God Meant it for Good Genesis 37

Yeah.

We spent some substantial time With Jacob over the last several months. For the last 11 chapters. He's been the main character. We saw the trajectory of Jacob's life go from being a deceiver to a man who fully surrendered himself to God.

But the focus from this point forward is not going to be on Jacob. Jacob is going to be mentioned a little and mostly in the background. The focus now turns to Joseph Jacob's 11th son. You do not have to be a Christian to be familiar with Joseph.

A while back I was talking to a student at St. Croix Falls High School and an athlete on the cross-country team and The topic came up that he was in a play at the high school. I Asked him what play he was in and he said Joseph and the amazing Technicolor dreamcoat.

So like Noah's Flood the Tower of Babel and Sodom and Gomorrah. The story of Joseph is well known. You don't need to be a Christian to know these famous stories from Genesis. People know that Joseph had a beautiful coat.

From his father and his brothers out of out of jealousy sold him into slavery. But our goal in this story is not only to see What we already know these facts about his life, but also to dig in to see all the other treasure that is there.

And this is what we always need to do and when we read the Bible. For the last several months at our Wednesday night Bible study those who have attended have taken a deep look at The book of Ephesians, and I've called our study mining the text of Ephesians.

And so that's what we're gonna be doing with Joseph's life. We're gonna mind the text of Joseph's life. And there is treasure here and we are going to see what is there in the application for our lives.

So I encourage you to turn with me to Genesis 37 if you're using a red Bible in the pews. It's on pages 36 and it spills into page 38 so pages 36 through 38 The sermon is titled.

God's Providence in Joseph's Life

God.

Meant it for good in our big idea. Our proposition is the Lord Weaves together the detailed story of the lives of his people. The Lord weaves together the detailed story of the lives of his people. And we're gonna see three ways.

How? The first way how is by planning Joseph's superiority over his brothers by planning his superiority. Over his brothers, we'll see this in verses 1 through 11. It's been three weeks since we were last in Genesis two Sundays ago.

We had Resurrection Sunday. Last Sunday. I was gone and and Bennett preached first John chapter 4 and Today, we're now back in Genesis, but three weeks ago. We looked at the end of Esau's life in chapter 36.

What we saw in that chapter was his genealogy. When his family left the land of Canaan the land of promise and went east of the Dead Sea to the land of seer. His family grew significantly. They had tribes chiefs and eventually Kings.

They became more powerful than the natives who lived in the land. This happened to fulfill what Genesis 27 40 said that he and his people would be strong. But they would never be as strong as Israel. But the focus of the passage was the tragedy of Esau.

We know from his story that as the firstborn he was in line to inherit the great Abrahamic promises. The promises that his offspring would be as many as the stars in the heavens. That his people would inherit the land of Canaan and most importantly that they would be under the blessing of God.

When Esau walked away from the land of promise he walked away never to return again. His departure out of the land of Canaan of land of Canaan was symbolic of his departure from God. When he forfeited his birthright and lost God's blessing he forfeited his salvation.

This is the tragedy. He was surrounded by the things of God yet gave them up for a single meal. He valued earthly things over the things of God. And this is where his allegiance was. That's what it showed and this is a great warning to each of us.

We must be all in for God and our allegiance must not be to idols. Now as we close the book on the life of Esau we turned our attention back to the main characters. And that is Jacob's line. We are going to be spending lots of time with Joseph as I already mentioned.

And if you can remember Joseph is the first of two sons from Jacob's wife Rachel his favored wife. So the last two children he had the last two sons. He had number 11 number 12 come from Rachel. So let's begin by reading verses 1 through 4.

And we're going to see the important connection here that his favored wife Rachel his son Joseph. And now we're going to see how the story plays out verses 1 through 4. Jacob lived in the land of his father's sojournings in the land of Canaan.

These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph being 17 years old was pasturing the flock with his brothers. He was a boy with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah his father's wives it and Joseph brought a bad report of them to their father.

Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of the other sons. Because he was the son of his old age and he made him a robe of many colors. But when his brother saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers.

They hated him and could not speak peacefully to him. The text tells us that Jacob and his 12 Sons lived in the land of Canaan the land of promise and as they live in this region Joseph a 17 year old is working out in the field with his brothers.

Joseph comes in to his father and gives a bad report about his brothers. Sometimes people say that that Joseph is an example of one who never sinned in Scripture. Obviously if you look at if you look at characters in the Bible right they always sin the sins everywhere.

Joseph is one of those that he's his pretty good character throughout, but I'll submit to you here I think he's sinning right here right from the get-go in his story. And I say that because it says here that he gave a bad report about his brothers to his father.

Now in in the Hebrew language, which is what the Old Testament is written in this can be translated evil whispering or slander. So you get the sense here that his brothers may have said something bad and Joseph is tattling on them.

He's crossing the lines that he's not treating his brothers with care as he talks about them. The Bible teaches us always to treat people with care Behind their backs whether they do something bad to us or not and it actually teaches us to go to the person if we have a problem.

Matthew 18 15 says if your brother sins against you go and tell him his fault. Between you and him alone if he listens to you you have gained your brother. Joseph did not do this. I think he's slandering against them here now in verse 3 we once again get the reminder that Jacob loved Joseph more than his brothers as I've mentioned many times before we should never show favoritism the way that Jacob is showing favoritism here to Joseph.

But the reason Jacob Favors Joseph is because Joseph is the son of his old age as verse 3 Says. And what does that mean? Well, I already explained. He's the favorite son because he because he comes from Rachel the wife that he loved the most.

Jacob loved Joseph so much that he made him a robe of many colors a beautiful robe. They would have been a constant reminder to his brothers that Joseph is the favorite. Verse 4 tells us that this love that Jacob had for Joseph caused them to hate him.

They despised him so much that they could they could not speak peacefully about him. Whenever his name came up they can only say bad things Concerning him. We see right here from the beginning that from the beginning that they wished ill upon him.

We know what the sin their committee here is this is the sin of jealousy. They see Joseph as the favorite and they can't stand it. I Remember when I was going through a school. It was a high school at this time I had a good friend who I was going to class with and we were in the same class together and The teacher loved my friend, but I could tell it didn't have any affection for me and as you might as you might imagine I hated going to this class because my Friend it was like the teacher's pet and I was just one of the guys who she didn't really like that much.

I don't think she hated me, but she just you could tell she didn't have affection for me. And so what came out of my heart then was jealousy. I'm thinking why I wish I was like my friend here and the teacher actually gave me the attention that I wanted.

So we see here, this is what his brothers are doing. They're being jealous and it's causing them to hate Joseph and this is what our sinful flesh does when someone else is favored over us. Now something is going to happen that is going to set off something big in the relationship between Joseph and his brothers.

In the following verses Joseph has two dreams. The first dream takes place in verses 5 through 8. Let's see this dream here. Now Joseph had a dream and when he told it to his brothers they hated him even more.

He said to them hear this dream that I have dreamed behold. We were binding sheaves in the field and behold My sheave arose and stood upright and behold your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheave.

His brothers said to him. Are you indeed to reign over us or are you indeed to rule over us? So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words. Now we know That this is an agrarian culture kind of like Eureka, right?

We have this here we can relate to this and Joseph dreams about the grain that he brings in from the field. The grain is put in sheaves. Now you could probably tell me better than I do what sheaves are.

I actually googled it this week. I'm like, what are sheaves here? This is the definition I got you can see if this is right a Bundle of grain stocks laid lengthwise and tied together after reaping. So these sheaves are laid and lengthwise.

But Joseph says that in the dream his sheave stands upright and his brother's sheaves are bowing to his sheave. Ever had a dream like this. This is this is really an odd dream. And as Joseph tells this to his brothers, they know the meaning of this dream.

It's clear He's going to reign over them. That's that's the meaning of the dream. They already hated him because he was the favorite son and now he tells them You're gonna bow to me one day. Now he's about to have another dream that's going to make his brothers feel even even that much better.

Obviously being sarcastic here. Okay verse 9. Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said behold I have dreamed another dream behold the Sun the moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me.

So in order to understand this right how many how many brothers does Joseph have 11 okay, how many stars here? 11 and then the Sun and the moon.

So.

They're bowing they're Bowing to him again. He's ruling over them. And this is Jacob's response. So we got his brother's response to the first right now. We're getting Jacob's response in verses 10 11.

But when he told it to his father and to his brothers his father rebuked him and said to him What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you and his brothers were jealous of him?

But his father kept the same in mind. So Jacob's father does not like what he hears either. But where his brothers aboard what he said the text says at the end of verse 11 that Jacob kept the same in mind.

He's thinking. Well, you're my favorite. This wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. What we must understand is that these dreams are prophecies. Many of you are familiar with the whole story of Joseph Later in his life.

He would rise up to be the number two man in the powerful nation of Egypt. His brothers would be in great need of his help during this great famine. They keep that would come on that region and they would bow to him.

So what Joseph is doing here is not making things up in order to to elevate himself to his brothers. Rather these dreams he experienced are truly from God. Back in Genesis 28 his father Jacob had a dream the Jacob's ladder event and in that dream the Lord spoke directly to Jacob and now in this dream the Lord's not speaking directly to Joseph, but he is Communicating something in it and that is that Joseph will rule over his brothers in the future.

So the Lord planned this and we would we will see this play out in the coming months here. So this is the first way how the Lord reveals the detailed story of the lives of his people by planning Joseph's Superiority over his brothers.

So we're gonna see the Lord's sovereignty over His his power over the events that are taking place in his life. The second way how the Lord reveals the detailed story of the lives of his people is by saving Joseph in order to preserve the great design for his life and we'll see this in verses 12 through 24.

Now after these dreams Joseph's brothers traveled north to Shechem. This location was named after the man Shechem who if you can remember assaulted their sister Dinah and After she was assaulted in chapter 34 Simeon and Levi wrongly took revenge upon Shechem and the people of the town by killing them.

So Joseph's brothers go back to this place where this event happened in order to pastor Jacob's flocks. Jacob still had a flock there since he wants to live there. Jacob tells Joseph to leave Hebron to go north to Shechem to check on them.

And this is what happened. So now we're seeing the scheming that's going to start by his brothers now his brothers went to pasture their father's flock near Shechem and Israel said to Joseph are not your brothers pasturing the flock at Shechem come I will send you to them and he said to him here I am.

So he said to him go now see if it is well with your brothers and with the flock and bring me word. So he sent him from the valley of Hebron and he came to Shechem and A man found him wandering in the fields and the man asked him.

What are you seeking? I am seeking my brothers. He said tell me please where they are pasturing the flock and the man said They have gone away. For I heard them say let us go to Dothan. So Joseph went after his brothers and found them at Dothan.

So just so Jacob sends Joseph To check on the flock to see if it is well with them. And then he wants them or wants Joseph to to give a report on how things are going so to return to him and As Joseph goes to Shechem to find his brothers a man spots him wandering looking for his brothers.

It's interesting that when you when you drive in St. Croix Falls in town, you can usually tell if the person is from here or not. They usually drive slowly Searching for where they are going. I mean, you know what I'm talking about, right?

And it can be frustrating when you get stuck behind one of these people, but sometimes you get the opportunity. They might ask you How do I get to this place and then you can help them? So that's a good thing here.

So this might remind you of that here. So Jacob he comes to this place. He doesn't know where he's going. He's wandering and this man says what are you seeking and Joseph tells him I'm searching for my brothers and this man tells him where they went and Sends him to Dothan the place where his brothers are and as Joseph travels there his brothers see him from afar and they are reminded of Their hatred of him so much so that as they see him coming they plot to kill him.

They plot to do evil against them verses 18 through 20. They saw him from afar and before he came near to them. They conspired against him to kill him. They said to one another here comes this dreamer.

Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits. Then we will say that a fierce animal has devoured him and we will see what will become of his dreams. It is in these verses That we see how much his brothers hated him.

I Remember as a child asking my mom, what does it mean to hate someone because you hear people say that in school. She told me to hate someone is to want the person dead. I Think that's a pretty good response now you may not want to murder the person but but you would be okay if that person was just gone and We as Christians should never hate anyone.

Except for the devil and his demons. That would be the only case where it would be okay. But the ones we are tempted to hate our enemies. We are taught by Jesus to love them by praying for them and doing good to them.

Matthew 544. That's what Jesus says. He says love your love your your enemies and pray for those Who persecute you it's okay to hate what people stand for, you know, that's okay. But to hate the individual oftentimes when someone hates what someone stands for they end up hating the person and that's unbiblical.

We should never do that. We should always love God's image bearers. But Jacob's brothers are evil people at this point in their life. They just want their brother out of the picture so that their father will love them without always playing second fiddle to Joseph.

As we saw in verse 20. Their plan is to kill him throw him into the pits and then say that if that a fierce animal devoured him. But at least one of the eleven brothers has a conscience and he speaks up in verse 21 and verses 21 and 22.

The oldest brother Reuben speaks up and this is what he says, but when Reuben heard it, he rescued him out of their hands. Saying let us not take his life and Reuben said to them shed. No blood. Throw him into this pit here in the wilderness.

But do not lay a hand on him that he might rescue him out of their hand to restore him to his father. So the oldest son here Reuben desires to spare his life. And so he tells his brothers. Let's just throw him in the pit and He thinks they might agree with this because they think well we just leave him in the pit and nobody comes by.

He's gonna die, but Reuben is planning. Once my brothers go away and I'm alone, I'm gonna come back in. I'm gonna pick Joseph out of the pit and then I'm gonna take him back to the to his father. See me ask the question here was Reuben.

Is this a holy action by him or does he have ulterior motives? We don't know for sure. He might have ulterior motives here because if you remember chapter 35 it said that Reuben Laid with one of Jacob's wives.

And this was a way of Reuben trying to defy his father's authority. So not only was the the sinful act sinful horrible, but Defying his father's authority was was very bad as well. And so by returning Joseph to Jacob he might be thinking well, I could win my father's good graces and later on in Genesis 49.

What we're gonna read down the way down the road here is that He would not get the blessing of the firstborn because of the sin that he committed in chapter 35. So so he's trying to win that back here I could be one of the reasons or he might actually have compassion for his brother.

We don't know for sure but But here's what his brothers do. That Reuben likes at first verses 23 and 24. So when Joseph came to his brothers they stripped him of his robe the robe of many colors that he wore and They took him and threw him into a pit.

The pit was empty and there was no water in it. So Reuben would have been happy with this they throw him into the pit and his plan is Set to work. He's gonna come by he's gonna he's gonna Scoop him out of the pit and he's gonna take him back to Hebron where his father is.

But what we must see here is the Lord's hand in this the Lord's providence is all over the place. God uses Reuben whatever motives he has to save the life of his brother Joseph. If the Lord did not do this think of how different the story would have been.

Joseph would have died at a young age the young age of 17 from his brothers Murdering him. No one would have ever seen the great plan the Lord had for Joseph. There would not have been a great story that people from generation to generation Would see about God's work in the life of this man.

As you know, I'm a runner and I've run it. I've run in two marathons. Both both didn't go very well but anyway, if you have any experience with marathons, it's a brutal race because. Especially especially the elite runners because they're going at such a hard pace for 26 .2 miles and it's a long time to hold on To a hard pay hard pace and that's an understatement.

In 1982 at the Boston Marathon. I know I know that Mike and Mike's wife Tammy just ran in Boston. They were just out there, but one of the most famous Bot marathon races in the world is the Boston Marathon.

It goes back to the late 1800s. But one of them one of the most Rememberable races that run in the history of that event in any event any marathon in the history of the world Was in 1982 and they called it the duel in the Sun.

It was a race between Alberto Salazar. He was the world record holder and then and then nobody someone who nobody nobody knew about named Dick Beardsley from, Minnesota. He had just kind of come out of nowhere.

He wasn't a star runner in high school. It wasn't a star runner in college, but he just got fast in his mid -20s and he got to that level. As a marathoner and as they were running the race He said in the early early part of the race and the first three four or five miles.

He felt like dropping out. He just felt sick and he just said, you know, I'm just gonna hang in there, but he felt like dropping out and as the race.

Went on.

He was he stayed with the front pack. Stayed with the front pack. They get to mile 17 and there's three guys left and he's one of them. One of the guys drops out and now there's just two the world record holder and him.

From mile 17 to mile 26. They're running neck-and-neck the entire way. The story doesn't end. Too joyfully because Beardsley I'm a Minnesota and I was I would I would have been rooting for him if I was still if I was Alive at that point.

But he loses by one and a half seconds, that's it so there was a neck-and-neck Race right to the right to the finish. But what Beardsley said. After the fact I've heard him talk about this race. He said if I would have dropped out in mile five think of how much different my life would have been.

Because of people know him for that race. He became world famous because of that race. He's thinking think of how much different my life would have been in and he still speaks on that race and everything.

And.

Think about how much different the story Would have been in your life if something went different. If you took a right turn instead of a left turn or if the right person at the right time was not placed in your life.

Think of how much different your story would be. The reason you are here is the Lord's hand is on your life. You could be somewhere else. But the Lord mysteriously guided you here and somewhere along the way.

You could have walked away from the Lord. But he guided you here and we must understand that as we follow the Lord the best story for our life. The best way that our that our life could possibly turn out is taking place.

You ever think about that? If you follow the Lord closely your life is gonna turn out better than it could have if you took any other path. So as we see here the Lord weaves together the story of the lives of his people and the second way how That we see in this text is by saving Joseph in order to preserve the great design for his life.

He didn't die there. The Lord had a big plan for his future. The third way how the Lord weaves together the story of the lives of his people is by allowing something bad to happen to him. For his ultimate good.

So this one's related to what we just talked about. But allowing something bad to happen him to him for his ultimate good. Verses 25 through 36 so we just saw Joseph's life is spared his brothers tear off his beautiful robe and throw him into the pits and Ruben plans to pull him out and bring him back to his father.

And if you stopped right here, you might say good. God used Ruben to spare Joseph's life. And now he's going to return home. He's going to be safe with his father and they are going to live a nice easy comfortable life back at Hebron.

Is that how it happened? No, not even close. The Lord writes adversity into his story and he writes adversity into our story. In order to make his design for our lives that much greater. You know, so they don't write history books about people who never faced adversity.

If you're gonna read a biography about someone I guarantee you there will be adversity in there. That's how God writes The stories of the lives of his people. So let's read about this enormous adversity that Joseph is about to face versus 25 through 28.

Then they sat down to eat and looking up they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites Coming from Gilead with their camels bearing gum balm and myrrh on their way to carry it down to Egypt. Then Judah said to his brothers.

What prophet is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? Come let us sell him to the Ishmaelites and let not our hand be upon him for he is our brother our own flesh. And his brothers listened to him.

Then Midianite traders passed by and they drew Joseph up and lifted him out of the pit and sold him to the Ishmaelites for 20 shekels of silver. They took Joseph to Egypt. Okay, let's stop right there so in verse 25 the brothers are eating together after they had thrown their brothers into the pits and They see slave traders coming their way and these traders are Ishmaelites Who are traveling toward Egypt and one of the brothers Judah comes up with a great idea in verses 27 and 28 as To what to do with Joseph and what you just says here.

Why would we kill him if we could make a profit off of him? That's a very noble thing to do. This is what they do. You will notice that this text mentions Ishmaelites and Midianites. Now, this is the same group of people.

It's that they're just called by two different names and in verse 28 We read that they sold Joseph for 20 pieces of silver. Think about that they sold their brother their own flesh and blood for 20 pieces of Silver and these Midian traders take Joseph down with them to Egypt.

Now as Joseph is being sold the brother who tried to save his life Reuben He wasn't involved involved with selling him to the Midianites, so he returns. And he doesn't find him verses 29 and 30 when Reuben returned to the pit and saw that Joseph was not in the pit he tore his clothes and Returned to his brothers and said the boy is gone and I where shall I go?

Reuben is obviously very upset that his brother is not in the pit. And like I said, we don't know what his motives are here but his plan To scoop his brother out of the pit and bring him up to his father has just been ruined and he says where shall I go?

He's clearly thinking here. My father would have been so pleased. And you probably would if he would have looked at me more favorably if I would have just been able to Complete this mission of delivering my brother back to him from this point forward.

Reuben does not speak against his brothers, so he goes along with them. Now that these brothers have gotten rid of Joseph now. They need to make it look like something else happened verse 31. Then they took Joseph's robe and slaughtered a goat and dipped the blood dipped the robe in the blood.

This is like one of those crime shows you ever watch those any of those crime shows on TV. What you see is whenever whenever if someone murders another The murderer makes it look like something else happened in order to cover their guilt.

All right, they blame it on they set up someone or they set it up like it was an accident. That's what they're doing here. So the brothers make the robe look like a wild animal killed Joseph and then they bring it to their father verses 32 and 33 and they sent the robe of many colors and brought it to their father and said This we have found please identify whether it is your son's robe or not and he Jacob Identified it and said it is my son's robe.

A fierce animal has devoured him. Joseph is without doubt torn to pieces. So that's so the trick is is pulled off here. Jacob believes them that his son truly was Torn to pieces by a wild animal. We already saw Reuben tear his clothes in the morning and it Mourning and not not the time of day, but he's he's weeping and Now Jacob mourns as well verses 34 and 35 then Jacob tore his garments and put sackcloth on his loins and Mourned for his son many days all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him.

But he refused to be comforted and said no I shall go down to show to my son mourning. Thus his father wept for him. We need to put ourselves in Jacob's shoes here his grief is tremendous. His son Joseph is 17 years old.

Losing a loved one is very hard. But I've heard it said that losing a child is the hardest of all. And so his grief is tremendous. And then in the second half of verse 35 Jacob says that he's going to show all in sorrow.

Show all in the Old Testament if you ever googled this on Bible Gateway it comes up hundreds of times. It's everywhere in the Old Testament, but what it means is the realm of the dead. So what Jacob is saying here is he's going to be in deep sorrow for the rest of his life before he goes to that place.

He's not optimistic that you know what I'm gonna get over this. He's he's in deep sorrow because not only did his son died his favorite son died. And as Jacob mourns he's comforted by his family it says here his daughters.

This could mean his Dinah and his daughter-in-laws. That's probably what it means. But what is really dark about this is the very ones who are guilty of selling Joseph into slavery are there to comfort?

Jacob so the perpetrators are there Comforted him and they have no sorrow for the horrible crime that they have committed, but they're gonna have to live with this guilt for the rest of their lives. Until they would encounter him again.

Now finally in verse 36 we see the story of Joseph take another twist verse 36. Meanwhile the Midianites had sold him in Egypt to Potiphar an officer of Pharaoh the captain of the guard. Okay, so the Midianites these traders that that purchased Joseph they go south to Egypt.