Trust Him!

Good morning church. If I have not had the pleasure of meeting you yet, my name is Taylor and I am one of the pastors here at Trailhead. If you have you bibles, I invite you to open to Genesis 50. If you are in need of a bible, feel free to use one of the bibles in front of you. Today is the second part of our two-part series of God’s good purpose in the life of Joseph. Last week, we looked at Genesis 39 and how we should turn from our sin and run to God. Joseph literally ran from Potiphar’s wife when she grabbed his cloak and told him to sleep with her. This is a great example of repentance. The truth about Joseph’s situation is that God had a good purpose of all that was going on in his life and this included his repentance. Now, we are going to see God’s good purpose in Joseph’s suffering. We will see from today’s text that we should trust God and we will develop this as we work through this sentence:

“Bad Things Happen And They Matter, But God Is In Control And He Is Good, And He Will Accomplish His Purposes”

Let’s read Genesis 50:15-21

Genesis 50:15–21 ESV

When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “It may be that Joseph will hate us and pay us back for all the evil that we did to him.” So they sent a message to Joseph, saying, “Your father gave this command before he died: ‘Say to Joseph, “Please forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, because they did evil to you.” ’ And now, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father.” Joseph wept when they spoke to him. His brothers also came and fell down before him and said, “Behold, we are your servants.” But Joseph said to them, “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? 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. So do not fear; I will provide for you and your little ones.” Thus he comforted them and spoke kindly to them.

Let’s pray.

Bad Things Really Happen and They Matter

Let’s start working through our sentence: Bad things really happen and they matter.

Look at Genesis 50:15

Genesis 50:15 ESV

When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “It may be that Joseph will hate us and pay us back for all the evil that we did to him.”

Joseph’s brothers recognized the evil they did against him. And look at Jacob’s message to Joseph:

Genesis 50:16–17 ESV

So they sent a message to Joseph, saying, “Your father gave this command before he died: ‘Say to Joseph, “Please forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, because they did evil to you.” ’ And now, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father.” Joseph wept when they spoke to him.

Jacob also recognized the evil they did against Joseph, and now look at Joseph’s own testimony of his brothers’ actions:

Genesis 50:19–20 ESV

But Joseph said to them, “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? 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.

If you were here last week, I went over much of what the brothers did to Joseph. So for the sake of time, I will briefly summarize what happened. Jacob, their father, loved Joseph more than the rest of his brothers and they became jealous over it. Jacob made Joseph a special coat, not to mention Joseph had dreams of his brothers bowing down to him. This made them even angrier with Joseph that they hated him. One day, as Joseph was coming to check on them while they were watching their father’s sheep, they plotted to kill Joseph, but through the oldest brother’s recommendation, they instead threw him in pit. Then, they sold Joseph as a slave to a caravan, who took Joseph to Egypt where he was purchased by a man named Potiphar.

All this happened to Joseph because of his brothers. And we might think that a mark of maturity with Joseph is for him to become indifferent to all this. As if it didn’t matter. We might think this way when it comes to Christian maturity. We might think that to be a mature Christian we have to become indifferent to the suffering we go through This is wrong thinking. As we grow in Christ, we do not have to act as if our suffering is menial. Christ’s suffering was not menial. We have plenty of passages in our bibles that speak of the suffering of Christ. The garden of Gethsemane is one of the more prominent ones that come to mind. The authors of the Gospels did not hold back in capturing and expressing Jesus’s sorrow and grief. We can openly and plainly acknowledge our suffering and sorrow. When we do this we can rightly deal with it. It’s when we act like everything is okay and that nothing is wrong that we tend to stuff down our pain and grief. It’s when we bring it to the light that we can see it and deal with it.

Dealing with it involves crying out to God in lament. It involves being honest about your pain and what is going on in your heart. The psalms are full of passages where the psalmist is crying out in pain to God. Scripture allows us to be honest about our pain, and in fact, encourages us to do so. Look at these passages:

Philippians 4:6–7 ESV

do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

1 Peter 5:6–7 ESV

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

These passages show us that we have the freedom to cry out to God in our pain and anguish and in our suffering. So don’t be deceived into thinking that you have to hide the suffering. Joseph’s brothers, Jacob, and Joseph himself all acknowledged that it was evil that they did to him. It was wrong. Joseph went through real pain and real evil was done to him. But I want you notice something else in Joseph’s acknowledgement of his brothers’ actions. He didn’t end there. He moved his focus to God. And he did this because Joseph understood that God is control and he is good.

But God is in Control and He is Good

Look at Genesis 50:19-20:

English Standard Version Chapter 50

19 But Joseph said to them, “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? 20 As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good...”

I am going to look at both concepts together: God’s sovereignty and his goodness. It would be worth to one day work through them separately. But just to briefly state it: God’s goodness only matters as long as he has the authority to enact it, and his authority or sovereignty is beneficial to us as long as he is good. If he is good, but not sovereign, then God only has good thoughts towards us and can’t actually help. If he is sovereign, but not good, then that would be a terrifying world to live in. Thankfully, our God is both sovereign and good. Now why does that matter in our passage? There are two purposes I want to look at. One we will look at now and the other we will look at in our last point.

First, let’s look at the goodness that God does in Judah. You might be thinking, “...Judah?....What?” I know, but this is the “deep” stuff I was talking about. Just stay with me.

When Joseph’s brothers throw him into a pit, who pipes up to sell him as a slave? Whose idea is it? Judah! Look at Genesis 37:25-27:

English Standard Version Chapter 37

25 Then they sat down to eat. And looking up they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, with their camels bearing gum, balm, and myrrh, on their way to carry it down to Egypt. 26 Then Judah said to his brothers, “What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? 27 Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.” And his brothers listened to him.

It was Judah who proposed the idea to sell Joseph. He was the ring leader who led his brothers to sell him. And they deceive their father into thinking that Joseph died. And with Judah being the ring leader in verses 25-27, we can probably assume that he was the ring leader in this as well. Either way, he was in agreement with it. But look at how they deceive their father. Now, pay attention to this. The way that Moses writes this is very important. Genesis 37:31-33:

English Standard Version Chapter 37

31 Then they took Joseph’s robe and slaughtered a goat and dipped the robe in the blood. 32 And they sent the robe of many colors and brought it to their father and said, “This we have found;

They deceive their father with dipping the cloak into goat’s blood and they say “identify this.” Remember that line because it will be important later. From here, we have this weird chapter in Genesis that involves Judah and Tamar. Moses does something really neat as he transitions between the two situations. Remember that our bibles did not originally have chapter and verse divisions. So if we read these passages together, we have this:

English Standard Version Chapter 37

35 All his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted and said, “

Joseph was going to Egypt, Jacob was going to Sheol, and Judah is going down away from his brothers. So Moses connects these stories together. So, we at least can see that chapter 38 was not randomly put here. But what is the point of it? I think there could be several reasons, but what I want us to focus on is what happens to Judah. Judah marries a woman named Shua, has three sons, and gets a wife for his oldest named Tamar. Some crazy stuff happens that I won’t go into much detail, but both of Judah’s older two sons die and Judah promises Tamar that he will give his youngest son to her when he gets old enough. Time passes by and Judah’s wife dies, but he never gives his youngest to Tamar. Eventually Judah ends up in a place called Timnah and Tamar dresses up like a harlot and deceives the deceiving Judah into sleeping with her. He leaves his signet, cord, and staff with her, which are important things for him to have. He doesn’t realize that he slept with Tamar and he finds out that she is pregnant. But he thinks it is from someone else and orders her to be burned. Before she is burned, look at what she says and notice the similarities between what she says and what brothers said to Jacob when they deceived him into thinking that Joseph was dead:

Genesis 38:25–26 ESV

As she was being brought out, she sent word to her father-in-law, “By the man to whom these belong, I am pregnant.” And she said, “Please identify whose these are, the signet and the cord and the staff.” Then Judah identified them and said, “She is more righteous than I, since I did not give her to my son Shelah.” And he did not know her again.

Tamar did the same thing that the brothers did when they deceived Jacob. The shoe is on the other foot, as it were. The same tactic that Judah used to deceive his father was used to deceive himself. Now, don’t be mistaken, church, when Judah says that Tamar was more righteous than he was, this is not to say what Tamar did was acceptable before God. This whole situation was wicked on all accounts, from both parties. But it does show us that there is a change that is beginning in Judah. In the previous chapter, he seemingly sells Joseph and deceives Jacob without any hint of remorse. But here we see some acknowledgement of wrongness in him, and from here, we will begin to see a major shift in Judah.

Now, the story shifts to Joseph, but don’t forget about Judah. Joseph has a lot happen to him, but he is eventually exalted to the right hand of Pharoah due to God’s plan, and the purpose, as we will see later, is to preserve life because there was a great famine in the land for 7 years. This famine affected even people in Canaan, which is where Jacob and his sons were. They were so affected that Jacob sent his sons to Egypt because he heard of Egypt having food. Ironically, when the brothers get there, they are confronted with Joseph, who they do not initially recognize, but he recognizes them. Joseph tests them and says that they need to go back home and bring their youngest brother, Benjamin, to prove that they aren’t spies. While they travel back home, Joseph keeps Simeon in prison there in Egypt. At first, Jacob refuses to let Benjamin go, and it isn’t until these words are said by Judah that he allows Benjamin to go:

Genesis 43:8–9 ESV

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. 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.

Remember, this is Judah saying this. This is the same Judah who was willing to sell Joseph because of Jacob’s favoritism towards him, and he deceived his father after doing so. Now, he is willing to bear the blame if Benjamin is not returned. We are seeing a major change in Judah. The brothers come before Joseph again with Benjamin. Joseph releases Simeon and lets them go back to their home, but then tests them again by hiding a silver cup in Benjamin’s bag. Joseph’s servant goes and finds the brothers along the path and shows that the silver cup was in Benjamin’s bag. The brothers think that Benjamin stole the cup. When they come back to Joseph, Joseph says that Benjamin has to stay in Egypt as his servant, but the rest of the brothers can go back. Now Judah steps up and recounts all that he said about the promise he made Jacob and notice what Judah says at the end:

Genesis 44:33–34 ESV

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. 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.”

By the end of it all, deceiving, wicked Judah, was willing to give up himself to protect his brother because he cared for his father. Instead of saying, “Well, go ahead and take him. I’m tired of him being the favorite anyways.” He offers himself so that Benjamin can go free. Instead of going back home without Benjamin and deceiving his father again, he cares for his father’s well being. There is a major shift in Judah and God does all this through Joseph’s life. What Joseph’s brothers, including Judah, meant for evil, God meant for good, including this major shift that we see in Judah.

Only a sovereign and good God can bring about such a change in someone through someone else’s suffering. The bad things that Judah did to Joseph really mattered, but God was in control and brought about good in Judah through it all. And if we get so consumed with ourselves in our suffering, we will miss things like this. There is work that God is doing in us through our suffering, but there is also work that he is doing through us in our suffering. Can you look at your suffering and trust that God has purpose in it all? Can you say that the purpose is good? Are there people in your life that you see as enemies or as people to avoid due to your suffering? What if they came to Christ? What if God is using your suffering to win them over to Jesus? What if, as they observe your steadfast suffering, and your glorification of God, and the love that you have for others in suffering, and your confidence that you have in the Lord, that they come to faith in Christ? Would that excite you? Would that cause you to rejoice in Christ? Or would you become bitter towards them? Would you doubt their salvation because of what they have done to you? What if your suffering brings them to seek forgiveness and reconciliation? Would you give it? Or would you withhold it out of spite? We need to learn from Judah and Joseph that God is working things in our suffering that we cannot always see. John Piper said it right:

“God is always doing 10,000 things in your life, and you may be aware of 3 of them.”

Desiring God [@desiringGod]. “Piper: ‘God Is Always Doing 10,000 Things in Your Life, and You May Be Aware of 3 of Them.’” Tweet. Twitter, 8 November 2012. https://x.com/desiringGod/status/266584993881550849.

Bad things really happened to Joseph, and they were important, but God is in control and he is good and one of the good purposes that he brought about through Joseph’s suffering was the change that we see in Judah. Next, we are going to look at the other purpose that God accomplished, but I want to complete our sentence:

“Bad things really happen and they matter, but God is in control and he is good, and he will accomplish his purposes.”

God will accomplish his purposes. One being the change we see in Judah and the other being the preservation of life.

And He Will Accomplish His Purposes

Look again at Genesis 50:20-21

Genesis 50:20–21 ESV

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. So do not fear; I will provide for you and your little ones.” Thus he comforted them and spoke kindly to them.

Look also at Gen 45:4-7

Genesis 45:4–7 ESV

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. And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. 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. And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors.

If we harmonize these two passages about God’s purpose in all this, it is to preserve life generally (Egypt and the surrounding areas), and specifically, to preserve a remnant of Abraham’s offspring. Why is this important? Back in Genesis 12-22, we have God promising Abraham several times about a multitude of offspring and land. But to the offspring point, look at Gen 22:15-18

Genesis 22:15–18 ESV

And the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven and said, “By myself I have sworn, declares the Lord, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore. And your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.”

So we have this promise from God to Abraham to give him a lot of offspring, and he does this first through Isaac, his son, and then Jacob, his grandson. And here, we have Abraham’s great grandchildren, Jacob’s sons, and there is a famine in the land that could wipe them out and then Abraham wouldn’t have the offspring that he was promised. In God’s goodness and faithfulness to his people and to his promises, however, God preserves them through the sufferings of Joseph. God preserves the lives of Abraham’s offspring through Judah’s betrayal of Joseph, Joseph’s sufferings, and his exaltation. The story of Joseph is not ultimately about his suffering or exaltation. It is about preserving the lives of Abraham’s offspring, and as a result, Egypt. It’s about God keeping his covenant with Abraham. And this covenant with Abraham and about his seed takes us back to the garden of Eden. Adam and Eve rebelled, and God promises to the serpent who deceived Eve that the seed of the woman would crush his head. And this theme of seed is picked back up with Abraham where God promises to preserve his seed. And it is though Abraham’s seed that God brings about the Messiah.

Now, here is where it all comes to a head. God’s promise to Abraham is not through Ishmael, but Isaac. And this promise carries through Isaac to Jacob, not Esau. Now Jacob’s sons form the twelve tribes of Israel as we will see them become in Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and even into Joshua, Judges, and the kingdom they become in 1 and 2 Samuel. But through which tribe does the Messiah come? Which tribe does Jesus come through? That David comes through? Judah...

And we see this in Jacob’s blessings to his sons that he gives them at the end of his life. Reuben, the oldest, and Simeon and Levi, the second and third oldest, get what seem to be more like curses. But it is through Judah that we get this blessing:

Genesis 49:10 ESV

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.

Man, how I wish we could camp here and draw out this language throughout the rest of Scripture. But for now, this language of “scepter” and “ruler’s staff” carry with it connotations of kingship which find their fulfillment in The King, Jesus. I think this blessing is passed over the older three because of their unrepentance. Reuben slept with Jacob’s concubine, and never repented. Simeon and Levi killed scores of men, and never repented. But Judah seems to repent. Or at least, we see a massive change in him in chapters 43 and 44. And this is why I think that he receives this blessing. God preserves Abraham’s offspring, and this includes Judah, and it is through Judah, after God brings about a great change in his life, that the Messiah comes. So, when we look at Joseph and his life, and his suffering and exaltation, none of it is really about him, but about God preserving his people to ultimately bring about the Messiah, Jesus.

This is true of your life as well. The suffering that you’re enduring, is not ultimately about you. God certainly cared for Joseph. We see in Genesis 39 that God showed Joseph that covenantal love, his steadfast love, his “chesed.” God certainly cares for you. If you’re a Christian, all of God’s promises are “yes and amen” in Christ. And God sees your suffering and Christ, as the suffering servant, is not a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses. Jesus knows what it is like to suffer. He understands. But, listen carefully here, if your thoughts in your suffering end ultimately with you and not the exaltation of Christ, your eyes are on the wrong person. Your eyes must be on Christ and the work that God is doing in and through your suffering to exalt Christ in your life to the rest of the world.

Even in our beloved passage, Romans 8, where we read that God works all things for our good, but don’t miss an important element in this passage:

Romans 8:28–29 ESV

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.

The purpose of God working all things for you to be conformed into the image of Jesus is so that JESUS would be the firstborn among many brothers. We can have hope for our well-being, certainly. We can trust that God will sustain us. We can hope that one day we will have resurrected bodies and that there will be no more pain. We can hope that God will make everything right again. But if our sights stop there, they are limited. We must continue to look upward in our hardships, sufferings, and trials until our eyes are squarely fixed on the glory of Jesus Christ.

Christian, are you resting in him and fixing your gaze on him? Or are you concerned with yourself? He will uphold you. Just look to him, and let him take care of you.

For the unbelievers in here, this is primarily a Christian message. The concept of God working all things for his people implies that you have to be one of his people for that to be true of you. This means that if you are an unbeliever, then this is not true of you, but it can be. You need to confess your sins and repent of them, and run to Christ like we looked at last week. And the bible says that he will forgive you of your sins and cleanse you. You can have hope in your suffering through the sufferings and victory of Jesus Christ, but you have to put your faith in him. I invite you to do that today.

To everyone here, I hope you leave here this morning remember this sentence in light of Genesis 50:15-21:

“Bad things really happen and they matter, but God is in control and he is good, and he will accomplish his purposes.”

Let’s pray.