Genesis chapter 37 Genesis 37 Just a reminder we have a get-together
this evening for the Our only graduate, high school graduate,
Jared's gonna have a get-together there at our house from 2 p.m. till 5 p.m. That'll give us a
little time to get home and get the place set up. It was raining
pretty good when I got up this morning, so that pushed us off
a little bit, but you're all welcome. Here in Genesis 37,
the title of my message is Our Willing Brother. Our Willing
Brother. It says in verse 12, Genesis
37, 12, and his brethren, Joseph's brethren, went to feed their
father's flock in Shechem. Do you remember where Shechem
was? That's where Dinah, their sister,
was defiled, wasn't it? And the Lord said, you're going
to dwell in tents, you're going to dwell in houses. So he said, well, I'll build
booths. Semi-hardened structures with
three sides. And then with all the pain that
went on there, where's the flock at in Shechem? We have a hard
time learning, don't we? I do. They did too. But his brother went to feed
their father's flock in Shechem, in Israel. said unto Joseph,
do not thy brethren feed the flock in Shechem? Aren't they
down there in that wicked land? Is that where they are? Come,
and I will send thee unto them. And Joseph, he said to him, his
father, here am I, here am I. Am I is in italics, right? He
says here. You know what that means? The
Hebrew word means low, behold. That's what the psalmist wrote
in Psalm 40, wasn't it? And said, I, lo, I come in the volume of
the book it's written of me. I delight to do thy will, O God. Joseph there, he delighted to
serve his father, to go after his brethren down the land of
Shechem. He says, hear my. Nobody else
go, I'll go, send me. I'll do it. Joseph's such a beautiful
type of the Lord Jesus Christ in this. He's a picture of him,
a picture of him. And those sons of Jacob, those
other 11, just a glimpse we get of what we are, of what all mankind
is. Everybody born of Adam. Joseph,
he delighted to serve his father and he was so willing to go to
them where his brethren were, those very ones that hated him.
And he said, I'll go, I'll go. And then us, natural man, because
of pride, we're just like those other sons of Jacob. Because
of pride, we have a very high view of self and a very low view
of God. We come from the womb. We don't
believe God. We think we're superior. Well,
this is how we've always done it. Or I think, right, this is
how it ought to be done. And in doing so, we're hating
him. Because of our pride, because of our high view of self, we
hate God. We hate our elder brother that came here for us. Our nature,
our instinct from Adam to me, we cannot stand, our natural
man cannot stand that Christ has preeminence in all things.
He comes first. He's the loved one. He's the
favorite son. We hate that by nature. We hate
that. Look at verse four. And when his brethren saw that
their father loved him more than all his brethren, he was the
favorite, they hated him. They hated him and could not
speak peaceably unto him. They didn't even have a kind
word to say. Well, I was taught from a young
age, if you ain't got nothing good to say, don't say nothing
at all. You ain't got something that ain't correcting and mean
and hard and vulgar or whatever, just keep your mouth shut. Those
other 11, they was raised right, wasn't they? I can't say nothing
nice, I'm gonna hold my peace. I'm not gonna say anything at
all. They couldn't speak peaceably. They had nothing nice to say
at all. He knew this. If I had 11 brothers
and none of them had spoke to me in a while, a year or two,
I'd kind of get the hint, wouldn't I? This hatred that they had,
because they're so mad at him because the father loved him
more, it grew. It grew, look at the end of verse
eight, Genesis 37, eight. It says, and they hated him yet
the more for his dreams and for his words. They hated him for
that. And that jealousy went beyond
that, or the hatred went beyond jealousy. It was envy. Jealousy
is like, I want what you got. And envy says, I want what you
got so bad, I don't even want you to have it. That ain't fair.
It's a shameful thing, isn't it? Look at verse 11, Genesis
37, 11. And his brethren envied him,
envied him. What did that grow into? They
fed it, didn't they? They said, boys, let's get together
and get dad out here. Dad, won't you pray to God for
us that he'd soften our hearts and make us put down these things
and have no contention and extinguish our pride and make us live peaceably
one to another. We're all sinners. You told us
so, and God's word says so, and we believe it. Why didn't they
do that? No, they just let it go, didn't they? They stewed
on it, and it grew. What did it grow into? Look at
verse 18. And when they saw him afar off, Joseph was coming,
even before he came near unto them. They conspired against
him to slay him. And they said one to another,
behold, this dreamer cometh. This one thinks he's got all
the prophecies. He's gonna say stuff before it happens. Who's
he think he is? Come now therefore, verse 20, let us slay him and
cast him into some pit. And we will say some evil beast
hath devoured him and we shall see what will come of his dreams
then. We'll see if you're the one that's exalted up. We'll
kill him. We'll throw him in a pit and
say some tiger come by and got him. And that isn't, it is not
some sibling just being mad at another sibling. I don't know,
I'm sure if y'all have siblings, you've never done this. But when
I was growing up, my sister's a little older than me, and I'd
get her by herself, I'd say, I'll kill you. Don't you dare take that
last piece of chicken, that's mine. I'll cut your head off.
Later, we hugged and got over it, didn't we? That's not what
it's talking about. When they said, I'll kill, we're gonna
kill him, that's a murderous hatred. It's a murderous hatred. For these very ones, these ones
that hated that he was preeminent, these ones that hated that he
was going to be sovereign over them, that they were going to
have to bow down to him, and he's going to reign over them, the ones that
wanted to kill him, that's the very ones, in verse 13, Joseph
says, behold, here am I. Lo, I'll go. I'll go down there
to seek him for him. And these sons of Jacob, we see
what all of mankind is by nature before God comes to them. That's
what we are. We hate God. We're at war with
him. And in Joseph, we see Christ,
our willing brother, the firstborn, who came to serve us, was the
scripture say, while we were yet in our sins, while we hated
him. Lord willing, Wednesday night,
we'll see that this sin's not just something bad that's done.
We've all committed a lot of sins. I've committed sins today. But the sin, singular, that feminine
noun, it's hating the triune God by hating the Lord Jesus
Christ, the one that's in flesh. Not believing him, not trusting
him. As I said, the Spirit's gonna
come, the Holy Ghost's gonna come convict men of sin. Why? Because
they believe not on me. If we were to get up and have,
uh, that was popular in Appalachia back in the eight seventies and
eighties, get up and have confessions. Everybody take turns. We tell
all the bad things we did that week. I never recommend doing
that. Keep that to yourself. But if somebody was set up and
say, I'm going to tell you the worst thing I've ever done in my whole life.
I've been through some stuff, Mike. Uh, I've been to war. I know what I am. I know what
mankind is because I'm worse than the rest of them. And I
said, I'm going to tell you the worst thing I've ever did in my whole
life. God said it here and I didn't believe him. I thought I was
right. You said, well, that ain't that
bad. That ain't that bad. That's it. That's, that is sin. That's the basis, that pride
of self, that's the root of everything else. Not believing him, not trusting,
not bowing to him, not preferring him, not, not wanting him to
be first. All because we believe ourselves,
we trust ourselves, we worship ourself, and we greatly prefer
anything about us over that God-man. That's why there's contention.
That's why there's hatred. Solomon said, only by pride cometh
contention. If there's conflict and there's
hatred, the only reason is pride. Turn over to Romans chapter eight. Henry preached out of, what we're
looking at Wednesday, Lord Will and Aaron John 15, Henry preached,
that's called the missing note in preaching. We're sin, you
hear that much? Ain't no billboards on that,
you're gonna die. It's always health and wealth, isn't it?
Romans 8. If you ask a random person at
the store, you go down to the grocery store, and you say, hey,
let me ask you something, do you hate God? Most of them, nowadays, who knows? Well, of course I don't hate
God. Of course I don't. And in their minds, you know
they're telling the truth. In their minds, they are. That
little G-God that they think of, he's fine. He just wants to do some stuff,
and you just do what you want, and he's just a parachute whenever
you need him. He's telling about the Holy God
that's on his throne that does right. And it ain't what I think
is right, what he says is right, what he does is right. You tell
them about him, and all of a sudden they don't want to shop in that
aisle with you no more. I thought you didn't hate God. I hate that
God. A good man told me that one time. He said, I hate your
God. I said, well, at least you're telling the truth. Remember Jacob and
Leah? People say they don't hate God.
Jacob says that he went into Rachel and he loved Rachel more
than Leah. He loved Rachel more than Leah.
The next verse in Genesis 29 says, the Lord saw that Leah
was hated. Well, he just loved her a little bit less. It don't
matter what I think, it matters what God says. And he said they
hated her. He hated her. That's what Jacob said here.
Fleshly, Jacob loved Joseph more than others. We're told plainly
in the scriptures, don't have preference of people. Fleshly,
he did that, didn't he? That means he hated him 11. There's conditional love, did
you know that? There's no such thing as unconditional love.
People say, well, I love them unconditionally. You're lying
through your teeth. I'm lying through my teeth. The
Lord doesn't have unconditional love. God the Father's love is
conditional on his son, who's perfect and holy and right and
just. And us being in him is how he loves his people. Well,
we'll just sweep that underneath the rug. That's not a holy and
just God. It's conditional on Christ and us being one with
him. He said, this is my son in whom I'm well pleased. If
he's gonna be pleased, it's gonna be in him, isn't it? You got
Romans 8, look here in verse 6. Romans 8, verse 6. Paul writes, for to be carnally
minded is death. But we have a carnal mind. This
carnal, this flesh, you see, I have a mind, I got a brain,
I think things, I discern things, don't I? But what seems right
to this flesh is the wrong way. What seemed right to me, that's
the way of death. To be carnally minded is death.
Solomon, that wisest man of all, we read in 1 Kings, he said,
there is a way which seemeth right unto a man. Well, that's
what everybody else says. Sure, there's strength in numbers,
right? The crowd has to be right. There's a way that seems right
unto a man, but the end thereof is the ways of death. To be carnally
minded is death. But to be spiritually minded
is life and peace. To be spiritually minded is life
and peace. A spiritual mind is the new mind from that new creation,
that new birth, and it wasn't there before. And the Lord shows
up and reveals himself to us, doesn't he? And it's the mind
of Christ. That's to be spiritually minded.
Not hatred, not pride, but humbleness and gratitude. Humbleness and
gratitude. There's writers of old have said
a lot of different things, but I can't remember which one it
was now. Huntington, I think. He said,
if the Lord saves a man, even his dogs will be the better for
it. Even his animals will be. You gonna tell. Paul wrote to the church at Philippi,
he said, let this mind be in you, that spiritual mind, let
this mind be in you, which is also in cross Jesus, who being
in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with
God, because he was, he's God in human flesh, but he made himself
of no reputation. And he took upon him the form
of a servant, was made in likeness of men, and being found fashion
of man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even
the death of the cross. Wherefore God hath highly exalted
him, and given him a name which is above every name, that at
the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven,
things in earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue
should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God
the Father. Life and peace. If we have that, we'll have spiritual
life and spiritual peace. There's this mind in us. It says,
verse six, for to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually
minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity,
it's hate, it's hostility, it's warring against God. For it's not subject to the law
of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are of the
flesh cannot please God. For everybody in this room, for
everybody in this county, for everybody on this earth, that's
at least half of us. of this person. That's at least,
we all have an old nature. That's what we come out of Adam
with. The Lord has to give that new life, doesn't he? He has
to give it. He had to come down from his father to us wicked
people that hated him to live for us and die for us and then
now send his comforter to us and preach these things in our
heart and give us life. Carnal mind is enmity against
God, for it's not subject to the law of God, neither indeed
can be, so then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. What did our text say? Look here
in Genesis 37. Look back to verse four. When his brethren saw that their
father loved him more than all his brethren, they hated him
and could not speak peaceably unto him. It was impossible,
wasn't it? Impossible. Why? These brothers hated Joseph because
he was the father's favorite. Christ is the father's favorite.
Mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth. He's the favorite. The sons of
Jacob, they hated Joseph because of his sovereignty. He was going
to rule over them. Look in verse 5. And Joseph dreamed
a dream, and he told it to his brethren, and they hated him
yet the more. And he said to them, Here, I pray you, this
dream which I've dreamed, For behold, we were binding sheaves
in the field, and lo, my sheaf arose, and also stood upright. And behold, your sheaves stood
round about it, and made obeisance to my sheaf, bowed to it. And
his brethren said unto him, Shalt thou indeed reign over us? Shalt
thou indeed have dominion over us? You gonna prophesy these
things, tell us this is gonna happen, and that's what's gonna
happen? And they hated him yet the more for his dreams and for
his words. Because he was gonna reign over his brothers, They
were going to bow down to him. They got so mad they wanted to
kill him. Do you remember? Because he's going to be king
of them in essence, right? Do you remember why Christ was crucified
on that cross at Calvary? What was written over top of
his head? It was in Greek and it was in Latin and it was in
Hebrew. That means whatever language it is, we're going to let you
know this is the king of the Jews. This is going to be the
one that arose. He's upright. He's the head sheaf.
and y'all gonna bow to him. And out of mocking, they told
the truth. Out of ignorance, they told the truth. That's why
they was mad at him, wasn't it? Just like Joseph's brothers,
our sin-filled instinct, we will not have this man reigning over
us, I know better. We reject his power, we reject
his position, we reject his preference. Naturally, don't we? That's who
he came to, and Shechem in this world right here. He said, I'll
go. If you know what you are, don't
that break your heart? How loving and kind the Lord
for making us know that. Not everyone knows it, but some
do, don't they? It said in John 15, they both
seen and hated me and my father. The world's seen it, but this
cometh to pass that the word might be fulfilled that's written
in their law. They hated me without a cause, but when the Comforter
has come, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit
of truth, which proceeds from the Father, he shall testify
of me. You can be mad about it all you want right now, but if
God's gonna save you, you're gonna be thankful here a little
while when he does it. And John 16, and when he has
come, he will prove the world of sin and righteousness and
the judgment of sin because they believe not on me. That's what
Christ said, and I didn't believe it. Thank you, Lord, for showing
me that. Thank you for seeing his kindness. We're the sons
of Joseph. He loved the son. or we're the sons of Jacob. He
loved the son and the one willing to serve the father and those
that hated him. He's pure, he's righteous, and he loved us when
we had no love for him. We're the wicked ones. There's
no cause in us for him to love us. He's the good shepherd. He
said, I giveth my life to the sheep, willingly. This wasn't
what the rules were. He had to grit his teeth and
just tough it out. That's what has to happen. He wanted to.
That's a love I can't enter into. Those hirelings, they'll flee
because the hirelings, they don't care for the sheep, but that
good shepherd, he goes, I know my sheep, I know of mine, and
I'm gonna give my life for them. I'm gonna lay down my life. Look
here at Genesis 37, verse 13. And Israel said unto Joseph,
do not thy brethren feed the flock and sheikim? Come, I will
send thee unto them. And he said, hear my. And he
said to him, go, I pray thee, and see whether it be well with
thy brethren, and well with the flocks, and bring me word again.
You report back to me. So he sent him out of the valley
of Hebron, and he came to Shechem. The father sent the son from
the vale of Hebron. That means that's the place of
sweet communion. the veil of Hebron, the sweet
communion, to Shechem, to Stiffnecked, to where Dina was deviled. That's
where he sent him. And that's our king, isn't it?
Who you and I believe in. Didn't he come from his place
on high, and though he was rich, yet for our sakes he became poor,
that through his poverty we might be rich. When Christ came to
this earth to bear all that he did, to live a life for his brethren,
given to him by the Father. He did it willingly. Willingly. For love's sake. For love to
his Holy Father and for love that he had towards those who
were actively at war with him. Hebrews 12 says, for seeing also
we are encompassed about so great a cloud of witnesses, let us
lay aside every weight. What are we having for lunch? A holy God came and was made
flesh for me. I don't care what I'm having
for lunch. Lay aside those weights. What about the pain? What's coming
up next week? Who cares? This is important. The sin which does so easily
beset us, let us run with patience the race that's set before us.
Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who
for the joy that was set before him, joy, he endured the cross. He despised the shame. and he
sat down at the right hand of his father. Isn't that amazing?
Isn't that something for us? Is that good news? Let's bottle
that up and hide it. Should we dig a deep hole and
get down in a cave somewhere and just not tell nobody about
it and just be selfish? Of course not. He ain't gonna
run out of that goodness. He has mercies for thousands,
isn't he? How many is that? I don't know. Tell them. His
riches are immense. He ain't gonna run out. Tell
everybody. There in verse 15. And a certain man found him, and
behold, he was wandering in the field. And the man asked him,
said, what seekest thou? And he said, I seek my brethren.
He came to seek and to save that which was lost, wasn't it? Tell
me, I pray thee, where they feed their flocks. And the man said,
there departed hence. For I heard them say, let us
go down to Dothan. And Joseph went after his brethren
and found them in Dothan. And when they saw him afar off,
even before he came near unto them, they conspired against
him to slay him. And they said one to another,
behold, this dreamer cometh. Come now, therefore, let us slay
him and cast him into some pit. And we will say, some evil beast
hath devoured him. And we shall see what will come
of his dreams. And Reuben heard it, and he delivered him out
of their hands, and said, let us not kill him. Reuben said
unto them, shed no blood, but cast him into this pit, which
is in the wilderness, and lay no hand upon him, that he might
rid him out of their hands, to deliver him to his father again.
And it came to pass, when Joseph was coming to his brethren, that
they stripped Joseph. They stripped him out of his
coat. His coat of many colors that
was on him. Our Lord was stripped of his
garments, wasn't he? Taken down to that soldier's house and they
put their own garments on him and mocked him and put a crown
of thorns on his head and spit on him and scourged him. All that that means. He was made
sin. Everything that entails. That
took place, didn't it? In verse 24. And they took him
and they cast him into a pit, and the pit was empty. There
was no water in it. Where's that pit? Where'd that
take place? That's across the Calvary, isn't it? There was
no water there. What did he cry? Right before
he cried, it's finished. Out of that pit of despair, his
father forsaken him. Willing him willingly lay down
his life. That's where it was where the rubber is meeting the
road. Wouldn't it? What'd he say on that cross? I thirst I thirst
verse 25 and they sat down to eat bread Well, you should have a clear
conscience maybe we shouldn't But get him down off that cross
we're gonna we got a Sabbath to observe what are you doing
we gotta keep God happy Religions sent more men to hell
and women to hell than a bottle ever did and a needle ever ever
could They sit down to eat bread and they lifted up their eyes
and looked and behold a company of Ishmaelites came from Gilead
And there are camels bearing spicery and balm and myrrh, going
to carry it down to Egypt. And Judah said unto his brethren,
What profit is it if we slay our brother and conceal his blood?
We're going to be happy. He'll be out of the way, but
maybe we can make some profit. He said, Come, let us sell him
to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he
is our brother in our flesh. And his brethren were content.
Now morals show up when money does, don't it? When it's beneficial. And there passed by the Midianites,
the merchantmen, and they drew and lifted up Joseph out of the
pit and sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites for 20 pieces of silver. And
they brought Joseph to Egypt. Our Lord Jesus was sold for silver,
wasn't he? Just like Joseph. Verse 29, and
Reuben returned to the pit and behold, Joseph was not in the
pit and he rent his clothes. And he returned to his brethren
and said, the child is not. And I, withershaw, I go, what
am I going to do now? I told y'all not to kill him,
to just put him in there. Maybe we could sell him. And then he got
in there and he got sold. What am I going to do now? Remember
when Judas betrayed him? And he saw that he was condemned
and he saw what he did and he repented himself. And he brought
those 30 pieces of silver back to the chief priest and the elders.
And he said, I have sinned that I betrayed innocent blood. He
went and killed himself, didn't he? Went and hung himself. Verse
31, and they took Joseph's coat and killed a kid of the goats
and dipped the coat in blood. And they sent the coat of many
colors and they brought it to their father and said, this have
we found. Know now whether it be thy son's
coat or no. We found this coat. Is this your
favorite beloved son's coat or isn't it? What a horrible children,
isn't it? to a sibling and a child to do
this, to take it to their father, doing their father this way,
bringing their disguised sin to them. Lock begets lock. What did Jacob
do? He went to his father with a
false coat for a blessing. These are just hide their own
sin. Verse 33, and he knew it and said, this is my son's coat
and evil beast has devoured him. Joseph is without doubt rent
in pieces and Jacob rent his clothes and he put sackcloth
upon his loins and mourn for his son many days. That pain's
real, isn't it? And you just hit the ground. People go through trials. I don't
want to be stoic. I want to be cold. I weep with
you. I know what that's like. But
it's right. It's good, isn't it? Verse 35, and all his sons and
daughters rose up to comfort him. That's low. They brought
this lie to him, making him think his son's dead, because it's
their doing. And it's all, let me hug you. Oh, sweetie pie. Oh, honey. Daddy, we just, it's
OK. But he refused to be comforted.
And he said, for I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning.
Thus his father wept for him. And the Midianites, they sold
him to Egypt and to Potiphar. an officer of Pharaoh's, a captain
of the guard. In doing that, little did they know that was
going to be their very salvation. That was the very thing that's
going to keep them from starving to death. When that famine came,
when the judgment of God came, and they're going to starve to
death. There's corn in Egypt. That fellow
looks kind of familiar to me. By their wicked hands, by their
foolishness, that's the very means the Lord is going to use
to save that family. Physically, isn't it? Well, you
know what we ought to do? We ought to sin more. God forbid. We all know better than that,
don't we? Read Acts 2. It said, Him, the Lord Jesus,
being delivered by the determinate counsel and the foreknowledge
of God, because of His wisdom, His providence, and His love
for His people, He delivered Christ. You've taken by wicked
hands of crucified and slain him. We did it. What we've been
looking at Wednesdays, you slay the prophets, but if you were
there, you'd have slayed the prophets, but now you adorn their
graves. And oh man, we love them so much. He said, you'd have
killed them too. What's he teaching us in that? And so I wouldn't
have done that to the Lord. I heard an old Pentecostal man
preach when I was a little kid. And he said, if I was there,
I wouldn't have let Christ die on that cross. You'd have held
the hammer and swung it. Therefore, let all the house
of Israel know assuredly that God has made this same Jesus,
whom you crucify both Lord and Christ. That's what they're gonna
find out here in a couple more chapters. That sheaf was upright. It did arise. We're gonna bow
to him. Now, when they heard this, they
were pricked in their hearts and said unto Peter and to the
rest of the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do? And Peter said,
repent and be baptized. Bow to God, obey him, come to
him. As our Lord hung on that cross for us, leading up to that, the
beatings and the mocking, he cried out to the father. He said,
father, forgive them for they know not what they do. And there
was some there in attendance. That's who Peter ended up preaching
at Pentecost. Every one of those brothers are going to come to
Joseph. They're going to bow to him. They're going to have
their lives saved by him. And they're going to be very
happy about it. They're going to cry and hug necks. I pray
the Lord would do that to his people, would bring us through
famine and trial and whatever hit takes, kicking and screaming
if need be, to our elder brother who was willing to come and live
for us and die for us and make us bow down to him and follow
him. Amen. All right, Brother Mark.