Genesis 49:18

I have waited for Thy salvation, of Lord

Times of waiting

A parenthesis in Jacob’s long blessing of his sons.

Exhausted with the thoughts and visions which passed over his mind in such quick succession, he paused to take a spiritual inspiration: “I have waited for Thy salvation, O Lord.”

1. Such Chapter s of life, such seasons of suspense, such exercises of the quiet confidences of the soul, are to be found in every Christian’s experience. They may come in different ways to different men, but they are in some form or other a necessity to every man--an essential part of the discipline of the school of salvation.

2. These intervals of waiting must be filled up with four things: prayer, praise, fellowship, and work.

3. It will be a helpful thought to you as you wait, that if you wait, Christ waits. Whatever your longing is that the time be over, His longing is greater. There are many things that you have had that have turned to a curse, which would have been blessings if only there had been more “waiting.” (J. Vaughan, M. A.)

Waiting for salvation:

1. From these words we may learn what was the nature of that inheritance which the patriarchs regarded as bequeathed to them by the Divine promises. The patriarchs looked for salvation.

2. We learn from the text what had been the great characteristic of Jacob’s life from the time that he was first brought under the power of Divine grace. His affections had been set on things above. His chief interest had lain in eternity.

3. The language of Jacob in the text proves most fully the truth elsewhere stated, that “the righteous hath hope in his death.” Practical questions:

(1) Do you know what is meant by the salvation of the Lord?

(2) Do you know what is meant by waiting for salvation--i.e., ardently but patiently looking forward to it?

(3) Do you know what is meant by preparing while you wait for the salvation of the Lord? (A. D. Davidson.)

Jacob’s dying confidence:

I. THE IMPORTANT OBJECT FOR WHICH THE PATRIARCH WAITED.

1. Salvation is present in its commencement.

2. Salvation is future in its consummation.

II. THE GLORIOUS BEING IN WHOM THE PATRIARCH CONFIDED.

1. Salvation is Divinely devised and provided.

2. Salvation is Divinely revealed and promised.

3. Salvation is Divinely imparted and realized.

III. THE SACRED EXERCISE IN WHICH THE PATRIARCH WAS OCCUPIED.

1. We must wait for salvation patiently.

2. We must wait for salvation believingly.

3. We must wait for salvation importunately.

4. We must wait for salvation perseveringly. (Sketches of Sermons.)

Jacob’s dying words:

I. The believer can use this language of the text, because he will be PUT, AT DEATH, IN POSSESSION OF A GLORIOUS INHERITANCE--“I have waited,” said Jacob, “for Thy salvation”; language implying that there was a future good not yet attained, long as he had been a subject of the Divine government, seeking humbly and holily to “ walk with God.”

II. The words imply Jacob’s WILLINGNESS TO LEAVE HIS CHOICEST EARTHLY COMFORTS. He looked for a better heritage, not exposed to vicissitude and change; not amidst a dark and idolatrous land, but in the region of glory where cherubim and seraphim abide; not accorded by the bounty of Pharaoh, but prepared by God for His people. He looked to a house, the “builder and maker of which is God.” He lived under a darker dispensation than ours; but he had heard the invitation, “Come up hither”: “Enter, thou blessed of the Lord.” If then, like Jacob, we have been reconciled and brought near through the “blood of the everlasting covenant,” are we not warranted in thinking that God will not leave His people comfortless at the last?

III. Jacob had EXPERIENCED MANY TRIALS AND BEEN SUBJECT TO MANY SORROWS. The words, accordingly, seem to have been spoken in assured belief that these would soon be past.

IV. The Christian may feel the force of Jacob’s words, inasmuch as he expects to be favoured with the nearer vision of, and to hold CONGENIAL INTERCOURSE WITH, THE SAVIOUR. (A. R. Bonar, D. D.)

Salvation

Salvation! Blessed be God, that our fallen earth has heard the joyful sound! It is unheard in hell. Blessed be the grace which brought it to your ears! To multitudes it is a tuneless cymbal. Salvation! It peoples the many mansions of the heavenly kingdom. Salvation I It is a roll written by Jehovah’s pen. It is the decree of Divine councils: the fruit of omniscient mind: the first-born of unmeasured love: the perfection of eternal thought: the strength of omnipotence. Salvation! It is the work for which Jesus was born in Bethlehem, and lived on earth, and died at Calvary, and descended into the grave, and burst the bonds of death, and mounted to heaven, and sits on the right, hand of God. For this He reigns and prays on high. It is the work for which the Spirit seeks our earth, and knocks at the barred entrance of the sinner’s heart. For this He assails the fortress of self-love, and reveals the perils of sin, and wrestles with ignorance and vain excuses. Salvation! It is the first message which mercy uttered to a ruined world. It is the end of every prophecy--the purport of every precept--the beauty of every promise--the truth of every sacrifice--the substance of every rite--the song of every inspired lip--the longing desire of every renewed heart--the beacon which guides through the voyage of life--the haven to which the tides of grace convey--the end of faith, the full light of hope, the home of love. Salvation! It is the absence of this blessing which builds the prison-house of hell, which kindles the never-quenched fires-which forges the eternal chains which wraps the dreary regions in one mantle of blackness--which gives keenness to the undying worm--which blows up the smoke of torment--which gives the bitterness of despair to the hopeless wail. Does any eager soul exclaim, Tell me, further, wherein Salvation’s blessedness consists? It is a blessed rescue, to change ceaseless wailings into endless praise: the blackness of darkness into the glories of brightness beyond the sun in his strength. Does any add, Let me clearly understand how this is all accomplished! Come, see the excellent things which Jesus works. He saves by rescuing from hell. He saves by giving title to heaven. He saves by meetening for heaven. He by His Spirit dethrones the love of sin: implants delight in God. It is great, because willed, provided, accepted by a great God, even the Father: because wrought out and finished by a great God, even Jesus: because applied by a great God, even the Spirit. It is great, because it averts great woe: bestows great grace: and blesses a great multitude. O my soul! see to it that you are saved. (Dean Law.)

The death-bed:

I. WHAT IS THIS SALVATION OF WHICH JACOB SPEAKS? As a dying man, he speaks of a salvation towards which he had looked, and for which he had waited until that hour. What that salvation really is, we now know by clear and unequivocal revelation; but the question before us is, what it was in Jacob’s estimation, what it was in its actual results upon the dying believer of his day? The full knowledge of the salvation of the gospel gives victory over sin, and death, and the grave.

1. Salvation with him would be deliverance from the burden of the flesh. A mind so spiritual as his, and so habituated to intercourse with the great Father of spirits, could not but discriminate between the immortal spirit and the perishable tenement in which it was confined. He had long experienced the sorrows incident to this imperfect state. The infirmities of age had long been stealing upon him.

2. The salvation for which he looked would be deliverance from sin. Sin was a permanent evil, with which, in some form or other, he had to contend in every period of his life. In youth, maturity, and age, it had still been, in one way or other, the cause of his anxiety. He had, however, attained by faith to the hope of the remission of sin. He leaned upon “the Angel that redeemed him from all evil.” The system of grace, however fully or scantily revealed, was to him a sufficient ground of hope and practical comfort in the house of his pilgrimage.

3. Jacob would include also in this salvation the high and permanent felicities of an eternal existence. I have waited all the days of my appointed time until my change come. And now, O Lord, fulfil all that I have been led to hope for, and crown this faint and failing spirit with immortal strength, and blessedness, and perfection.

4. Jacob evidently implied, in this strong expression of reliance upon God, the expectation of deliverance from the evils of death itself. The act of dissolution is an event from which human nature shrinks. It is unnatural. It is the consequence of sin. But, Lord, I have waited for Thy salvation. I have looked for complete deliverance. Let my Shepherd and my Guide be with me in the shadowy valley. O God most holy, O Lord most mighty, O merciful Saviour, Thou most worthy Judge Eternal, suffer me not, at my last hour, for any pains of death, to fall from Thee. Here, then, we have a view of the salvation for which Jacob waited.

II. WHAT ARE WE TO UNDERSTAND BY JACOB HAVING WAITED FOR THIS SALVATION? He refers to the habit of his previous life, to the whole tenor of his course. “This has been the grand object of my existence. This is the thing for which I have sought.”

1. The expression implies that he had believed the truth of this salvation; but of this we need say nothing, for every step of his life exhibits his willing acceptance of the promise of deliverance, and his perfect satisfaction with the covenant of mercy.

2. He had sought for this salvation in the zealous use of the means of grace, in the way of holy and prayerful obedience.

3. He had expected this salvation with increasing affection. It became more and more the object of endeared attachment. To wait, implies the intense occupation of the soul.

4. That Jacob waited implies that he was patient. A waiting spirit is a patient and submissive one. His is not a petulant wish, in a moment of dissatisfaction, to depart; but a calm and even energy of soul bearing towards immortality.

Lessons:

1. Be thankful that, in a rebellious and lost world, the benevolence and the wisdom of God provided, even in the earlier stages of our history, a means of redemption so ample and effective, and left on an infallible record such bright examples for our encouragement and comfort. Let us thank God, and take courage.

2. Again, be humbled when you compare the faith of earlier days with ours in days so rich in evangelical privilege.

3. Lastly, be diligent, then, that you may be found of God in peace, without spot and blameless. (E. Craig.)

The believer waiting for God’s salvation:

I. THE LIVING SAINT’S CHARACTER. He is one who is “waiting for the salvation of God.” By the term “salvation” here, we are probably to understand the Saviour Himself--the Messiah who had been promised. By the words he uses in the text, Jacob evidently expressed his faith in the testimony of God as to the coming of the Messiah, to whom he looked, as every guilty sinner must do, and in whose name he trusted for salvation and eternal life. Salvation, taken in its fullest sense, expresses all that the soul can require for time and eternity. And well might this good old saint, Jacob, say here, in addressing God, “Thy salvation.” The glorious design of saving sinners of the human race by a Mediator was conceived in the infinite Mind, and determined upon in the counsels of God, before the foundations of the world were laid, or even time had begun its course. For this salvation Jacob had waited. Numerous had been the incidents of his past life, but amidst them all he had kept his eye fixed on the salvation of God, and had consequently passed through things temporal so as not to lose those things which were eternal.

II. THE DYING SAINT’S COMFORT. Brethren, there is no real comfort in dying moments, but that which comes from having waited for God, and being in immediate prospect of entering on a full and uninterrupted enjoyment of the salvation of God; a lively and well-grounded confidence that we are in Christ, and shall be saved in Him, with an everlasting salvation; a hope that maketh not ashamed, that we are heirs of, and are about to be admitted to, glory, honour, and immortality. Sorrow is banished, and desire fully satisfied. A well-grounded hope of thus receiving the end of his faith, even the salvation of his soul, and of being admitted to the felicities, full and perfect and enduring, of the heavenly world, affords strong and abundant consolation to a dying saint. To enjoy this salvation at death and in eternity, it must now be sought by you. (W. Snell.)

Waiting for salvation:

I. How BELIEVERS LIVE. They live waiting for the salvation of the Lord. This comprehends many important particulars both in doctrine and experience.

1. A conviction of the need of salvation. The sick man only needs healing; the man in danger only needs rescuing: to offer to one that is not sick a remedy, and to one that is not lost, salvation, would only be mockery. And this teaches us the reason of a fact which is awful: the whole, in their own estimation, refuse a physician; those who are unconscious that they are lost, ruined, and undone, neglect the great salvation.

2. A knowledge of the method by which salvation is to be obtained. Waiting for a thing implies a sense of its value and importance.

3. Diligence in the use of those means with which the salvation of the soul is connected. Faith and hope do not lie dormant in the heart; they are active principles, always in exercise. The more diligent and devout your attendance on the means which God has appointed in dependence on the influences of the Spirit, the more clear will be your vision, the more fervent your desires, the more full your foretastes of salvation. Waiting on the Lord, you shall renew your strength, and go on in the beauty of holiness, till you appear perfect before God in Zion.

4. That the hope of salvation is the grand support of the believer, and the only source of his consolations under all the sufferings to which he is exposed. He “endures, as seeing Him that is invisible,” and “in hope rejoices against hope.”

II. How BELIEVERS DIE. The reigning temper of his heart is still the same. He lived, and now he dies, “waiting for the salvation of the Lord.” “The ruling passion” is “strong in death.” The last emotion, when nature sinks, and all is feebleness and decay, is a desire for the salvation of God. And this implies that the believer considers death--

1. As an entrance on immortality. Surely when he says, “I have waited for Thy salvation, O Lord!” it does not imply that he wishes his being to become extinct. David knew that he should live in the presence of God. Jacob knew that when “the earthly house of his tabernacle was dissolved,” he had “a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”

2. As the termination of his sufferings. His temptations and sorrows can follow him no further. At the gate of death he lays down his burden: he is to sigh and suffer no more for ever. His warfare is accomplished. His long, tedious, painful struggles are at an end. Death, which is to some the beginning of sorrows and of sufferings, is to him the end of both.

3. As the harvest, when all the graces of the spirit would be ripened, and matured, and gathered, it is said that the good man shall come to his grave, “like as a shock of corn cometh in his season.” Observe this figure: The fallow ground is first broke up, the seed is sown, and it remains unseen.

But the process of vegetation is going forward; the germ is expanding; ere long the green blade appears. The frosts pass over it, and it withers; but the sun shines, and it recovers. At length, after it has experienced a few storms, and been impeded in its growth by noxious weeds, in consequence of fruitful showers and genial sunshine, it is fully ripe and fit for the harvest. So the fallow ground of the heart is broken up; the good seed of the kingdom, the incipient principles of grace are implanted. They are hidden for a season, but they proceed; there is the principle of vitality; and we see “first the blade, then the ear, and after that the full corn in the ear.” All the graces of the Spirit are then ripened and perfected; faith into vision, hope into fruition, and love is made perfect so as to cast out all fear. Then the believer shall see God without an interposing cloud, love Him with a perfect heart, and serve Him without weariness.

4. An assurance of a glorious resurrection. When Jacob was dying, he took an oath of his son that he would bury him in the land of Canaan. And Joseph also “gave commandment concerning his bones.” What should make these holy men so anxious about the place of their interment? The world is lost to a dead man; and what matters it whether he lies in Egypt or in Canaan? What could it he for, but to express their faith in the promise of God; their belief that death would not cut them off from His favour. The place of their burial, therefore, will remain as a monument of their faith to the latest period of time: and when the angels gather up their fragments, where are they to look for them but in that land where they are laid, and where Christ appeared, and will appear again?

From the whole let us--

1. Learn the vast importance of that salvation which has been an object of desire to the saints of God in all ages. The word signifies deliverance--deliverance from all evil, and introduction to all good.

2. Behold the perfect man, and mark the upright; for the end of that man is peace. If his life is honourable to religion, his death is a confirmation of all that he professed. (W. Thorpe.)