If you have ever wondered why the tribes of Israel don’t include a Tribe of Joseph, this meeting between Jacob, Joseph and Joseph’s two sons provides the answer.

The mother of Joseph’s sons is not an Israelite, but instead a high-ranking Egyptian lady. Abraham’s descendants have all been instructed to take wives from their own people, even if it has meant travelling all the way back to the land of their origin. Joseph could not do that, and his sons risk being excluded from the inheritance of the promise of God.

Jacob’s solution to this is to essentially adopt Ephraim and Manasseh as his own sons, and to give them equal standing with Joseph’s brothers. At the same time, he gives them an irrevocable blessing, just as he himself had been blessed by his own father, Isaac. This became the fourth generation where the younger son was blessed ahead of the older son!

Ephraim and Manasseh were brought into the inheritance of the promise by adoption, just as we are! In his letter to the Romans, Paul tells us that, “all who live by the Spirit of God are sons of God” (Romans 8:14). Through God’s gracious choice, he “predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 1:5). This allows us to cry ‘Abba Father’! Instead of being slaves, we are sons and heirs.

It is Jesus who paid the price for our adoption, but the process is not without cost for us too. In the same passage in Romans, Paul urges us to “put to death the deeds of the body”, and to be prepared to suffer with Christ so that we may be glorified with him. We are sons and heirs with Christ. It is both a privilege and a responsibility.

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NEWBOLD COMMUNITY CHURCH