In Joshua 17, we find the disgruntled descendants of Joseph, the tribe of Manasseh, dissatisfied with the portion of Canaan that was administered to them by Joshua and Eleazar the priest. Scripture details that the tribe of Manasseh had strengthened and grown in number, which they now felt entitled them to more than one portion of the Promised Land.
“And Joshua answered them, ‘If thou be a great people, then get thee up to the wood country, and cut down for thyself there in the land of the Perizzites and of the giants, if mount Ephraim be too narrow for thee.’ And Joshua spake unto the house of Joseph, even to Ephraim and to Manasseh, saying, ‘Thou art a great people, and hast great power: thou shalt not have one lot only: But the mountain shall be thine; for it is a wood, and thou shalt cut it down: and the outgoings of it shall be thine: for thou shalt drive out the Canaanites, though they have iron chariots, and though they be strong.’” Joshua 17:14-18. (KJV)
Joshua gives ear to Manasseh’s discontent and encourages them not to wait, but to possess the land! Joshua uses the Hebrew verb, “bara” in the original translation indicating that the power to “cut it down” will be divine in origin and God will shape the result to the benefit of Manasseh! Sadly, even with the assurance of divine help from their anointed leader, he never moves to take the mountain, choosing instead to rest on the more comfortable cushion of complaint and entitlement.
Joshua, Israel’s leader in this Scriptural setting, is a type and shadow of Christ. The priest Eleazar, whose name means “the help of God,” is often thought by scholars to be the foreshadowing personification of the Holy Ghost in the New Testament. Together, they administered the promised land to the tribes of Israel. Let us learn from Manasseh, not only to face whatever mountain of disappointment or opposition may appear in our lives but to cut it down through the authority we have in Jesus and by the inimitable power of the Holy Ghost. We are a great people with great power!
Let us learn from Manasseh, not only to face whatever mountain of disappointment or opposition may appear in our lives but to cut it down through the authority we have in Jesus and by the inimitable power of the Holy Ghost.
Kara Moses
Generations before the tribe of Manasseh failed to take their mountain, we see Joseph bringing his sons, Manasseh and Ephraim, to meet the father that he had missed so desperately throughout his decades of lonely toil in Egypt. Watching Israel painstakingly pull up his last few ounces of strength to bless the grandchildren that he had never known must have been beautiful torture for Joseph. The weight of so many missed moments, coupled with the joy of this unexpected reunion could have brought any man to his knees. Through tear-filled eyes, Joseph watched the decidedly aged, trembling hands of his beloved father rest on the heads of his two sons to pass on the blessings of his father and his father before him. Israel then turned toward Joseph in this divinely orchestrated and undeniably sacred encounter that Genesis 48 describes:
“And he blessed Joseph, and said, God, before whom my father’s Abraham and Isaac did walk, the God which fed me all my life long unto this day. And Israel said unto Joseph, Behold, I die: but God shall be with you, and bring you again unto the land of your fathers. Moreover, I have given to thee one portion above thy brethren…” Genesis 48:15, 21-22 (KJV).
In Hebrew, the one portion that Israel conveys in his blessing over Joseph directly translates into the word “Shechem” or shoulder. It’s in this heaven-sent, full-circle encounter in Scripture that we begin to understand what Shechem means in the life of Joseph. The horrible pit Joseph found himself tossed into by his brothers at the beginning of his journey into Egypt was in Shechem. Now, we can clearly see Shechem, not as the vehicle of intolerable pain, but as the shoulder upon which God carried Joseph into untold promises and kept His covenant with Abraham.
It was Jacob, before he became Israel, in Genesis chapter 28, who traded in his own pillow of self-interest that the later generations of Manasseh chose to embrace.
“And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And, behold, the Lord stood above it, and said, I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed;” Genesis 28:11-13 (KJV).
Jacob went on, in Genesis chapter 32, to wrestle with the Angel of the Lord until he obtained the blessing of God. The Angel blessed him and touched the hollow of his hip producing a physical limp that would forever remind him of whose shoulder upon which he must always lean. It was the knowledge of this divine shoulder that Israel gave to his son, Joseph, as his portion of blessing and it was this shoulder that the tribe of Manasseh turned its back on generations later. Let us not be pillowed by complacency as Manasseh was but let us hold fast to the promises of God and carry onward through the power of the Holy Ghost to seize whatever mountain of disappointment would arise in our own lives for we know whose shoulder upon which we are forever carried!
Let us not be pillowed by complacency as Manasseh was but let us hold fast to the promises of God and carry onward through the power of the Holy Ghost to seize whatever mountain of disappointment would arise in our own lives for we know whose shoulder upon which we are forever carried!
Kara Moses
“…For I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.” 2 Timothy 1:12 (KJV).
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