We Need a Hero: Joseph

I don’t get mad. I get _______.

What goes in that line? You ever feel like that? Some people spend hours or days or weeks plotting how they will get even. A study done last year on revenge found that the sweetness of revenge is typically fleeting. People involved in the study found a lot of satisfaction in getting revenge on someone who had done something wrong. But then the more they thought about it, the more they were still bothered by the original offense that triggered their revenge. Revenge is sweet. But only for a time. It’s easy to want revenge. We want life to be fair. We want people to be punished for behaving badly, especially against us. We all have a sense of justice, although that sense can be badly misinformed. Our movies and fiction stories often have elements of revenge, and the revenge brings a sense of closure and justice. but in real life, it almost never works that way. Closure is fleeting.

Our story today has revenge written all over it. But the ending to the story is quite surprising. Hollywood likes this story. There have been numerous versions of this story over the years. Joseph: King of Dreams was DreamWorks attempt at telling the story. It’s a rags to riches tale full of danger and success that everybody loves. The story we have in our Bibles certainly lends itself to this idea of moving from being a shepherd to being a king… and it’s not the only story we have like this in our Bibles. David was another underdog… and shepherd who ended up as king. But just like the other stories we've looked at, Joseph is the hero of the story. The moral of the story is if we simply hang on and we do what is right, things will turn out all right. And in Joseph’s instance, because he was willing to make the best of bad situations, he ends up as a king. And in some ways that it is presented, because Joseph always does what it right, he gets the last laugh on his brothers. Way to go Joseph!

But that’s not how the Bible presents the Joseph story. We’ve read this morning the opening chapters of Joseph’s story. One thing we can say right away:

This is not a revenge story. And Joseph is not the hero.

But this is a story of redemption. And along the way, we learn a little bit about our own salvation.

Joseph’s vocation

The first thing we notice in the story is Joseph’s vocation.

Genesis 37:2 “At seventeen years of age, Joseph tended sheep with his brothers.”

Joseph is a shepherd. Shepherds in that culture were at the bottom of the economic ladder. There was nothing romantic about being a shepherd. In fact, years later when Joseph’s family shows up in Egypt, the Egyptians can’t get over the fact that they are shepherds. Shepherds are dirty and smelly. They were not part of the in crowd. You didn’t want to be associated with shepherds. But when our story starts, Joseph is tending sheep.

Joseph’s status

The next thing we notice in Joseph’s story is that he has a status the rest of his shepherd brothers don’t. Our story says Joseph gave his father a bad report about the brothers. Joseph is making his way into upper management at 17. And then there’s this:

Genesis 37:3 “Now Israel loved Joseph more than his other sons because Joseph was a son born to him in his old age.”

Uh-oh. Israel or Jacob, the father, loved Joseph more. This is where Joseph’s story tends to go off the rails and it never recovers. We’re not being given a lesson on what not to do in a family. By the time we get to this point in the book of Genesis, we already have a very good picture of Joseph’s dysfunctional family. The brothers are notorious. They are not nice guys, for the most part. We’re not told what the bad report was. But we do know that Joseph enjoys a place in the father’s heart that the other sons do not have. Joseph is the chosen one. Joseph is the favored one. Jacob himself is a chosen one.. the one through whom the blessing of God’s covenant will flow. And as the story of Joseph begins, his father Jacob is setting Joseph up as if he will be the Blessed One through whom the messiah will come.

Joseph’s robe

Jacob then gives Joseph a token of his favored status. Jacob isn’t simply loving Joseph as a chosen one, he wants Joseph to be seen as a chosen one.

Genesis 37:3 “Jacob made a long-sleeved (or multi-colored) robe for Joseph.”

This robe is the stuff of kings. Of royalty. Of destiny. More importantly, this robe is the robe of Promise. The multiple colors we’ve seen before… the Promise given to Noah after the flood, the Promise that the Offspring of Eve would flow through Noah is in a rainbow. And here again, we have colors of Promise in the form of a royal robe. This goes beyond simply being the primary caretaker in the family sheep business. Joseph’s robe speaks to the anticipation of Promise and Blessing that had been promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God had told Abraham that kings would come through his offspring and here Jacob is thinking… maybe Joseph is the One. He dresses him in clothing that speaks to being a king and a promise.

Joseph’s dreams

But that hope of Jacob is embraced by Joseph himself. Joseph isn’t simply wearing the robe of kings and promise, he’s is dreaming of kings and promise.

Genesis 37:5 “Then Joseph had a dream… there we were binding sheaves of grain in the field. Suddenly my sheaf stood up, and our sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.”

First, that’s absolutely bizarre. When was the last time you dreamed of sheaves of grain? The subject matter is an immediate tip-off something is different here. Joseph is dreaming about grain. And the end result is that his brothers acknowledge his status as the king, as the Promised One. I can think of all sorts of ways to convey that same sentiment, but grain would not be it. But that’s not the end of it… again… another dream:

Genesis 37:9 “I had another dream, and this time the sun, moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.”

The grain is gone. It’s now the planets and stars.. it is an image from beyond earth. But the point is the same. Joseph is being given dreams of destiny. of Promise. That coat he had been given is now being given interpretation and narrative. The coat and the dreams speak to the emergence of a Promised One, a King, that is bigger and more majestic than any king known on earth. Joseph sees himself in these dreams to be sure, but the nature of these dreams suggest that more is going on than whatever is going down between Joseph and his brothers. Nations hang in the balance. The world’s destiny is on the line. This robe and these dreams of Joseph speak to the Promised One who would come and fix all things and make everything OK. This is the gospel found in Joseph.

Joseph’s rejection

Wherever there is the gospel, wherever there is the Promise, there are enemies. There are those who refuse to believe it. That’s here. The brothers can’t stand Joseph. In fact, there is escalation in the antagonism in the story. The robe and the dreams and Joseph’s proclamation of the Promise in the dreams is more than they want.

Genesis 37:4 “They hated him and could not bring themselves to speak peaceably to him.”

Genesis 37:5 “When Joseph told the dream to his brothers, they hated him even more.”

Genesis 37:11 “His brothers were jealous of him.”

This isn’t your typical hatred. This isn’t your typical sibling rivalry. The brothers hate the Promise. They hate the covenant. They hate Joseph’s chosen status. They hate the idea of the Promised one. They have no plans to bow the knee or swear allegiance to those who speak of a hope that is beyond their circumstances. They hate the robe. They hate the dreams. They hate Joseph himself. And all of this hatred comes to a boiling point:

Genesis 37:20 “Let’s kill him and throw him into one of the pits. We can say that a vicious animal ate him. Then we’ll see what becomes of his dreams!”

Genesis 37:23 “When Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped off Joseph’s robe, the long-sleeved robe that he had on. Then they took him and threw him into the pit.”

Joseph’s story is literally at rock bottom. If Joseph is the Promised One, the pit is as low as it gets. Throughout the Bible another word for death is “the pit”. The pit is an old dried up well. A cistern. There’s no escaping from a cistern. It is empty. It has no water. Regardless of the fact that they don’t immediately put Joseph to death, being at the bottom of a dried up well from which there is no escape means that in all likelihood Joseph will die. What will become of the dreams now? What of the gospel promise now? If Joseph is the Promised One, that destiny is now all-but-dead in the bottom of a well that has no water.

Joseph’s resurrection

But Joseph’s story does not end there.

Genesis 37:28 “When Midianite traders passed by, his brothers pulled Joseph out of the pit and sold him for twenty pieces of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took Joseph to Egypt.”

Joseph is pulled from the pit. He is sold as a slave. His life is spared, only somewhat. The brothers have no idea where he is headed or what his fate is. They fabricate an elaborate lie using Joseph’s robe:

Genesis 37:31 “They took Joseph’s robe, slaughtered a male goat, and dipped the robe in its blood.”

The brothers’ hatred for Joseph and the promise and the covenant is complete. Joseph and the Promise may not be in reality dead. But He and the Promise are dead for the brothers and for their father. This goat is not being sacrificed to atone for sin. This goat is being sacrificed to somehow conceal the sin. And the robe of promise is now used to provide an alternative story about Joseph and the gospel.

But the reality is that Joseph rises from the pit, from death, to life. A life completely unexpected.

Joseph’s salvation

Of course, we know how the story ends. Joseph ends up in Egypt. Over time, he becomes the second most powerful guy in the world. And over time he reunites with his father and his brothers. But here’s how his story is not the story of Hollywood. This is not a revenge story. Joseph isn’t about getting even or even getting a leg up on his brothers. Here’s how Joseph himself says it:

Genesis 50:20-21 “You planned evil against me; God planned it for good to bring about the present result—the saving of many people. Therefore don’t be afraid. I will take care of you and your children.” And he comforted them and spoke kindly to them.”

You planned evil. God planned good. And the good that was planned: the salvation of many people. This story is not Joseph’s story. It’s not Joseph’s doing. It’s not about revenge. It’s about salvation. And it’s God at work being the hero of the story. Again. God planned it. God did it. God is the hero.

God is the hero

Throughout the whole story, God was with Joseph.

Acts 7:9-10 “God was with Joseph and rescued him out of all his troubles. He gave him favor and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh.

God was with Joseph. God rescued Joseph. God gave Joseph favor. God gave Joseph wisdom. And through all of this, God was with Joseph so that the world could be saved from starvation and thirst. God was with Joseph to save the world.

Jesus saves the rejecters

That’s Jesus. That’s Jesus for all of us. Joseph doesn’t just save the world. Joseph saves his brothers. The ones who hated the promise. the ones who hated the gospel. And that’s Jesus. We are the brothers in this story and the brothers are in need of saving. Like Joseph, Jesus was sold for silver. Like Joseph, Jesus was hated because He was the Promised One. Like Joseph, Jesus was rejected and killed. Like Joseph, Jesus rose from the pit, from the grave to save the world. Like Joseph, Jesus did not opt for revenge, but salvation and grace and kindness.

Cinderelli, Cinderelli

One of those popular rags to riches stories is one we all know. The oppressed orphan who has nothing eventually gets the prince and gets everything. The story ends with a happy Cinderella and the new prince with the disgusted evil step mother and step sisters having to watch all their plans foiled. Revenge is not stated, but the animators give us enough of the anger and disgust of the step mother and step sisters that we feel satisfaction in seeing them “get theirs”. But the most recent live-action Cinderella cause a bit of a meltdown on the internet. And that’s because at the end of that film, Cinderella, forgives the evil step mother. Angry viewers wanted punishment and revenge. Instead, Cinderella offers forgiveness.

What’s missing in our revenge? Forgiveness

Revenge cannot coexist with forgiveness. Wherever there is revenge, there is no forgiveness. The hero we need, the hero we must have must be about forgiveness. If it is revenge, we don’t stand a chance. Joseph was the second most powerful man on the planet and instead of revenge, he is all about forgiveness. Forgiveness that the evil brothers didn’t deserve. It’s not surprising that there would be outrage at Cinderella’s forgiveness. That’s not the world we want. When someone takes advantage of us, when someone is acting out of step with our sense of fairness and justice, we want revenge. We want to see them get theirs. And even as Christians, we know God has said, revenge is mine I will repay. But we quote that verse with gusto. We can’t wait for our enemies to get theirs, even if we’re not the ones exacting revenge.

In those moments, we’ve completely forgotten that we are the brothers of the Joseph story. That’s us. That’s who we are. And we deserve vengeance and instead, Jesus gives us kindness and grace and forgiveness. For our salvation. Our hero, Jesus, did not get revenge. He wasn’t out to get even. He didn’t gloat. He didn’t do a touchdown dance. Jesus forgave. Jesus forgave us for crucifying him. Jesus forgives us. For our salvation. For the world.

Let’s pray.

From the pit to the throne of Egypt. That’s a picture of what Jesus has done for us in our salvation. And this right here is the pit. Jesus wasn’t rescued from the pit. Jesus died and then rose from the pit. For our forgiveness. Jesus is our Joseph, in his body and in his blood so that we would have forgiveness and salvation.