Turn to Genesis chapter 47. Genesis chapter 47. The title of the lesson, Presented, Blessed, and Nourished. Resented, blessed, and nourished.
Before we get into this, though, let's seek the Lord for His blessing
this morning. Our Father, which art in heaven,
hallowed be Thy name. Help us this morning, Father,
to listen, be our teacher this morning, grant unto us the spirit
of worship, enable me to rightly divide the word of truth, bring to my remembrance the things
that thou hast taught me, and enable me to communicate them
to the people. Make me and make thy word a blessing
this morning. Forgive us our sins for Christ's
sake, and bless and be with the Padgett family this day, Father. We know thy grace is sufficient. But our greatest desire, as we
have already stated, is to worship you in spirit and in truth. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. Presented, blessed, and nourished. Israel
is coming to the land of Egypt. He is directed to go to the land
of Goshen by Joseph, We see that over in chapter 45.10. And in
this chapter, chapter 47, we will see how that Joseph presented
his brethren to Pharaoh and how he blessed them and how he nourished
them. And in seeing this, we should
be able to see the Lord Jesus Christ. how He has presented
us to the Father, blessed us, and even now nourishes us. It's written in verse 1, Then
Joseph came and told Pharaoh and said, My father and my brethren
and their flocks and their herds and all that they have are come
out of the land of Canaan, and behold, they are in the land
of Goshen. The first thing I noticed here
is that Joseph speaks to Pharaoh on behalf of his brethren. And
I could not help but thinking of the Lord Jesus Christ interceding
for us before the Father. He speaks to the Father on our
behalf. And then here's something else.
Joseph is not ashamed to call them his brethren. He's not ashamed
to call them his brethren, even though they were shepherds. He
says, they're my brethren, they've come to me. Look over in chapter
46, just cross the page, and look in verse 33. And it shall come to pass when
Pharaoh shall call you and shall say, what is your occupation?
That you shall say, thy servant's trade hath been about cattle
from our youth even until now, both we and also our fathers,
that you may dwell in the land of Goshen. For every shepherd
is an abomination unto the Egyptians. They despise shepherds. They
were like the dust on your feet. And Joseph said, you tell him
when he asks. We'll see this here in a minute.
You're shepherds, and shepherds are an abomination. But Christ,
now listen, just as Joseph here, just as Joseph was not ashamed
to call them his brethren, these shepherds are my brethren, Christ
is not ashamed to call sinners like you and me, his brothers,
his brothers and his sisters. And Joseph didn't try to hide
what his brethren were. He didn't try to gloss over it
and try to just dance around it. He said, when Pharaoh asks
you your occupation, you tell him you're a shepherd. Don't
you take the edge off of it. Don't change it. You tell him
exactly what you are. Tell him exactly what you are,
shepherd. We confess before our Father we are what? Sinners. We're sinners, sinful, ungodly. Christ died for sinners. Christ
died for the ungodly. Our Lord never tells us to hide
what we are. And He never hides what we are. Every time you hear the name
Rahab, how is it put together? Rahab the harlot. That's how
she's known. Matthew the publican. John the
sinner, saved by grace, but a sinner. That's all we are. We are his
saints, chosen ones, sanctified, but we are sinners. We never
get above being a sinner. And then Joseph here presents
his brethren. He took some of his brethren.
He took five. He took five men there in verse
two and presented them unto Pharaoh. The five represent the whole
family. Joseph presents them to Pharaoh. They didn't present
themselves. This is a beautiful picture.
They didn't present themselves to Pharaoh. Joseph presented
them. He brought them before Pharaoh.
He said, these are my brethren. This is my family. I want Christ
to present me to the Father. When we go to the Father, how
do we go to the Father? In the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ. He is the one who presents. He
presents our prayers. He presents our person. He is
the one who presents us. I want him to present me. And
they were accepted by Pharaoh for Joseph's sake. That is the only reason they
were accepted because they were shepherds and they were an abomination
unto the Egyptians. But here they are accepted for
Joseph's sake. And you and I are accepted and
forgiven for Christ's sake. The scripture says, he hath made
us accepted in the beloved. We are accepted in Christ. take the Lord Jesus Christ out
of the picture and no one is accepted. Because apart from
Christ, we are an abomination to God. Only in Him can we be
presented and accepted. And then in verse 3, And Pharaoh
said unto his brethren, What is your occupation? And they
said unto Pharaoh, Thy servants are shepherds, both we and also
our Fathers are ancestry. This is interesting. Pharaoh
asked them their occupation and they confessed. They are shepherds. An abomination to the Egyptians,
but we are shepherds. We're sinners. We're sinners.
You know, God will make everyone whom He saves, He'll make everyone
whom He saves to confess what they are. Sinners. No more, no
less. But sinners, that's what we are.
And notice here, that they confessed not only that they were shepherds,
and that was their occupation, but their fathers were shepherds.
You see that? Our fathers are shepherds. We
are not only sinners, now listen, our whole family is sinners.
Our whole family is. Our origin is sin. David said,
I was born in sin and shepherded in iniquity. In sin did my mother
conceive me. They said, we are shepherds and
our fathers, our ancestry, have been nothing but shepherds. And
that's abomination to those Egyptians. We know what we are. We know
what our ancestry is. I don't have to get a family
tree and look and see what's in it to know where I came from
and what I am. I'm a sinner. I'm a sinful human
being. I got it from my mom and dad
and they got it from theirs all the way back to Adam. And they said moreover unto Pharaoh,
verse four, For to sojourn in the land are
we come. For thy servants have no pasture
for their flocks. For the famine is sore in the
land of Canaan. Now therefore we pray thee, let thy servants
dwell in the land of Goshen. Listen, we are sinners. Our family
is nothing but sinners. And we are beggars, we're beggars. They said, we've come from the
land of Canaan and there's no pasture, there's no food there.
We're at your mercy. We are at your mercy. We come to the Father in the
name of the Lord Jesus Christ and we pray for mercy. mercy. I believe I have an article
in the bulletin by Todd Nyberg. He said, this is one prayer God
always answers. Have mercy on me. Mercy beggars. There was a man at 13th Street
years ago, Cecil Roach. He would use that term all the
time. Mercy beggars. We're nothing
but mercy beggars. That's all we are. We beg for
mercy. We beg for forgiveness. We pray that he would forgive
us for Christ's sake and accept us in Christ and have mercy on
us. And we realize that his mercy
is sovereign. When they stand there before
Pharaoh, they didn't come into town and say, you know, we'd
like to live over in Goshen. You know, Joseph is our brother,
so you just know. They came in as beggars. And
they realized they were standing before, at that time, the most
powerful king on earth. And they know that this king,
he can say, no, no. They realize that. And we realize
when we go before God Almighty that He is sovereign. God is
sovereign. He's sovereign in mercy. He's
sovereign in grace. He's sovereign. But I tell you
this, the sovereign delights to show mercy more than you and
I will ever delight to have it. He delights to show mercy. They
come as shepherds, like we come as sinners. They come as mercy
beggars, just as we come as mercy beggars. And notice now who Pharaoh
speaks to in verse five. And Pharaoh spake unto Joseph.
You see, Joseph is the mediator here. He speaks to Joseph and
Joseph relates to his brethren. He speaks to Joseph and saying,
thy father and thy brethren are come unto thee, are come unto
thee. Christ said, come unto me, all
you that labor and heavy laden, I'll give you rest. We come to
Christ. He's our salvation. He is our
rest. We come to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Pharaoh said, thy father, thy brethren, they've come to thee.
They've come to you, Joseph. We come to Christ. For everything
we need, we come to the Lord Jesus Christ. Then Joseph, or
it is through Joseph, Pharaoh gives the best land to his brethren. He gives them the best land,
but he gives it to them through Joseph. The land of Egypt is
before thee. In the best of the land, make
thy father and brethren to dwell. You see how this is going on
between Joseph and Pharaoh, which is what goes on between the father
and the son concerning us, his people. In the best of the land, make
thy father and brethren to dwell. In the land of Goshen, let them
dwell. And if thou knowest any man of
activity among them, then make them rulers over my cattle. But
in the land of Goshen, let them dwell." Why is so much made out
of the land of Goshen? Because the land of Goshen is
a type of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's why so much is made out
of the land of Goshen. It was the best land to dwell
in. It was the best land to abide in, in Egypt. In all of Egypt,
the best land was Goshen. Jesus Christ is the best abiding
place in heaven and earth. There is no better abiding place
than in Jesus Christ. None. None. No better place to
abide in. Christ said, He that abideth
in me. We dwell in Him. We dwell in
a person. In the Lord Jesus Christ. And
He dwells in us. It was given to them as a gift.
They didn't purchase one inch of it. It was given to them as
a gift. Listen, Romans 6.23, For the wages of sin is death,
but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our
Lord. Eternal life is a person and
it's through a person. Now listen to Romans 5.17, For
if by one man's offense death Reign by one, much more they
which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness
shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ." Romans 5.15. But not as the offense, so also
the free gift. For if through the offense of
one many be dead, much more the grace of God and the gift by
grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abound to many. Did you notice something there?
Did you notice how the gift of God is directly connected to
Jesus Christ? Every time the gift of God is
spoken of, it's spoken of through the Lord Jesus Christ. Not apart,
but through Him. And then here's another thing
about the land of Goshen in reference to the Lord Jesus Christ. All
the elect dwelt in Goshen. Every one of them dwelt in Goshen.
They all did. All of God's elect dwell in the
Lord Jesus Christ right now. Even the ones that have not even
been born yet, they're in Christ. God put them in Christ before
the foundation of the world. And then here's something else
about the land of Goshen that is a good picture of the Lord
Jesus Christ. None of the plagues fell on the
elect of God in Goshen. None of them. Listen to Exodus chapter eight,
verse 22. And I will sever in that day
the land of Goshen, in which my people dwell, that no swarms
of flies shall be there, to the end that thou mayest know that
I am the Lord in the midst of the earth." None of the plagues touched God's
elect in Goshen. God's wrath will not touch you
in Christ. It will not touch you in Christ.
And you'll notice something else here. The word in... in Exodus
22 here where he said he would sever. The word sever, he said,
and I will sever in that day. The word sever means the same
as the word in Exodus 11, seven, where he says, he said, let me
read it to you. But against any of the children
of Israel shall not a dog move his tongue against any man or
beast that you may know how that the Lord, and here's what it
means, doth put a difference. He's put a difference between
you and the Egyptians. That's why you are in Goshen.
That's why you are in the Lord Jesus Christ. God has put a difference
between you and those who believe not. And the difference is Christ.
The difference is the Lord Jesus Christ. He says in Exodus 9.26,
Only in the land of Goshen where the children of Israel were,
he said, there will be no hell. Hell that fell down from heaven,
none of it fell on the land of Goshen. Not on God's elect. The
wrath of God fell on the Egyptians. It never fell on God's elect
in the land of Goshen. And then in the land of Goshen
is where the Passover was first killed. That's where the Passover
was killed, in the land of Goshen. Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed
for us. He's our Passover. He's our land
of Goshen. The Lord is. And then when darkness
filled Egypt, there was light in the land of Goshen. Look over
in Exodus 10. In Exodus 10, let's look at verse 21. I'll read 21 through 23. And
the Lord said unto Moses, Stretch out thine hand toward heaven,
that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, even darkness
which may be felt. And Moses stretched forth his
hand toward heaven, and there was a thick darkness in all the
land of Egypt three days. They saw not one another, neither
rose any from his place for three days. But all the children of
Israel had light, in their dwellings, in the land of Goshen. They had
light. They had light. Our Lord said
in John 8, 12, Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am
the light of the world. He that follows after me shall
not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. You have
life, you have light, while the world out there is walking in
darkness. I mean, darkness that may be
felt. I can't imagine that kind of thick darkness. He said that
it's so dark that it's just like you couldn't feel it. Our Lord said in John 9, 5, as
long as I'm in the world, I am the light of the world. I'm the
light. I'm the light. In Christ, we have light. We
have understand, we've been illuminated. While the world walks in darkness,
you don't. You don't. You walk in the light.
And then in Goshen, the children of Israel, they were placed there.
They were set. They were set there. They possessed
the land of Goshen and they were nourished in the land of Goshen.
That's where they were nourished and taken care of. In verse 11 and 12, and Joseph,
and I'll close with these. And Joseph placed his father
and his brethren and gave them a possession in the land of Egypt.
in the best of the land, in the land of Ramses, as Pharaoh had
commanded. And Joseph nourished his father
and his brethren and all his father's household with bread
according to their families." He nourished them. You know that's
what's happening this morning. The Lord's nourishing you. He's
feeding you. Are you hungry? It says in the verses there that
He placed them. He placed them. You know that
word placed means sit down or married. He married them. He placed them. He married. He
made them to sit down. He married them in Goshen. And that's how we came to be
in Christ. God put us in Christ. Of Him are you in Christ Jesus. And God is married to us in Christ. He has set us down in Christ.
In Him we are seated in the heavenlies. And then the word of possession,
it actually became theirs. The Scripture says, All things
are yours in Christ, and Christ is God's. All things are yours. We are joint heirs with Christ.
His righteousness is ours. His righteousness, the righteous
doing of the Lord Jesus Christ is ours. His atonement, the blood
that He shed for the atonement of our sins is ours. It's our
atonement. It's ours. Eternal life is ours. He that hath the Son hath life.
And then it says He nourished, that is taken care of, and it
has this meaning, kept in. He nourished, that is, He kept
in. We are what? Kept by the power of God through
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. We are kept in the best place,
in Christ. In Christ. He has nourished us,
He's kept us. It says in Jude 1.24, Now unto
Him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present
you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy,
but now unto Him that is able to keep you from falling, We
are kept by the power of God through faith. He keeps us. And then it says they're nourished
with bread. They were fed with bread. We are fed with the best
bread. That's why I said, are you hungry?
Feast on the bread of life. Feast on the bread of life. It's
here this morning. We have His word. It's in your lap. Feast on the bread of life. Boy,
I tell you, I do. I would to God I'd have more
of an appetite for Christ like I do food for my body. I haven't eaten breakfast this
morning. I just didn't eat breakfast this morning. But I can tell
you right now, when 12 o'clock comes around, I gotta get something
to eat. Because I can already feel it coming on. I would to
God I would be hungry like that for Christ and for righteousness. Because he said, he that hungers
and thirst after righteousness shall be filled." He said, I'll
fill you, I'll feed you with it. And there's no way of hungering
after righteousness in a proper manner without hungering after
the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the righteousness of God, who
is our righteousness. Oh, the Lord would give us an
appetite for Christ. And then he says here, he fed,
he placed them, they had a possession, they were nourished, and they
were nourished with bread according to their families, which means,
according here to their families, it means, I think it's the word
cordy, it means tripping ones. Tripping ones. I thought that
was, it meant a lot to me when I read it, tripping ones. It
means he takes care of those who stumble and fall. The tripping
ones. How many times do we stumble
and fall during the day? How many times do we get an attitude?
That's a tripping. Attitude over nothing. There's nothing in this world
harder to get over than an attitude. I've learned one thing, attitude
is everything. If your attitude toward something
changes, like where you work, if your attitude toward it changes,
I mean, it's like the whole picture changes. It's like somebody just
turned the page around and you've got a whole new view of it. Attitude's
everything. According to their families,
according to the tripping ones, or according as a little child
is nourished. The way you would nourish a little
child. It also has that meaning. The way you would nourish a little
child. Watch a mother nourish a child.
It's so tender. It's so gentle. She doesn't throw
food at it. She doesn't throw the food at
it. And I need to learn that in preaching. You don't preach
throwing it at people. That's why Paul said, preach
the truth in love. Serve it the way you want to
be served. As a little child is nourished
or according to the little ones. In closing, to wrap this up briefly,
we are accepted in the Beloved, we are accepted in Him, we are
presented by Him to the Father, we dwell in the best place, the
Lord Jesus Christ, and we are nourished, we are kept in Him
by the grace of God. That's a good picture of the
Lord Jesus Christ there. Presented, blessed and nourished
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Does not get any better than
that. All right.