God's Sovereignty Over All Creation

I'd like to begin by reading a brief passage from the book of Genesis.

Okay. I'd like to direct your attention really almost to the very end of the book of Genesis, in chapter 50, beginning at verse 15, where we read these words,

Genesis 50:15–17 NIV

15 When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “What if Joseph holds a grudge against us and pays us back for all the wrongs we did to him?” 16 So they sent word to Joseph, saying, “Your father left these instructions before he died: 17 ‘This is what you are to say to Joseph: I ask you to forgive your brothers the sins and the wrongs they committed in treating you so badly.’ Now please forgive the sins of the servants of the God of your father.” When their message came to him, Joseph wept.

"Before I finish this text, you're aware of what has led up to this moment wherein one of the most cold-blooded acts of treachery and betrayal,

Joseph, who was the apple of his father's eye, had been sold into slavery by his jealous and envious brothers,

And as all of this works out, we finally come to the end of the story where Jacob, after having learned that his son was still alive, has died and the brothers now know that they don't have the protection of their father, Jacob, to shield them from the vengeful wrath of their brother.

And so they assumed that Joseph would behave toward them in seeking revenge with the same kind of fury that they had exercised out of their jealousy and envy against him those many years before. So now they are begging for forgiveness, but they acknowledge that what they had done was evil.

"Thus you shall say to Joseph: 'I beg you, please forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of your father.'" And Joseph wept in the midst of this acknowledgment of their sin, in the midst of their repentance where we still don't know was motivated by a genuine contrition or more out of a fear of punishment, but they acknowledge that what they had done was wicked, and it brought their brother to tears. Now, listen to what follows.

Genesis 50:18–21 NIV

18 His brothers then came and threw themselves down before him. “We are your slaves,” they said. 19 But Joseph said to them, “Don’t be afraid. Am I in the place of God? 20 You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives. 21 So then, don’t be afraid. I will provide for you and your children.” And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them.

'" Doesn't that foreshadow the experience of the prodigal son in the New Testament where after he came to himself by living a life of licentiousness and determined to come home to his father's house, when he comes in repentance, he says to his father, "I am not worthy to be your son. Please forgive me and make me as one of your slaves." "I don't have to be a son. I just want to be in your house.

And I'm happy to be there as your slave." And it's the same idea here that the brothers are saying to Joseph, "

I'm not ruling in the place of God. As for you, you meant evil against me. You acknowledge it. I'm not going to sugarcoat it. What you did to me those years ago when you betrayed me and sold me into slavery was unspeakably wicked. It wasn't an accident. You knew exactly what you were doing. You meant it and intended it for evil.'" And it is as if Joseph were saying to his brothers, "You know, I thought about this a little bit over the last several decades. I had a lot of time in the prison to think about this, and I've had to deal with the possible root of bitterness that would grow up in my soul because of what you guys did to me, but I've come to understand that you were not the only players in this episode.

I've come to understand that the sovereign God of the universe, the Lord God of Israel, was intimately involved in your wickedness. You couldn't have hurt me for a second. You couldn't have damaged my heart or destroyed my relationship with my father. You couldn't have had me delivered into the hands of my enemies and cast into prison for one second apart from the sovereign providence of God because God's sovereignty was involved in your diabolical actions against me.

And I believe in a God who works all things together for good to those who love Him and who are called according to His purpose, and I believe that the Lord God of the universe has the sovereign power even to work your treachery against me for good.

"Now, before you relax and say, 'Well, see, we were just carrying out the sovereign will of God. Certainly, you're not going to be upset with us for that. We can't even say that the devil made us do it, but it's this sovereign God up there that made us betray you.'" So just like Adam before them would say, "The woman that You gave me led me into this predicament," Joseph is not going to give them that option. He said, "Let's be clear. What you did was evil." And Joseph was not about to call good evil or evil good. "What you did was evil and you meant it for evil, but what you meant for evil, what you designed out of the wicked machinations of your hearts for evil, God meant for good so that God's intent in all of this was altogether righteous,

that God in His sovereignty has the capacity and the ability to work through the sinful decisions and the wicked choices of His creatures to bring about His sovereign will which is altogether righteous."

Now, John has already shown how that works out in the New Testament, that the cross

was not an accident. The cross was the most wicked evil ever perpetrated by human beings. Caiaphas meant it for evil. Pilate meant it for evil. The Pharisees meant it for evil. But over and above the human intentionality, the human decisions that grew out of the evil inclinations and impulses of fallen human beings, God was at work to bring about good.

And you know, when I wonder why we call the most wicked event in the history of the world that took place in Golgotha that we remember that and call that day Good Friday. Why don't we call it Bad Friday? We don't call it Bad Friday because what God wrought in that action was the greatest good in the history of the world, in the atonement for His people. Now, what we see here in this passage, well, let me read it, the rest of it,

Genesis 50:20 NIV

20 You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.

"As for you, you meant evil against me. But God meant it for good," God's purpose in all of this, "in order to bring it about as it is this day to save many people alive. So, don't be afraid; I will provide for you and your little ones. And he comforted them and he spoke kindly to them," not because of their good intentions, but because of God's good intention.

Acts 4:27–31 NIV

27 Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. 28 They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. 29 Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. 30 Stretch out your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” 31 After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.

Romans 8:28 NIV

28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

You had the old adage, "For want of a nail, the shoe was lost. For want of the shoe, the horse was lost. For want of the horse, the rider was lost. For want of the rider, the battle was lost." And so, the pivotal moment that decided the outcome of the battle was a single nail from the shoe of the horse. An insignificant detail became the pivotal reason for the loss of the battle.

You ever think of what led to Good Friday, whatever led to your salvation? Just go back a little bit in time. Jacob favors Joseph, so he makes this gorgeous coat of many colors for him, and he gives him that coat. And Joseph struts

around like a peacock in the thing, and he tells his older brothers that I had this dream where you guys were bowing down in front of me. And they said, "That's it. It's enough with the coat. You know, this kid has got to go." And so they go and they sell him into slavery, and he goes. They just happened...it just so happened that when they're trying to get rid of him, just at that second, comes these caravanners on their way to Egypt, and there's this unplanned intersection between the intentions of the Midianite caravan merchants meeting up with the plans of Joseph's brother. And so when they join together, everybody is happy. It's a no-lose situation. The brothers get rid of Joseph, the Midianite traders get a prize that they can sell him in the slave mart. So, they now go down to Egypt, and just by chance when they put this kid up for sale on the slave

block, it just so happens that the one who gets the winning bid is this captain of the guard named Potiphar who just happened to be married to this unscrupulous woman who tried to seduce this young slave who was falsely accused, thrown into prison, where there happened to be his fellow prisoners, the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker. And while he's in there, he is interpreting dreams for them. It just so happens that one of them gets out and goes to talk to Pharaoh, and Pharaoh has these nightmares, but good luck for Joseph, the candlestick maker remembers this guy back in prison who can interpret dreams. You know the story. So he finally brings him back. Joseph becomes the prime minister. The famine comes. The brothers come and they finally invite Jacob to come back down to Egypt. And if it hadn't been for that, the Jews never would have sojourned in Egypt, but now they come and they live in the land of

Goshen. They multiply, they produce, but, it just so happens that there comes this Pharaoh who didn't know about Joseph, and instead of giving safe conduct to these Jewish immigrants, he decides to turn them into a slave labor force to take care of his public building projects. Well, as fate would have it, one of their women conceived and has this baby, and at the time the Pharaoh creates this edict to destroy the children. And so, this mother, not wanting her baby to be put to death, makes this little ark out of reeds and pitch, sets it adrift in the river, consigns the fate of her child to the hidden providence of God. And so, the little thing starts to float down the river, starts to cry, and if that child hadn't cried, nobody would ever notice the doggone thing, but it just so happened that Pharaoh's daughter is down there doing her wash and she finds this baby, and she says, "Well, I got to take care of this baby." She takes it home, raises it as the child of Pharaoh so that the little baby gets all the training of the best of the Egyptian court.

But then, just one fateful day, without any intent, without any plans, nobody was lying in wait, he happens to see a guard mistreat one of the Jewish slaves, and in his anger he rises up and strikes this guard and kills him accidentally. It wasn't malice aforethought. It wasn't first-degree murder. He wants to hide the body, but somebody saw him. And because somebody saw it, Moses is banished into exile where he languishes as a shepherd in the Midianite desert until his old age. But when he least expected it, he's taking care of the sheep one day and all of a sudden he looks over and he sees this bush that's burning, it's not being consumed. He says, "What is this?" And he turns aside and the bush starts talking to him and tells him...it just so happens that that was the place where God reveals Himself to Moses and God gives Moses the mandate to go to the court of Pharaoh and to say to Pharaoh, "I have heard the cry of My people. Let My people go." And what follows is the greatest redemptive event in the whole history of the Old Testament, the exodus. God saves His people, enters into a covenant with them, makes them a nation, gives them His law, conquers the land, gives them a king, sends them His prophets, and a couple of thousand years later, out of all of this, a baby is born in Bethlehem. And we could go on with this story, but you realize, all of this because of one lousy coat of many colors. Huh?

No coat, no jealousy. No jealousy, no betrayal. No betrayal, no sale into slavery. No trip to Egypt, no Potiphar. No Potiphar, no Potiphar's wife. No Potiphar's wife, no prison sentence. No prison sentence, never meets the baker, and wine taster. He doesn't meet them, he never gets acquainted with Pharaoh. He's never elevated to the prime minister. The children of Israel never settle in the land of Goshen. There's never a slavery. There's never an exodus. There's never a nation. There's never the Ten Commandments. There's never the kingdom of God. "You meant it for evil,

but God intended this for good, to save many people." Is that incredible?

Praise God for His sovereignty over all creation!

You are no accident! What happened to you, what you did to others, it will all one day make sense in the grand scheme of things.

To God be the Glory!

What?

Know the God is not limited by anything or anybody to do whatever he so desires.

be humble and deeply respectful of the Lord Jesus Christ!