10/1/23 Genesis 37-50 “Where Does Your Road Begin?”

28 Sep 10/1/23 Genesis 37-50 “Where Does Your Road Begin?”

10/1/23     Genesis 37-50         “Where Does Your Road Begin?”

I hope that our new sermon series is going well.  (I have been doing a sermon series on the Bible.)  This is our third week and we will finish Genesis.  I know that a lot of things have been left out in our selected readings and I think that it is ok.  It is very hard to do something like this; make it for everyone and include everything. Also, I would guess this might be too deep for some and not deep enough for others.  For those of you who think it might be too deep, just hang in there and hopefully you will begin to see the connection between books like Genesis and the Gospels.  For those of you who think it might not be deep enough, I would like you to consider leading a group at your church.  That way, you can go a little deeper as you prepare for a lesson.  The purpose of a study like this is so that everyone together can understand more of what Jesus is all about.  I would also encourage you to read all the passages.  I know they are a little long but there is a wealth of information there plus these are wonderful stories.  The first week we talked about the love that God has for us and last week we talked about being faithful.  We should also keep in mind that these first chapters talk about many other things.  Due to time constraints, I can only highlight some of the major points.  There is much, much more in there.  Today we are going to look at the story of Joseph.  I will pull out a couple of points but there are more in the reading.  Let’s see if we can learn from Joseph.

Richard Hoefler tells the story of a little boy visiting his grandparents.  He was given a slingshot and we went out and tried and tried to use it but he couldn’t hit anything.  He came back to the grandparent’s yard and spotted a pet duck.  On impulse he took aim and let fly.  Wouldn’t you know, the stone hit its target.  The boy panicked and hid the dead duck in the woodpile.  He looked up and saw his sister, Sally, watching him.  She said nothing about it.  After lunch that day, Grandma said, “Sally, let’s wash the dishes.”  But Sally said, “Johnny told me he wanted to help in the kitchen today.  Didn’t you, Johnny?”  Then she whispered to him, “Remember the duck!” (quack) So, Johnny did the dishes.

Later Grandpa asked if the children wanted to go fishing.  Grandma said, “I’m sorry, but I need Sally to help me make supper.”  Sally smiled and said, “That’s all taken care of, Johnny wants to do it.”  Again, she said quietly, “Remember the duck.”  (Quack) Johnny stayed to help and Sally went fishing.  After several days of doing both his chores and Sally’s, he couldn’t take it anymore.  He confessed to Grandma that he killed her duck.  “I know, Johnny,” she said as she gave him a hug.  “I was standing at the window and saw the whole thing.  Because I love you, I forgave you!  I was wondering how long you would let Sally make you her slave.”  I would guess that we have people here today that are being held in bondage by their sin.

But before we go there, I would like to talk a bit about something else that is often overlooked in the readings about Joseph and that is the evangelism that was taking place.  The Bible tells us that Joseph was one of the good guys even as a child.  The Bible doesn’t tell us of any faults that Joseph might have had.  I think that we like to read faults into his character.

Here is what I mean.  The brothers of Joseph didn’t like him because he was the favorite of his father, Jacob.  As far as I can read, this is not the fault of Joseph.  It is the fault of Jacob the father.  God is showing us that if we decide to play favorites with our children, there will be consequences.  I think that Joseph is innocent here. He tries to do good when things are bad.

These types of things happen in today’s world also.  How often have you become discouraged doing good things in a world where most things are bad?  Joseph was good in a bad world.  I know of someone who helped a friend who was at a different church.  They were doing some repairs or something like that.  The people working with him couldn’t figure out why he would come and help them.  They wanted to pay him.  They didn’t understand the concept of helping our neighbor.  This particular church didn’t understand the concept of giving.

The second reason that the brothers’ hated Joseph was because of the dreams he had where Joseph was the leader of his brothers, who were almost all older than Joseph.  Remember that the oldest sons were the ones who always inherited and they were supposed to be the favorites.  Here, this was not the case.  Anyway, Joseph has this dream and he tells everyone about it.  It doesn’t tell us that God sent this dream but I think He did because it was a dream that foretold the future.  So once again we have Joseph really undeserving of this hate as God sent him this dream.  Because of all of this, the trouble really begins…why?  It is because of the hate of the brothers.  I don’t understand how a family can hate someone so much that they want to kill a brother.  I cannot imagine hate this deep.

This story is so full of things that I find myself chasing down trails where I don’t want to go today.  What I first want you to notice is after Joseph is sold into slavery, is his attitude.  Nowhere does it tell us that Joseph was upset, mad, or disappointed.  As a matter of fact, it tells us just the opposite.  The author tells us that God was with Joseph.  This is just the opposite of the story of Jacob where God wasn’t mentioned much until later.  God is with Joseph and things happen.  Joseph becomes the head of the household of Potiphar, leader in the prison and finally he heads up the whole nation of Egypt except for the Pharaoh.  All these things happen because he is faithful to God.  He is evangelizing by living the only way he knows how.  He is dedicated to God and points to God in all he does.

We should notice that this is the first book of the Bible and we already have evangelism.  This is a theme that goes all through the Bible.  Jesus wants us to go and spread the Good News to all who will hear.  Whatever your gift is, use it to help your neighbor or just go out and help your neighbor.  I know of people who need help.  I would like you reach out to people all the time.  We don’t want to be known as someone who doesn’t understand charity.  We all need to be aware and helping our neighbors all the time.  It would be good for all involved.

Now I want to turn to another main point of this story.  When we read the story of Joseph, it is hard not to notice the forgiveness.  Joseph was raised in a family who basically hated him.  They sold him into slavery.  Can we even begin to imagine how scared he might have been that day?  He goes from being free in the countryside to a slave.  For Joseph, this was totally unexpected.

Then he becomes the slave for Potiphar and things go well until the wife falsely accuses him.  After this event we don’t hear about this woman again.  What I’m trying to say here is that Joseph got no revenge.  He probably didn’t even seek revenge.  What he did do was go to prison and make the best he could of that situation.  Are you making the best of your situation?

Now I would guess that there are people here today who have been falsely accused of something.  In most cases it would be something minor.  However, it might not be something that important in the larger scope of things but it was large in your life.  Maybe someone became your enemy because of this.  Maybe your course in life was changed because of a false accusation.  I remember a couple to times when I was in school where I was accused of something that I knew nothing about.  It slowed me down and made me think.  What God is trying to show us here is that we aren’t to make a big deal out of situations like this.  We will see in just a moment how things like this can fester and grow into an emotional cancer that is very hard to defeat.  It doesn’t have to but it can.

Moving on, while Joseph is in jail, we meet his jail partners, the cupbearer and the baker.  He interpreted dreams for these guys.  Then when cupbearer was released, Joseph wanted him to say a good word so that he could be released also.  Of course, the man forgot all about this and Joseph spent some more time in jail.  It seems that Joseph just can’t catch a break.

I have gotten to know some you folks pretty well over the last few years and I would say without any hesitation that you are pretty good folks.  You are trying to do the right thing.  You try support God in all things.  Have you ever had a time when everything went against you?  You get up and you hit your head on the cupboard door.  Then you stub your toe on a chair you didn’t see.  So, your head hurts and your toe hurts and you get to work and the boss yells at you.  Or you go to the field and the combine breaks down and the closest parts are in Minneapolis.  So, you jump in the pickup to get parts only to have a flat tire.  This just goes on until you can’t wait to go to bed because tomorrow will be a new day and it has to be better.  We have all been there.  I don’t know why this happens but it has happened to everyone.  The question is, “How do you deal with days like this?”  You can either crawl into hiding with a lot of complaining or you can just keep going.  God is trying to tell us that we are to keep our eyes focused on Him and keep on living life as it unfolds before us.  He is in charge and He will get us through anything and everything, stubbed toes and all.

Now before we look at the forgiveness of Joseph, I want to take a peek at what it looks like not to forgive.  What is it like if we let a situation fester in our lives?  I would guess in our human condition; we have all experienced what it is like not to forgive.  We have all had our times when we have had a hard heart.

Notice in our reading that Joseph doesn’t forgive right away.  Do you remember the story?  At first, he is surprised that his brothers are there.  After all it has been years since he has seen them.  Initially he sends them away with supplies so that they can return with his younger brother Benjamin.  After he does this, Joseph weeps.  Then they come back and Joseph is hard with them again and again Joseph weeps.  The brothers still don’t know who Joseph is and yet he weeps for them.  He weeps because he has not yet forgiven his brothers.

My question to you is, “Why do you want to feel terrible all the time?”  If you don’t forgive people, then this is how you will feel.  You will weep.  Why do you want to feel bad?  And if this isn’t bad enough, you will feel even worse the longer you hang onto this sin.  This is a sin.  You are commanded to forgive.  As long as you have Jesus Christ, you don’t have to live your life like this.

Now Joseph is a man of God and it takes a little while but he finally gets the idea.  He tells his brothers who he is and the brothers become afraid of what Joseph might do to them.  You see the brothers had lived for years with the tremendous guilt of what they had done.  When they sold Joseph into slavery, these brothers began a life of guilt.  Everyone involved in this story had their lives severely altered by this one event.  Now they think they know that Joseph will have them killed.  But Joseph has finally forgiven his brothers because he realizes that all of this was part of God’s plan to save him and his family.  Isn’t it amazing how we can sometimes look back and see how God has done great works in our lives when we think He isn’t even listening?  Praise the Lord!

And I think that this is the key to all we do.  We are very used to doing things all by ourselves.  We are self-sufficient.  Not only that but we don’t give credit to Jesus very often, especially in public.  As we try to apply these lessons to our lives, I think that sometimes we have to get sold into some sort of slavery.  Sometimes we have to be put into some sort of personal prison.  Sometimes God has to put us through trials and hardships so that we can come to the point where He wants us, in this case to forgiveness.  It’s God’s plan.  We need to let go of our lives so that God can control us.  This is the way to a good life even when bad things are happening.

The bottom line to all of this is that no matter what the hurt or pain, the road to recovery begins with Jesus Christ.  We need to take our sins first to Jesus so that He can forgive us.  Maybe you are prouder than you think.  Maybe you have some personality flaws.  It is only after Jesus forgives you that you can begin to forgive others.  It may take some time to forgive as we saw in the case of Joseph, but don’t give up.  Keep trying to forgive and it will eventually come.  It is always right to forgive because your life will be miserable if you don’t.  By not forgiving someone, you hurt your life, not the other persons.  Remember that!

Darren Ethier tells the story of a woman who just had a radical transformation in her life that was the result of her coming to know Jesus Christ in her heart.  Isn’t that glorious?  It was great and she finally felt great for the first time in her life.  She declared, “I’m so glad I got religion.  I have an uncle I used to hate so much that I vowed I’d never go to his funeral.  But now I’d be happy to go to his funeral anytime.”  Jesus will forgive you of all our sins if you ask.  Then He helps you to forgive all people and especially people like this uncle.  This gives you a far better and happier life.  Jesus loves you and He wants you to follow Him to a better life.  This life in Jesus that we have is beyond any description of good.  Thank you, Jesus, for first loving us.  Let’s pray.