Dreamers & Potiphar's House
Notes
Transcript
Opening Notes
Opening Notes
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Every dreamer will have four stages they must endure before the complete manifestation of their dreams. Today, we want to talk about stage 1, Potiphar’s house.
Introduction/ The Harriet Tubman Story Plot
Introduction/ The Harriet Tubman Story Plot
It’s Black History Month! I personally enjoy this month and designate it as a time to place a special interest on the reflecting upon the stories and events that make up the tragic, yet, compelling story of African American history.
Watching movies is one way I reflect on those old narratives. A couple of years ago a movie entitled Harriet was released. This movie was intended to be a portrayal of the courageous life of Harriet Tubman.
In this movie we discover that Harriet was born a slave in Maryland with her mother and sister. Her father was a freedman and there was an agreement that her mother and children would be freed at the age of 45. However, their family’s slave master denies the permission that was left in his ancestor’s will that permitted Harriet and her family’s freedom. Thusly, they accepted the fate of living as a slaves forever.
However, Harriet was one that received visions or dreams from God. She received divine communication that allowed her to see herself and her family free! Based on the visions she received, she ran just before she could auctioned off by her slave masters—pursuing the sort of liberty that only a dream could envision.
Through much toil, she arrives in Philadelphia where she finds a life of freedom—the life of an African American that had not been found any other place she had been.
It was an incredible accomplishment for Harriet to find freedom in Philadelphia. After a year of being free, she requests assistance to go back to her home to lead her family to freedom. Against the advice of many, she returns back to Maryland to lead her family to freedom.
Due to the fear that had settled in the hearts of her family member, she led many other slaves to freedom before she would ultimate lead them all, except her sister because of death, to freedom.
The reason I share this story line is because I want you to see the persistence of Harriet that concluded that freedom is worth having if she could not have it with her family. Though her travels were dangerous, the journey long, her family resistant, she still made the concentrated effort to save her family.
You see it is believed that family should always have your back. If no one looks out for you, family should. If there’s no one to help you, family will.
Tension: Sometimes, family let you down.
Family Over Everything?
Family Over Everything?
It’s funny how we often say things like “family over everything” until it’s time to give something up. It’s family means everything until we have to pay some bills, make some sacrifices, and adapt your life.
Reference Dr. Robertson McQuilkin
The interesting thing about the story of Joseph, which is really the story of Jacob, is that their family problems was the major component that led to Joseph’s dilemma. Yet, it may not be the family members you have imagined. It was not simply the brothers of Joseph that caused problems. The end of Genesis 37 tells us something that is often missed about the experience of Joseph.
36 Meanwhile, the Midianites sold Joseph in Egypt to Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and the captain of the guards.
The Midianites were descendants of the relationship that had formed between Abraham and Keturah, after Sarah’s death. The individuals that bought and sold Joseph to the Egyptians was the Midianites, making these descendants brothers. However, this is not where the family betrayal ends.
1 Now Joseph had been taken to Egypt. An Egyptian named Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and the captain of the guards, bought him from the Ishmaelites who had brought him there.
Though the Midianites sold him, the Ishmaelites delivered him. That is, when he should have received assistance and deliverance from one set of family members, he only found denial from two sides of his family.
Tension: While we may think the rejection is from our family, the real rejection is from God who prevents the sort of help we think we should receive in some of the most tragic times of our lives.
Your family and closest reliances were prevented by God from helping you, because God wanted you in the mess they would have saved you from!
In Potiphar’s house, you have to be comfortable with not being helped by those you love.
Don’t fret when your family betrays you. Understand that God is sometimes says no, because He is trying to get you to the yes that will make you forget He ever said no.
What does honor attract?
What does honor attract?
I must admit, this series has already challenged almost all of my theological assumptions. For a long time, we have taught that if you are faithful you will be rewarded in accordance to your honorability and righteousness. We say do the right thing and you will attract the right people.
Though all of these things are true, they are not completely true. What we have forgotten to tell individuals is that doing the right thing does not always lead to what is desirable. The proof is in Genesis 39:2-6.
2 The Lord was with Joseph, and he became a successful man, serving in the household of his Egyptian master.
3 When his master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord made everything he did successful,
4 Joseph found favor with his master and became his personal attendant. Potiphar also put him in charge of his household and placed all that he owned under his authority.
5 From the time that he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the Lord blessed the Egyptian’s house because of Joseph. The Lord’s blessing was on all that he owned, in his house and in his fields.
6 He left all that he owned under Joseph’s authority; he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate. Now Joseph was well-built and handsome.
Whoever told us that having God’s presence upon us, being blessed and successful was fulfilling?
Many times, we have tried to fulfill ourselves with things our success and anointing has grant rather than with God.
Tension: Many times doing the right thing and living upright makes you attractive to the wrong people.
Some of your worst relationships and temptations in life came not from what you were doing wrong, but from what you were doing right.
In Potiphar’s house you have to be ready to deal with the mess your righteousness attracts.
Tension: Why Resist the Temptation?
Tension: Why Resist the Temptation?
All of us have asked how could Joseph resist his master’s wife. I think the question of how is very apparent. However, I believe Genesis 39:9 actually answers the question of how and why Joseph was able to resist the temptation to betray his master. The last part of Genesis 39:9 gives us the how, but the first part of Genesis 39:9 gives us the why.
We’ve been in church a while and we understand the transformative side of God’s work in us. We know the fear of God and why it is important to resist sin. This is our how. This is how we prevent ourselves from sinning. Yet, why we sin is uniquely different.
9 No one in this house is greater than I am. He has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. So how could I do this immense evil, and how could I sin against God?”
I believe the first part of Genesis 39:9 tells us why Joseph resisted the temptation. James 1:14 tells us that we are tempted by our desires. It is our lusts that gives our temptation power. That is, our desires draws us from our place in God and yields us to the thing that tempts us.
Quite frankly, Joseph did not take the bait of Potiphar’s wife, because his desire for something else was much stronger than his desire for Potiphar’s wife.
In Potiphar’s house you must have a desire for something that only God can sustain.
This requires a clear recollection of where you used to be and a firm determination to never return back there again.
Some of us have been delivered from very bad situations, but because we did not have the desire we needed, we found ourselves back in situations worse than the ones before.
The Croods: The man that had a vision for tomorrow.
Honor does not always lead to instant victory.
Honor does not always lead to instant victory.
19 When his master heard the story his wife told him—“These are the things your slave did to me”—he was furious
20 and had him thrown into prison, where the king’s prisoners were confined. So Joseph was there in prison.
If Potiphar’s house teaches us anything, it teaches us that being honest and honorable does not always lead to immediate victories.
Share the experience you had while being unjustly locked up.
Some victories take time.
Don’t get in too much of a hurry to win.
Forgive and forget quickly.
Stay focused on your dream.
Conclusion: You Will Survive Potiphar’s House
Conclusion: You Will Survive Potiphar’s House
21 But the Lord was with Joseph, and shewed him mercy, and gave him favour in the sight of the keeper of the prison.
22 And the keeper of the prison committed to Joseph’s hand all the prisoners that were in the prison; and whatsoever they did there, he was the doer of it.
23 The keeper of the prison looked not to any thing that was under his hand; because the Lord was with him, and that which he did, the Lord made it to prosper.
We will survive and prosper, because God is with us and His favor is upon us.