[Text: Gen. 34] “Not To Be Taken Lightly”

It is difficult to read this story. There is a darkness and evil seen in this chapter that makes me long to see more light, more hope than it presents. As we read this, we’ll be seeing some of the worst of humanity on vivid display. But remember that there is a reason why God gave us even this difficult passage. We need to understand the weightiness of sin to embrace the greater weight of His grace.

[Read and Pray – Father, we need you. We need you to come to us by Your Spirit and open our ears and hearts to hear your Word. Father, have mercy and convict us, then lead us up to the cross to see the forgiveness you have offered in your Son. And in the empty tomb of Jesus let us find rest for our bodies and souls.]

In trying to make sense of all this evil, it helps to remember who the original audience of this story was. Israel heard it as they were rescued from slavery in Egypt and were headed toward the Promised Land, a land then occupied by the Canaanite peoples. And when they got there they were going to face two severe temptations. First, they would be tempted to take lightly the word of God and take the easy road of entry into the Land. All they had to do was join themselves to the current inhabitants through intermarriage. But God had said that was not the way, so, Moses’ words here function as a warning against the Canaanites and their ways. But second, and just as important, Israel, because of their own hearts, would be tempted to treat as light and insignificant all of the things of God. So again, Moses warns that Israel needs to take sin – the natural tendency of all humanity toward rebellion against Yahweh – take it very seriously. Joining themselves to the Canaanites was no light matter. But neither was the sin in the Israelites’ own hearts that could lead them to take lightly all the things of God.

So as the Israelites heard this dark story about their fathers, they would have heard about no heroes, no paragons of faith, no one who considered the full weight of Yahweh’s glory. What they heard was a story of predator and prey, murderers and victims, sin leading to sin and more sin, each more grievous than the last in a landslide of evil that threatened to destroy the people of God. And there was no escape from guilt, especially for the people of God. This is a story in need of a hero as everyone involved takes so lightly the things of Yahweh.

But I can’t point any fingers. There are so many times that I take lightly the things of Yahweh. I take His commands lightly when I prefer running after my own ways of life. I take His sacraments lightly and make them more about me than about the abundant grace they point toward and apply to me. I even take His holiness – His perfection that is farther above me than the highest heavens are from the earth – I take His holiness lightly and offend it through compromise with “little sins” and say, “Well at least I’m not __________.” And I know I’m not alone in that.

So look with me at this dark story and let it do its work in our hearts, warning us of the true weight of our sin and creating longing in our hearts to embrace the grace that has been shown to us in Jesus.

The very first thing to notice in chapter 34 is what is NOT there. The name of Yahweh is completely absent – not a single mention of God at all. That tells us something about Jacob and his family. Even though he’d experienced incredible grace from Yahweh in his reconciliation with Esau and his return to the Promised Land, Jacob had failed to fulfill his vow to Yahweh by returning to Bethel. Instead he’d ended up in Shechem, a center of trade and wealth that was much more comfortable than Bethel. And even though he’d built and altar when they first arrived, these several years later the name of Yahweh was far from his own lips and the lips of his children. It appears that the worship of Yahweh was a light thing to Jacob. And if it is a light thing to the father, then why would it be weighty and important to the children?

So we see Dinah, Leah’s daughter by Jacob, going out to see “the women of the land.” To our ears, that seems innocent enough. But the only other place where the phrase “the women of the land” appears is when Rebekah is speaking to Isaac at the end of chapter 27. She doesn’t want Jacob to marry “one of the women of the land” (meaning one of the Canaanite women like the ones Esau had married, who want nothing to do with Yahweh). So hearing that Dinah was out with “women of the land” meant, at the least, Dinah was not keeping the best of company. But even that comes back on to Jacob’s head.

It comes back on Jacob because allowing one’s daughter to roam so unwisely with the world isn’t even practiced by conservative families in the middle-east today and it certainly wasn’t practiced then. But when you think about Jacob’s relationship with Dinah’s mother, Leah, the whole situation might make a little more sense. Jacob didn’t love Leah, Dinah’s mother, and so we have to wonder how much his loving concern fell on Dinah. Jacob’s failure as a father, combined with taking lightly his vow to Yahweh as he moved his family to Shechem, opened the door to what follows.

Shechem, the son of the prince of the city, saw Dinah alone and took advantage of her by force. Let no one here misunderstand – though Dinah was wrong to join herself to “the women of the land,” no one can say that she simply got what she deserved. Dinah was foolish, yes, and should have been loved enough at home to be disciplined. But instead Dinah became a victim of Shechem’s unrestrained lust. The text is clear in the progression of the verbs in v. 2. “He seized… (he) lay with…and (he) humiliated her.” She did not deserve this evil and the blame falls on Shechem and her father. It wasn’t her fault.

It grieves me to think that, in all likelihood, Dinah’s humiliation has been experienced by some of you here today. For that I am deeply mournful. No one should have to endure such savagery, and no one should be accused of bringing such pain on themselves. The blame belongs to those who commit such evil.

But it also appears that forgiveness is possible. Although his actions at the first are so deeply sinful, it appears that he does not truly hate Dinah as so many offenders do their victims afterward. What we see is Shechem actually speaking tenderly to Dinah –literally, “he spoke to her heart,” which seems to indicate that his words of love were actually received by Dinah. Otherwise his request of his father wouldn’t make much sense. He very likely would not have asked his father to get her for a wife had she hated and refused his love. I’m not saying that’s what has to happen. I’m just saying that seems to be what happened in this case.

In v. 5 the news of what happened has come to Jacob. His sons weren’t home, though, so Jacob keeps silent until they got there. At that time, Shechem and his father, Hamor, the prince of the city, come to Jacob to make a request. But when Dinah’s brothers, the eleven sons of Jacob, hear about what happened, anger wells up in them because of this outrageous thing that had been done in Israel. I’d say of them, “So far, so good.” Anger at such sin is not wrong.

But from this point to the end of the story, all we see is how lightly sin is taken and how lightly the things of God are taken.

So, Hamor and Shechem have an offer. On the surface it sounds (sort of) honorable. It actually sounds like what is supposed to happen in these situations, even among the people of Israel as Yahweh later gives a law in Deuteronomy 22:28-29,

[28] “If a man meets a virgin who is not betrothed, and seizes her and lies with her, and they are found, [29] then the man who lay with her shall give to the father of the young woman fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife, because he has violated her. He may not divorce her all his days.”

That’s what you hear from Shechem’s own mouth in v. 11-12 as he says “…whatever you say to me I will give. Ask me for as great a bride price and gift as you will, and I will give [it]. Only give me the young woman to be my wife.”

But what you don’t hear from Shechem is any sort of repentance for how they got to be in this situation in the first place. He takes the issue of his forcing himself on Dinah very lightly, which is unfortunately what one would expect from someone outside of a relationship with Yahweh, both then and now. When there is no fear of the Lord, why would there be repentance over sin? Sin is a light thing to those who do not have a holy God.

But Hamor also suggest that they should make a larger agreement to actually unite their two tribes into one large (and very powerful) family. From their point of view, there is nothing but advantages and they sell it pretty hard to Jacob and his sons as well as to their own tribe later on.

At this point we see two things happen. First, and most significant, is another one of Jacob’s failures. Instead of him dealing with this request as the patriarch of the family, indeed the patriarch of all the people of God, we see him disappearing behind his sons and allowing, through his silence and in-action, all of the evil that follows. And second we see his sons stepping forward in v. 13 and answering Hamor’s request “deceitfully.” That word isn’t just telling us they lied about their intention to join the families together. The word for “deceitful” here means there was treachery involved. What we understand is that all of the evil that followed was already in their hearts the very moment they answered Hamor’s request. In their hearts, Hamor and Shechem and everyone in the city were already murdered in cold blood.

And what were the terms they treacherously set to join the families together? They said they would join their tribes if all of the men of Shechem were circumcised.

Stop right there and think about everything circumcision stands for at this time of the Story. It is the sign of cleansing and the forgiveness of sin by Yahweh. It is the sign of entrance into the people of God, admission into the family of those being saved through faith in Yahweh and rest in His promises. It is the sacrament that sealed to those who received it by faith the redemption that God had promised in the beginning and confirmed to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Truly offered and embraced, this offer made to Hamor, his son and his people could have been a blessing to them!

Instead the sons of Jacob use what should be a blessing to be a curse to the people of Shechem as the sign is robbed of all redemptive meaning. It is simply a painful act that means lust can be satisfied; both Shechem’s lust for Dinah and Jacob’s son’s lust for revenge. Through their treacherous plan, through taking lightly the holy sacrament from Yahweh, Jacob’s sons turn the sign of the covenant into a weapon.

And through ignorance, Hamor and Shechem agree. But consider this; how lightly do they take their own actions? Though Jacob’s sons rob them of the knowledge of what circumcision means, what are the motives behind their willingness to embrace circumcision? For them, circumcision was merely a means of gain. That’s what they say when they go home to Shechem in vv. 18-24. They say, “Look, these people are at peace with us. We’ll be one people with them and all we have to do is endure a little pain. If we do that, won’t everything that is theirs become ours?” And every man listened to them; every man in Shechem was circumcised.

What irony! They lightly thought that through circumcision all that belonged to Israel would become theirs. But instead of Israel’s possessions belonging to Shechem, in three days all that belonged to Shechem would fall into the hands of Israel. They had no idea the weight of treachery and evil that was about to fall on them through Jacob’s son’s abuse of the covenant sign.

I shudder to think of the scene vv. 25-29 paints. When the men were at their sorest, when the crudely performed procedure had surely subjected some of the men to painful infections and they were at their most helpless, Simeon and Levi, Dinah’s two oldest, full brothers, fell on the city. They made their way through the town systematically, bursting into homes and slaughtering men in their beds, coldly murdering every male as they took their sister back. Such reckless vengeance! Such rage-fueled violence that goes beyond justice! For the sin of one man – a terrible and evil sin though it was – for the sin of one man the men of an entire city were murdered in premeditated, treacherous hate by these followers of Yahweh. And although Simeon and Levi wield the swords, all the sons of Jacob plunder the city – taking the animals, their wealth, their little children and the wives of the men whose blood filled the streets – because “they” had defiled their sister.

And after his sons come home, what do you hear from Jacob? Not concern for the sinful abuse of the covenant sign. Not outrage at the immoral vengeance taken by Simeon and Levi as they set themselves up as the judges of sin only to fall into worse sin than what they sought to punish. What we hear from Jacob is deep and focused concern – for his own welfare – and fear about retaliation from the other neighboring peoples. So is it any surprise that his sons are unrepentant in the end, thinking their sin to be a light thing when compared to the sin done to their sister? Once again Jacob fails in both his calling as a father and as the representative of the people of the covenant.

So how do you feel here at the end of chapter 34? Oh, how this story would make the readers long for the day when such sin, even of the people of God, would be dealt with and removed from the earth! Everyone involved is dripping with sin and guilt, especially the people of God. As evil as Shechem’s actions were, the evil of Jacob and his sons far exceeded them! They knew the grace and mercy of God and yet they showed none toward the men of Shechem. They knew the weight of glory circumcision signified but used it as a weapon of vengeance instead of a means of grace and blessing. This is a story that would have left Israel, like us, longing for some ray of light, for some hero. But there is none in chapter 34.

It is important to remember that these chapter and verse divisions are something that we have developed over time to simplify searches, etc. That can confuse us and make us think this passage is meant to stand alone. But it isn’t, of course. It’s part of a larger story, one that continues and moves forward into another chapter. So keep in mind the heaviness of sin and the hopelessness that you feel at the end of chapter 34. Then look at the opening of chapter 35. Part of it is on the front of your bulletin today.

Chapter 35 opens with this, “God said to Jacob, ‘Arise, go up to Bethel and dwell there. Make an altar there to the God who appeared to you when you fled from your brother Esau.’”

In this one phrase we see the reality that the larger Story has been driving home ever since the beginning. There is no hero of this Story other than Yahweh. When all of humanity would be crushed under the weight of their guilt, Yahweh sends the greater weight of His grace to fall on His people. Far from rejecting Jacob and his family as they deserve, Yahweh comes to them and calls them back to Himself, calling them to repent and return to Him in worship.

But here’s a question: Is God unjust? He allowed Simeon and Levi to destroy a people because of a single sin, but He had mercy and spared Simeon and Levi for taking both their sin and Yahweh so lightly? So is Yahweh unjust? The answer is “No” because of this reason from Romans 3:

“…God put (Jesus) forward as a propitiation [that is, an atoning sacrifice] by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”(Rom. 3:25-26)

God demonstrated His intense hatred of what Simeon and Levi, members of His covenant people, did, but He was patient with them and put off the punishment of their sin until the fullness of time when Jesus came into the Story. Yahweh put off the full punishment of the sins of all his people until He poured out all of His justice, His righteous anger and hatred at such evil, fully onto the shoulders of Jesus on the cross. Look at Jesus’ suffering there and see Yahweh punishing the sin of Simeon and Levi. See there the agony that should have been Jacob’s being endured by his Substitute. See there the sins of all the people of God throughout time, even mine and yours, both past and present and future, being atoned for in the flesh of the suffering Savior. That is how seriously God took the sins of His people. In mercy toward us He crushed His own Son beneath the weight of them all. And through the death of Christ, the justice of Yahweh was satisfied once for all for the sins of those who look toward Jesus in faith.

If God has taken sin so seriously, then my thinking needs to conform to His. But that is difficult, is it not? So, we thank God for the gift of His Spirit who is at work in us – a slow and painful work though it may be – but a work of grace to change us and make us more like our Savior.

The Spirit convicts us, especially us fathers, when we see Jacob’s sin wreaking havoc among his children. But by God’s grace to us in Christ, we can lament our failures to embrace the weightiness of the things of God – like public and home worship, loving our children and leading them well, and taking hold of the means of grace – we lament and repent of our failure in these things while knowing that Christ has paid for all our sins and means to grow us in grace and empower us to pursue new obedience!

And the Spirit convicts us when we would set ourselves over other sinners, deeming ourselves more worthy of grace than them because their sins are somehow worse than ours. In the Gospel we see more clearly that we who know the Lord are actually the greater sinners. Grace, far from making light of our sin and inflating us with pride, actually humbles us and helps us to deal more gently with sinners now, desiring their repentance and redemption. And grace helps us to wait more patiently for God to demonstrate His justice against sin, knowing He has promised the Day will come when all the wrongs of this world are made right again.

So let us not take lightly the Word of the Lord. Let us not take lightly our callings as parents. Let us not take lightly the things of God like His worship, His commandments, His sacraments or His promises. Let us not take lightly our calling to be a blessing to the nations by proclaiming the forgiveness of sins in the death of Christ. And let us not take lightly the hope of the resurrection and the hope that Jesus is making all things new! In Christ we ARE new creations – the old HAS gone and the new HAS come. We are simply called to live in line with what we already are in Jesus.

But when we do take these things lightly, when we do fail in our callings, becoming curses to ourselves and others, let us not take lightly the greater weight of grace that has been shown to us in Jesus. It is for sinners like Jacob and Simeon and Levi and me that Jesus came to die, to earn forgiveness. If such as us could be welcomed into the people of God, then why not you? Where our sin abounds, his grace and mercy is super-abundant, surpassing all that we need even to the point that there is no condemnation that can stick to us, nor is there anything that can separate us from the love of God our Father, which is ours in Christ. So to him direct your faith and you will find the weight of glory and grace and forgiveness and new life is far greater than the weight of your sin.

A prayer by Ligon Duncan: “Our Heavenly Father, we bow before You and we acknowledge this to be Your word. We ask that You would speak to our own hearts, if we have been tempted to abuse the holy of our own ends, convict us of it. If we have failed to see our responsibility to be a blessing to the nations, convict us of it. If we have been blissfully unaware of our own potential for sin, even as believers, convict us of it, O Lord, and even as we read this passage, and its sadness, we pray that You would convict us of the truthfulness of Your word. You are holy, and You are pure, and You are good. Your people are not yet. And so O Lord, we look to You and to You alone.”