18 Their proposal seemed good to Hamor and his son Shechem. 19 The young man, who was the most honored of all his father’s family, lost no time in doing what they said, because he was delighted with Jacob’s daughter. 20 So Hamor and his son Shechem went to the gate of their city to speak to the men of their city. 21 “These men are friendly toward us,” they said. “Let them live in our land and trade in it; the land has plenty of room for them. We can marry their daughters and they can marry ours. 22 But the men will agree to live with us as one people only on the condition that our males be circumcised, as they themselves are. 23 Won’t their livestock, their property and all their other animals become ours? So let us agree to their terms, and they will settle among us.” 24 All the men who went out of the city gate agreed with Hamor and his son Shechem, and every male in the city was circumcised. ~ Genesis 34:18-24
Today, we return to our study of Genesis 34 which can adequately be defined by three words: Defilement, Deception and Disgrace. Even though Jacob had entered into a personal relationship with the God of the Bible and his faith in Him made it possible for him to find favor with God, Jacob still struggled with the flesh. In fact, we all share this struggle with Jacob. And, when we forsake the truth and are not careful to hide it away in our hearts, the enemy can have a hay day in our lives.
When we entered into a personal relationship with God through His Son, we became "born again." To be "born again" is to made alive to God as a result of His Spirit making our once dead spirit alive to Him. This results in a personal relationship with God. God tells us that now that we are alive to Him, we experience the battle between the Spirit and the flesh. The flesh is the evil that makes us do those things that are contrary to God's will in our lives. It is the flesh that is contrary to the working of the Holy Spirit in, to, and through us.
We have three parts to us: our body, soul and spirit. The arena of our sanctification which is the process of God getting His culture inculcated into us is the arena of our soul. Our soul is made up of our mind, our will, and our emotions. To know God means that we are learning God's thoughts and ways primarily through His word and His Spirit. The changing of our minds and our ways is called in the Bible, sanctification, which is a process that we are engaged in til the day that we go to be with God in heaven. Due to the fact that it is a process explains why we struggle and we have set backs. There are times that we wisely feed the Spirit of God who lives in us. This means that we allow our thoughts and actions to be guided into God's culture by the Holy Spirit. Then, there are times that we unwisely feed the flesh which wants to lead us into sin or the opposite of what God wants for us. Just like Jacob, even though we have entered into a personal relationship with God, we still are engaged in the civil war within between the flesh and the Spirit.
In v.18-19 of today's passage we read, "18 Their proposal seemed good to Hamor and his son Shechem. 19 The young man, who was the most honored of all his father’s family, lost no time in doing what they said, because he was delighted with Jacob’s daughter."
Hamor and Shechem were okay with the proposal that Jacob's sons presented to them, even though it involved circumcision.
Shechem may have taken the wrong steps in his initial dealings with Dinah, but he wanted to make it right and so he immediately went to be circumcised. Shechem was so delighted in what he saw in Dinah, he therefore was willing to endure excruciating pain to have her as his wife.
In v.20-23 of today's passage we read, "20 So Hamor and his son Shechem went to the gate of their city to speak to the men of their city. 21 "These men are friendly toward us," they said. "Let them live in our land and trade in it; the land has plenty of room for them. We can marry their daughters and they can marry ours. 22 But the men will agree to live with us as one people only on the condition that our males be circumcised, as they themselves are. 23 Won’t their livestock, their property and all their other animals become ours? So let us agree to their terms, and they will settle among us."
After being convinced that the men of the city of Shechem needed to be circumcised, Shechem and Hamor went to the gate of the city. In that day in the biblical Middle East, the important affairs of the people were always conducted at the gates of the city. It was the equivalent of the courthouse in America. Anything that needed to be addressed, decided, judged would have been done at the city gates.
Shechem and Hamor knew that in order to get the men of their city to do something which would not be pleasant, they first have to get them to understand the benefits involved. In addition, it was easier to inform the men of the city of the negatives after telling them of the positives. The good news about Jacob's wealth becoming theirs was highlighted first. Greed was the motivation that Shechem and Hamor appealed to first. Of course, the love of money is a very poor motivation for making such a decision. In the same manner that Lucifer duped Eve in the Garden of Eden, so Shechem and Hamor deceived the men of the city.
In 1 John 2:15-16 we read, "15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world."
God warns us against the world because it impairs our proper understanding of His love. We think that the world is outside of us, yet this passage clearly states that the world is inside us. Thus, we naturally love ourselves or our flesh the most. The heart of the matter is a matter of the heart. You see, it is out of the heart that our issues flow. Therefore, we must be careful what we give our hearts to, because what we give our heart to is what we will love and worship. I find it very instructive that the first time the word "worship" appears in the Bible is the same context where the word "love" first appears.
In v.24 of today's passage we read, "All the men who went out of the city gate agreed with Hamor and his son Shechem, and every male in the city was circumcised."
Shechem and Hamor deceived all of the men of Shechem to be circumcised that day. These men lost their ability to think rationally because money was involved. These men were so easily deceived into being circumcised because they expected some form of a kickback from a wealthy man.
In John 8:32 we read, "Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." Truth is the nature of things as they are defined by God. The truth provides for us the ability to see through all the deceptions of the enemy. It is the truth that enables us to get down to the heart, to the core, to the reality of anything. The truth enables us to view life from God's vantage point and it sets us free from the distortions that have long prevented us from freedom.
When we follow wrong and do wrong, we become the slave of that wrong. Gradually we discover we are under its control. Unbeknown to the men of Shechem, they were being made into slaves through their lust for wealth. Slavery is the opposite of freedom. If freedom is being able to be all that we were meant to be, then slavery is to lose all possibility of that. When we give in to wrong deeds and wrong thinking, gradually an invisible net is being woven that we cannot see and can't be broken but by the truth. This is what had happened to the men of Shechem that day so long ago. And, this is why it is so important for us to hide the truth away in hearts.
