What Makes A Church Relevant? – Genesis 46: 26-31 Series

I talked to a lady this week who said to me, “I love the teaching that we're doing through Genesis.” That's where we are in our book right now. She says, “I was listening to your sermon series that you did before in Genesis.” That must have been ten years ago. Okay. She says, “I was listening to that series in Genesis and comparing it to the sermons you're teaching now. It's completely different.” And of course that's the case. I used to think when I first started preaching about forty years ago, I better save the sermon because I'm going to preach this again some time. I need to keep the recordings and everything. So I have them aside since I did all that work. And then I realized I never go back and look at that stuff. Why? Because the scriptures tell us that they are alive, living and active. What that means is that they are engaging. When we come to the scriptures, every time we do, we learn something new. So my commitment to you is that I'm every week going to go into God's word and I'm going to experience God's word in my own heart. When I do, then I'll have something to share that comes out of my heart and out of God's word that'll be relevant and practical for you. That's my commitment to you. That's what I want to do. I love that kind of teaching and that approach to scripture.

So this week when I came to this passage in Genesis 46, I was actually startled. I don't think I ever saw this before. So I'm eager to show this to you. I was so taken aback. It kind of took me on a tangent into the New Testament to do some study and some work to compare the story in the New Testament to the Old Testament. So that's what I'm going to share with you today as we go into Genesis 46.

I'd appreciate it if you'd open your Bible if you brought it. I encourage you to write and take notes. I've also put the words up here on the on the screen so you can see them.

Let me explain to you where we are in the story. This is the story of Joseph. Some of you have told me that this is your favorite Bible story in all of the Bible. I understand why. This story of Joseph is so exciting because we see the drama, we see the emotion. But we see God's providence at work in the life of a man who experienced all kinds of terrible things in his life. Yet he remained faithful. He continued to move forward. And God blessed him in some great ways. We all need that message. That's encouraging to all of us.

So we're going to pick up the story today. Joseph sent word to and his whole family back – go bring dad back here. And everybody come. I want you to move back to Egypt here. That's where I want you to come. So now let's shift over to the perspective of Jacob, the dad, and he's gathering everything, getting it all ready to go. We enter the story in verse 26 when we have this recounting of the numbers, how many people are going into Egypt away from Canaan.

It says in verse 26 – All those who went to Egypt with Jacob—those who were his direct descendants, not counting his sons’ wives—numbered sixty-six persons. With the two sons who had been born to Joseph in Egypt, the members of Jacob’s family, which went to Egypt, were seventy in all.

So the number becomes important. There's seventy people that is marked out here in the scripture. It's important because it's a small number. Seventy is the sixty-six people who are coming (not counting the wives, but sixty-six), and then there's Jacob himself, and then there's Joseph and his two boys that are in Egypt already. So you're going to start with that group of seventy, so to speak, and it's going to grow, and God has a plan for these people. Over 430 years those number of people are going to grow to be over a million people. And those people are going to then be moved out of Egypt and go back to Canaan. That's room for another book of the Bible. That's the next book, the book of Exodus. But we're in the book of Genesis now. And this point is made that there are these seventy persons that are coming. God has a plan in their lives. So the numbers at that point become important.

It says, as we read in verse 28 – Now Jacob sent Judah ahead of him to Joseph to get directions to Joseph to Goshen. Now Judah here, we've already read about him. He seems to be a leader among the brothers in the family. He was the one whose idea was let's sell Joseph into slavery. That was his idea years before. And then you’ll remember more recently, when Joseph said, “I'm going to keep Benjamin here; you guys can leave,” it was Judah who gave that great plea and that appeal to Joseph saying, “Do not do that. Our father will die if we don't bring Benjamin back. Take me. Put me into slavery.” That's what Joseph was looking for was the brokenness in Judah’s heart. And when he saw that, that's when he wept and he revealed himself to his brothers. Now we see again, Judah is a leader and he's stepping out and he’s saying, “I'll go,” and they're sending him out to get directions to know where to go. I like it that men are getting directions according to the scripture here. That was very helpful. Notice getting directions to Goshen.