Genesis 49:1-4

Jacob called to his sons, and said: “Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which will happen to you in the days to come.

Assemble yourselves, and hear, you sons of Jacob.Listen to Israel, your father.
“Reuben, you are my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength;
excelling in dignity, and excelling in power.
Boiling over like water, you shall not excel;
because you went up to your father’s bed,
then defiled it. He went up to my couch.

One of the difficult things about reading this history book has been the fact that little has been spoken about the morality of what has been going on. Here we are at the end of Genesis and we hear the prophesy of Jacob about his own children. In this prophesy, we hear the heart of God and what He thought about what had been going on in Genesis.

Remember that Reuben, the first born, slept with his step-mother. In the historical record, God didn’t say anything about what he thought until now. Now we can clearly see that this is wrong and should not be done. God took away some of Reuben’s blessing because he did this thing.

Notice what this also tells us about those who have dignity and power. They may not have purity, and it is purity that will be the thing that will actually cause them to excel. So we learn that true excellence is connected with purity more than power and dignity.

We also learn that power and strength can actually be abused. It can boil over and fail in its purpose. This is a lesson to everyone who has a lot of earthly strength. What we need is the wisdom that goes with that strength. No one is too big to fail when they are living an impure life. We know from other parts of the Bible that this principle applies to whole countries too.