Genesis 46-47

Transcript

We study through books of the Bible here at the Village Chapel and we happen to have some extra copies. If you didn’t bring one with you and you’d like one to follow along, just raise your hand up. Matt, somebody in the back can bring one by so that you can follow along. The internet network for the building is also up on the screen along with the password if you would like that. We’re studying the book of Genesis and it’s the book of beginnings. It goes back to the beginning of beginnings, of course, where it says, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” And we’ve studied through those first 11 chapters as one section, now we’ve been studying, really, the lives of the patriarchs and the way that God has been in pursuit of a people he can call His own and He has made.

As progress has been made through this book, I hope you have been inspired and encouraged by what you see God doing in the lives of so many of these characters that we read about because their lives, just as messy as our lives, and their brokenness, just as severe as our brokenness, and their longings, just as deep as our longings. And so, this is the second to last study of the Book of Genesis and you say, “Yeah, but Jim, there are five chapters,” and I say, “Yes, that’s right.” We’ll do two of them today and then we’ll get together next week and tackle the last three chapters but we’re going to call this one, “A Sojourning Reunion.”

I don’t know if you like reunions or not. I happen to like reunions, I think they’re great. I love it when long lost family members are reunited, we’ve all heard stories like that. When old friends are reunited, I love it when pet owners find their lost dogs. That has happened to me. I love it when pet owners find their lost cat, their bunny or even their boa constrictor, I don’t care. Whatever you got, if you find it, it’s a good thing. Reunions are a good thing unless of course you’re talking about the reunion of ABBA or Air Supply or Milli Vanilli or if you were to even go so far as to say the Spice Girls or Limp Bizkit, I would probably not be into all … Now, have I offended almost everybody, I have reaching for that.

I’m going to call this “A Sojourning Reunion” because what we have here is the climax. We’ve been working toward this where the family of Jacob and all of his sons and the entourage have discovered now, Joseph has revealed himself to the brothers and it’s really moving and powerful. But now we’re going to read in chapter 46 and 47 about Jacob actually moving to Egypt. And it’s sojourning, it’s a traveling, if you will, reunion because it’s not their permanent home and I think that’s something for us to take note of and to maybe learn something about. What does that teach us about God? What does that teach us about God’s will for His people as He calls them and what happens to them? Sometimes I don’t know if you ever feel like the stage coach is running toward the edge of the cliff and in your world or in the world around us and you’re wondering if God’s in charge. What does this all mean, all these changes and disruption and all of that?

This is that kind of story that’s been preserved for us down through history to remind us of some things about the God who’s actually in charge of it all. And so, without further ado, let’s take a look. I’ll remind you Jacob, Israel, is 130 years old at this particular moment. [v1]  “And Israel set out with all that he had and came to Beersheba and offered sacrifices to the God of his father, Isaac.” So, the first thing he did after receiving the good news that Joseph’s alive and he wants to welcome them out of the famine that is around and into the safety of where he’s at in Egypt and where he actually has plenty of food. [v2] “And God spoke to Israel in visions of the night…”. And, by the way, it’s interesting to me that that happens multiple times. This is probably about the fifth time we’ve heard of God speaking to Jacob. And guess how many times we read of God speaking to Joseph? Zero.

Now, that’s interesting to me. It’s actually encouraging to me because we do read multiple times of God being with Joseph unless we fixate on the supernatural moments of thinking, we hear a special word from or whatever. I just want you to know, here’s a quarter of the book of Genesis dedicated to the Joseph storyline and we’re told God is with him over and over and over again but he doesn’t have one of these big supernatural aaah moments where he gets some a vision or something. It’s just daily fidelities and it’s God being faithful, God being with him, the divine initiative in his life. This is really interesting.

[v2-3] “But God spoke to Jacob or Israel in visions of the night and He said to him, ‘Jacob, Jacob,’ and he said, ‘Here I am.’ And then God said, ‘I am God, the God of your father, do not be afraid to go down to Egypt for I will make you a great nation there.” So, Jacob, your family will become a nation. This will, in his mind, Jacob who sat around the campfire with Isaac, who sat around the campfire with Abraham, the promise. We sing the promise, Pass the Promise, that promise got passed along as well to Abraham that your descendants will be as numerous as the sand on the seashores or the number of stars in the skies. Here’s a promising God who keeps His promises even when the road or the path seems very strange at times. Go to Egypt? No, do not be afraid to go. Don’t be afraid of change, of strange change.

If it’s God behind it, you can trust God and He is basically breaking through to Jacob as Jacob goes to Beersheba, that place where Abraham and Isaac, that very frequent spot for them to go and worship the Lord. And I love this about what happens right here. “And do not be afraid.” Of course, we constantly like to point that out. The most often repeated negative command in the Bible is don’t do this, don’t be afraid. Verse four,” I will go down with you to Egypt and I will also surely bring you up again and Joseph will close your eyes.” So, there’s this promise that actually goes beyond the sojourning moment there in Egypt, which is really going to be about a 400-year moment, but God’s going to say to Jacob and his family I will go with you, I’ll be with you and then, after a period of time, I’ll also bring you, meaning this nation that is going to come from your descendants, I’m going to bring them back to the promise land.

The same promise he gave to Abraham and we read that same indicator that they’re going to be in a foreign land in Genesis chapter 15 which you can check that out by yourself if you would like to.

So, they took their livestock, it says here, and he arose from Beersheba. Verse five – eight:

“…and the sons of Israel carried their father Jacob and their little ones and their wives in the wagons which Pharaoh had sent to carry him. They took their livestock and their property which they had required in the land of Canaan and came to Egypt, Jacob and all his descendants with him. His sons and his grandsons with him, his daughters and his granddaughters and all his descendants brought with him to Egypt. Now, these are the names of the sons of Israel, Jacob and his sons who went to Egypt: Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn, and the sons of Reuben…”

dot, dot dot. Unless you think I’m afraid of trying to pronounce the names, I just remind you we’ve done a bunch of that before but I’m going to let you read these aloud at lunch today no matter where you go and I want you watch the people on the tables around you move away from you or whatever. But yeah, it’s a great list and it’s a great reminder that each of these names are important to God, each of these. And here’s the thing, God is saying to Jacob, I know you, know your family and I know who’s going with you. And all of this is preserved to remind us, I think, that down through history, God’s ultimately in charge.

And so, specific people are listed but also these people are talked about as a group as well. So, not either or, it’s both and, when it comes to our faith in God. I’m an individual, I’m one sheep in the flock but I’m a part of a flock and I belong to Jesus and I also belong to everybody else who belongs to Jesus. And that’s really what I think this thing reminds us of, that God is meticulously watching over human history.

And, in this particular case, these are the people that are going to be the fountain through which the stream of the people of God will come and the nation will be formed there in Egypt and then God will go and set them all free.

Verse 26-27, “All the persons belonging to Jacob, who came to Egypt, his direct descendants, not including the wives of Jacob’s sons, were 66 persons in all and the sons of Joseph who were born to him in Egypt were two. And all the persons of the house of Jacob who came to Egypt were 70.”

Remember, the two sons of Joseph, Ephraim and Manasseh.

[v28] “Now, he sent Judah before him to Joseph to point out the way before him to Goshen…” 

Goshen would be that area, that region of Egypt that would be north and the northeast corner of Egypt and great land there, great opportunity for them to bring their flocks and their herds and be able to flourish there[v29] “And Joseph prepared his chariot”. And remember, he’s the right hand man of the Pharaoh. So, he’s got his chariot, he prepares it, he’s got a license plate on that chariot that’s VP. He’s literally Vice – Pharaoh and so he has lots of privileges and has the ability to offer to his family, with Pharaoh’s endorsement, the best land that there is for them there. “And so, he prepared his chariot” , verse 29 tells us:,” and he wanted to go to Goshen and meet his father Israel soon. As soon as he appeared before him…” and please don’t miss this:

” he fell on his neck and wept on his neck a long time.”

And guys, this is 22 years. I thought you were dead for 22 years, mourning, grieving, trying to move on in some ways. But now, all of a sudden, the most amazing, surprising news and that God had preserved Joseph for such a time as this. What did that look like?

Joseph literally dresses like an Egyptian, looks like an Egyptian, has the Egyptian haircut, the Egyptian makeup and it looks, talks and walks like an Egyptian. So, what must that have been like though to see his son after 20, 22 years? I don’t like being displaced from my wife for a weekend. Yeah, we’re calling each other, I don’t want to make you guys too sick of the syrup and all that stuff but it’s like, every 20 minute, “You okay?” “Yeah, I’m okay.” “All right, I miss you. I love you, honey.” You too schmucky.”  All that stuff, all the little nicknames and all that stuff and I know a bunch of you are the same way and you do that same thing and you have your certain parameters but being reunited with somebody you love is just so amazing and this is so moving here when Joseph and his father finally see each other after all this time, v30,  “Israel” Jacob “ said to Joseph, ‘Now let me die,.’” This is an old testament [inaudible 00:12:57], this is now I can die in peace. This is what I’ve been longing for for so long. And so, the emotion is there and we don’t want to miss it. It speaks to us too. [v30-34]

“’Now let me die since I’ve seen your face that you are still alive’. Joseph said to his brothers and to his father’s household, ‘I will go up and tell Pharaoh and will say to him my brothers and my father’s household who were in the land of Canaan have come to me. And the men are shepherds for they have been keepers of livestock and they’ve brought their flocks and their herds and all that they have’. And it should come about when Pharaoh calls you and says, ‘What is your occupation?’ that you shall say your servants have been keepers of livestock from our youth even until now, both we and our fathers, that you may live in the land of Goshen for every shepherd is loathsome to the Egyptians’”.

Now, what’s Joseph doing there? He’s telling his family to tell the truth about your occupation. In a world where shepherds are despised, look down on, shepherds are from the other side of the tracks, we might say in our own nomenclature, but just tell the truth about who you are and what you do. And perhaps, even in so doing, Joseph realizes that this may go well for them, that it would lower any sense of a threat that Pharaoh and the Egyptians might feel as these folks come in with some level of privilege. And they’re going to expand and grow as we know and, along the way, another Pharaoh will come along who won’t know who Joseph is. And those of you who have read the book of Exodus understand how the story goes. They end up becoming a threat; they end up becoming enslaved in bondage in very severe work conditions.

But I love this chapter for the reunion that it is and the way that these two come together. And there’s an article from, actually, it goes back to 1997, The Jerusalem Post, and I just wanted to read it to you. It’s short but it’s a more modern day version. This is by Rabbi Shlomo Riskin is the guy’s name who wrote it. I know a man who grew up in South Africa, having been rescued by Christians during the Holocaust. He lived in Johannesburg, turned religious under Habad influence and eventually became a rabbi. Once, he found himself on a plane next to an elderly gentleman to whom he felt particularly drawn. They spoke in Yiddish and talked about Israel politics in the Jewish world. When breakfast was served, the older man ate the regular meal of sausages, eggs and milk while the rabbi ate his specially provided kosher breakfast.

The rabbi gently suggested that perhaps the elderly man could do without the sausage. The rabbi was told in no uncertain terms that since he had lost his only child in Auschwitz, the old man ate whatever he liked. They parted but the rabbi couldn’t get the elderly gentleman out of his mind and was deeply disappointed that he hadn’t asked for his telephone number. Two years later, on a visit to the Yad Vashem, that’s a Holocaust museum there in Jerusalem, some of us have been there to visit that site. But two years later, on a visit to Yad Vashem, the rabbi saw a familiar figure near the entrance of the building and rushing over he said in Yiddish, “Do you recognize me? Do you remember our plane trip?” The man smiled, nodded and said, “And I still eat the sausage!”

The rabbi wanted to see the exhibits and asked if the old man would join him. “I never go in. Didn’t I tell you I lost my only son in Auschwitz?” Something suddenly clicked in the rabbi’s brain. “”What was your name before the war?”, he asked. When the man answered, the rabbi whispered with tears in his eyes, ‘Tate,’ Yiddish for father.” All that I was given by the people who adopted me was your name. I’m your son.” Now they both live together in Israel, the father no longer eats sausages and the only thing that the rabbi complains about is that, whenever he enters the room, his father stands up.

Well, because we’re all sinful people, I’m pretty sure reunions have been necessary since the historical first family. It’s very important. Our passage today is a 4,000 year old reminder that God can do amazing things when hearts are obedient to Him and surrendered to Him and I think that should give us hope but I think there’s even more and so let’s take a look at chapter 47: “ Then Joseph went in and told Pharaoh and said, ‘My father and my brothers and their flocks and their herds and all that they have have come out of the land of Canaan and, behold, they are in the land of Goshen’.” So, Joseph reporting to his boss Pharaoh and he took five men from among his brothers”, we’re not told which five, but he just took five and presented them to Pharaoh. [v3 – 6]

“And Pharaoh said to his brothers, ‘What is your occupation?” So, they said to Pharaoh, “Your servants are shepherds, both we and our fathers.” And they said to Pharaoh, “We have come to sojourn in the land for there is no pasture for your servant’s flocks for the famine is severe in the land of Canaan. Now, therefore, please let your servants live in the land of Goshen.” And then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Your father and your brothers have come to you, the land of Egypt is at your disposal. Settle your father and your brothers in the best of the land, let them live in the land of Goshen. And if you know any capable men among them, then put them in charge of my livestock.”

Isn’t this beautiful the way this is working out? I love this.

[v7] Then Joseph brought his father Jacob and presented him to Pharaoh;…”

And this is really a twist right here what it says,[v7] “…and Jacob blessed Pharaoh.” Usually, it’s the man with the status that does the blessing but, here, the 130-year-old Jacob blesses Pharaoh.

[v8-9] “And Pharaoh said to Jacob, “How many years have you lived?” And Jacob said to Pharaoh, “The years of my sojourning are 130, few and unpleasant have been the years of my life nor have they attained the years that my fathers lived during the days of their sojourning.”

Abraham, you will recall, died at 175, Isaac at 180, I believe, if I’m recalling right. And so, at 130, Jacob is going, “Ah, I still got 50 years left on me,” he’s still talking about few years at 130.

[v11]  “So Jacob blessed Pharaoh and went out from his presence. So, Joseph settled his father and his brothers and gave them a possession in the land of Egypt, in the best of the land, in the land of Rameses as Pharaoh had ordered.”

And, of course, our narrator has the perspective of time and some will triangulate the events that are being reported here and go, “Hey, there was no Rameses back then.” Well, there was at the time of the writing and so I think it’s fair for the narrator to be able to use that term in writing whether this is Moses or an edited group of writers that Moses edited. Either way, Rameses would have been later, and, certainly, Moses would know about that. [v12] “So, as Pharaoh had ordered and Joseph provided his father and his brothers and all his father’s household with food according to their little ones.”

And so, here he is being able to bring his family, remember Joseph had these 10, 11 brothers including Benjamin and there’s a sister, Dinah, as well that we know and then there are all these grandchildren as well, grandchildren to Jacob. And so, he’s grown up in a family with four moms, which is three more than you’re supposed to have anyway, and yet, in spite of all of that, God has been shepherding His flock even as they shepherd the literal flocks that they have brought into the land of Goshen.

Verse 13 “ Now, there was no food in all the land because the famine was very severe so the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan languished because of the famine.” So, the idea that you’re going to be given here is about Joseph’s management style and the gifting of management that God has given to Joseph and how that use of that gifting has actually found favor for him with the Pharaoh. Also, please note the intensity of the famine here in verse 13. I’ve been shocked lately at how I walk into Kroger and my favorite choice of capers isn’t there in a jar. Maybe you have too, well, maybe not but it seems like some of the shelves are a little bare. We don’t know anything at all about this kind of famine. And so, I just want to point that out to you, how desperate these people were. And so, it’s so severe that the people are languishing.

[v14-20] “Joseph gathered all the money that was found in the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan for the grain which they bought and Joseph brought the money into Pharaoh’s house. When the money was all spent in the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan, all the Egyptians came to Joseph and said, “Give us your food for why should we die in your presence for our money is gone.” And Joseph said, “Give up your livestock and I will give you food for your livestock since your money is gone.” So, they brought their livestock to Joseph and Joseph gave them food in exchange for the horses and the flocks and the herds and the donkeys and he fed them with food in exchange for all their livestock that year. And when that year was ended, they came to him the next year and said to him, “We will not hide from my lord that our money is all spent in the cattle or my lord. There’s nothing left for my lord except our bodies and our lands. Why should we die before your eyes, both we and our land? Buy us and our land for food and we and our land will be slaves to Pharaoh. So, give us seed that we may live and not die and that the land may not be desolate.” So, Joseph bought all the land of Egypt for Pharaoh for every Egyptian sold his field because the famine was severe upon them, thus the land became Pharaoh’s.

And again, I want to just remind us all as we read this, this isn’t teaching about slavery or something, that’s not what this is. This is reportage. This is just reporting how desperate the world was at the time and how desperate measures would be required for them all to survive. So, if your goal is just to get to this, boy, especially when we have this but that’s going on here. It’s such a desperate time, people are taking desperate measures including Joseph and he’s attempting, with his management skill, to do things that will make sure people can eat, okay? [v20] “And he bought all of the land for Pharaoh, every Egyptian sold his field because the famine was severe.”

v21, “And, as for the people, he removed them to cities. In other words, he moved them around from one end of Egypt’s border to the other. Only the land of the priests he did not buy for the priest had an allotment from Pharaoh and they lived off the allotment which Pharaoh gave them, therefore they did not sell their land. Then Joseph said to the people, “Behold, I have today bought you and your land for Pharaoh. Now, here is seed for you and you may sow the land again.”

He wants them to be able to eat, he wants this all to work

[v24] “And at harvest, you shall give a fifth to Pharaoh and four-fifths shall be for your own, for seed of the field and for your food and those of your households and as food for your little ones.”

Notice, again, the care and the compassion and the order that he’s trying to bring to what is a desperate and chaotic situation. Joseph made it a statute concerning the land of Egypt valid to this day that Pharaoh should have the fifth, only the land of the priest did not become Pharaoh’s. So, basically, it’s a 20% flat tax is what he’s doing.

[v27-30] “ And Israel lived in the land of Egypt and Goshen, they acquired property in it and were fruitful and became very numerous and Jacob lived in the land of Egypt 17 years” .

So, now he’s 147, right?

“So, the length of Jacob’s life is 147.When the time for Israel to die drew near, he called his son Joseph and said to him, “Please, if I have found favor in your sight, place now your hand under my thigh and deal with me in kindness and faithfulness. Please do not bury me in Egypt. But when I lie down with my father, you shall carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their burial place.” And he said, “I will do as you have said.”

Very much a tradition in their time, when you’re going to make a promise to somebody, make a covenant promise to somebody that you will indeed follow through with to put their hand under their thigh. In our day and age, I’m really glad we shake hands. That’s all right with me, I’m sure it’s all right with you. But it does show the level of seriousness, the promise that’s being made, how important that was, eye to eye making this promise.

[v31] “And he said, “Swear to me,” and Joseph swore to him. Then Israel bowed, and this is fascinating to me, Jacob bowed, and if you have a New American Standard, it’s in italics which means it’s not actually there but it’s implied. He bowed in worship at the head of the bed.”

And so, there he is and we’ll read about his actual death next week but here it is, he’s getting ready to die. He understands how important it is that God’s promises to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob be realized and fulfilled. He’s actually in a foreign land right now, he’s an alien and a stranger and God’s promise needs to be fulfilled. And so, he wants the promise from Joseph that his bones will be carried back and buried with Abraham, Isaac in the cave there at Machpelah and indeed that will happen. It’ll be a really powerful thing the way that goes and we would read about that a little bit later. So, what do we learn here?

Well, let me just throw a few things. I’ll just give you three or four things today. This is a sojourning reunion, and as I said, this is a temporary residence for them and the reunion happens there and it’s beautiful. But Jacob reminds us that seeking after God and worshiping God equips us to be able to hear from God and that happens at the very beginning of chapter 46, does it not? When he goes to Beersheba, upon receiving this great news Joseph’s alive, come on down to Egypt and live there, we have everything you need and you’ll be able to live there because there’s famine everywhere. But God has made a way for you.

So, here’s what we get. Jacob, this guy, probably, as we all studied this, probably identified at one point or another. Jacob, who is a heel grabber, a thief in some ways in part of his life and yet, at the same time, we saw the curve of his spiritual life, we saw him beginning to pray and put a priority on God. And here, when he gets toward the end of his life, here, this is his first natural instinct is I get this good news, it’s this opportunity to stay alive and to feed my family, oh, let me give thanks first, let me worship first and what happens is he hears from God.

And I don’t know what you do when you’re trying to hear from God. We tend to, in desperate moments, we tend to turn to God and often try to hear from God but sometimes our ears haven’t been tuned to hear from God because we aren’t really coming to Him as God, we’re just coming to him as somebody who’s just a lifeguard that might rescue us from the drowning thing that we’re experiencing right now. Does God turn us away? No, he doesn’t. That’s the beauty of grace. But why would you wait until things got desperate to tune your ear to the Lord? And, of course, you’re here, we are worshiping him, we want to hear from him.

But let me remind us that that kind of seeking the Lord, that kind of worship is meant to be a way of life for us, not just something that happens on Sunday morning for an hour. Because there’s no way that Sunday, one hour, hour and a half, whatever it is going to push back the tide, the landslide, the tsunami of influence that is hitting you every single day from either media sources or just the culture of flow sources or whatever. That’s all trying to shape and influence you not to trust God, that’s all trying to tell you that you should be proud or angry or fearful or whatever. And here, we have a God that’s saying no matter what happens, no matter where you end up having to go, no matter how difficult the famine is around, I am God. I will be with you. Do not fear.

See, that’s beautiful. I’ll take that any day of the week. “In a life with God, His guidance, provision and protection are important as Jacob and the psalmist knew. But in all such experiences, the center and the source is God’s presence with us”. And that’s what we’ve been told as we’ve studied the life of Joseph, that God was with Joseph and now here we find Jacob reaching out to God and the Lord speaks to him. “To discover,” as Richard Bauckham, in Who is God, continues to say, “that God is with us is probably the most important discovery anyone can make for, once made, it colors all of life’s experiences”. Think again about the images of Joseph’s storyline, whether you’re in the pit or the palace or the prison or back in the palace again, God was with him.

And here’s the beautiful promise from Jesus that He will never leave us or forsake us. Jesus, the much greater Joseph, Jesus, the one who left the comforts of heaven, came to the dark world that we live in on a rescue mission to show us that God desires to be with His people. And we’re going to celebrate that crazy in the advent season because the incarnation is not just a sweet little romantic syrupy little thing, it’s not just about nostalgia. I am, at heart, a romantic and I do nostalgia and all that stuff but there is an incredibly powerful event that happened when God came to live among us and to walk this planet and it’s really powerful that He would even make that move in our direction. So, Jacob does remind us that seeking after God and worshiping God does equip us to be able to hear from God.

Secondly, Jacob and Joseph remind us that sometimes God uses believers to bless non-believers. Joseph’s interpreting of dreams, management skills here as we just read, his business sense became a blessing to Pharaoh and the people of Egypt. Pharaoh set up or Joseph rather set up a system that strengthened his immediate boss, Pharaoh, but also provided infrastructure, security and resources to meet all the needs of the Egyptian people as well as his own family that have just moved in to Goshen. And then, also, when Jacob had a personal audience with Pharaoh, Jacob blesses Pharaoh. So, God again, using His people to bless those who are non-believers.

I think there are some religious people that don’t like that idea. They think God doesn’t want to bless anyone other than the people from their particular denomination who think, act and look precisely the way they do. I, on the other hand, am convinced that, on the first day in heaven, the most often heard statement is going to be, “What are you doing here?” And it will be said of me, and I’ve said that over and over again, I’ll continue to say it, I think that the first day of heaven is going to be stunning and shocking and I kind of look forward to that. I don’t know about you but I like to be stirred in that way myself.

And I think the stories are going to come back on such a day that some humble believer reached out with a kind word or a loving deed, some wise advice was given and they did something to bless somebody who did not expect it and that God used that word or that deed to draw someone to Himself because one of His people was willing to give away a part of their life or be inconvenienced or give away some resource for another person. Unbelievers are drawn to God by humble believers. I’m unaware of anyone who ever became a believer because they lost the argument. Behind the questions about faith in the mind of every unbeliever is this question, “Does the God you want me to believe in actually care about me or my family or my situation? Does that God you’re trying to convince me to believe in care?”

And that’s why Jesus said this shockingly but really beautiful and amazing thing from John 13:35 that all people would know you’re My disciples if you have love, thank you, if you have love for one another. One of my favorite Bible teachers has been Steve Brown over the years. He was a pastor and affiliated with Reformed Theological Seminary down in Florida. He said,

“When we feed the hungry only because, once fed, they’ll listen to the gospel presentation, we betray the very teaching of the One who had compassion on people because, well, just because He was compassionate.”

And around here we like to feed the hungry simply because, well, simply because they’re hungry and that’s what God’s called us to do. So, if we want them to hear the gospel as well, we’ll be wrapping it in a sandwich first as Charles Spurgeon used to say.

Jacob and Joseph remind us that sometimes God uses believers to bless non-believers. And, interestingly enough, if I could just twist that back around, Pharaoh reminds us that sometimes God uses non-believers to bless believers. Again, some religious people don’t like this. They want to live in a little religious bubble, don’t want to accept anything that might be touched or tainted by an unbeliever. They only work with other believers, only read Christian books, only watch Christian movies, only listen to Christian music and they like to make sure that they buy all their kitty litter from Christian kitty litter stores.

Jacob and Joseph and family are strangers and aliens in a foreign land but they interacted with Pharaoh and the Egyptians and God blessed Jacob’s family as it grew in size to become a nation within a nation. I love it that they brought their stuff with them, did you notice that? It’s just something you don’t want to miss. It sounds like some trivial thing but it was Pharaoh that said, “Don’t worry about bringing anything with you, you don’t have to do that. We’ll have everything here for you.” And yet Jacob and maybe Joseph and maybe the family talking and all of that, I don’t know how it exactly went down but I don’t think it’s insignificant that they brought their stuff with them.

Perhaps, I speculate, but perhaps it is an indication that they want to be in but not of. Just as we’re supposed to be in but not of since we too, as the Apostle Peter would remind us, are strangers and aliens in a foreign land as we live here in this world that is a world that has said no to God, turned its back on God and wants to be its own God here we live in a foreign land and we’re here for a reason and a purpose. Part of that indeed is to bless our city, to be blessed and to receive blessings from others as well, to show that that kind of relationship of giving and taking is actually the way God designed for things to be so that His love might flow between people and that’s a really powerful thing. Calvin Miller, in Into the Depths of God, said:

“Evangelicals for the most part of their history have had a curious emphasis on the breaks rather than on the steering wheel. They’re forever quitting this or that. I was decades into my life in Christ before it seriously occurred to me that we did not become vibrant believers because of the things we quit.”

Some of you grew up in the don’t do, don’t do, don’t do, don’t do culture and I did too, I did. Are there some things we’re not supposed to do? Yes, there are some things that are not very wise or prudent and there are some, actually, things that are in offense to God. Who gets to decide what and what isn’t sin? God. If you listen to the voices of this culture, you get to decide. But if you listen to the word, scriptures, and that’s why we study through books of the Bible here, is we know it’s God that makes that ultimate decision.

So, Pharaoh does remind us though that sometimes God uses non-believers to bless. And my last point for today is Genesis 46 to 47 leads us to rest in the fact that God is sovereign over human history and points us to the promise that we should pass that He has planned the greatest reunion of all. And that reunion is on a great day when the Lord will return and there will be a trumpet blast is the way the apostle Paul describes it in First Thessalonians 4:13-18. And if you’re willing, I would love to one more time engage you in some public reading of scripture. Let’s read together:

“But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. For this we say to you, by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so, we shall always be with the Lord, therefore, comfort one another with these words.”

Wow. Realize, our new testaments point to the return of Christ about 200 times and we talk about it so little and yet is so full of hope and he even tells us here, comfort one another with these words. So, I’m doing that today, I wanted us to read it aloud together because I think it should be of comfort to you no matter what. We come to a holiday season, some come right in the middle of grief and loss and we’ve prayed and continue to pray for those people. Some of you have experienced loss in the maybe recent past and some of you may yet be mourning as many of us anyway have lost loved ones and we might have an anniversary date for the day that person passed but these words are true all the time because we are one day closer right now.

Do I know when the Lord’s going? No, I haven’t got a clue. It’ll be 2:00 p.m. on the planet somewhere but there is a day, there is a time when He will create this amazing reunion. We will be reunited with our King, Jesus, in a different kind of way when we see Him face to face and we will be reunited with all of the saints who’ve gone before us. And I so look forward to that day, it’s just a beautiful, wonderful thing. We’re longing for that, all of us, and we’ll close with this Lewis quote here:

“Our lifelong nostalgia, our longing to be reunited with something in the universe from which we now feel cut off, to be on the inside of some door which we’ve always seen from the outside, it’s no mere neurotic fancy but it’s the truest index of our real situation.”

Let’s pray.

“Lord, indeed, we sense that longing that Lewis has talked about and we yearn for the day when You return to set things right because so much is broken, so much has gone off the rails. There’s plenty of confusion and pain, there’s plenty of disruption and despair in the world in which we live and we need you. So, please Lord, hear our cry for mercy. I pray that every person within the sound of my voice would be reminded that Your mercies are new every single morning and that every single day You refresh us, restore us as we turn to You, as we look to You, as we go to Beersheba, to seek You and worship You and to hear from You.

I pray, Lord, that You would indeed prove Yourself faithful in the lives of each and every

one of us here as we turn to You and that we even collectively, as a church, would be earnestly seeking You and worshiping You. As we move into advent, people are open to hearing stories of hope because of their own desperation or their own longings or their own fears. Lord, help us to live in such a way that we advent people expecting your soon appearance and, at the same time, giving thanks for Your appearing 2,000 years ago when You came.

Lord, may we be the kind of people that can sing full throated with full hearts, that we trust You, that we believe You and that we would overflow with joy as we consider Your reappearance here to set things right. We love You and thank You for this day and this time together. In Jesus’ name, amen and amen.”