Joseph

How can you apply Joseph's story of faith and trials to your own life when facing difficulties?

What steps can you take to trust God's plan for your life, especially during challenging times?

In what ways do you see God's hand at work in your own moments of hardship, similar to how He worked in Joseph's life?

How does Joseph’s ability to forgive his brothers inspire you to forgive others in your life?

What does it mean to you to be redeemed by God, and how can you share that message with others?

Pre-Work

MPT - The story of Joseph shows trials, blessings, faith, and redemption all packed into one.

MPS - If we are faithful to trust what God is doing, His desire is to use to first redeem us to Himself, and then to use to us see others redeemed as well.

Introduction

So glad to be back with you guys tonight.

To finish up the story that started about 10 days ago, I finally had to have the tooth that was giving me troubles pulled yesterday.

Who can tell me what we have covered so far in our Journey Series?

Creation

The Fall

Noah

Abraham

Tonight, we are going to add another important person to that list and we are going to talk about Joseph.

Joseph is the next guy that we need to cover in order to understand the redemptive arc of the Bible and let me show you why.

Lineage from Adam to Joseph

Talk about slide:

Adam > Noah (Genesis 5)

Noah > Shem (Genesis 5:32)

Shem > Abram (Genesis 11:10-26)

Abraham (Abram) > Issac (Genesis 21:1-7)

Issac > Jacob (Genesis 25:19-26)

Jacob > Joseph (Genesis 35:24)

Joseph’s Sins

Joseph’s Sin

Look with me in Genesis 37:2

Genesis 37:2 ESV

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

The last part of that verse lays an important foundation for the story of Joseph.

This part of the bible was written in Hebrew.

When you look up the actual translation of the words that get your to “bad report”, you see that they have a negative meaning similar to tall tale or even a lie.

So Joseph has approached his father with the intent to tell him a lie or lies about his brother. How does Jacob respond?

Read Genesis 37:3

Genesis 37:3 ESV

Now Israel 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 colors.

Israel was Jacob, Joseph’s father.

He believed what Joseph has said about his brothers because he loved Joseph more than any of the other brothers. So much so, that he gave him an extra special robe made of many colors.

Now I am sure you can see where I am going with this.

Think back to all of the times that you had a brother or sister, cousin, or even a friend tell a lie or lies about you and they were believed.

How did that make you feel?

Of course that made you feel angry, sad, isolated, etc.

So for a minute, we can sympathize with what Joseph’s brothers were going through here can’t we?

Not only is the the favorite kid, but when he lies about us dad and mom believer him!!!

But that’s not all of the foundation that we need to lay here.

Over the next few verses, we see that Joseph has a dream were pretty important.

Read Genesis 37:5-8

Genesis 37:5–8 ESV

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 sheaf arose and stood upright. And behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.” 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.

And not only did that happen one time, but he had another dream too.

Read Genesis 37:9

Genesis 37:9 ESV

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.”

Both of these dreams seemed to imply that Joseph’s brothers were going to be bowing before him as he stands in a place of authority over them and the second dream even seems to suggest that his father and mother will bow before him too.

How did the brother’s feel about this?

This passage tells us a few times that they were filled with hatred for Joseph.

They were probably thinking, “You mean to tell me he can lie on us and get away with it AND that he is brave enough to tell us that one day we, his bigger, stronger, brothers, were going to bow down to him?”

And that’s exactly what Joseph was doing.

He was lying and it’s believed that they way he told his brothers about this was very prideful and arrogant.

But, what we are going to soon learn, is that in the midst of that sin, God has a plan and Joseph wasn’t necessarily wrong about how he interpreted those dreams.

Trans: But before we and even Joseph get’s to see how those dreams end up, we have to explore some of the hard things that he had to go through.

Joseph’s First Hardship

Shortly after the whole dream situation, Joseph runs into his first major hardship of his life, at least that we know of.

Summary:

Jacob sends Joseph to check on his brothers who are out tending to the sheep in the pasture.

Joseph approaches Shechem and realizes his brothers are not there but a man is and tell hims that they have gone even further down to road to Dothan.

In verse 18 the perspective of the story changes and we see Joseph approaching from the viewpoint of this brothers and it’s not good.

Read Genesis 37:18

Genesis 37:18 ESV

They saw him from afar, and before he came near to them they conspired against him to kill him.

Now there are some questions that need to be answered here.

First, how did they recognize him from so far away?

As I studied for this, some guys way smarter than I am implied that he was possibly wearing that robe of many colors that Jacob had given him.

It would have stood out from far away after all right?

Second, how did they come to that conclusion so far?

Again, if you look into the Hebrew text here, the words used for “before he came near” implied that they very quickly decided this was the time to kill him.

But what you can also assume here is that this wasn’t a 0 to 60 moment.

They didn’t just see him coming and say, you know what we should do when Joseph gets here, we should just kill him.

Likely, this was something that was thought about and maybe ever pre-meditated or pre-thought through.

Joseph found favor with Jacob and was presented a coat of many colors, but ultimately, for the same reasons he gained favor with Jacob, he created a hatred that ran so deep in his brothers that as soon as they saw the robe, they were ready to just do away with Joseph.

But in steps Reuben, the oldest of the brothers.

Read Genesis 37:22

Genesis 37:22 ESV

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.

Reuben is trying to save Joseph’s life here.

Joseph’s sinful actions had got him into this moment, but Reuben’s mercy saved him… well kinda.

Ultimately, the brothers made the greedy, but not murderous decision to sell Joseph to the Ishmaelites and Joseph is taken to Egypt.

God’s First Blessing

Upon arriving in Egypt, Joseph was sold to Potiphar, the captain of the guard.

And in the following verses, we see God’s mercy for Joseph.

In spite of Joseph’s previous sins, God still showed him mercy because God knew there was more for Joseph than being sold into slavery.

Read Genesis 39:2

Genesis 39:2 ESV

The Lord was with Joseph, and he became a successful man, and he was in the house of his Egyptian master.

Joseph was sold into slavery only to find himself in a prominent position in Potiphar’s house.

I’m not sure where along the way exactly Joseph would have considered himself a follower of God, but it would seem that it was before this moment.

God has a bigger plan for Joseph, not just in regards to his family, but also, with regards to you and to me!!!

Trans: But Joseph’s first blessing doesn’t last all that long before the second big hardship of his life comes.

Joseph’s Second Hardship

Joseph was rocking along as the overseer of Potiphar’s house when something crazy happened.

Read Genesis 39:6

Genesis 39:6 ESV

So he left all that he had in Joseph’s charge, and because of him he had no concern about anything but the food he ate. Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance.

Joseph was a handsome guy, apparently so handsome that he drew the attention of Potiphar’s wife according to verse 7.

In this moment we see a different Joseph than maybe we had seen before.

When Potiphar’s wife made her first advance on Joseph, he basically said, “Listen, Potiphar has given me authority over everything but you which tells me that he doesn’t want me messing around with you.”

Does this sound familiar?

Remember back to the Garden of Eden?

Adam and Eve were given authority over everything in the garden except the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil

It was the only thing God didn’t want them to interact with, but they did.

Joseph, however, was able to withstand the temptation that was placed before him and he told Potiphar’s wife that he didn’t want anything like that to happen between them.

But that wasn’t the end of her attempts.

Read Genesis 39:11-18

Genesis 39:11–18 ESV

But one day, when he went into the house to do his work and none of the men of the house was there in the house, she caught him by his garment, saying, “Lie with me.” But he left his garment in her hand and fled and got out of the house. And as soon as she saw that he had left his garment in her hand and had fled out of the house, she called to the men of her household and said to them, “See, he has brought among us a Hebrew to laugh at us. He came in to me to lie with me, and I cried out with a loud voice. And as soon as he heard that I lifted up my voice and cried out, he left his garment beside me and fled and got out of the house.” Then she laid up his garment by her until his master came home, and she told him the same story, saying, “The Hebrew servant, whom you have brought among us, came in to me to laugh at me. But as soon as I lifted up my voice and cried, he left his garment beside me and fled out of the house.”

He did everything right, but still got accused of doing something wrong.

This doesn’t seem fair does it?

Im sure when you do the right thing, you don’t expect there to be negative results do you?

What ends up happening is Potiphar’s wife, and her lies, find favor with Potiphar, and Joseph ends up being thrown in prison.

That seems to come full circle doesn’t it?

Joseph’s lies, and the favor he found with Jacob, it what seemed to have started the hatred he received from his brothers.

His lies landed him in a pit and sold into slavery. Her lies landed him in prison.

You might be expecting me to tell you that Joseph gets out of prison by some miraculous, God-driven way, but that doesn’t happen.

Actually, Joseph experiences another significant hardship in his life.

Joseph’s Third Hardship

Some time after Joseph is send to prison, two of Pharaoh’s officials are sent to prison too.

During their time in prison, they both also had dreams that were significant moving forward.

Read Genesis 40:9-11

Genesis 40:9–11 ESV

So the chief cupbearer told his dream to Joseph and said to him, “In my dream there was a vine before me, and on the vine there were three branches. As soon as it budded, its blossoms shot forth, and the clusters ripened into grapes. Pharaoh’s cup was in my hand, and I took the grapes and pressed them into Pharaoh’s cup and placed the cup in Pharaoh’s hand.”

Joseph interpreted that dream to mean that the Chief Cupbearer would be restored to his place in Pharaoh’s course. But the Chief Baker also had a similar dream

Read Genesis 40:16-17

Genesis 40:16–17 ESV

When the chief baker saw that the interpretation was favorable, he said to Joseph, “I also had a dream: there were three cake baskets on my head, and in the uppermost basket there were all sorts of baked food for Pharaoh, but the birds were eating it out of the basket on my head.”

Joseph interpreted this to mean that in three days, Pharaoh would choose to kill the Chief Baker

And three days later, Joseph’s dreams came true as on Pharaoh’s birthday, he threw a big party and he restored the Chief Cupbearer to his original position while ordered the Chief Baker to be hanged.

As the Chief Cupbearer was on his way out the door, Joseph asked that he would put in a good word for him with Pharaoh but that seemed not to happen, at least for a little while.

Imagine how he was feeling. Just sitting there, day after day, waiting, hoping that each time the door opened that it was someone to come get him out of the prison.

But God had Joseph right where He wanted him.

God’s Second Blessing

After two, long, likely agonizing years, there came some relief for Joseph.

This time, Pharaoh was the one to have some dreams.

Read Genesis 41:1-7

Genesis 41:1–7 ESV

After two whole years, Pharaoh dreamed that he was standing by the Nile, and behold, there came up out of the Nile seven cows, attractive and plump, and they fed in the reed grass. And behold, seven other cows, ugly and thin, came up out of the Nile after them, and stood by the other cows on the bank of the Nile. And the ugly, thin cows ate up the seven attractive, plump cows. And Pharaoh awoke. And he fell asleep and dreamed a second time. And behold, seven ears of grain, plump and good, were growing on one stalk. And behold, after them sprouted seven ears, thin and blighted by the east wind. And the thin ears swallowed up the seven plump, full ears. And Pharaoh awoke, and behold, it was a dream.

Pharaoh looked for anyone that could interpret his dreams and found no one until the Chief Cupbearer told him about Joseph.

And immediately, Joseph was rushed to Pharaoh’s court.

Pharaoh retold the dream to Joseph and Joseph interpreted it for Pharaoh but it wasn’t good.

Read Genesis 41:29-31

Genesis 41:29–31 ESV

There will come seven years of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt, but after them there will arise seven years of famine, and all the plenty will be forgotten in the land of Egypt. The famine will consume the land, and the plenty will be unknown in the land by reason of the famine that will follow, for it will be very severe.

But Joseph also goes on to give him a solution to the problem they are about to face.

Appoint people to store up some food for when the famine comes and everything will be ok.

No in this moment, I can assume that Joseph may very well be looking back on his life and speaking from experience.

When things got scary with his brothers, God appoint Reuben to save him and Potiphar to give him the position that he held.

When things got scary in prison, the cupbearer remembered Joseph and here he was sitting before Pharaoh giving him wise counsel.

In the famines of his life, God always seems to appoint someone to help him walk through those situations.

Pharaoh was pleased by what Joseph said, so much so, that he appointed Joseph to be the one over all of the land of Egypt, and take on storing up all of this food to help them navigate through the famine.

And once the famine hit, the redemption story would start to play out.

The Redemption Story

Once the famine does hit, Joseph’s family is forced to come to Egypt to get food to live on.

Joseph recognizes them but they don’t recognize him and thus Joseph puts them through three tests.

During these tests, they admit what they did to him, although not realizing it was him and Joseph chooses to repay everything they did to him with forgiveness.

He chose to give them the food that they needed, gave their money back, and ultimately moved them all to Egypt.

In Joseph’s story, we see several important takeaways.

First, God always had Joseph right where He wanted him.

Joseph was sold into slavery, and quickly given a spot in Potiphar’s house.

Potiphar’s wife made false accusations about him, and he was sent to prison just in time to interact with Pharaoh’s servants.

That interaction led him to get out of prison and find favor with Pharaoh such that he was put in charge of all of Pharaoh’s land.

And only then, was he able to fulfill his original dream and to extend forgiveness.

During one of the trips back to Egypt, Pharaoh’s family did in fact find themselves bowing before him.

And it was this moment that caused him to reveal himself to them and start the reconciliation process with his family.

Next, we see God’s provision for those who are living right.

Specifically with the story around Potiphar’s wife, Joseph is trying his best to stand strong in the face of sin and does so, but yet still get caught up in the lie.

And yet, God still had a plan for him to get him to the place where he could not only forgive his family, but be the person who essentially saved all of Egypt.

Without Joseph’s plan being put in place, Egypt would likely not have made it through the famine.

Lastly, we see God’s plan working continuing.

Remember all the way back to the beginning of this lesson?

We traced Adam to Joseph.

And if you were to take the time, you could then continue that line and trace Joseph to Jesus.

You see this wasn’t just some story about a guy with good luck.

God used Joseph to keep the promises he made to Adam, Noah, and Abraham alive.

God redeemed Adam and that led to Noah.

God redeemed Noah and that led to Abraham.

God redeemed Abraham and that led to Jacob and Joseph.

And God redeemed Joseph so that one day, through the life of Jesus, each one of us could be redeemed too.

Conclusion

So, where do you find yourself in this story?

Are you in a place where you just need to learn to trust God’s plan?

After all, it’s the best plan.

Or are you in a place where you need to trust that God is going to provide for you?

Because He will?

Or maybe you are here today and you need to be redeemed?

Maybe you are here today and you need to make Jesus Christ the Lord of your life.

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