Genesis 37-50
A tale of 2 brothers and their dad.
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Today we finish off Genesis, as we look at chapters 37-50, which focuses on the story of Joseph, who is one of the most famous biblical characters. Just about everyone has heard of Joseph, whether they’ve been brought up in the church or not There’s the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, “Joseph and the amazing technicolour dreamcoat.” There’s the more recent animated movie, “Joseph: King of Dreams.” But what comes to your mind when you think of Joseph? His amazing technicolour dream coat? His dreams of feast and famine in Egypt? His up and down career - from favourite son, to slave, to trusted servant, to prisoner and then finally to prime minister of Egypt? What a varied life! All these things are true, but there’s far more to the story of Joseph than just these things. Joseph is a story of jealousy and betrayal. A story of attempted murder, of enslavement. A story of repentance and forgiveness. And most of all, a story of God’s sovereignty and control over everything, even in the midst of despair and wickedness.
You might remember that last time, we talked about Jacob. Jacob, who despite his faults, which were many, inherited the promise from his grandfather Abraham and his father Isaac: the promise of offspring, which as we learnt was ultimately fulfilled in Jesus Christ. The promise that through Abraham and his offspring, all nations of the world would be blessed. And you will remember that as well as all this, Jacob had 12 sons born to him. And Joseph was one of these sons. But Joseph was special for Jacob because he was the son of his old age.
Please open your Bibles with me, as we resume the story in Genesis 37, where the story starts to concentrate on Joseph, who at the time is in his late teens, the second youngest of Jacob’s sons. In verse 3 we read: Gen 373 Now Israel [remember Israel is another name for Jacob] loved Joseph more than any other of his sons, because he was the son of his old age. And he made him a robe of many colours. We see here that Jacob loved Joseph more than his other sons, and makes him a beautiful robe to show his preferential love for him. Well, we probably all know the result of showing preferential treatment to one child over the others, and so you can probably imagine how Joseph’s brothers felt about this preferential treatment Gen 374 But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him. And the rest of the book of Genesis covers the results of this hatred Joseph’s brother had of him.
In verses 5-10 we read of a couple of dreams that Joseph had. Dreams that one day his brothers, his older brothers, that they would bow down to him! And Joseph wasn’t backward in telling his brothers about his dreams, that one day they would all bow down to him! And his brothers’ reaction, the Bible makes it quite clear, that they hated Joseph even more because of his dreams and Joseph’s boasting about them. They hated him so much in fact, that one day his brothers hatched a plan to kill him. Now it’s one thing to be jealous of your brother because he gets the best clothes, but it’s going way to far to decide to kill him! But then the brothers see a caravan of traders going past, and Judah, the fourth oldest son makes a suggestion. He suggests they sell Joseph rather than kill him. Sell him into slavery. Now take a note of Judah, because we will be following the development of Judah as well as that of Joseph. We can see here that Judah doesn’t seem to like the idea of killing Joseph, but he’s quite happy to sell him into slavery. What a nice brother to have!
and so the brothers sell Joseph into slavery. They take Joseph’s precious robe and dip some goat’s blood on it, take it back to their father, and lie to Jacob their father. And Jacob is devastated, believing that Joseph his favourite son is dead. And chapter 37 finishes with Joseph reaching Egypt and being sold to an important official in Egypt called Potiphar.
Then chapter 38 interrupts the story of Joseph to talk about Judah, one of Joseph’s brothers. We might wonder why Genesis seems to suddenly interrupt the story of Joseph, but what happens to Judah is also important. Chapter 38 talks about the descendents of Judah, and it turns out that Judah is the ancestor of Jesus Christ. So his descendents are important. But perhaps what is more interesting, is that chatper 38 and chapter 39 present us with a stark contrast in how two of Jacob’s brothers, Judah and Joseph, deal with sexual temptation. In chapter 38 we read of Judah. Without going into all the details of what happened, which you can read about yourselves, Judah’s daughter-in-law who has been widowed disguises herself as a prostitute by wearing a veil and tricks Judah – her father-in-law - into sleeping with her. The upshot is we see that Judah doesn’t have any sexual scruples. He is willing to have a fling with an anonymous prostitute who turns out to be his daughter-in-law.
Contrast this with Joseph now in chapter 39, who by now is serving as a slave in Potiphar’s house. He is doing a good job there. He is diligent and competent and trustworthy - so much so in fact, that his master trusts him with everything. And it appears that he is quite handsome, because his master’s wife takes a liking to him. So much so in fact, that she chases him and does everything she can to get him to sleep with her, as it says in Gen 39.6a-7:Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance. 7 And after a time his master’s wife cast her eyes on Joseph and said, “Lie with me.” What was Joseph’s reaction? Did he succomb to her advances? No! We read of Joseph’s reaction to her advances: Gen 37 9b How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?” 10 And as she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or to be with her.
And so we see that Joseph’s reaction to temptation, especially in the area of sexual temptation. Not only did he refuse to lie with her, he refused to flirt with her, he refused to be with her. That is, he stayed as far away from trouble and sin as possible, which is something we can learn from it our sex charged society where temptation confronts us at every turn. And Joseph’s motivation for doing the right thing, was that he didn’t want to sin against God. That is, Joseph’s concern was to please God with his conduct. And because Joseph wouldn’t sleep with his master’s wife, she set him up, made it look like he was trying to rape her, and Joseph got thrown in the slammer. So Joseph actually paid a heavy price for doing the right thing. And sometimes, we too will also suffer for doing the right thing.
So we have in these two chapters the contrast of two brothers. Judah – who doesn’t seem to have a care in the world but himself. Who thinks nothing of selling his brother into slavery, who isn’t bothered by breaking his father’s heart, and who doesn’t hesitate to sleep with a disguised prostitute who turns out to be his daughter-in-law. On the other hand, we have Joseph, who has been unjustly sold by his brothers into slavery, and despite sexual temptation, at the cost of his freedom he refuses to sin. Joseph’s motivation is to please God.
Now many of know that while Joseph was in prison, he was able to correclty interpret the dreams of some of his fellow prisoners. And a couple of years after being in prison, the Pharoah (the king of Egypt) had a couple of disturbing dreams, and so Joseph was called out of prison to interpret Pharoah’s dreams. The interpretation was that Egypt would have 7 years of bumper crops followed by the 7 years of famine. And that during the bumper years, grain should be stored up, so they could get through the years of famine, the years of drought. And Pharoah appointed Joseph second in charge in Egypt, second only to himself, with the task of collecting and storing the grain during the bumper years, and then distrubuting it during the years of drought. In one day Joseph went from prisoner to prime minister. When people go from poverty to riches very quickly, they often forget God. But not Joseph. He was thankful to God.
And so the 7 years of plenty pass, during which Joseph diligently collects and stores part of the harvest from those good years. And then the 7 years of famine start. And we learn at the end of chatper 41 that the famine isn’t just in Egypt, it’s in Canaan too – where Jacob and Joseph’s brothers live. And after 2 years of the famine, Jacob and his sons are running out of food, so Jacob sends ten of his remaining sons
- all except Benjamin the youngest - to Egypt to buy grain. Joseph’s brothers come to Egypt to buy grain, and guess who was the one in Egpyt selling the grain? Joseph! And so Joseph and his brothers meet 19 years after they sold him into slavery….
Now perhaps we’ve heard the story of Joseph so many times that we lose the emotion, the shock of that meeting. 19 years had passed since Joseph and his brothers has last seen each other. Joseph’s brothers didn’t recognised Joseph, but Joseph recognised them. Now put yourselves in Joseph’s shoes. Have you ever been in a situation, where someone did you some wrong? And then after years of not seeing that person, suddenly you see them! They start talking to you! What do you do, what do you say? And now think of Joseph. Here were his 10 brothers that had wanted him dead. But instead of killing him, they made some money by selling him as a slave. And here they are, 19 years later, begging for food. What would you say? What would you do? Well, first up you’d probably be stunned. Possibly Joseph was - we read of their initial encounter in Gen 427 Joseph saw his brothers and recognized them, but he treated them like strangers and spoke roughly to them. “Where do you come from?” he said. They said, “From the land of Canaan, to buy food.”
As his brothers bow down before him, Joseph remembers the dreams he had 19 years before of his brothers bowing down to him. When the brothers sold Joseph into slavery, they had all the power. Now the shoe is on the other foot. Not only does Joseph have the power to give or deny them food, but as second in command of Egypt, he could most likely have demanded their lives as well, and exacted vengeance on them. But he doesn’t do that. And over the next few chapters we see a gripping story played out, a story of repentance and forgiveness.
But intially Joseph doesn’t reveal himself to them. He acts gruffly and suspiciously towards them in the way he deals with them, giving them a hard time, in order to test them. The brothers start to talk amongst themselves, not realising that Joseph could understand, and they say Gen 4221 Then they said to one another, “In truth we are guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the distress of his soul, when he begged us and we did not listen. That is why this distress has come upon us.” We start to see the first signs of regret and repentance amongst Joseph’s brothers. Meanwhile, although Joseph acted gruffly towards them, giving them a hard time, Joseph actually supplied their needs, selling them the grain they needed, as well as sending the money they paid for it back with them. Joseph repaid evil with good. And Joseph sent them home with instructions to bring Benjamin, the youngest brother.
And so the brothers return back to Canaan. Eventually the food runs out and they are starving, but Jacob doesn’t want to let Benjamin go with them. He’s already lost Joseph, he doesn’t want to lose Benjamin too. The brothers are desparate. Without food they will all die, but Jacob won’t let them go, he fears for Benjamin. He’s lost Joseph, and he doesn’t want to lose Benjamin too. Then we see something remarkable happen. Judah steps forward. Judah, whose idea it was to sell Joseph as a slave. Judah, who thought nothing of sleeping with a prostitute who turned out to be is daughter in law. Judah who shirks responsibility. We start to see this Judah changing for the better. Gen 438 And Judah said to Israel his father, “Send the boy with me, and we will arise and go, that we may live and not die, both we and you and also our little ones. 9 I will be a pledge of his safety. From my hand you shall require him. If I do not bring him back to you and set him before you, then let me bear the blame forever. From here on in we see a change in Judah. We see him taking responsibility. He is willing to bear the blame if anything goes wrong. We see his concern for the little ones – the children, and we’ll soon start to see Judah taking leadership of the brothers.
And so the brothers – this time with their youngest brother Benjamin, return to Egypt and to Joseph. They arrive and Joseph continues to give them a hard time, to test them. He plants a valuable silver cup in Benjamin’s sack, and then accuses Benjamin of theft. Joseph tells the rest of the brothers they can go free - only Benjamin has sinned, he says, only Benjamin must remain and be my slave. And then we see something remarkable from Judah. He steps up and intercedes for Benjamin, and at the end of his long speech to Joseph he says, Gen 44 33 Now therefore, please let your servant remain instead of the boy as a servant to my lord, and let the boy go back with his brothers. 34 For how can I go back to my father if the boy is not with me? I fear to see the evil that would find my father.” Wow – what a changed Judah! He’s willing to become a slave instead of his brother Benjamin! His concern is for his father and the grief it would bring him! Judah has matured – and changed. And Joseph’s reaction to this, is that finally he reveals himself to his brothers in what must be one of the most emotive reunion scenes ever. It’s worth reading some of chapter 45 just as it stands:
45 Then Joseph could not control himself before all those who stood by him. He cried, “Make everyone go out from me.” So no one stayed with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers. 2 And he wept aloud, so that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard it. 3 And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still alive?” But his brothers could not answer him, for they were dismayed at his presence. 4 So Joseph said to his brothers, “Come near to me, please.” And they came near. And he said, “I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. 5 And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. 6 For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. 7 And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. 8 So it was not you who sent me here, but God.
What a remarkable encounter! We can see the brothers’ initial dismay when he reveals himself. No doubt they thought that Joseph would now seek revenge. After all, the shoe is on the other foot now and Joseph holds all the power. But revenge is far from Joseph’s mind. Here is Joseph, who totally forgives his brothers, the brothers who had wanted to kill him but then decided to sell him into slavery instead.
And Joseph doesn’t just grudgingly forgive them. Joseph is genuinely glad to be reunited with them. And later on in the chapter, we learn that he tells them to go and fetch Jacob their father, and that Joseph will provide for them, provide for all their physical needs.
But over it all, we can see Joseph’s total trust in God and His ordering of events. Even though it was the brothers’ who sold Joseph into slavery in Egypt, Joseph can see that God used it. Not only used it – but planned it, so that the lives of many could be saved through Joseph. Because it was Joseph who was able to interpret the dream predicting the famine, and Joseph who prepared not only Egypt but many other nations for the famine, and thus saved many lives, including those of his brothers.
The brothers go to Canaan to collect Jacob, and you can imagine how excited he was to hear that Joseph was still alive! And on the way down to Egypt, Jacob stopped at Beersheba in the south of Canaan. Jacob was about to leave the land promised to Abraham and Isaac and himself. And God appeared to him in Gen 46:2-4: Gen 46 2 And God spoke to Israel in visions of the night and said, “Jacob, Jacob.” And he said, “Here am I.” 3 Then he said, “I am God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for there I will make you into a great nation. 4 I myself will go down with you to Egypt, and I will also bring you up again, and Joseph’s hand shall close your eyes.” This is important. You see Jacob was about to leave the promised land, so he felt that he needed permission from God to leave. And God says it’s okay to go, in fact it’s part of the plan. Because it is in Egypt that Israel will become a great nation. At that time the descendents of Jacob, also known as Israel, were just 70. A large family, but hardly a nation. But in the 400 years in Egypt, they were to become a nation, and we’ll learn more about that when we do our overview series of Exodus sometime next year.
So Jacob comes to Egypt. You can imagine the reunion with his beloved lost son Joseph! Jacob and the brothers settle in Egypt, while Joseph continues running the country. And then in chapter 49 just before he dies, Jacob blesses his sons. Each of the 12 sons would become the ancestor of each of the 12 tribes of Israel. And we note in particular the blessing given to Judah. Jacob prohesies that Judah shall become the pre-eminant tribe, and in Gen 49:10 we read:
Gen 49 10 The scepter shall not depart from Judah,
nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet,
until tribute comes to him;
and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples
Ancient Near Eastern idioms are a bit hard for us to understand, but what this means is that it is from Judah that the kings shall come. The kings of Israel, and ultimately, the King of Israel. And He would be not just king of Israel, but of the world. That is - King Jesus, the offspring promised to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. The descendent through whom all peoples would be blessed. The descendent through whom God would fix up our sin problem, our problem of disobedience and rebellion against Him.
Today we finish our very quick overview series of Genesis. We’ve covered a lot of ground, and I hope you’ve enjoyed reading through Genesis and seeing God’s earliest dealings with us people. We’ve looked at the creation of the world. That it was made very good – perfect. Paradise. And that death was not on the agenda. People were immortal. We’ve looked at how Adam and Eve were tempted by the devil. The devil who tempted Adam and Eve to doubt God when the devil said, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” We’ve looked at how Adam and Eve chose to believe the devil instead of God. And because of that, sin entered the human race, and along with sin, God’s judgement also entered the human race. Our relationship with God was ruined, our relationships with each other were corrupted, and we lost immortality. Death entered the human race. We then looked at the descendents of Adam and Eve, and how they entered a moral spiral dive, and even the judgements of Noah’s Flood and at the Tower of Babel only paused the moral spiral dive, but didn’t stop it. We had a problem – sin. Disobeying God our creator, ignoring God our maker. And this problem led to a continuing separation from God with the ultimate inescapable consequence of death.
And then in Genesis 12 we find the glimmer of hope. God called Abraham. He called him to move to another country. But the call was far more than that. Part of the call was that all the nations would be blessed through Abraham’s offspring. And we learn in the New Testament that the fulfillment of that promise, was to be Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ – as the Son of God, God Himself, perfect in every way, without sin, and therefore able to suffer death on the cross on our behalf, so that all those who trust in Him can be restored to fellowship with God and receive eternal life.
And we’ve followed through some of Abraham’s descendents. Isaac his son, Jacob his grandson, who was renamed Israel. And today we’ve looked at Jacob’s sons, in particular Joseph, who out of all the patriarchs shines as an example for us of a wise and godly man. And also we looked at Judah and seen the changes in his life, as he repented and was sorry for the things he had done wrong and changed his ways and took responsibility. And in the story of Joseph and his brothers we see a wonderful story of repentance and forgiveness, of restoration of relationships in a fractured family.
But ultimately we see God’s sovereign control over the affairs of people. It was Jacob’s favouritism of one son, Joseph, and his brothers’ reactions to that – selling him into slavery to the Egyptians - that led to the whole chain of events recorded in Genesis 37-50. In other words, all that happened was a result of sin and wickedness. But through it all, even through the sinful actions of people, in a way that is difficult to understand, God was still in control. Right at the end of Genesis, Joseph explains to his brothers the result of their actions: Gen 5020 As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.
And today, God is sovereign also. Even though the world may appear to be in a mess, which it a result of the sin of people, ultimately God is in control, and will one day bring all things under Christ in that heavenly city, were there will be no more pain, no more suffering, but only perfect relationships with God and with each other. Forever.
