If You are Teaching about Joseph (Old Testament), Part II: Mercy and Grace

This the last installment on my lessons about Joseph.

Let's start with some background. In comparison to Mesopotamian civilizations, the Egyptian civilization provided a distinct environment for the Israelites.  They were superstitious about death, more focused on it. Mesopotamians had a harsher climate, evil gods that wanted human sacrifices, constant wars and rising and falling civilizatins, and little idea of afterlife. Egyptians civilization was stable, affluent, agricultural (based on the floods from the Nile depositing rich minerals in the soil), protected. Life on earth was good and so was life afterward. 

Joseph would have looked and dressed like an Egyptian (even face paint), spoken Egyptian, and 20 years later, so it’s no surprise he wasn’t recognized.

Broad outlines of the story: Jacob’s brothers, minus Benjamin, come to Egypt. Joseph recognizes them, sends them back with their money in their bags, keeps Simeon, says not to come back without Benjamin. Eventually they have to go back and they bring Benjamin. Judah says he will protect Benjamin. Joseph is very moved when he sees Benjamin, then they have a meal and Benjamin gets five times as much, but no one has a clue this is Joseph. Why should they, even though he asks about their father, since that was common in those days, respect for the elders.  Joseph has his servant put the silver cup in Benjamin’s bag; the brothers leave, but are overtaken, and Benjamin is arrested, and Judah stands in for him.  Judah says “take me, send Benjamin back to his father, because it will kill Jacob to lose Benjamin.”  Pick up there. 

Genesis 44:18-45:8, 50:15-19

Takeaways: 

1. This is a picture of the Judah descendant standing in for all of us. 

2. Joseph’s speeches about forgiveness are good patterns. Gen. 50:15-19. You did mean it for evil. No doubt about that. God redeemed their evil circumstance. Their bent toward deception was so ingrained in them that after their father died they are still lying (Jacob hadn’t told Joseph that before he died).  Joseph was not deceptive like his brother—he’d seen enough of the problems—but he still messed with them a little bit, kind of funny but also he was manipulating events. The brothers would not have repented unless they were put in the circumstances they were: need, accusations, pressure. Still God had to do it.

3. Joseph’s story is symbolic of many things, but one is the difference between mercy and grace. His brothers did not deserve either. Mercy and grace are two things we never deserve. And they are not the same thing. Mercy vs. grace.  David Platt tells a story of a seminary professor whose students were trying to persuade him to give them an extension on an assignment, and they asked for grace. The professor told them, “Mercy is giving you an extension on your grade. Grace is my writing the paper for you.”  Joseph did not just give mercy, but grace. Mercy is easier for us than grace. Mercy: Joseph does not seek revenge and forgives. Grace, he provides for them to live in a good area of Egypt for the duration of the famine.

4. But there is a law of unintended consequences. I don’t think the plan in Joseph’s mind was for them to stay 400 years. There were fewer than 100 people who came, and Pharaoh gave them land for their flocks (they were herders, which was not a big thing in Egypt).

5. Why didn’t they go back to Canaan a few years later, after the famine?  Interesting question. Some ideas:

They weren’t large enough yet to fight any battles against the Canaanites to secure the land they were promised. 

They did not have a strong national identity yet.

Best reason:  God had a plan for them to understand deliverance from slavery, a powerful story for us politically and spiritually.

 6.  It’s interesting that so much of the Mosaic law is about being truthful and honest, in light of how dishonest these people were.  Why are we dishonest? 

Fear of social disapproval

Wanting something

Want to seem smarter than we are

Just don’t know, have forgotten but don’t want to look like we have

7. What is Repentance: take full responsibility. No buts or excuses or reasons or rationalizing . I know I did X and it was wrong, but . . .

Confrontation is sometimes needed, but God still has to bring the conviction.

We cannot really manipulate people into confessions, though. God meant it for good.

8.  Does God use sin? Was God ultimately guilty for how Joseph was treated? God does seem cruel sometimes.  A Severe mercy. Death by cancer.  The ultimate answer, if we can say that, is that God has a perspective we may never have. We also have expectations that may not be right.

You meant it for evil, God meant it for good. God does not tempt man to evil. God is perfectly good so any appearance of God being cruel is being filtered through our brains and needs recalibration.

I am thinking of this because of a closere family memb. 61, will die of breast cancer soon, it has spread.  She is younger than I. Why her? Medically, not in the family; she did smoke for many years, though. Not really curable in the form she had, but she has lived like 7 years with it, almost constant treatment. Her husband’s former wife died of cancer too. This is my trying to figure it out, make sense of it, like we do. We think this life is better than all possible worlds. She’ll be in heaven eternally. We will mourn temporarily.  But the passage is hard and I wish she would be cured. Robby told a story of a man who was “healed but not cured.” The man repented while in the last days of his life and was right with God, but he died (was not cured).  That is what I pray for people.  

We can only view 2-3 or so lines of causality. Genetics, upbringing, trauma, etc.

God has millions of lines of causality. All the people who come into your life, for starters.

Joseph’s line is the OT equivalent of Romans 8:28.  Let’s look at that. 

As we said last week, secular people, unbelievers, use that verse out of context. In context it’s even better, though. It’s not about immediate answers to everyday questions, like “why did God let me wreck my car?” but ultimate questions to larger life issues.

Read that v. 18 to end of Romans 8.  

This is a perfect passage for advent, which means coming. Jesus came, and is coming again.  We live in the already but not yet.  Powerful.  “We always see ourselves both “in the moment” and in Christ’s eschatological horizon.” Elisabeth Rain Kinkaid, CT.