Joseph’s Call
Notes
Transcript
Joseph’s Call
Genesis 37:1-11
The story of Joseph is by far the longest and most masterful narrative in Genesis, if not the entire Bible.
Thomas Mann, the celebrated German novelist and Nobel laureate, expanded the story line into an immense three-volume work: Joseph and His Brothers, Young Joseph, and Joseph in Egypt, which when published in 1930 some called “perhaps the greatest creative work of the 20th century.”
Agnes E. Meyer, writing in The New York Times Book Review, said, “… purely as narrative and background there is a magnificent story here which exceeds in drama, opulence, and movement anything that Hollywood has ever dreamed.”
Andrew Lloyd Webber must have thought the same when he composed the musical Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.
Be that as it may, the divinely inspired account exceeds its fictional renditions with a depth and theological subtlety beyond the intent and capacities of Mann and Webber. And because it is real-life theological drama, the inspired narrative has a power that exceeds art alone. The biblical account is at once theological narrative and heroic literature that will instruct and challenge everyone who will seriously engage it.
Here is a sweeping narrative that moves between the pastures of Palestine to the courts of the Nile with a hero for the ages. The character of Joseph towers over it all, much like that of Daniel in Babylon. Indeed, both Joseph and Daniel displayed the wisdom of God, both men interpreted the dreams of their kings, both couldn’t be compromised, both were jailed for their obedience, and both were made vice-regents of their adopted realms.
And more, Joseph’s actions sometimes foreshadowed those of Christ himself, whose rejection by men played an essential part in bringing about our deliverance.
The Joseph story also records the development of the nation of Israel as it chronicles the migration of Jacob’s clan to Egypt, where it would grow to maturity near the Nile. Some four hundred years later, Israel burst fully out from Egypt, fulfilling God’s prophecy to Abram:
Then the Lord said to Abram, “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years.
But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions.
As God would have it, the miniature of Joseph’s life would be fully prophetic of the life of the nation of Israel in the big picture. Allen Ross explains:
… just as Joseph lived in bondage in Egypt before his deliverance and supremacy over Egypt, so would the nation. Just as suffering and bondage formed tests for Joseph to see if he kept his faith and was worthy of the promise, so too the bondage of the nation was a means of discipline and preparation for the nation’s future responsibilities.
Moreover, the climax of the story showed that the Hebrew slave served a God who was infinitely superior to Egypt, who controlled the economy of Egypt, and whose wisdom outstripped the wisdom of Egypt.
Ultimately, and above all, the story of Joseph is about God working his will through the everyday events of life. There are no miracles here. God doesn’t suspend His natural laws to make things happen. The story is about the hidden but sure way of God. God’s hidden hand arranges everything without show or explanation or violating the nature of things. God is involved in all events and directs all things to their appointed end.
Toward the conclusion of the great narrative, when Joseph reveals himself to his brothers, he says just this:
And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors.
So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt.
7 And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors.
8 So it was not you who sent me here, but God…
What a God he is—because he is not just a God of the extraordinary but a God of the ordinary. His power and infinitude take both the good and evil actions of Joseph’s family, of Pharaoh and his servants, and of passersby and uses their actions for good.
As the story begins, God providentially brings about Joseph’s rejection so that Joseph himself might ultimately be used to bring about his people’s salvation. God choreographed Joseph’s rejection in two ways: first, by his father’s favoring of Joseph over his brothers, and second, by God’s giving Joseph a vision of his own future exaltation.
Human sin and divine revelation combined to produce a hatred and rejection that ultimately created a way of salvation.
Jacob lived in the land of his father’s sojournings, in the land of Canaan.
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.
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.
But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him.
The first thing we see is:
Jacob sets up Joseph’s Rejection
Jacob sets up Joseph’s Rejection
With Esau’s departure from the land of promise, Esau had in effect acknowledged Jacob’s right to the promised land. So, Jacob settled down to stay.
“The generations of Jacob” is the ninth occurrence of the phrase “These are the generations of.”
This is largely an account of the life of his son Joseph, just as “the generations of Isaac” were taken up with the life of his son Jacob. And here it is the life of Joseph that preserves and saves the generations of Jacob.
The epic begins with the teenaged Joseph shepherding his father’s flocks along with Dan, Naphtali, Gad, and Asher, the sons of Jacob’s secondary wives Bilhah and Zilpah. Even though these are full sons, these men had a secondary status in Jacob’s affections.
We’ve already seen that there were hard feelings between Jacob and the sons of his unloved wife Leah, and these were made even worse by Jacob’s disregard for their sister Dinah.
And likely, Jacob felt even less affection for the sons of his slave wives, and these four sons of Bilhah and Zilpah knew it and resented it. Quite naturally, then, the four had little regard for young Joseph, the son of their father’s favorite wife.
Now Joseph was far from perfect, notwithstanding his future greatness.
Up until recently it has been customary for preachers to accord Joseph an almost sinless status because the Scripture records no overt sin or criticism of him. Such a perspectice, of course, is contrary to what Scripture teaches about the sinful nature of all people and what we know about the daily sins and repentance of the most godly.
At best, young Joseph was a good-boy sinner.
So, the elaborate attempts to say that Joseph did nothing wrong when he “brought a bad report of them to their father” ring hollow. This is especially true in light of what the text actually says about the incident, because the word “report” is always used in the rest of Scripture in the negative sense of an untrue report, and here it is qualified by the adjective “evil.”
This is “fake news.”
Joseph misrepresented and criticized his brothers. Likely, his report was essentially true, but not perfectly true, due to exaggeration or inaccuracies. So young Joseph, in effect, became a tattler.
In the eyes of the disgruntled sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, this was a monstrous offense. And when the rest of the older sons heard about what Joseph had done, they began to smolder with resentment. Joseph’s offense grew larger with each retelling. On their personal scale of morality, Joseph was the lowest.
Favoritism had become a generational sin in Jacob’s family. Remember, Isaac loved Esau more than Jacob, and remember that Rebekah loved Jacob more than Esau, and remeber that Jacob loved Rachel and her children more than Leah and her offspring.
“Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his sons, because he was the son of his old age.”
Jacob probably couldn’t help his feelings of favoritism because Joseph was the son of Rachel, his deceased and never-forgotten first love, and Joseph had been born late in life after so many years of frustration. Along with this, young Joseph’s freedom from the sins of his older sons made him a source of solace and joy to his father.
Still, Jacob’s blatant favoritism was unconscionable. The lifelong hurt inflicted by his own father’s favoritism should have made him wary of even a hint of not being evenhanded with his children.
But Jacob was in a relational fog, for we read, “And he made him a robe of many colors.”
The designation “many colors” is arbitrary and derived from the Septuagint and Vulgate translations. The coat may well have been colored and ornamented. But likely the term describes a sleeved coat that reached to the wrists and ankles, thus setting Joseph apart as the one who would receive the double-portion of the inheritance.
Joseph was the first son of Rachel, whom Jacob had chosen to marry before being deceived by Laban. And more, Reuben, the firstborn of Leah, had forfeited his birthright because of incest with Bilhah.
Young Joseph’s sudden appearance in the distinctive robe ignited his brothers’ hatred.
4 But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him.
Joseph was already at the bottom of the brotherly chain because of his evil report, and now his lordly attire, announcing that he was “the wave of the future,” inflamed their burning rage. Sarna translates the phrase, “could not speak peacefully to him” as literally saying, “they could not abide his friendly speech”—that is, they rebuffed his every attempt to be friendly. Joseph’s brothers loathed his presence.
The human causes of this are so readily apparent: Joseph’s sinful distortions and Jacob’s sinful favoritism and blatant elevation of Joseph combined to harden his sons’ rejection of and bitter hatred for Joseph.
Next, we see:
God Seals Joseph’s Rejection
God Seals Joseph’s Rejection
The fuel came in the form of two Joseph-exalting dreams.
The first dream utilized a pastoral motif and is described in “rhythmic, almost choreographic language.” Joseph was so full of the dream that he was compelled to pour it out to his brothers.
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.”
No one, not even the dullest of his brothers, could miss the point. Joseph certainly must have understood it too. But the force of the dream, plus his naivete and self-focus (which came from being the center of his parents’ affection), impelled him to spontaneously share it.
After all, the dream was the real thing, and not a concoction. The dream, of course, foreshadowed the saving climax of the Joseph narrative when, because he had become ruler of Egypt, his brothers bowed down to him.
There is no way of knowing what response Joseph expected from his brothers, but there was really only one possible response:
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.
Their ironic, sarcastic disgust throbs here: “This arrogant, pompous, ego-centered, self-focused brat is awash in megalomania. The spoiled little braggart.” The refrain, “so they hated him” is the third repetition of this phrase in the account, marking the escalated intensity of their hatred.
All dreams in the Joseph narrative come in pairs, because the pairing of dreams meant certainty of fulfillment. Later Joseph would explain to Pharaoh:
And the doubling of Pharaoh’s dream means that the thing is fixed by God, and God will shortly bring it about.
So, Joseph’s second dream now sealed the matter. God would sovereignly bring to pass the fulfillment of Joseph’s dreams. This certitude may be the reason that Joseph had the audacity to inform his family of its contents.
The second of the dreams goes beyond the first in the grandeur of the emblems and also in the inclusion of his parents in bowing to him:
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.”
The vision was symbolic and surreal—a sky filled with just eleven stars (his eleven brothers) and the crowning glories of a radiant sun and moon (his father and mother)—and they all bow down to him.
How did they bow? Did the spheres momentarily flatten out like a setting sun? Did they blink respect in Morse code? We don’t know. But one thing is sure: He saw them all bow to him—from Reuben to Benjamin to his father Jacob and his deceased mother Rachel.
This was too much, even for his doting father.
But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?”
And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind.
Jacob rebuked Joseph, but he didn’t hate him the way his sons did. Something inside of him gave him pause. Like Mary to come, he contemplated the meaning of what he’d heard in his heart
Jacob wasn’t dismissive. Joseph was fortunate to have a father who, though he was the younger son, had himself become heir of the birthright and blessing. What was God showing him about Joseph?
But the brothers’ silence was ominous. Joseph’s future was sealed. There was no reversing his rejection. The epic course of his life had been set.
The hand of God was everywhere in this sweeping narrative as it orchestrated the creation of a preserver of his people. God’s hidden hand had its subtle way amidst the morass of human sin. Young Joseph’s “bad report” set him at odds with his brothers. Jacob’s rooted favoritism of Joseph only increased his sons’ resentment and rejection of Joseph.
God’s visible fingerprints were seen in the substance and choreography of Joseph’s two dreams. Their origin and meaning came from God’s pleasure. God sovereignly sealed and insured the rejection of young Joseph. Human sin and divine revelation were made to do his good work. As Walter Brueggemann has said:
The main character in the drama is Yahweh. Though hidden in the form of a dream, silent and not at all visible, the listener will understand that the dream is the unsettling work of Yahweh upon which everything else depends. Without the dream there would be no Joseph and no narrative.
From the perspective of the brothers, without the dream there would be no trouble or conflict. For the father, without the dream there would be no grief or loss. The dream sets its own course, the father-brother-dreamer notwithstanding. And in the end, the dream prevails over the tensions of the family.
The effect of the dream and its narration set in motion a chain of events that were not disasters but the work of grace.
“God’s work of providence is his most holy, wise, and powerful preserving and governing all his creatures, and all their actions,” says the Westminster Shorter Catechism, Question 11. Our Creator uses his creative power to keep all creation in existence, to involve himself in all events, and to direct all things to their appointed end.
That is why Joseph would one day say:
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.
Do you see what that tells us?
It reveals that any of us who follow God will live a life that will sometimes become very tangled. At times complications will rise from our own sin (as with Joseph), from the sin of those around us, and from the sin of those in the wider spheres of our existence.
We live in a world caught in a web of sin, and it’s constantly casting new webs. But we know that in the midst of life’s complexities the creative power of God is at work to do us good. This is true when we’re ill, when we have trouble with our children or grandchildren, when professional problems surround us.
Truly we have a God of providence, a God who sustains our souls in all of life, perpetually working good. This is a truth to learn now, because life is not going to get easier. In fact, the more you follow God, the more complicated life will become because your life’s course will buck the currents of this world.
But take it to heart that God is at work to do you good, and rest your soul in that. Submit yourself to him in the great processes of life. Follow him. Listen to the life of Joseph, a hero for the ages, who became so much like Christ himself.