When God reaffirms his covenant with Jacob, he gives a promise that feels almost too large for one man to carry:
“A nation and a company of nations shall come from you.”
(Genesis 35:11 ESV)
The Hebrew phrase here — qahal goyim (“an assembly of nations”) — reveals something stunning about God’s heart. From the very beginning, his family was never meant to stay small. Through Israel, God planned to gather people from every nation, every background, every story, and form them into one restored humanity under the Messiah.
For God this is not just about numbers. It is about a family healed and restored. A humanity made whole again. A world reconciled under God’s faithful love.
A Story That Ends in Peace
Genesis 35 ends with a quiet but powerful moment: Jacob and Esau standing together to bury their father Isaac. Two brothers, once torn apart by deceit and fear, now share a moment of unity. What began in rivalry ends with peace.
This is not just a family detail. It is a hint — a foreshadowing — of what God intends to do with the whole world. Reconciliation is not an afterthought in the biblical story. It is the direction in which the story is moving.
Does “Goyim” Mean “Heathens”? A Better Way to Read It
A reader asked a great question: “Does the word goyim mean ‘heathen nations’? And can we read Genesis 35:11 as God gathering people from the non-Jewish nations to worship him?”
The short answer: yes, your instinct is right — but not in the way the word “heathen” sounds in modern ears.
In Genesis, the word goy simply means “nation.” There is no connotation of hostility there. It is not meant to point to a religious contrast. In fact, God calls Abraham a goy — a “great nation” — three different times. Only later, after Israel becomes distinct from its neighbors, does goyim take on the meaning “Gentile nations.”
But even in Genesis, God’s vision already stretches across borders. When he renames Abram as Abraham, He says: “I have made you the father of a multitude of nations” (Gen.17:5 ESV). The promise is breathtaking in scale: global, generous, and overflowing with God’s heart for the world. What God later tells Jacob — “an assembly of nations will come from you” — is part of this same sweeping vision.
So no — you’re not too enthusiastic. You’re actually reading Genesis the way it wants to be read. From the beginning, God intended all nations to worship him. Abraham’s family was always meant to become a blessing that would overflow to the whole world.
Our Part in God’s Growing Family
Today, that global family is forming all around us. The nations are not far away — they live on our streets, work in our offices, and sit next to us in church. God is still building his qahal goyim, his assembly of nations, one restored life at a time.
Our calling is beautifully simple: to welcome the nations into God’s story, to carry his reconciling love into our neighborhoods, and to reflect the unity he has always planned for his family.
Genesis 35 isn’t just a story about Jacob. It’s a glimpse of what God is still doing today: forming one restored people from every nation under heaven — and inviting us to join him in his cause.
Featured image by Anne Nygård on Unsplash
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