Part 6

So he said to Jacob, "I am so faint for food that I am ready to die! What good will this birthright do me?"

So Jacob answered, "You must give me your most sacred promise that you sell it to me for this pottage of lentils!"

And Esau promised most solemnly; and so he sold his birthright!

Then Jacob gave Esau some bread, and his pottage of lentils, and Esau ate and drank, and rose up and went away.

And thus, he despised the birthright which God had given him. He was very very sorry afterwards, but he could not undo what he had done.

I think this is a very sorrowful story, because there are so many people like Esau, who turn away from God's best gifts, and seek only the earthly things which will quickly pass away.

Let the lesson to us, dear children, be to love God first and best of all—before food or clothes, or toys, or happiness—to put God first; and when we have Him for our own, He will take care that we shall have all we need to make us happy; and at the end "a Right to the Tree of Life; and we shall enter in through the gates, into the Heavenly City."

XXXVI. The Ladder up to Heaven

Though Jacob loved God truly, he was not very truthful, and had many faults.

This is very sad, but I think knowing about it is a help to you and me, dear children, because we see that in spite of all, God loved him and forgave him, and taught him as He led him through his long life, to try more and more to please Him in everything.

Jacob had bargained with his hungry brother Esau for his Birthright, and had got it from him.

After a time when Isaac, his father, was very old and was soon going to die, Rebecca heard Isaac asking Esau to go out hunting and bring him home some savoury meat, for he wished to bless him before he died.

Directly Esau was gone, Rebecca called Jacob to her, and together they planned to deceive Isaac, who was nearly blind with age, by Jacob's dressing up in Esau's clothes and pretending to be his first-born son.

So Jacob got his father's blessing as well as the Birthright; and Esau was so terribly angry that he said he would kill his brother when his father was dead. When Rebecca heard of this, she begged Jacob to fly to Haran, where her brother Laban lived, and stay there until Esau was pacified.

Then she went to Isaac and told him that they would send Jacob to get a wife from her old home, and Isaac agreed, and Rebecca sent her son away and never saw his face again.

Oh, sad deception! What sorrow it brought on both Rebecca and Jacob!

So Jacob set out on his long journey and one night he came to a lonely places far from any village where people lived.

Jacob was tired and the sun had set, and he had no light to guide him, so he thought he would lie down where he was, and go to sleep till daylight.

Then he had a wonderful dream, and this is what he saw: Right in front of him was a ladder set up on the earth, and it went up till the top reached right to heaven. And he could see the angels of God going up and coming down upon it.

But beyond all, in the radiant glory, the Lord stood above the ladder and spoke to Jacob. He told him that He was the Lord God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and that by and by through his children's children should come the One who was to be the Blessing of the whole world.

We know the name of that Holy One Who is the world's blessing; it is Jesus Christ, Who came into the world to save sinners!

Then Jacob awoke from his dream and said, "Surely the Lord is in this place! . . . This is none other than the gate of heaven!"

So he took the stones on which he had been resting, and set them up for an altar to the Lord, and made a vow that he would serve God all his life, and would give to God the tenth part of everything that God gave to him.

Now it seems to me, children, that this Ladder up to heaven comes into our lives every day.

Jesus, our Saviour, is like the ladder which rested on the earth close to Jacob; and He is gone back to heaven now to be there to help us in every way: that is the top of the ladder which reached to heaven, where the Lord stood and spoke to Jacob.

So when you see this picture, say to yourselves, "Jesus is my ladder! He is close to me here, He is close to God there! He will never leave me nor forsake me; I can send messages and prayers every time I am lonely or in trouble, and He will send back answers if I wait for them."

So Jacob went on his journey over the desert and at length reached the country to the East, where he hoped he would find his mother's relations.

XXXVII. Jacob meets Rachel

One day Jacob sat down by a well, and looking about him he saw a number of flocks coming near and waiting by the mouth of the well, which had a large stone upon it. So he asked the shepherds whether they knew a man called Laban; and they told him that they did, and that his daughter Rachel was even now coming with her father's flock!

So Jacob was very glad to see Rachel, and went to the well and rolled the stone away, and watered the flock for her. And then he told Rachel that his mother was Rebecca, Laban's sister; and she ran and told her father.

[Illustration: JACOB WAS VERY GLAD TO SEE RACHEL.]

Then there was great rejoicing, and Laban welcomed Jacob to his home, and he began to take care of the flocks.

When Jacob had been there a month, Laban asked him what wages he would have, and whether he would stay with him? And Jacob gladly consented, for he loved Rachel very much, and promised to serve Laban for seven years, if he would give him Rachel for his wife.

So at the end of the time, Rachel became his wife; and by and by, God sent her a little son called Joseph, who was going to be, many years afterwards, a great ruler in the land of Egypt!

XXXVIII. The Story of Joseph

You have often heard of Joseph's coat of many colours, and of his being sold by his brothers into Egypt.

So I am going to tell you a little about him, and then you will understand how he came to have that beautiful coat. I have read that generally the eldest son was given a bright coloured, beautifully-worked coat; but Joseph was the eleventh son, and Jacob, his father, gave him that pretty coat because he loved him so very much.

When his brothers saw it, they felt very jealous, and hated Joseph because his father made him such a favourite.

Now jealousy is a very wretched feeling. It is wrong as well as wretched. If boys and girls—or grown up people-give way to jealousy, they may by and by do very unkind and wicked things. The Bible says "Jealousy is cruel as the grave," and you will see as we go on with the story of Joseph, how very true it was in his case.

One day Joseph had a very wonderful dream, and he told his brothers about it.

He had dreamed that he and his brothers were binding sheaves of corn in a field, and that his sheaf stood upright, and that all the sheaves of his brothers bowed down to his sheaf.

This displeased his brothers very much, and they hated him more than they did before.

After a time, Jacob sent Joseph to some far-off fields to see how his brothers and the flocks were getting on, for Jacob and his sons were shepherds.

When the brothers saw him coming, they remembered about his dream, and they determined to kill him, and cast his body into a pit.

But Reuben, his eldest brother, wished to save him out of their hands, so he advised them to put him into the pit alive, intending to come presently and take him back to their father.

But while Reuben was away, some merchants came by on camels, on their way down to Egypt, and the brothers decided to sell Joseph to them.

Though the lad wept and besought them not to be so cruel, they would not hear. So the merchants gave them twenty pieces of silver for their brother, and put him on a camel, and took him a long way off to sell him for a slave.

Then the brothers took Joseph's coat of many colours, and dipped it in the blood of a little goat, and carried the coat back to Jacob, telling him they supposed Joseph must have been killed by a wild beast, as that was how they had found his coat!

But "God meant it for good" all the time, and afterwards we see how this was.

So the unkind brothers let their poor father grieve for Joseph for many many years.

Meanwhile Joseph was brought by the merchants down to Egypt, which is the country that joins on to the land of Canaan at the bottom—or south.

The master who bought him from the merchants treated him very kindly, and when he saw how God prospered all that Joseph did, he made him overseer of all his property.

But all at once another trouble came to Joseph! He was falsely accused to his master, and was cast into prison. Still God meant it for good, and Joseph behaved so well in the prison (for God was with him), that the keeper of the prison took the fetters off his feet, and gave him the charge of all the other prisoners.

See, children, what a nice thing it is to serve God in difficult circumstances!

By and by, after a very long time, Joseph was taken to Pharaoh, the great King of Egypt, to tell him the meaning of a wonderful dream, which had frightened him very much.

Thus step by step the slave-boy was being brought to the king's palace.

God gave Joseph wisdom and favour. He was not only able to tell Pharaoh the meaning of his dream, that there would be seven years of plentiful harvests and seven years of famine; but he gave the king such good advice that the Egyptians were delighted, and Pharaoh put Joseph at the head of everything to carry it out.

The advice was, to carefully store up the corn in the good years, so that there would be enough for the bad years.

And it was in those bad years of famine that old Jacob—Joseph's dear father—sent ten of his sons down to Egypt to buy corn.

They had no idea that the great ruler, who, they heard, was selling corn to the hungry people, was their own brother, whom they had sold for a slave thirteen years before!

So they came down to Egypt, and were taken into the presence of Joseph, though they did not recognize who that great prince was. Then they bowed themselves to the ground before him, and asked him if he would sell them some corn for their families!

Joseph knew his brothers at once. They were less changed than he was; but he did not make himself known to them at first.

He asked all about their father, and their youngest brother; and spoke roughly to them, telling them that if they wanted corn, they must go back to fetch their brother Benjamin, that he might see him, if they were true men!

Afterwards he told them that he served God himself, and as he knew their families were hungry, he would give them some corn, but they must go, all the same, and fetch their other brother back.

Oh! How sorry all those ten brothers were for their sin. They remembered now how cruel they had been. They said to each other, "We were verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the anguish of his soul when he besought us, and we would not hear."

But they talked in their own language, and did not know that the great prince understood them; and Joseph hastened away from them and cried. For he was quite ready to forgive them, but he longed to see his brother Benjamin. So he sent nine of them back with the corn to fetch him, and kept one brother in ward till they should come again.

So they returned to Canaan, and poor old Jacob was obliged to spare his youngest boy to go down to Egypt, little thinking that Joseph was alive, and that by and by, in God's best time, he was to see his dear Joseph again, and clasp his son In his arms.

God watches over His people, and promises to make all things work together for good, because they love Him!

XXXIX. Jacob Comes into Egypt

When at last Benjamin reached Egypt, Joseph could hardly help telling his brothers the great secret, that he was alive! But still, he allowed them to set out with their sacks of corn on their homeward journey again; and told his servants to hide his drinking cup in Benjamin's sack. When the party had gone a little way, Joseph's servants were told to overtake them, and to charge them with having stolen his cup!

You can guess how terrified the brothers were at such a charge from the great prince!

They unloaded their asses, and told the Egyptian servants to look for themselves!

But when the cup was really found in Benjamin's sack, they had not a word to say; and as they returned sorrowfully to the house of the great prince, they confessed to each other that God was punishing them for their cruelty to their young brother long ago.

But God saw their sorrow for their sin, and He forgave them, and was going to bring good out of it all.

When they got back to Joseph, after hearing their sorrowful explanation, he could no longer keep in his loving wish to forgive them; and he told them not to grieve, for he was still alive. And then, he sent them all home again, giving his brothers a handsome set of clothes each, and with quantities of presents for his aged father, as well as sending some wagons to the land of Canaan, to fetch his father and all their families down to Egypt, that he might take care of them while the famine lasted.

Joseph sent his father a great many beautiful presents; and when the brothers got back, and told Jacob that Joseph was alive and was ruler over all the land of Egypt, and that he wished his father and all their families to come down to Egypt, the heart of Jacob fainted within him, for he did not believe them.

But when he saw the wagons which Joseph had sent to carry him down to Egypt, "the heart of Jacob their father revived, and Israel said, It is enough; Joseph my son is yet alive: I will go down and see him before I die!"

And children! These wagons of Joseph's have often been a lesson to me!

Like old Jacob, we see God's mercies surrounding us, and yet because we do not believe and trust Him enough, our hearts faint within us at some fresh difficulty that stands in our way, perhaps.

You ask, "What are the wagons, then?"

I think the wagons are a picture to us of the reality of God's promises, and of the reality of the living Jesus.

Jacob said, "Joseph my son is yet alive!"

We may say with tenderest reverence, "Jesus my Saviour is a living Saviour, I will trust myself to Him and follow Him, and one day I shall see Him face to face!"

XL. Moses and the Children of Israel

You often hear in the Bible about "The Children of Israel," and now I am going to tell you how it was they were called by that name.

Long before Jacob and his sons went down to Egypt to live near Joseph, God had met Jacob one night and had given him a new name. God loved Jacob very much, and He did not wish him to be called Jacob any more, because that name meant a Supplanter—one who had taken something away from another—and God forgave Jacob for his deceit, and called him henceforward, Israel.

So, when in after years, he went down to Egypt, he is often called Israel; and thus his twelve sons came to be called "The Children of Israel."

Well, the children of Israel settled down in Egypt, and Joseph was very kind to them, and they lived in the land of Goshen and were very happy.

But after a time another Pharaoh came to the throne, who did not remember Joseph, and all he had done for the Egyptians in that great famine; and this Pharaoh thought that these Jews or children of Israel should be made into slaves, and should build his great cities and pyramids; and he made their lives a terrible burden to them.

But God had not forgotten His great promise to Abraham that his children should live in the land of Canaan; and when the time that God had mentioned to Abraham drew near, He was preparing a great deliverance for them; to take them right out of Egypt back to their own land!

You will now hear how God brought this to pass. His ways are most wonderful!

The King of Egypt, called Pharaoh, was very surprised to find that in spite of all his unkindness, the children of Israel grew to be so many, that he feared they would fill up all the land of Egypt. So he sent out a cruel order that all the little baby boys should be killed as soon as they were born.

Some of the Jews who loved and feared God would not obey the wicked order, and among these was a mother called Jochebed who had a very beautiful baby called Moses.

The very best way when we want to do anything very difficult is to tell God about it, and ask Him to help us. So this Jewish mother did; and then she made a strong basket of bulrushes, over which she put pitch to keep out the water, and then laid her sweet baby in it, and laid the cradle in the bulrushes on the river bank, sending his little sister Miriam to watch him as well as she could.

Think of the greedy crocodiles who might have come up from the river and have eaten little Moses up!

[Illustration: THE FINDING OF MOSES.]

But God's loving care was over him and he did not get any harm.

By and by the daughter of Pharaoh came down to the river to bathe; and God sent her to the very spot where little Moses lay crying in his basket.

[Illustration: THE DAUGHTER OF PHARAOH CAME DOWN TO THE RIVER TO BATHE.]

The Princess felt very sorry for the little baby, and guessed it must belong to one of the poor Jews who were ordered to throw their boys into the river. So she told her maids to take up the babe; and just as they did so, little Miriam, who was not more than twelve years old, came up to see what would happen to her little brother.

When she saw the Princess was so kind, she offered, like a wise little girl, to fetch a nurse for him; and when the princess gave her permission, Miriam ran to Moses, own dear mother; and she was allowed to take care of him, to bring him up for the princess, who loved him so much that she called him her son.

We are told in the Epistle to the Hebrews, that it was "by faith" that Moses' parents saved his life! Because they trusted God to do for them what they could not do for themselves!

XLI. The Rod of God

Perhaps when you have thought of little Moses in the bulrushes, you have wondered what became of him when he grew up to be a man?

Well, at first when he was in Pharaoh's Palace, he was given hard lessons to learn, like any of us. But he seems to have been very clever and very industrious, for soon he became learned in all the arts of the Egyptians, and was mighty in word and in deed.

Though he was brought up so grandly in a palace, he did not forget that he was a Jew, one of the Children of Israel. He was very sorry to see his relations so cruelly treated, and sometimes he would walk down to the part of the town where the Jews lived, and would look at them as they toiled at the hard work which Pharaoh gave them to do.

One day Moses saw one of the Egyptians being very unkind to a Jew, and he ran to them and defended the Jew, and killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand; he thought the Jews would understand that God was going to send him to deliver them.

But the next day when he wished to settle a quarrel between two of the Children of Israel, they did not like it, and asked him if he was going to kill them as he did the Egyptian yesterday?

Then Moses was frightened, and left Pharaoh's beautiful palace, and all the splendour that he had enjoyed all his life, and went away quite far from Egypt for forty years! Here he was married and had two sons, and he kept his father-in-law's flocks, and lived very happily.

At length, when he was watching the sheep one day near to a mountain, the angel of God appeared to him in a flame of fire, out of the midst of a bush. Moses thought the sight so wonderful that he came closer to look at it, and then God called to him out of the burning bush and told him not to come near, as God Himself was there, and the place was very holy.

And the Lord said, what will comfort every one of us to remember, if we are in any trouble or sorrow, "I have surely seen the affliction of My people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows; and am come down to deliver them out of the hands of the Egyptians. Come now therefore, and I will send you to Pharaoh, that you may bring forth My people out of Egypt."

But at first Moses was very much afraid that the Children of Israel would not trust him, and he almost wanted God to send some other messenger who would do the work better.

But God was very patient with Moses; He kept on assuring him that He would help him in every difficulty, "Certainly I will be with thee," He said.

At last Moses told the Lord that the people would say that he had not seen God at all; and then the Lord asked him what it was which he held in his hand?