, With the precious fruits of the sun, With the precious produce of the months, With the best things of the ancient mountains, With the precious things of the everlasting hills, With the precious things of the earth and its fullness, And the favor of Him who dwelt in the bush. Let the blessing come ‘on the head of Joseph, And on the crown of the head of him who was separate from his brothers.’ His glory is like a firstborn bull, And his horns like the horns of the wild ox; Together with them He shall push the peoples To the ends of the earth; They are the ten thousands of Ephraim, And they are the thousands of Manasseh” (Deuteronomy 33:13–17).
Ephraim and Manasseh are specifically referenced because they are the two sons of Joseph upon whom God would give the birthright blessings. Jacob’s name “Israel” was passed on to them. God fulfilled His promises in abundance after withholding them for 2520 years.
The future blessings promised to Ephraim and Manasseh begin with referencing Rebekah, Jacob’s mother: “And they blessed Rebekah and said to her: “Our sister, may you become The mother of thousands of ten thousands; And may your descendants possess The gates of those who hate them” (Genesis 24:60). Ephraim and Manasseh were promised control over their enemies as well as the means to trade and their commerce. See also the promise to Abraham that his descendants will possess the gates of their enemies (Genesis 22:17).
A summary of the blessing of the brothers is found in Deuteronomy: “And the Lord will make you abound in prosperity, in the fruit of your womb and in the fruit of your livestock and in the fruit of your ground, within the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to give you. The Lord will open to you his good treasury, the heavens, to give the rain to your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hands. And you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow. And the Lord will make you the head and not the tail, and you shall only go up and not down, if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God, which I command you today, being careful to do them,” (Deuteronomy 28:11–13 ESV). Notice, the “if you obey” is a qualifier of the blessings.
The times of the Gentiles is the reversal of this “if you obey”” situation. The rise of the Gentile nations is referred to as: “The alien who is among you shall rise higher and higher above you, and you shall come down lower and lower. He shall lend to you, but you shall not lend to him; he shall be the head, and you shall be the tail (Deuteronomy 28:43–44). Continuing in Leviticus 26:19-20 God says: “I will break the pride of your power; I will make your heavens like iron and your earth like bronze. And your strength shall be spent in vain; for your land shall not yield its produce, nor shall the trees of the land yield their fruit.”
These troubles coming upon Ephraim and Manasseh as the birthright nations are a switch from the blessing side of the ledger to the curses side of the ledger. Always in the background (if we’re talking about blessings and cursings) is the covenant. Lest it seem that God is being vengeful, it is important to look at the covenant He made with Abraham which involves his descendants.
“When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, ‘I am Almighty God; walk before Me and be blameless. And I will make My covenant between Me and you, and will multiply you exceedingly.’ Then Abram fell on his face, and God talked with him, saying: ‘As for Me, behold, My covenant is with you, and you shall be a father of many nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham; for I have made you a father of many nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come from you. And I will establish My covenant between Me and you and your descendants after you in their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and your descendants after you’ “ (Genesis 17:1–7).
When we get to the renewal of the covenant (the same covenant but being renewed with Israel at Mount Sinai) the emphasis switches over to the requirements upon the children of Israel. So, it’s just a matter of emphasis, but here the emphasis is upon the promises that God made. “And I will make your descendants multiply as the stars of heaven; I will give to your descendants all these lands; and in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed; because Abraham obeyed My voice and kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes, and My laws” (Genesis 26:4–5).
God’s law defines His character and nature. Blessings come by adhering to them: “Praise the LORD! Blessed is the man who fears the LORD, Who delights greatly in His commandments. His descendants will be mighty on earth; The generation of the upright will be blessed” (Psalm 112:1–2).
When we talk of curses, we are addressing a factor of the covenant agreement. “‘And if by these things you are not reformed by Me, but walk contrary to Me, then I also will walk contrary to you, and I will punish you yet seven times for your sins. And I will bring a sword against you that will execute the vengeance of the covenant; when you are gathered together within your cities I will send pestilence among you; and you shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy’ “ (Leviticus 26:23–25).
God’s purpose when administering punishment is to produce a positive effect of realignment with the conditions agreed to with the covenant: “ ‘As I live,’ says the Lord GOD, ‘surely with a mighty hand, with an outstretched arm, and with fury poured out, I will rule over you. . . .’ “I will make you pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the bond of the covenant;’ “ (Ezekiel 20:33,37).
This time of Jacob’s trouble is the time when God will execute the vengeance of the covenant in its fullness. “Now these are the words that the Lord spoke concerning Israel and Judah. “For thus says the Lord: ‘We have heard a voice of trembling, Of fear, and not of peace. Ask now, and see, Whether a man is ever in labor with child? So why do I see every man with his hands on his loins Like a woman in labor, And all faces turned pale? Alas! For that day is great, So that none is like it; And it is the time of Jacob’s trouble, . . .” (Jeremiah 30:4-7).
Disobedience to the covenant negates the blessings in the latter days: “When you beget children and grandchildren and have grown old in the land, and act corruptly and make a carved image in the form of anything, and do evil in the sight of the Lord your God to provoke Him to anger, I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that you will soon utterly perish from the land which you cross over the Jordan to possess; you will not prolong your days in it, but will be utterly destroyed. And the Lord will scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations where the Lord will drive you. And there you will serve gods, the work of men’s hands, wood and stone, which neither see nor hear nor eat nor smell. But from there you will seek the Lord your God, and you will find Him if you seek Him with all your heart and with all your soul. When you are in distress, and all these things come upon you in the latter days, when you turn to the Lord your God and obey His voice (for the Lord your God is a merciful God), He will not forsake you nor destroy you, nor forget the covenant of your fathers which He swore to them” (Deuteronomy 4: 25-31).
When the nation of Israel turns to God in obedience, He delivers them out of captivity: ” ‘For it shall come to pass in that day,’ Says the Lord of hosts, ‘That I will break his yoke from your neck, And will burst your bonds; Foreigners shall no more enslave them. But they shall serve the Lord their God, And David their king, Whom I will raise up for them. ‘Therefore do not fear, O My servant Jacob,’ says the Lord, ‘Nor be dismayed, O Israel; For behold, I will save you from afar, And your seed from the land of their captivity. Jacob shall return, have rest and be quiet, And no one shall make him afraid (Jeremiah 30: 8-10).
God is faithful to His side of the agreement as far as the covenant is concerned. Despite the actions and the attitude of Israel, God fulfilled what He said He would do. Unfortunately, the current descendants of Ephraim and Manasseh are not fulfilling their part of the covenant agreement. The prophets foretold of a time of great trouble for Israel in the latter days. Christ described this time of Jacob’s trouble as the tribulation when humanity is about to destroy itself off the face of the earth: “For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be. And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened” (Matthew 24:21-22; Luke 21:22).
Christ will intervene to stop the annihilation of all flesh from the earth which will encompass the time of Jacob’s trouble and the times of the Gentile rulership at the end of the age. After God has punished Israel, He then punishes the rest of the nations. The remnant of Israel will be restored in a covenant relationship. Israel is going to be the light to the Gentiles yet in the future, to bring the entire world back into alignment with God once Satan is removed from the picture by Christ at His return. Then God’s plan will move on into the millennial stage.
Those in God’s Church now entered a covenant relationship with Him at baptism, similar to the covenant with Abraham and the descendants of Israel: God promises to do His part if we do ours, which is obedience to the law and submission to God. We have the additional aspect of God’s Holy Spirit available to us since Jesus Christ’s sacrifice. In Revelation 14:12, the attributes of our covenant with God are described: “Here is the patience of the saints; here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.”
Individually we have little control over the behavior or fate of our nations, but we can be blessed individually and protected by God from His wrath on the nations by keeping His commandments: “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome” (I John 5:3).
Brian Orchard