All right, if you would now open
your Bibles with me to Genesis chapter 47. Genesis chapter 47. We'll begin reading in verse 13. We'll
read through the end of the chapter. And there was no bread in all
the land, for the famine was very sore. So the land of Egypt
and all the land of Canaan fainted by reason of the famine. And
Joseph gathered up all the money that was found in the land of
Egypt and in the land of Canaan for the corn which they bought.
And Joseph brought the money into Pharaoh's house. And when
money failed in the land of Egypt and in the land of Canaan, all
the Egyptians came unto Joseph and said, give us bread, for
why should we die in thy presence? For the money faileth. And Joseph
said, give your cattle, and I will give you for your cattle if money
fail. And they brought their cattle
unto Joseph, and Joseph gave them bread in exchange for horses
and for the flocks and for the cattle of the herds and for the
asses. And he fed them with bread for
all their cattle for that year. When that year was ended, they
came unto him the second year and said unto him, we will not
hide it from my Lord, how that our money is spent, my Lord also
hath our herds of cattle, and there is aught left in the sight
of my Lord, but our bodies and our lands. Wherefore shall we
die before thine eyes, both we and our land? Buy us and our
land for bread, and we and our land will be servants unto Pharaoh.
And give us seed that we may live and not die, that the land
be not desolate. And Joseph bought all the land
of Egypt for Pharaoh. For the Egyptians sold every
man his field, because the famine prevailed over them, so the land
became Pharaoh's. And as for the people, he removed
them to cities from one end of the borders of Egypt even to
the other end thereof. Only the land of the priests
bought he not, for the priests had a portion assigned them of
Pharaoh, and did eat their portion which Pharaoh gave them. Wherefore,
they sold not their lands. Then Joseph said unto the people,
Behold, I have bought you this day, and your land for Pharaoh. Lo, here is seed for you, and
ye shall sow the land. And it shall come to pass in
the increase that ye shall give the fifth part unto Pharaoh,
and four parts shall be your own, for the seed of the field,
and for your food, and for them of your households, and for food
for your little ones. And they said, Thou hast saved
our lives. Let us find grace in the sight of my Lord, and
we will be Pharaoh's servants. And Joseph made it a law over
the land of Egypt unto this day that pharaohs should have the
fifth part, except the land of the priests only, which became
not pharaohs. And Israel dwelt in the land
of Egypt and the country of Goshen. And they had possessions therein
and grew and multiplied exceedingly. And Jacob lived in the land of
Egypt 17 years. So the whole age of Jacob was
140 and seven years. And the time drew nigh that Israel
must die. And he called his son Joseph,
and said unto him, If now I have found grace in thy sight, put,
I pray thee, thy hand under my thigh, and deal kindly and truly
with me. Bury me not, I pray thee, in
Egypt. But I will lie with my fathers, and thou shalt carry
me out of Egypt, and bury me in their burying-place. And he
said, I will do as thou hast said. And he said, Swear unto
me. And he swore unto him. And Israel
bowed himself upon the bed's head. We'll end our reading there. Let's bow together. Our Father, we come into your
courts this evening with thanksgiving. How thankful we are to be able
to come before the God of heaven and earth and have our prayers
heard. To be able to come before you
accepted in the beloved. Father, we're so thankful. And
we've come, Father, carefully and reverently, knowing that
we come and bow before the King of all the earth. And Father,
we come beseeching thee, begging you, that you'd be pleased to
be merciful to us tonight, that you'd send your spirit upon us.
And that, Father, you would enable us to hear a word from thee,
that you would enable your people gathered here to not just hear
the voice of a man, but Father, that you'd speak to us through
your word, speak to the hearts of each one of us here this evening.
Give us faith to believe, to cling to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Father, let us behold with awe and wonder everything he has
so freely given to his people. What it cost him, it cost him
his life's blood to be the redeemer of his people, to be able to
purchase his people out of this world, but all what he gives
to his people freely, without any charge to us. Father, we're
so thankful and beg of you that you would enable us to worship
this evening. And while we pray for ourselves, Father, we pray
for your people wherever they might gather together tonight.
Father, bless them for your great namesake. Cause your word to
go forth in power to reveal your glory to comfort and edify the
hearts of your people. Father, for those who are in
times of great difficulty, sickness, heartache, Father, we pray for
them. We mentioned Novi earlier. Father, we pray you'd be with
her. Touch her body and heal her. Restore her to full strength. Be with her in a special way.
That whole family, we pray. And others that need you especially,
Father, you know where they're at. You know their needs. We
pray you'd comfort their hearts with your presence. All these
things we ask in that name, which is above every name, the name
of Christ our Savior. Amen. I've titled the message this
evening, The Son Glorified the Father. In our text that we just
read, Joseph, by his wise government of Egypt, he glorified and enriched
Pharaoh. Much more riches and glory than
Pharaoh ever could have got on his own. And Joseph did all that
as a picture of Christ, the son of God. The son of God came to
this earth incarnate as the servant of God. And everything he did,
he did to honor and glorify, magnify his father. The main
purpose in Christ's coming was not so that he could do something
nice for you and me. The main purpose in Christ's
coming was that he would glorify and magnify every attribute of
his father so that all creation could see, through what the Lord
Jesus Christ did, all creation could see how glorious God is. Now that's why Christ came. And
God's sinful people, they're the beneficiaries of that, aren't
they? See, before God could do something for the likes of you
and me, he first had to do something for himself. He had to satisfy
His holiness. He had to satisfy His righteousness.
He had to satisfy His justice. Before God could be gracious,
He had to first satisfy His justice. So when God did something for
Himself and got glory to His name, He did it by saving a helpless,
sinful people from their sin. God got glory to His name by
saving a people nobody else would have saved. He paid the debt
for a sinful people, a debt nobody else could have paid. That's
how God got glory to his name. And I wanna show you five pictures
of that in our text this evening. Number one, Christ, the servant
of God. He bought the whole world for his father. Way back before
this famine started, before there were seven years of plenty and
seven years of famine, remember Joseph was down there in prison.
They brought Joseph up out of the prison. He interpreted Pharaoh's
dream. And he told Pharaoh, now this
is what you ought to do. You ought to find somebody, you know,
wise and discreet, somebody you can trust and store up food in
the seven years of plenty. So you'll have something to eat
in the seven years of famine. And Pharaoh said, that's a good
idea. He looked at all his other counselors. He said, boys, he
said, I know who we ought to put in charge of this, Joseph.
Nobody's as wise as this man. Nobody's got the spirit of God
like this man. Nobody's wise enough, we can't
trust anybody else to save everybody from starving like we can this
man. We'll put this man in charge. And during those 14 years, not
only did Joseph keep the world from starving to death, Joseph
made Pharaoh more wealthy and more powerful than he ever had
been. Joseph got possession of all
the money that was in Egypt. You know, they didn't have paper
currency, you know, like we have, you just print some more. Their
currency was solid silver. He got all of the silver in a
land, all of it, all of it in the land of Egypt, and he put
it all in Pharaoh's storehouse, every last ounce of it. Then
Joseph got possession of all the livestock, all those animals,
farm animals, whatever kind of animals that they had, Joseph
took possession of every last one of them and gave the deed
to Pharaoh. Now Pharaoh owned every animal in the land of Egypt.
Then Joseph got possession of all the land in Egypt and he
gave the deed to Pharaoh. Pharaoh owned, not just, he didn't
just rule over it all, he owned it all, he had the deed to it.
Then Joseph got possession of all the people and gave them
to Pharaoh to be his servants and they'd give him 20% of everything
that they produced. See, everything Joseph did glorified
Pharaoh and rich Pharaoh didn't. And boy, he did a good job of
it. The only, the one and only thing Joseph did not buy in the
land of Egypt was the false religion of that land. Look in verse 22. Only the land of the priest bought
he not. For the priest had a portion assigned them of Pharaoh and
did eat their portion which Pharaoh gave them. Wherefore they sold
not their lands. That was the only land Joseph
didn't buy. But he didn't want it anyway. That's false religion. He didn't want that anyway. He
didn't want anything to do with that false religion. But all
the rest of it, he bought and gave to Pharaoh. Now here's the
picture. Before creation, the father put
all things into the hand of his son to govern and to rule over. Nobody else was wise enough.
Nobody else was strong enough. Nobody else was trustworthy enough
to do the job. Nobody else was righteous enough
to satisfy God's holiness. Nobody was wise enough. Nobody
was loving enough. Nobody was gracious enough to
do the job, to redeem sinners from their sin. So the father
gave that job to his son, the job of redeeming his elect from
their sin. He gave it to his son. Nobody
else was trustworthy enough. In the fullness of time, Christ
came. He came to do the job his father
gave him to do. He came to glorify his father
in every way possible. He enriched his father, if you
will, by showing creation all the glories of God's different
attributes. Now, everybody would have thought,
everybody who had some idea who God was, they would have said
God's wise, wouldn't they? They would have said God, of
course they would have said that. But Christ came and he glorified
the wisdom of God. I tell you, the place you see
God's wisdom most clearly is in the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Only in Christ do we see how
can God be both just and still justify the ungodly. And how
can a holy God ever justify the ungodly without violating his
holiness? Without violating, how is that possible? that can
only be done through the obedience and sacrifice of Christ. Now we all know God's wise, but
God's wisdom is magnified in the person of Christ, isn't it?
I would say most people that know anything about God would
agree God is gracious. Wouldn't you say most people
would agree with that? But I tell you where God's grace is magnified,
where it's glorified, it's in the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. If you want to see how gracious
God is, go to Calvary. The father slaughtered his son. He allowed the body of his son
to be so abused it didn't look like a man hanging there. And
he made his soul, his soul, an offering for sin before his father. The father did that to his son
so he could be gracious to the likes of you and me. Gary, that's
grace. No. Now you see the shine and
the glory of God's grace, don't you? By looking at Christ. God shows grace to sinners like
us because he gave his wrath to Christ our substitute. Now,
I mean, that's great. That makes it just all the more
glorious, doesn't it? Christ came and he also glorified
the holy justice of God. Now again, I would say everybody
that knows anything about God would say, yes, God's holy. Yes,
God's just. Of course he is. But I tell you
where you see God's holy justice glorified and magnified, it's
in the person of God's son, the Lord Jesus Christ. The father
is so inflexibly holy, so inflexibly just, You know, we say holy,
but we think, you know, there's some wriggle room there. No,
there's not. There's perfect holiness or there's unholiness.
That's all there is. There's either perfect justice
or there's no justice. God is so inflexibly holy. He's
so inflexibly just that he slaughtered even his only beloved son when
his son was made sin for his people. Every parent here would
like to think I'd be just. But now we find every way in
this world possible to cut our child some slack, wouldn't we?
Not God the Father. He slaughtered his son because
he's holy and just. And the place you really see
that is at the cross. The cross glorifies and magnifies
God's justice. Now here's some comfort for your
soul to show you how glorious Christ made God's holy justice.
The Father will never condemn His people. Never. Because He already condemned
Christ our substitute for our sin. Now that's glorious. That's glorious. I'll admit to you a little secret.
On Wednesday evenings, if I get here a little early, get everything
done that I need to get done, I sign on to Sermon Audio. And
I see who is live streaming now. And there's this fella. I thought,
well, this looks kind of interesting. So I watched his live stream. And boy, he about blew me out
of my chair at first. He talked about the Lord telling
those Pharisees, you believe not because you're not of my
sheep. And I thought, well, now it's impossible to mess that
up. And he didn't. He said, this is it. Now, those
people did not believe because they were not God's elect. Only
God's elect will believe. Oh, now we might be on something
here. We went on a little ways and talked about how, you know,
God's sheep, they can't lose their salvation. And I'm not being picky, but
this is this is what he said. This man may be a brother, he
might be preaching the gospel, but this is what he said. Can
one of God's sheep commit such a heinous sin that God would
take their salvation away from you? Now, the answer is no. And he said the answer is no.
But here's why he said that's not possible. Because you won't
do that. God's sheep won't do that. God
won't let them. No, sir. No, no, no, no. That's not right.
You're right. God's sheep can never lose their
salvation. You know why they can never lose their salvation?
All of our sin, all of our sin is heinous. I mean, we think,
oh, I just told a little white lie. That's heinous in God's
sight. God sent us down for that. Our heinous sin has already been
punished in the person of our substitute. That's why God's
sheep can't lose their salvation. Aren't you thankful God's just?
That justice is seen and glorified at Calvary. Look at Philippians
chapter two. Here Paul tells us, how that
everything the Savior did was so that creation would see the
glory of the Father. Philippians chapter two. Verse five. Let this mind be in you, which
was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought
it not robbery to be equal with God. but made himself of no reputation
and took upon him the form of a servant. He was made in the
likeness of men, and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled
himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the
cross. Wherefore, because he did that,
God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which
is above every name." Now, why did God do it all that way? Why
did God accomplish the redemption of his people that way? Verse
11 or verse 10 tells us that. Now here's why God did that.
At the name of Jesus, every knee should bow of things in heaven
and 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. See, the way God did all of that
through his son was all done for the glory of God the Father. The way we see the glory of the
father is by what he sent his son to accomplish. Look at John
chapter 17. Here the savior tells us he bought
the whole world so that he could redeem his elect out of it. John 17 verse one. These words speak Jesus and lifted
up his eyes to heaven. and said, father, the hour has
come. Glorify thy son, that thy son also may glorify thee. Now
this is the reason the son went to the cross. You see, he's gonna
glorify his father. He said, enable me to glorify
you. As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should
give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. Now the
father's greatest glory is seen by the Lord Jesus Christ suffering
and dying to redeem his people. He bought the right to the whole
world, to every son of Adam. The father gave him power over
all flesh so that he could reach down and redeem his people out
of it. Now that shows us the glory of God, doesn't it? What
he did for his people. So Christ bought it all for his
father. The father owns it all. He rules over it all. He owns
all the people in it. Well, here's my second point.
This sovereign of all slowly brings his people to himself. Now he redeemed them. He bought
them. They belong to him. It's his
purpose to redeem them, but he slowly brings those people to
himself. Now we know this. Almighty God
has a people he's going to save. His elect. Those people he chose
to save before he created anything. Before the Lord saves those people,
before He reveals Himself to them, before He brings them to
Christ and gives them life, the Lord's got to slowly strip away
everything that they trust in until they have nothing left
to trust in but Christ. You heard men say before about
being shut up to Christ. That's what that means. The Lord
stripped away everything, so the only place we have to go
is to Christ. Now that's pictured in our text. Egypt was a wealthy,
wealthy country. People there had plenty because
they lived in a land of plenty. This is the most advanced civilization
on earth at that time. And Joseph slowly stripped away
everything that the people had to depend on until they were
left with only him to depend upon. First, Joseph took all
their money. Look at verse 13. And there was
no bread in all the land. for the famine was very sore,
so that the land of Egypt and all the land of Canaan fainted
by reason of the famine. And Joseph gathered up all the
money that was found in the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan
for the corn which they brought. He traded them corn for the money,
and to steal it, he sold them the corn at a fair price. And
he got all the money in Egypt and Canaan and brought the money
into Pharaoh's house. And verse 15 says, and when the
money failed in the land of Egypt and in all the land of Canaan,
All the Egyptians came unto Joseph and said, give us bread, for
why should we die in thy presence? For the money failed. Now I absolutely
love this. When all the money was gone,
they didn't have any money and no more silver did they have
to take to Joseph to buy any more corn. And this is what they
said, Joseph, why should we die in your presence? Isn't that what a believer says
when we come to God begging for mercy? Lord, why should I die
in the presence of the Savior? Why should I die in the presence
of life himself? I don't have any goodness in
me. There's nothing good in me that would give me life, but
he does. Christ has all the mercy. He
has all the power. He has all the forgiveness. He
has the blood to pay the price. Why should I die? in his presence
since Christ can give me life. I'm coming begging for it. Why
should I die in your presence? Well, when all the money was
gone, Joseph, he didn't let him die in his presence, did he?
He said, well, I'll trade your corn for your livestock. And he got
all the livestock in the land of Egypt. Verse 16. And Joseph
said, give your cattle and I'll give you for your cattle if money
fail. And they brought their cattle into Joseph and Joseph
gave them bread in exchange for the horses, and for the flocks,
and the cattle of the herds, and for the asses. And he fed
them with bread for all their cattle for that year. Joseph
took possession of all the livestock, and he gave them bread to feed
them for that whole year long. Well, now the money's all gone.
Barrel's got all of it. Now the livestock's all gone.
Barrel's got all of it. But the famine's still going
strong. It's gonna be several years until this famine's over.
So next, Joseph takes their land, And then he takes all the people.
So they all belong to Pharaoh. Verse 18, when that year was
ended, they came unto him the second year and said unto him,
we'll not hide it from my Lord, how that our money is spent.
My Lord also hath our herds of cattle and there's all left in
the sight of my Lord, but our bodies and our lands. And here
they say it again, wherefore should we die before thine eyes? How can we die in your presence?
both we and our land. Buy us and our land for bread,
and we and our land will be servants unto Pharaoh. And give us seed
that we may live and not die, that the land be not desolate."
Well, now everything and everyone in all the land of Egypt belongs
to Pharaoh. It all belongs to him. Joseph
had bought it all for Pharaoh to glorify and enrich Pharaoh,
just like Christ did. for his father. But you notice
that took a process, didn't it? It didn't happen instantly. It
took a process. See, the people, at the beginning
of this famine, the people wouldn't have been willing to become Pharaoh's
servants. They'd say, no, I'm not going
to be his servant. We just had these seven years of planting.
Well, I've stored up all this corn. I got plenty of things
for myself, you know. I got stuff saved up, you know.
They wouldn't have been willing to be a slave depending on somebody
else at that time. They had plenty of food in the
cabinets, didn't they? They had plenty of corn in their own silos.
But Joseph slowly took all of that away. Until at the end,
they were begging to be Pharaoh's servants. Let us be your servants. That's a picture how the Lord
whittles down his people. You know, we come into this world
thinking we've got a lot of resources. We think we can be self-sufficient. We think, I've got enough good
works to get by. I've got enough righteousness.
It's enough. You know, my mama and my daddy
and my grandparents, they've been telling me I'm lovable since
the day I was born. I must be lovable enough that
God will overlook my sin and he'll accept me. He won't damn
me because of my sin, because I'm so cute. We think, now I
can do enough, that God will overlook my sin. Lord, I preached
in your name. Done many wonderful works in
your name. We fed the poor in your name. We've done all these
many wonderful works in your name. We think all of our religious
activities is good enough that God will be happy with us. Now
I know some people go to the grave trusting that. But you
belong to Christ, you won't. God's gonna slowly strip all
of that away. until we're naked before him.
See, God has to take away everything that the flesh trusts in. Now,
that's painful, isn't it? He's got to take away everything
that the flesh trusts. It's painful to find out I'm
not lovable. It's painful to find out how
wretched and vile I am of my sin. It's painful to find out
I can't, I'm not self-sufficient, not self-dependent. That's painful
to find out I'm dependent on somebody else to give me grace
I don't deserve. That's painful to this flesh.
But I tell you what, we're never gonna come before God like these
people came before Joseph. And so Lord, I'm not hiding anything
from you. I'm not hiding my sin from you.
I'm not hiding my self-righteousness from you. You see me as I am,
that's why I'm begging for grace. I'm not hiding any of my sin
from you. so that you can forgive. I'm
not hiding it. God has to take away all hope
we have in the flesh until we have one hope of salvation, the
Lord Jesus Christ. That's a process. And God's gonna
do it that way, because that's the only way this rotten flesh
is ever gonna beg for mercy. Matter of fact, this rotten flesh
won't ever beg for mercy. God's gotta give us a new nature
to beg for mercy, doesn't he? I mean, we're hopeless. God's
gotta do it all. And Joseph did it that way as
a picture of how God strips away everything his people trust in
so that they'll trust in his son. Now here's something I'd like
to ask you. Maybe you thought this, I kind
of thought this when I first read this passage. Was Joseph
being kind of mean here? Was he being kind of cruel to
these people? I mean, it seems like he's taking
advantage of them in this situation. Is he? Absolutely not. Here's the third
thing. Christ bought it all so he could
redeem his people out of this world. Verse 23, Joseph said
unto the people, behold, I've bought you this day and your
land for Pharaoh. Now when Joseph said, I bought
you this day, you know what he's literally saying? I've redeemed
you today. I've redeemed you. I've paid
your grocery bill so you never have to go without food again.
I took the responsibility of keeping you alive. I took the
responsibility of taking care of you. You belong to Pharaoh,
but I took the responsibility to take care of you. I bought
you. So the responsibility for your
life is not on you anymore. It's on me. And Joseph had been
such a wise ruler. He had conducted himself in such
a way that people were very willing to be Pharaoh's servants for
Joseph's sake. Look at verse 25. And they said,
thou has saved our lives. Let us find grace in the sight
of my Lord and we will be Pharaoh's servants. Well, this is just
not typical human nature, human behavior. The people thought
so highly of Joseph. They thought so highly of how
wise he was in saving their lives. They said, Joseph, let us find
grace in your sight to be your servants and to own nothing.
You know, normally you think we'd say, Joseph, let me find
favor in your sight that I can own a little piece of land over
here that I can call my own. That's not what they said. They
didn't say, Joseph, let me find grace in your sight that I can
be free from having to be Pharaoh's servant. They said, Joseph, let
us find grace in your sight so we can be your servants. Now
that's amazing. And the only reason anybody would
say that is because of the character of Joseph. Now that's a clear picture of
what Christ has done for his people. He's redeemed His people
from their sin. He paid the debt. He bought us
lock, stock, and barrel with His precious blood. We are not
our own. We're bought with the price.
Scripture says we don't belong to ourselves anymore. Now we
belong to Christ and we serve at His pleasure. Don't we? We serve Him at His pleasure.
Wherever it is He has us serve and whatever it is He has us
do, that's what we do. and we're happy to do it. Christ the Lord is so wonderful. He's such a wonderful, gracious,
wise Savior. He makes His people willing to
be His servants. He makes it so we come to Him
saying, Lord, don't let me be responsible for anything. You
be responsible for me. Lord, I'm Your property. Do with
me as You will. I'm yours. Now, how in the world
did that happen? He made us willing in the day
of His power. He made us willing because He's
such a wise and gracious and loving Savior. He made us willing
because first thing He did is reveal to us His glory, didn't
He? He made us willing to be His
servants. Well, here's the fourth thing.
Here's another reason I'm saying, now Joseph wasn't being mean to these
people. He wasn't taking advantage of them. Once Christ owns you,
lock, stock, and barrel, he gives you everything freely. In verse
23, Joseph said unto the people, behold, I bought you. I redeemed
you this day and your land for Pharaoh. Lo, here's seed for
you, and you shall sow the land. Joseph said, now you belong to
Pharaoh now. What he really meant is you belong to me. I'm the
one governing you. I'm the one that's going to manage
all of your affairs now. And I'm going to take care of
you. I'm going to give you everything that you need. Here's seed for
free. Now before, they had to trade
all their money. But that wasn't enough to see
him through, was it? Then they had to trade all their livestock.
And that wasn't enough to see him through the family. Then
they had to trade all their land. And that wasn't good enough to
see him through the famine. Then they traded themselves,
and that wasn't good enough to see him through the famine. And when
everything was gone, Joseph said, here it is for free. You take
it. You feed yourselves. You feed
your little ones. You have seed to plant so that you can grow
crops. And you give 20% of it to Pharaoh. That's all you've got to give
back? He gave him seed for free. And that's what the Savior says
to His people. I bought you. I bought you with My blood. I
redeemed you. You belong to Me. Here's everything freely. Everything
that you need to stand before the Father, perfect, I give it
to you freely. Now it cost Him, didn't it? He
paid the price and He gave it to His people freely. Christ
gives his people bread to eat. He gives us himself, the bread
of life. He gives us his word to open
up. This is the children's bread. And he also gives us seed. I
thought about this. I think about this a whole lot. This seed. It's the next generation
to be born. Till Christ returns, there's
another generation coming. Now it's up to us to take care
of them, to preach Christ to them, to teach them the scriptures
and to always point them to Christ. God's given us a seed. And Joseph,
he took care of everything for them. Look at verse 21. And as for the people, he removed
them to cities from one end of the borders of Egypt, even to
the other end thereof. Now Joseph took them and he made
them all move to the cities. And you think, I don't know,
that kind of reeks of fascism or something, doesn't it? I mean,
no, no, no, no. Joseph was being wise and gracious. You know why? You remember reading
this in the Seven Years of Plenty? Where did Joseph store the corn?
In all the cities. He took the people that didn't
have nothing, and he put them in a place where the food was
stored. So they'd be right there by it. Now I know you see that's
a picture. It's a picture of the local church.
God sets his people in the local church. You know why? That's
where the sheep food's found. God sets his people in the local
church because that's where the Lord's presence is. Gathered
together with his people. And they gather together to worship
him and preach the gospel. This is a place. God's grace
is preached. The forgiveness of sin is preached
here. The person of Christ is preached
here. Everything that you need for spiritual life, for a healthy
spiritual life, everything that you need to instruct you in the
ways of righteousness, everything that you need to keep pointing
you to Christ, everything that you need for the comfort of your
soul is preached here by preaching the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. This is where God sets his people. this local church
and one over there and one over there. I know where a bunch of
them are at, don't you? God's given that to his people
and put them there because that's what food is. Then here's the last thing. Now
our Savior bought this whole world. He owns it. He runs it. He governs it. He
blesses it for the sake of his people. But the prayer of his
people is, Lord, thank you. Thank you for all the blessings
of this. Thank you. But don't leave me here. Look
at verse 27. And Israel dwelt in the land
of Egypt, in the country of Goshen. And they had possessions therein,
and grew and multiplied exceedingly. Remember, Joseph was taking care
of them too, wasn't he? And Jacob lived in the land of
Egypt 17 years. So the whole age of Jacob was
140 and seven years. And the time drew nigh that Israel must
die. And he called his son Joseph and said unto him, if now I found
grace in thy sight, could I pray thee thy hand under my thigh,
and deal kindly and truly with me? Bury me not, I pray thee,
in Egypt. But I will lie with my fathers,
and thou shalt carry me out of Egypt, and bury me in their burying
place. And he said, I will do as thou hast said. And he said,
swear unto me. And he swore unto him, and Israel
bowed himself, upon the bed's head. Jacob tells his son Joseph,
son, I know you've been made ruler over this place. And boy,
son, you're doing a good job. Oh, the Lord's blessed this land
because of you. He blessed you with wisdom and
understanding. He's blessed us. You brought
us to this land. He's blessed us mightily because
of you. We just can't even reckon up
in order the blessings God's given us here. Not just Egypt,
Not just this 70 people that came down to Egypt, but the whole
world has been blessed because of you. And I'm thankful. I'm thankful to be here. Can't
you just imagine Jacob after all those years? You know he
enjoyed these 17 years getting to see that favorite son. He
enjoyed it. He enjoyed it. It made him happy. But Jacob says, son, there's
a better place than here. Now, I'm thankful, aren't you? But there's a better place than
here. It's the land of God's promise. Don't you bury me here. You take my body, you bury me
in the land of God's promise. That land that God promised my
grandfather, my father and me. You take me there and bury me
there. Now that's what a believer says,
isn't it? This world has been blessed for Christ's sake. It's
been blessed for the sake of His people. Now I know it's full
of sin Every day, I mean every single day, we find new examples
of men just running off the rails. It's unbelievable. But even with
all this sin that's in us and around us, now there's a lot
to enjoy here. There's a lot to enjoy. You know,
I love being able to worship here with you all. I count it
a great, great blessing. I just think it's one of the, I hope I don't say this wrong,
but it's such an honor to be your pastor and to worship with
you. I just, I love it. I love to
be able to enjoy God's family here. This week, I've talked
to God's family from all over the place. I mean, all over the
place. Bruce Crabtree, I should have
told you at the start of the service, told me, tell everybody
hello, how much he loves you. I've talked to, I mean, it's
just been such a blessing. Even though this works with sinful,
that's a blessing. And I enjoy my family. I enjoy my loved ones. They make me happy. I'm just
telling you now, they make me happy. God's just blessed us
with so much in every way. I mean, there's not one person
here worrying about going to bed hungry tonight. I mean, just
how he's blessed us. But there's a better place than
here. And the believer's prayer is,
Lord, don't leave me here forever. Don't leave me here forever. Janet told me today about the
second oldest woman in the world, 116 years old. Not so sure that's a blessing,
are you? I mean, I don't know, I don't know. But I know this,
this is the believer's prayer. I don't know the time, but Lord,
you do. When it's time, take me out of here and fulfill your
promise and take me to be with you, that I may see you as you
are and behold your glory, just like you promised. Isn't that
the believer's promise? I'm thankful for this place,
I'm thankful. But there's a better place. And I long for that time
when the Savior says, come on, don't you? All right, I hope
the Lord bless that too. Let's bow together. Father, how we thank you for
the Lord Jesus Christ. How we thank you for your wisdom
and your love that provided such a salvation for vile, hell-deserving
sinners like we are through the sacrifice and the blood of your
own beloved son. Father, how we thank you. Oh,
we can't thank you enough. Human language cannot express
the Thanksgiving for redemption in Christ Jesus, for your constant
love and care and provision over us. Father, we're thankful. Father, I pray that you take
your word as it's being preached tonight. Father, by your Spirit,
show each one of us here tonight the glory of Christ our Savior
and cause us to run to him, to rest in him and trust in him.
Father, it's in his name. For His sake and His glory we
pray. Amen.