Are You Living Like Jacob or Settling in Vanity Fair?

After many years apart, Jacob was finally reunited with Joseph, now as a prince of Egypt. He was sold as a slave by his brothers, wrongfully accused and imprisoned by Pharoah’s wife. Yet, in all this he maintained strong integrity and relation with God. God honoured his faithfulness and blessed Egypt.

In Genesis 47, Joseph introduces his father to Pharaoh, who asked,

“How old are you?”

Jacob replied, “The days of the years of my pilgrimage are one hundred and thirty years; few and evil have been the days of the years of my life...”

Jacob saw himself as a pilgrim passing through this world, like his forefathers Isaac and Abraham.

In this devotional blog, I hope to challenge you whether you are a pilgrim like Jacob.

Let’s begin with the lives of Christian and Faithful in Pilgrim’s Progress.

In chapter 9, the path leading to heaven led Christian and Faithful through a town called Vanity Fair, which was a place of sensuality, feverish and wilful ignorance. The moment they stepped inside, everyone stared and found them to be offensive because of three reasons.

1.        First, the pilgrim’s clothes were so different from those that were traded at the fair that the people just stood and stared at them. Some said they were fools; others said they were lunatics; still others said they were very strange.

2.        Second, just as the people marvelled at their clothing they also wondered at their speech, for only a few could understand what they said…so from one end of the fair to the other, the pilgrims were thought to be uncivilised foreigners.

3.        Third, the pilgrims showed little interest in the items displayed for sale... They did not care enough even to look at them, and when the merchants called upon them to buy, they would put their fingers in their ears and cry. "Turn my eyes away from worthless things." They would then look upward, signifying that the only things of interest to them were in Heaven.

Let’s breakdown their three distinguishing traits  

1. They were criticised because the people at the fair did not understand what they wore and did not possess it themselves. It was the garment of the righteousness of Jesus. In Acts 13:38-39, we are told, if we believe on Jesus, we receive the same garment as that of Christian and Faithful, which is the forgiveness of sin. No one at the Fair had that. May I add, the way they were dressed physically as how they looked spiritually.

2.  Their manner of speech revealed they were not from Vanity Fair. There is a saying, you know a person, by what they like to talk about. You can also know where a person spends most of their time by what dominates their conversation. Christian and Faithful spoke a foreign language that only those who have been through The School of Christ can understand.

3.  Lastly, Christian and Faithful were interested only in what would help them reach heaven. Colossians 3:1 advises us, “If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above...”

Why Should You Care?

In Vanity Fair, Faithful lost his life, but his death was not in vain. Hopeful was won by his faithfulness and became the companion of Christian till the end. Your faithfulness may be the reason someone stays with Jesus. Someone is deciding to give God another chance because of you. Someone is reconsidering Jesus again, or is being persuaded to remain on the opposite side from Christ, because of you.

Will you reconsider your choices for Hopeful?