Holly Bible - KJV with Concise Commentaries by Z Selam - HTML preview
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(2.) It pleases him to think of going to see him. Though he was old, and the journey long, yet he would go to see Joseph, because Joseph's business would not permit him to come to see him. Observe, He says, "I will go and see him," not, "I will go and live with him;" Jacob was old, and did not expect to live long; "But I will go and see him before I die, and then let me depart in peace; let my eyes be refreshed with this sight before they are closed, and then it is enough, I need no more to make me happy in this world." Note, It is good for us all to make death familiar to us, and to speak of it as near, that we may think how little we have to do before we die, that we may do it with all our might, and may enjoy our comforts as those that must quickly die, and leave them.
Genesis -46
Jacob and His Family in Egypt
1 And Israel took his journey with all that he had, and came to Beer-
sheba, and offered sacrifices unto the God of his father Isaac.
How he acknowledged God in this way. He came to Beersheba, from Hebron, where he now dwelt; and there he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac, Ge 46:1. He chose that place, in remembrance of the communion which his father and grandfather had with God in that place. Abraham called on God there (Ge 21:33), so did Isaac (Ge 26:25), and therefore Jacob made it the place of his devotion, the rather because it lay in his way. In his devotion,
1. He had an eye to God as the God of his father Isaac, that is, a God in covenant with him; for by Isaac the covenant was entailed upon him. God had forbidden Isaac to go down to Egypt when there was a famine in Canaan (Ge 26:2), which perhaps Jacob calls to mind when he consults God as the God of his father Isaac, with this thought, "Lord, though I am very desirous to see Joseph, yet if thou forbid me to go down to Egypt, as thou didst my father Isaac, I will submit, and very contentedly stay where I am."