Joseph Reminds Me of Jesus-01 — William MacDonald

I think Don should have warned you that once you get that in your head and in your mind, you'll be singing it the rest of the week. It's one of those choruses that just goes over and over in your mind.

Joseph as a Foreshadowing of Jesus

For the benefit of those who were not here last week, we started on the story of Joseph. Joseph makes me think of Jesus, and I think I'll just review the similarities. We pointed out that there are over 100 correspondences between the life of Joseph in the Old Testament, centuries before Christ, and the life of the Lord Jesus 2 ,000 years ago.

We're not going to go over all 100 this morning or even this month. We're going to take up some of them. We noticed that Joseph was a root out of a dry ground. And when we say that, we mean he was a remarkably fine person, and he came from a very questionable background.

You wouldn't have expected anybody so good to come from the background he came from. And that was true of the Lord Jesus too. It speaks of him in Isaiah chapter 53 as being a root out of a dry ground.

And the dry ground there was the nation of Israel at that time, really away from God. That's why it's a figurative expression, a root out of a dry ground. Then Joseph was loved by his father. He was the son of Rachel, whom his father dearly loved, and Joseph was his father's favorite.

No question about that. And we saw that that was true of the Lord Jesus, that his baptism, God opened heaven and said, this is my beloved son in whom I have found all my delight. Kind of remarkable, isn't it, that a person living so many centuries before Christ would be such a tremendous type of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Joseph had a distinctive robe. His father gave him a robe of many colors. And, of course, this really stirred up the hatred and envy and jealousy of his brothers. Well, the Lord Jesus had a distinctive robe too, didn't he?

When you come to Calvary, when he was led out to Calvary and the soldiers cast lots for his garments, but there was one garment they couldn't divide. That was his robe that was woven without seam. He had a distinctive robe.

And then Joseph was the appointed heir. Actually, the oldest son in the family was Reuben, but through sin he lost the birthright and it came on down to Joseph. And so when the land of Israel was distributed, Joseph got two portions instead of one.

He was the appointed heir. And, of course, the Lord Jesus is the appointed heir that he might be the firstborn among many brethren, we read in Romans 8 .29. Joseph was hated without a cause. And I think we're going to see that today as we go to the Word of God and see how it develops.

And it's an amazing thing to me that when the Lord Jesus came to this earth and his was the only perfect life ever lived on this planet, men hated him without a cause. Isn't that amazing? It is to me.

And it says that in John chapter 15, verse 25, they hated me without a cause. And then he predicted that his brothers would bow to him. He had a dream, you remember. He had two dreams. And in the dreams he saw his brothers, his father and his mother, bowing.

Of course, this made them furious, didn't it? I mean, who are you that we would ever bow to you? But that's what the Lord Jesus says through Paul in writing to the Philippians. He says that in the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow.

Things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth, that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. We saw last week that his brothers envied him.

For what? He didn't have great possession. They just envied him. And when the Lord Jesus was on trial, Pilate realized that he had been delivered up from envy. In other words, the rulers of the Jews, the chief priests and the rulers of the Jews, they felt that Jesus was a threat to their position.

They wanted to be the leaders of Israel. And they were not going to tolerate him to come and take that place. And so they envied him and delivered him up to be crucified. It says here his parents pondered these things carefully.

And in Joseph's case, it says that about his father. And in Jesus' case, it says that about his mother, Mary, the Virgin Mary. So she pondered these things in her heart. In other words, it was something unusual about these lives that made the parents stop.

What's going on anyway? You know, what is God working throughout all of these? And they thought very seriously about it. Then Joseph was sent by his father to check on the welfare of his brethren. They were out there with the sheep, you know, and they were wandering around.

Jesus Sent to Seek the Lost Sheep

And the Lord Jesus was sent down here to check on the welfare of his Jewish brethren. He said he was sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And yet Joseph knew that his brothers would resent him and that they would be thoroughly unpleasable.

That nothing he could do would please him. That was true of Jesus, you know. And Jesus gave that parable. He said, you're like children playing in the marketplace. And we mourn for you and you wouldn't lament.

And we rejoice with you and you wouldn't dance. Nothing we could do would please you. And that was exactly true. But Joseph was obedient to his father. His father said, go. He went. No hesitation. No arguing.

He just went. He obeyed his father's voice. Well, that was certainly true of the Lord Jesus. The Lord Jesus sent him from heaven's highest glory down to this scene to suffer, bleed, and die for guilty sinners like you and me.

And he said, lo, I come in the volume of the book that is written of me. I delight to do thy will. Oh, my God. Even if it meant the shedding of his blood, even if it meant his giving up his life, he delighted to do the will of God.

You and I can't understand that. Then he sought them until he found them. And he went out and out and out. And he asked, where are my brothers? And they led him. And he finally found them. And that reminds us of the Lord Jesus, the good shepherd.

And he had 99 sheep in the fold, but one sheep had gone astray. And he went out and sought that sheep until he found it. And if you and I, if you're saved here today, you and I are that lost sheep. Well, there were a couple of other things that we went over last week.

We found out last week that his brothers weren't where they were supposed to be. They had started out from a place called Hebron, H-E-B-R-O-N. And incidentally, names in the Bible have meanings. That's a wonderful thing about the Bible, that names have meanings, colors have meanings, numbers have meanings.

Everything in the Bible is meaningful. And Hebron means fellowship or communion. And what it's really saying is that Joseph's brethren had wandered away from fellowship with God. They were out of touch with God.

But he sought them. And once again, these two passages in Matthew speak of the Lord Jesus going to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And then as we closed last week, we noticed that he came to them, but they didn't receive him.

Instead of saying, wow, our lost, our long lost brother, we haven't seen him for a long time. They said, let's kill him. And that's what it says concerning the Lord Jesus in John chapter 1, verse 11. He came unto his own, but his own received him not.

But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name. I think before we go further, we'll turn to Genesis chapter 37. And let's begin reading there just to get the, we've got the background now.

So we're going to just read from there on. Verse 18, Genesis 37, verse 18. If you don't have a Bible, maybe one of your neighbors will share a Bible with you. Genesis 37, 18. Now, when they saw him afar off, even before he came near them, they conspired against him to kill him.

Then they said to one another, look, this dreamer is coming. Come, therefore, let us now kill him and cast him into some pit. And we shall say some wild beast has devoured him. We shall see what will become of his dream.

You see, they resented his dreams that said that one day his father, mother, brothers would bow to him. But Reuben heard it, and he delivered him out of their hands and said, let us not kill him. Reuben said unto them, shed no blood, but cast him into this pit, which is in the wilderness, and do not lay a hand on him, that he might deliver him out of their hands and bring him back to his father.

So it came to pass when Joseph had come to his brothers that they stripped Joseph of his tunic, the tunic of many colors that was on him. Then they took him and cast him into a pit, and the pit was empty.

There was no water in it. They sat down to eat a meal. Then they lifted up their eyes and looked, and there was a company of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead with their camels, bearing spices, balm, and myrrh on their way to carry them down to Egypt.

So Judah said to his brothers, what profit is there if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? Come and let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother and our flesh.

And his brothers listened. Then Midianite traders passed by, so the brothers pulled Joseph up and lifted him out of the pit and sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty shekels of silver. They took Joseph to Egypt.

Then Reuben returned to the pit, and indeed Joseph was not in the pit, and he tore his clothes. And he returned to his brothers and said, The lad is no more, and I, where shall I go? So they took Joseph's tunic.

This is very, very cruel, isn't it? They took Joseph's tunic, killed a kid of the goats, dipped the tunic in the blood. Then they sent the tunic of many colors, and they brought it to their father and said, We have found this.

Do you know whether it is your son's tunic or not? What a way to treat the old man. And he recognized it and said, It is my son's tunic. A wild beast has devoured him without doubt. Joseph is torn to pieces.

Then Jacob tore his clothes, put sackcloth on his waist, and mourned for his son many days. And all his sons and all his daughters arose to comfort him. But he refused to be comforted, and he said, For I shall go down into the grave to my son in mourning.

Then his father wept for him. Now the Midianites had sold him in Egypt to Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and captain of the guard. Notice, first of all, they called him a dreamer. We just read that, didn't we?

They called him a dreamer. But they were resentful of him, and when they called him a dreamer, that doesn't sound too bad in the English language today, but it was worse than that. What they were really saying is that he didn't have a full sea bag, you know.

His elevator didn't go to the top floor. They said, Something missing. Now, if you'll just turn in your Bible to Mark 3 and 21, and I think this is an amazing verse of Scripture. Mark chapter 3, 21. This is about the Lord Jesus.

Mark 3, 21. When his own people heard about this, they went out to lay hold of him, for they said, He is out of his mind. That is a shocker. Dear friends, the Lord Jesus Christ is the only totally sane person who's ever been in the world.

And they said, He's out of his mind. Well, aren't we sane? Well, all of our minds have been affected by sin. They have. Your memory and mind has been affected by sin. Some days you get an argument with your wife, and she says, Was this way?

And you say, No, it wasn't that way. It was this way. And somebody's memory isn't right. You know what I mean? And life is like that. Life is like that. You forget things. I brought two letters with me today to mail them.

They're still in the car. You know, I say the Lord Jesus is the only sane person, truly sane person who ever lived in the world. And they said, He is out of his mind. And that's really what they were saying about Joseph.

When they said, He is a dreamer. So, they not only said that, but they plotted to kill him. We read that in verse 20. What's that all about? Well, his life of righteousness and holiness was a rebuke to them.

Men don't like that. People don't like that. That's why the Bible says that men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil. They do. Man in his unsaved condition prefers darkness to light.

That's why drinking places are usually pretty dark, aren't they? They're not highly illuminated. And other places of sin are the same. There you have it. They plotted to kill him. And, of course, that's what they did with the wonderful Lord Jesus Christ, the sinless Son of God, came down to this world, and men set out to kill him.

They stripped him and threw him into a pit. We saw that with Joseph, didn't we? How they took his clothes off him and threw him into a pit. That's exactly what they did with the Lord Jesus. They took his clothes, they cast lots for his tunic, divided his garments among them, and the pit, the grave, the sepulcher of the Lord Jesus.

He was buried in the tomb of Joseph, a tomb that was carved out of solid stone. And they sat down unconcerned. It's pretty cruel when you think of it, isn't it? These brothers to be treating their own brother like that and to be callous about it.

They didn't care. Now, dear friends, that's exactly what happened at the cross. It says that. It says, sitting down, they watched him there. They didn't care. They said all nature was convulsed at the death of the Son of God.

But only man's heart was hard and impervious to it all. There's nothing as bad as the heart of man. Jeremiah says, the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked above all things. Who can know it? And that's true.

If you look into your own heart and I look into mine, we have to admit that's exactly true. Nobody can know the depth of depravity in the human heart. Well, not only so, but they they forsook him. They threw him into a pit and they absolutely forsook him.

Christ Forsaken, Sold, and Rejected

And this was true not only of the world at the cross of Calvary, but of the Lord's own disciples. Those who profess to be his followers. It says in Mark 14 and verse 50, they all forsook him and fled.

They were afraid of their own skins. Everything when everybody was against the Lord and they didn't have the courage to stand up for him. In fact, it was the women at Calvary and at the tomb who were the bravest.

I want to tell you, the women in the gospel narrative shine with great luster. While the men are all beating it for their lives, the women are standing true to the Lord Jesus. They saw his anguish and were unmoved.

Amazing, isn't it? Tell you, there never was a day in human history like that day. The Lord Jesus Christ was there in agony on the cross, bearing your sins and my sins. And they saw that agony. It didn't move them.

No wonder Jeremiah says in Lamentations chapter one, verse twelve, Is it nothing to you, all you that pass by? Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow. Wherewith the Lord has afflicted me the day of his fierce anger.

That's really prophetically the voice of the Lord Jesus coming down to us from the cross. As a multitude passes by unmoved, is it nothing to you? We might ask ourselves that question today. Is it nothing to you that Christ, the Son of God, died for your sins on the cross at Calvary?

Can you be unmoved by it all? Really, if it had its desired effect in our lives, we'd fall on our knees and we'd say, My Lord and my God. That's what we'd say. Then it says they sold him. You talk about being callous.

You talk about being hard. Don't kill him when you can make some money off him. That's really what they were saying. Don't kill him. I was going to say this maybe reflects the Jewish tendency toward business, but it's not just Jewish.

Gentile as well, too. They sold him for 20 pieces of silver. Incredible, isn't it? You say, well, does that have a counterpart in the life of the Lord Jesus? And, of course, you know that it does. They sold the Savior for 30 pieces of silver.

In the Old Testament, in the book of Exodus, God laid down a law that if an ox gored a man, restitution had to be made. And if an ox gored a slave, the owner of the ox had to pay 30 pieces of silver. Judas sold Jesus for the price of a slave gored by an ox.

That's what he did. Terrible, isn't it? I think the poet has said it very well. 30 pieces of silver for the Lord of life they gave. 30 pieces of silver. Only the price of a slave. But it was the priestly value of the Holy One of God.

They weighed it out in the temple. The price of the Savior's blood. The priests came and they paid 30 pieces of silver to Iscariot. 30 pieces of silver laid in Iscariot's hand. 30 pieces of silver. The aid of an armed band, like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, brought the humbled Son of God at midnight from the garden where his sweat had been as blood.

30 pieces of silver burned on the traitor's brain. 30 pieces of silver is hellish gain. I have sinned and betrayed the guiltless, he cried with a fevered breath. He cast them down in the temple and rushed to a madman's death.

30 pieces of silver lay in the house of God. 30 pieces of silver, but oh, it was the price of blood. And so for a place to bury the strangers in, they gave the price of their own Messiah who lay in a borrowed grave.

They used the money to buy a cemetery to bury strangers in it. Here's the application. It may not be for silver. It may not be for gold. But still by tens of thousands is this precious Savior sold. Sold for a godless friendship.

Sold for a selfish aim. Sold for a fleeting trifle. Sold for an empty name. Sold in the mark of science. Sold in the seat of power. Sold at the shrine of fortune. Sold in pleasure's bower. Sold where the awful bargain none but God's eye can see.

Ponder my soul the question, shall he be sold by me? Sold, oh God, what a moment. Stifled his conscience voice. Sold in the price of the Savior to a living coal shall turn the pangs of remorse forever deep in the soul to burn.

They sold Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. Well, their plot failed because he came out of the pit. Now this is a very wonderful thing. They threw him in the pit. Forget him. A caravan came along. It was what the Bible calls an Ishmaelite caravan or a Midianite caravan.

Now get this. This caravan came along and the brothers took Joseph out of the pit and sold him to the Midianites. So they could take him down to Egypt where he would become a slave. First of all, you see in this that bad things sometimes happen to good people.

But you see something more. Look, if you belong to the Lord, nothing happens in life by chance. And God is overruling everything in life. That Midianite caravan started months before Joseph was thrown into the pit.

But it just came to the pit at the right time. What? God wanted Joseph in Egypt. And the Midianites gave him free transportation. You see God's overruling hand here in a wonderful way. Let me read it to you the way F .B. Meyer says it.

And I think it's beautiful. He says it was not chance but providence that brought these Midianites to the pit at that hour. They had of course fixed their time of departure, the speed at which their camels were to travel, and the amount of time which they would spend at the fairs and market en route.

I mean they had their own schedule. They knew what they were doing. Quite irrespectively of all other considerations but their own profit and convenience. Yet quite unconsciously they were moving according to a divine timetable.

Everything in life is directed, superintended, and controlled by a divine forethought. Let us live in constant recognition of this. You may be in a pit of dark misery but God knows you are there and times the moment.

Only continue to trust and do not be afraid. Blessed are they that believe to them there shall be a performance. Months ago a caravan started which will arrive at the precise hour when intervention will best serve you.

And so there you have it. Joseph is in the pit. Why? For wrong he had done? No, not for any wrong he had done. And let's say he cries to God, he prays to God. Before he ever prays God sets the caravan in motion.

Caravan comes along. It's making stops along the way but it just gets to Joseph at the right time. Take him out of the pit and down to Egypt he goes. What do we learn by this? Well, God allowed those brothers to have their wickedness, didn't he?

But God had his way. There's a verse in the Psalms that says, He makes the wrath of men to praise him. This is true. God makes the wrath of men to praise him and the remainder of wrath he restrains. What won't praise him, he'll hold it back.

This is a tremendous comfort to those who are saved, who are real Christians, to know that their lives are superintended and that nothing happens by chance. There is no luck for the child of God. Everything is planned.

Things don't just happen, they're planned by God. And although at the time you may be, as Meyer says, in a pit of dark misery, don't worry, God is working things out. It'll all come out exactly right at last.

The Empty Pit and the Resurrection

Well, the pit was discovered to be empty. Joseph is no longer in the pit. And I don't have to tell you what the application to the Lord Jesus is. In Luke chapter 24 and verse 6, Easter morning, they come to the sepulcher.

They come to the grave. He's not there. He's risen. And wherever that sepulcher is, over outside Jerusalem today, I'll tell you, it's an empty sepulcher. You can't go and visit a grave where the body of Jesus is, or where the dust of Jesus is.

He rose on the third day, triumphant over sin, death, and hell. And he lives today at the right hand of God, a man in the glory. And he lives there in the power of an endless life. I'll tell you, it's wonderful.

And Joseph is a foreshadowing of all of that. I think it's absolutely beautiful. It wasn't. It wasn't the evidence. But you know, Jacob, the father, had deceived his father by the use of a goat, a kid.

I don't know if you remember the story, but in order to get the blessing of the firstborn, in order to get the birthright, Jacob's mother and he had taken the skin of a kid and covered his arm with a kid's skin so that it would appear to be Esau's hairy arm.

And then he went in to his aged, blinding father. The father said, Well, the hand seems to be the hand of Esau, but the voice is the voice of Jacob. Not too bad, was it? What I'm saying is, Jacob deceived his father with a kid.

Now, Jacob is deceived with a kid. Be sure your sins will find you out. I tell you, God has built principles into this universe and they work like a railroad that works sometimes. And you never can escape them.

The way of the transgressor is hardest. Little did Jacob think that day, years ago, when he deceived his aging father, that he in his age would be deceived by his son. Little did he think that his chickens would come home to hatch, to root.

But they do, they do, in all of life. You say, Well, that's pretty bad news. Yeah, but that's a way of escape. It's a way of escape. And that is to come to the Lord Jesus and to repent of one's sins. To say, I have sinned against God and in thy sight and am no more worthy to be called thy son.

Make me, I pray thee, as one of thy hired servants. And to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and to accept him as one's only hope for heaven. And look, the past is blotted out. I think that's marvelous.

I think it's wonderful that God has provided a way whereby I, Bill McDonnell, a guilty, lost, hell-deserving sinner, can come to Christ and through repentance and faith in him can have the past blotted out.

And hear the Lord Jesus say to me, through the word of God, Your sins are forgiven. Go in peace. Incidentally, that's something no psychiatrist can ever say to you. We don't need the couch. We need the cross.

Because only the Son of God can say to you, Your sins are forgiven. You go in peace. And he longs to say it to you. Longs to say it to you this morning. Joseph is mourning. The deceiver is now deceived.

Joseph in Egypt and Christ’s Humiliation

And dear Joseph goes down to Egypt. Well, that's interesting, isn't it? Because you remember that when the Lord Jesus was a baby and Herod was going to kill all the children in the environs of Bethlehem that the angel came and said to Joseph and Mary, Get down to Egypt.

And they did. Jesus, in his very early years, was down there in Egypt. Joseph is just a forepicture of that. And then, of course, Joseph was a slave in Egypt. He became a servant down there in Egypt. Well, you say that.

Surely it never happened. The Lord Jesus, He didn't become a slave. Oh, yes, He did. Yes, He did. Philippians, you might like to turn to that verse in your Bible. I think it's beautiful. Philippians chapter 2, verse 7.

Philippians 2, verse 7. Well, I'll go back to verse 5. It says, Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a servant and coming in the likeness of men.

Incidentally, there are two kinds of servants in the Bible. One is called a bond slave. The other is called a hired servant. A bond slave belongs to his master. He's property belonging to his master. A hired servant works for pay.

Which do you think Jesus was? The bond servant. He said, The Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to do what? To give His life for ransom for many. And, you know, one day the Lord Jesus took a towel and He girded Himself with a towel.

And the towel was the apron of a slave. And you know what He did? He got down and He washed the disciples' feet. You talk about taking the lowly place. Jesus washed the disciples' feet. Not the way of the world, is it?

You'd hardly expect the president of IBM to get down and polish the shoes of the janitor. Jesus did something more wonderful than that. He washed the disciples' feet. So there you find Joseph, a slave, down in Egypt.

And you find the Lord Jesus Christ coming into this world as a slave. Well, it's an interesting thing that although he was rejected by his own people, Joseph was accepted by the Gentiles down in Egypt.

The Egyptians are Gentiles. And he found a welcome down there of sorts. It's interesting that in the public ministry of the Lord Jesus on earth, he was largely rejected by the Jewish people. His own people.

He was a Jew. And he was largely rejected by the Jewish people, but he was accepted by the Gentiles. If you'll turn to those verses of Scripture, Matthew 8, 10 and Luke 7, 9, the Lord Jesus comes across Gentiles.

And do you know what he says? He says, I haven't found such faith in all of Israel. It's amazing, isn't it? And you know, that's still true. It's really still true. It's sad to say that largely the Jewish people today reject the Christ of God.

And most people today who are saved, the Gentile people, have been saved by the Christ of God. He came unto his own. His own received him not. The Jews. But as many as received him, them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.

God’s Presence and the Prosperity of Christ’s Work

The Lord was with Joseph. It says that. In fact, this is funny, but in one of the early translations of the Bible, it says the Lord was with him and he was a lucky fellow. I think lucky meant something different in that day than it means today.

Because today luck means chance of fortune. As I said, there's no chance of fortune with the child of God. But the Lord was definitely with him. And you know, that's a great thing to have the Lord on your side, isn't it?

It's terrible to be against the Lord or not on the Lord's side. It's a wonderful thing to have the Lord with you. If God be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?

To be against the Lord is like being a mosquito going against a blast furnace in Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. What chance does a mosquito have in a blast furnace? None. No chance at all. And so the person who takes sides against God, who's not on God's side, is already doomed.

I don't think there's anything worse than thinking of the wrath of God poured out against a Christ rejecter. He rose to power and prominence. He did. Joseph rose to power and prominence. Why? Because cream always rises to the surface.

God blesses those and God honors those who honor him. And of course that was true of the Lord Jesus. You see it throughout his ministry and in John chapter 5 it speaks of the many ways in which God the Father and the Lord Jesus are equal and then it says he's entrusted all judgment to his son.

All judgment has been entrusted to the Son of God. Everything Joseph did prospered. Beautiful. Why? Because the Lord was with him. It says that in Psalm 1, concerning the man of God, whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

And it says it concerning the Lord Jesus in Isaiah 53 verse 10, the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. Joseph was like a tree planted by rivers of water bringing forth fruit for the glory of God.

Blessing to the Gentiles Through God’s Servant

And I'm just going to close with this one. It says that blessing came to the Gentiles through him. Let me just read you Genesis 39 .5. Genesis chapter 39 .5. It says, So it was from the time that he had made him overseer of his house and all that he had that the Lord blessed the Egyptians' house for Joseph's sake.

And the blessing of the Lord was on all that he had in the house and in the land. How can I say this to you today? When a person is a Christian, he brings blessing to people who aren't Christians. When a wife is a Christian, he brings blessing to a husband who's not a Christian.

It says that in the Bible. It says an unbelieving husband is sanctified by the believing wife. That's why your children are unclean, but now are they holy. It's a wonderful privilege to have a wife who bows her knee in praise to God.

It is a wonderful privilege. And wherever you get Christians, they're the salt of the earth. Salt hinders the spread of corruption, creates thirst, a purifying agent. That's true. And here the Egyptians are blessed.

Once again, let me quote F .B. Meyer. When we reach heaven and are able to trace the origin of things, we shall find that many of the choicest blessings of our lives were procured by the prayers or presence of very obscure and unrecognized people who were dear to God.

And many of you who are Christians here today know that's true. You can look back through your life and you can think of your contact with Christian people and how your life has been enriched by them.

Well, that's what happened to the Egyptians. They were blessed through this dear man of God, Joseph. And how true that is. How blessing has come to the Gentiles through the Lord Jesus Christ. He came to Israel.

Israel rejected him. And the Gentiles have come into the place of blessing today. So that the church today is largely, not exclusively, but largely a Gentile church made up of Gentile believers who, in the Old Testament, were considered dogs.

The Jewish people believed that the Gentiles were made by God to be fuel for the flames of hell. That's how highly we rated in the Old Testament. But the Lord Jesus came primarily to the house of Israel but also that the blessing might overflow to the Gentiles.