STONES MENTIONED IN GENESIS
[p. 207] STONES MENTIONED IN GENESIS
Genesis 28:10 - 22; Genesis 29:9,10; Genesis 31:45 - 49; Genesis 35:9 - 14; Genesis 49:22 - 25
I wish to speak, dear brethren, very simply about the stones mentioned in these passages, which include almost all the references to stones in this book; and in the language of the inquiry in Joshua 4:6, we may well ask, “What mean ye by these stones?” The Scriptures have a language of their own, God having set in creation a variety of things which are under men’s eyes, through which He intends to speak to us, and amongst these things are stones. We have in Scripture not only what the Spirit of God says, but what He shows; and in these stones certain things are shown.
We have in Genesis 2 the first mention of stones, they are precious stones. These of course are the most interesting, and the onyx stone is alluded to. In chapter 11 we have an allusion to stone as conspicuous by its absence, by its non-use by the Babel builders; and there I apprehend you get the divine clue that the Babel builders — world builders — do not employ what is permanent, whereas God employs building material that is permanent; and that, I apprehend, in the main, is the significance of the stone. We would have it so; what God builds is for ever; and He would have us to see that what the world is building is not permanent. According to the sweeping statement of John, “the world passeth away” (1 John 2:17) — a very searching and important word, especially for young people to notice, for the world offers much that is attractive outwardly. However solid it may appear, however permanent the institutions in it may appear, some of them extending back for more than a millennium, they will not continue; “the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but [p. 208] he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever”. That is an immense thing for the young people and for us all to see, that “he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever”.
The Babel builders had no idea of the will of God; they had, as Scripture says, eliminated Him from their knowledge; they gave Him up, and had recourse to their own ingenuity; and hence they disclose what the world is. They had bricks for stone, bricks, humanly made things, and slime for mortar. Whereas faith takes up the stones. Those Babel builders were energetic enough as you know. They said one to another, “let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven” (chapter 11:4). They had their own thoughts and schemes but the material they employed discloses the nature of their structure. They had bricks; their own man-made things: whereas faith takes up things made by God, or more accurately, things given of God, for Christ is the Stone; the great idea of stone is primarily in Him. We have His eternal personality in the Deity in John 1; whether we go backwards or forwards there is permanency, and particularly in regard to the will of God, for when we come to that side it is a question of moral worth, and in Christ we have perfection. We have perfection in that respect as in all others. There is His personal worth, which every lover of Christ extols, but then there is His moral worth; what came out in Him here in the carrying out of the will of God. Morally there is nothing greater than that; it is what marked Christ in coming here into manhood; “Lo, I come ... to do thy will, O God” (Hebrews 10:7).
Well, now I wish to speak of stones in connection with Jacob, and one would like to begin with the young ones here, so that each may get something. One idea of the stone among other things, is its permanency; it is also alluded to in Scripture as symbolic of what is hard. Now, what is hard, or what from God’s side may appear hard, is really with a view to what I may call softness; this is seen by comparing Genesis 28, the head pillowed on a stone, with John 13, the head pillowed on the bosom of Jesus. The one leads to the other. Things may seem hard, and I know well enough how the young ones look at things as coming into contact with what is of God, especially the house of God. I will not enlarge on Genesis 28, except on this one point. Things may seem hard, but Jacob arrived at this spot under the will of God, or rather under the will of his parents, which in this instance implied the will of God. For parents as seen in Isaac and Rebekah, in this respect represent God, particularly in Isaac who was representative of God as blessing Jacob. He had blessed him, and the blessing was irrevocable. Authority following upon blessing should be easy to accept. In Ephesians 6:1,2 the apostle enjoins children to be obedient to their parents, reminding them that this is “the first commandment with a promise”.
Jacob had been blessed by his father, and now he is moving under the direction of his father, which is an important matter, but the state of his soul was very low. The salvation of a young person is in this respect by submission to the will of God, whatever the state of his soul; however doubtful he may be, doing the will of God is his salvation. That is to say, he moves on principle, he moves in divine light furnished to him; disregarding his own feelings. And not only is Jacob here moving under the direction of his father and mother as blessed, but he had the knowledge that his mother undertook all the penalty attaching to his deception; he had the thought of a parent suffering in his stead. She had had a transaction with God about Jacob, as godly parents have about their children, and she said, “On me be thy curse, my son!” And now he is moving under the direction of Isaac and Rebekah. He begins at Beer-{210} [p. 210] sheba, which is a very fine place to start from, as suggesting the faithfulness of God. Whatever your failings, God is unchanged, God is faithful. To the refractory Corinthians, “God is faithful” is said three times (1 Corinthians 1:9, 10:13; 2 Corinthians 1:18), for God would cover the heads of the young lest they might be despondent over their state. The time comes when you can look with confidence within and take account of the work of God in you, but earlier you have to rely on light as to God.
So Jacob arrives here and takes a stone for a pillow; it belonged to the place, that is a point to notice; God is going to deal with Jacob in connection with this experience; this place and this stone are never to be lost sight of. There is apparent hardness in this experience, this stone, but it is your own selection, you may say. God allows you to do this, and then He holds you to it and shows you that after all you made no mistake. What you may have thought a mistake and what occasioned you hard experiences was under God’s ordering and God’s will. Of His will you are in the path of obedience, and the first great impression of the house of God that you get is connected with a journey and such an experience as this. He made a stone a pillow for his head. The sun had set and he spent the night there, an experience that was never to be forgotten; here “the mighty God of Jacob” appeared to him. He is in heaven above and Jacob is lying on the earth; heaven is engaged with Jacob, and a ladder is set up on the earth reaching up into heaven. There is one man lying there alone, to the rest of mankind very little known, but heaven is looking down on him, God is there and the angels of God ascending, for they began at the bottom of the ladder. Love begins with God, and love shows itself where it is needed, and it was needed there. Jacob needed it particularly then — a lonely traveller, behind him the hatred of his brother. He needed such consolation. Doubtless he did not [p. 211] expect it, but God loves to surprise us — love would surprise us — and the angels were ascending on the ladder, as though they would convey to Jacob that they are communicating to heaven everything that love would wish heaven to know; not that heaven did not know, but God would have him to know that it knew. There was a means of communication between God and Jacob, that he is now learning. It is a time of hard experience and God is coming in in the hardness, and the very hardness is to be a monument. He takes the stone that was his pillow and sets it up for a pillar and pours oil upon the top of it. He has the mind of God in a measure, and this stone set up and anointed is a testimony to this. What is of God is to be anointed. If it has proved effective in my soul it will prove effective in another.
The anointing implies that the experience is not to be exclusively mine, I am not to be selfish about it. There are those who get light and are not anointed. They do not pass it on. The idea of anointing is that the experience from God characterizing you is made available to others; others see it and get the good of it. The stone would be the house of God; Jacob calls the place Bethel. You see what an impression he obtained through this experience. I hope that we may get into our souls the value of divine impressions, and that we may not be selfish, as to them. They belong to others. That stone stood for twenty years anointed on the top of it.
In order to complete this thought I will go on to chapter 35 to show how he has advanced. I do not think he had advanced very much for the number of the years. Many of these days were spent without much profit spiritually, but the Spirit of God gives us a paragraph in chapter 35, verses 9 - 15, to show the result of the twenty years. You will observe in the verses I read that it stands by itself, it includes what happened at Peniel, seen in chapter 32. It is [p. 212] the Spirit of God putting together the result of the twenty years. God loves to write up His people, to write up their histories. The paragraph begins with God appearing to him after he came out of Padan-aram, as though He would confirm and consolidate in his soul the result of this experience. That is what God does for us. Nothing must be lost and the consolidation fixes it so that it is part of us for ever. He appeared to Jacob after he came out of Padan-aram, and said, “Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not henceforth be called Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name”. Now he is regarded as spiritual; his name is Israel, that is to say, he has made headway in his soul; he is now in Bethel again. It includes chapter 32, although in that chapter God withheld His own name; but now in Bethel He tells Jacob His name, as though God would say, You have now come into My house suitably and so intelligently, I can disclose My name to you. God had told him to “go up to Bethel and dwell there”. He knows how to go; he buries the idols; he is in the house now under divine direction and in intelligence. He is no more Jacob; he is an Israel; God has ennobled him, He has made him suitable for His house. Who of us is suitable for the house of God naturally? None. We do not know how to behave ourselves in it naturally. We have to be ennobled to be in it according to God. We do not sit down together in the smallness of the flesh; we do not sit down in legality, but as ennobled, in divine order, in submission; we are there as sons of God.
God reveals His name to Jacob, and that is what I would stress. He says, “I am God Almighty”. He is no longer on the top of the ladder in heaven. He is standing by Jacob. What grace! Now we have the full idea of the house; it is no longer that of a mere stone, but a man in Bethel, there according to God, who is talking with him: “And God went [p. 213] up from him in the place where he had talked with him”; where the feet of Jehovah rested. Hallowed spot! how blessed such a spot as that, where the feet of Jehovah rested, where He talked with Jacob! That is the full idea, and instead of a stone for a pillar, it is “a pillar of stone”. It denotes the full progress of Jacob. It is not something that is to pass away in a moment, it is a permanent thing, and a drink offering is poured upon it. Jacob understands that God is pleased with him. Blessed realization! I do not know of anything more to be commended to the young people than that. We are very apt to be pleased with ourselves, but how much do we think of God being pleased with us? It leads up to our realization of the joy of being accepted in the Beloved, that we are pleasurable to God in Christ. The drink offering signifies what satisfies God, as I may say, what refreshes Him; and surely that is the thing that ought to be before each of us, dear brethren, to be in the house of God as ennobled by Him, and in the intelligence of our souls as Israels, as princes with God, to minister refreshment to Him.
I come now to Genesis 29 briefly to show how in the idea of the stone on the well’s mouth you have another thing. We should note the energy of Jacob. You may say he is anointed, for who could deny that there was some dignity in him as he moved out of Bethel. The scripture says, “Jacob continued his journey”; the original, I think, is that he “lifted up his feet”, there was a spring. It was a question of a foot journey and there was spring in him, and he went “into the land of the children of the east”. It was a long way, but there must have been faith; although the drink offering was not there in chapter 28, the oil was there; the sense that was with him of a wonderful experience with God, that no one else had had; that God was with him and would bring him back. He looks around as he gets to Haran. Another [p. 214] point for young people, have your eyes open to see. The Scriptures are full of precious things strewn there by the Spirit if only our eyes are open to see. A feature of a man of faith is the power to look around and see what is of God. He looked and he saw a well. It was no accident, there was a well, and three flocks of sheep were lying by it. What an open book that is to faith! But there was a great stone on the well.
Now you see he is in the presence of a difficulty. One might say much about the great stone, it undoubtedly refers to the judgment of God. The well was there, the water was there — the system of grace beginning with Hagar, that was the first well — but there was a heavy stone on it. That is now the test, what will he do with this stone? It means sacrifice now. He had made no engagement as to this with God at Bethel; this is a new matter. He knows the water is there, the flocks are lying by it, but, for the moment, he does not do anything. He asks, “My brethren, whence are ye?” That is the thing you want to know, who people are if you are going to serve them. As it was said to Hagar earlier, “whence camest thou? and whither wilt thou go?” You find this throughout Scripture, an inquiry as to whence people are. It is important to know this, if you are to serve them. They knew Laban, they tell Jacob, but yet he does not roll away the stone. He says, “Lo, it is yet high day, ... water ye the sheep”. Why should they wait? It was really the Old Testament position, a position of limitation. There was virtue there; there was grace there, but there was the stone and who could roll it away? These flocks were needing water earlier than others, why should there be anything hindering them? He discerns the position at once; that is to say, he is anointed and has intelligence, and he is bringing his intelligence into activity, but he does not do what is needed.
[p. 215] We need more than speaking, we need power; and with Jacob power came into action when he “saw Rachel ... and the sheep of Laban his mother’s brother”. Now you see there is a motive. Much might be said on this, but I am dwelling upon one thing, the anointed man, the man who has had to do with God only a little way back, but he has recognized the idea of anointing, and he has to convey to others what he has got; but he is not moved to action until he sees Rachel. That is love. We are to serve by love, not simply by light. He had light, he could speak to others about what they should do, but what is he doing? Only as he sees Rachel and the flocks of Laban does he rise and roll away the stone. One might make much of Rachel as a type of Israel; she was an object for Jacob’s affections, and hence as he sees her he is moved to serve. There is now more than the anointing, more than light; there was affection and he rolled away the stone. How much that is needed now! Working by love is that you will not allow any impediment to prevent those you love receiving the blessing of God. He does not put the stone back, though that was the custom. I have no doubt he is here a type of Christ, as removing permanently what hindered the blessing of God flowing out; but I am thinking of how we are to serve by love, Christ’s service to the assembly being the example. The suggestion is that there is an object for our affections. It is said that Jacob served for a wife. He rolled away the stone and watered the sheep of Laban, his mother’s brother. He served by love in rolling away the stone and watering the sheep.
Now I wanted to speak about the witness in Galeed, and it brings out a state of things that I am afraid often exists among the people of God, often with those of us who have light. He was now moving back to Canaan to his father, according to the word of God. He is leaving Laban now. He is not now thinking of Laban’s flock, his love has waned; trouble has arisen. In other words, brethren have gone on well for a while, love has been active, but the time comes when we agree to differ; agree to be absent one from the other; one of the most pernicious principles of the flesh. The supreme idea in the epistle to the Ephesians is that in all lowliness we are to endeavour to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace, the uniting bond.
Now here is “a heap of stones”. He asks them to gather the stones, and they make a heap of stones and eat upon the heap. It is very nice to see brethren eating together, it is the appointed way in the Lord’s supper that we should eat together, and drink together; it is the divinely appointed way of keeping us together, of keeping Christ in our hearts. But here are people eating and drinking in order to separate, as about to separate. They are not to live at war with one another, it is simply that they agree to differ, a most pernicious principle, whether we speak it or act it, it is contrary to the mind of God. Why should a thing be left in abeyance? If it is right, it is right, why cannot I see that it is right as others do, instead of eating upon a heap of stones? It may have seemed nice to agree not to have war, we do not want open division, but there may be cleavage without open division, and if there is cleavage there is room for Satan. Satan has a footing, and he will not be content with a footing, he will seek more than cleavage.
I dwell on this, that they eat on a heap of stones. They were pious in it, they say, “The Lord watch between me and thee, when we are absent one from another”, but we never read of Jacob visiting Laban again. As a matter of fact, love had gone, the love that was there, the interest that was there when he watered the flock of Laban in the presence of Rachel had gone; now there is nothing left but [p. 217] this heap of stones. I do not deny that there may be something in it, the preservation from war, they were not to pass that heap of stones. But then there was the want of love, it is a poor state of things that we should settle down to eat on a heap of stones, and then say, “The Lord watch between me and thee, when we are absent one from another”. Why should we be absent from one another? The whole trouble among the people of God arises from being absent from one another. Christianity means presence, the Lord’s supper implies this. The Lord is absent, we know, but the Lord’s supper is to bring Him in. The saints are together in love and the Lord is brought in through our remembrance of Him; that is the idea of it.
Now I proceed to the last scripture, where you have “the stone of Israel”. Jacob is now touching a high level, as blessing Joseph. Here he is occupied in blessing Joseph with his other sons. In spite of their history, they are all blessed. A most encouraging thing, that in spite of the terrible things that have to be said, the twelve are all blessed; quite in keeping with the faithfulness of God. The same thing is seen in the history of the assembly, but the Holy Spirit would lead us up to the plane of Joseph, that is to say, Christ as separated from His brethren. He now sees Him as a fruitful bough by a well. That is what God would bring us into; He would lift us up into the full thought of Christ, that there may be the maintenance of the dispensation characteristically. That is what is presented in Joseph; Exodus opens up the administration of that. The fruitful bough by the well whose branches run over the wall; that is the fruitfulness of Christ. And then His sufferings; the awful opposition to Christ. “The archers ... shot at him”.
It is well to face these things, for it is the present position. I am speaking now to the elder brethren,
[p. 218] the opposition of the present time is to Christ, as typified in Joseph; what we see in Joseph involves the truth of the epistle to the Ephesians. Ephesians is on the same level as the gospels, that is, the saints are brought to see the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ. That is the idea; so that you see the whole position, the fulness of the dispensation in Christ. But it is necessary that we should bear in mind the relentless opposition that there is to Christ. “The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him: but his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of mighty God of Jacob”. That is the position today, and so it says, “from thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel”. We have come to see Christ from this point of view; we have come to see Him in His eternal permanence; He is the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel. The New Testament opens that up, how He is the Stone which the builders rejected, and He is made the Head of the corner. That is Ephesians, “Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone” (chapter 2:20). It is the top stone, not simply the foundation, for Ephesians is the top stone, the adorning, binding stone, Christ is all and in everything.
I trust God will bless these thoughts to us that we may all be in the full light of Christ as the Head of the corner.