Let's be turning to Genesis chapter
37. Genesis 37. We're going to return
now to Joseph, because Joseph provides us with a fruitful,
abundant field of pictures and types of our Lord and Savior,
Jesus Christ. Now today I want to focus on
the sending of Joseph. Joseph is sent of the father
to seek the welfare of his brethren. And so he goes out being sent
of the father who is concerned for the welfare of his children. And then we'll see Joseph's willingness
to do the father's will. So let's read verses 12 and 13.
And Joseph's brethren went to feed their father's flock in
Shechem. And Israel said unto Joseph,
Do not thy brethren feed the flock in Shechem? Come, and I
will send thee unto them. And he said to him, Here am I. So the scene here is that the
sons of Joseph are not at home. They're not at home. They're
far away. They're actually very, very far
away from Jacob's home where he was at that time. He was in
Hebron there. So he's even further away than
he was when he was in Bethel. And Shechem, as I understand
it, from where they were now is at least 60 miles, if not
70 miles away. So they're very far from home. And it would seem here, based
on what's said, that Jacob began to be concerned about their well-being. He was concerned about their
welfare being so far away. And Jacob, we see here, cares
for his sons and therefore he's worried about them. He's worried
about how far they are, where they are. in particular, where
they've gone. And this tells us something of
Jacob's heart. Jacob cared for his sons. He
loved his sons. Joseph was his well-beloved son,
but that doesn't mean he didn't love and care for the well-being
of his children. Now, if you recall, Shechem was
a place of great heartache. This is where Simeon and Levi
had risen up. They were angry with Shechem,
how this place got its name. They were angry with Shechem
for the sin that he committed against their sister, what he
did to Dinah. He raped her and then wanted
to make it right by marrying her afterwards. He wanted to
make it right. Well, they were angry about this,
and rightfully so. They were very, very angry about
this, but we saw them take true religion and use it deceitfully
to deceive Shechem and to put him to death and all with him. They put them all to death and
then the other brethren came in and they divided the spoil
amongst themselves. It was a place of great heartache
and Jacob Fearing for his life said back there in Genesis 34
30 ye have troubled me to make me distinct among the inhabitants
of the land among the Canaanites and the Parasites and I being
few in number they shall gather themselves together against me
and slay me and I shall be destroyed I and my house and So it's a
picture there of the fruit of the flesh This is his fruit doing
these wicked works, making him to stink. And it's a picture
of our fruit, what we bring forth in the flesh by nature, thinking
this is a good work. And really what it is, is sin.
And it makes us to stink before God. It corrupts us. So now these
sons are back in Shechem. They're far, far away. in Shechem,
and it's likely put them in a dangerous place. If Jacob feared for his
life because of the inhabitants still there, then why not his
sons who are now there again? But because he loved them, Jacob
says to his well-beloved son, come and I will send thee unto
them. And Joseph, willing to do his
father's will, said, here am I. And so with this detail so
far, does it not put your heart, does it not put your mind on
our heavenly father and his well-beloved son? Does it not remind us of
where we are? Now, in our flesh, in the danger
that we find ourselves in because we've put ourselves there, and
the Father who sent His well-beloved Son for our well-being. Well, this account here, we see
many, many types. As we look at Joseph, it's just
nonstop types of Christ and what he's accomplished for us. And so here, in these types,
we see the revelation of the eternal love of God for his people,
the concern, the care that he has for his people and the steps
he has taken to provide for our welfare for us who are in Shechem,
this place of heartache and heartbreak and full of sin and the misuse
and abuse of religion, the wickedness that goes on here. And so this
shows us the eternal love that the father has for his chosen
children in putting us into the care of his well-beloved son. It says in Ephesians 1, 4, and
5 that God hath chosen us in Christ. He had no greater to
put us into the care of. He had no greater hand, no mightier
hand, no more sure and certain salvation but to give us into
the hand of Christ to save us, to redeem us, to provide for
us. He chose us in Christ before
the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without
blame before Him in love. and that the Father predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself according
to the good pleasure of His will. God the Father, knowing all things,
chose us, knowing what we would do, chose us and provided for
us in Christ Jesus before the world ever began. And so this
is the picture we see. In Adam, we rebelled against
God. We sinned and death entered because
of our sin and put us to death spiritually so that we now are
plunged into spiritual death, spiritual blindness, spiritual
misunderstanding and not understanding the true and living God. But
in grace, he made provision for us beforehand in his well-beloved
son. And so he sends his son on a
mission of mercy, seeking that which is lost to provide for
our eternal well-being and good. Because as it stands now, left
to ourselves, we're in grave danger. Grave danger. And so
the scriptures tell us of his sending the son to seek and to
save his lost sheep. 1 John 4.10 says, Herein is love,
not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son
to be the propitiation for our sins. His death is the means
of our forgiveness. His resurrection is the means
of our life. His propitiation turned the wrath
of God from us, put it on Himself to stand in our place as our
substitute and to set us free. To set us free in Him. And so
we see this faithful type in Joseph who promptly said, here
am I. I'll do it. Here am I. And so
he's ready to do whatsoever the Father's will was for him in
perfect obedience. So our gracious Savior willingly
agreed to come according to the Father's will, knowing the price
that he would pay. And so in that appointed hour,
in the fullness of time, he was born of a woman, or God sent
forth his Son, born of a woman, made of a woman, made under the
law. And so the faithful son, we see
the faithful son willing to do all that the father requires
of him. Hebrews 10.7 writes of our Lord's
willingness where he says, lo, I come in the volume or in the
beginning of the book, it is written of me, what's written?
To do thy will, O God. We see it here in the beginning
of the book. in Joseph in picture and in type. We see it in the
promise which God made to Adam and Eve in the garden immediately
after our fall. We see it right in the very third
verse of Genesis 1 3 when verse 2 describes what we are by nature
in darkness without form and void of all spiritual understanding. And God said let there be light
and there was light. That's Christ. Christ is the
light of men. He's the one who reveals the
salvation of God to us undeserving sinners. And so it's the Savior's
willing heart that we see witnessed in His people, right? So you
that are made willing in the day of God's power, that's the
spirit, the willing spirit of Christ, which we see in Him,
in the faithful, well-beloved Son brought in us, whereby we
are made willing. We hear the word of God and we're
made willing. Our hearts are turned from death
and wickedness to the obedience of Christ. We see it in Isaiah
6. In Isaiah, the prophet who saw
the Son of God seated on his throne in all his glory, and
then seeing his own sin, knowing what he is, and seeing the true
and living God, he recognized, I'm the sinner. I'm the wretched,
ruined sinner. And the angel took a cold, the
alive coal off the altar and touched his lips Christ is the
altar Christ is the coal Christ is the one who cleanses him and
his sin was removed his sin was was removed and then it says
he heard the voice of the Lord saying whom shall I send and
who will go for us then said I here am I send me that's a
picture of of Christ and that's what he works in us. He gives
us an obedient heart, an obedient spirit to follow him and that's
what's given to us who believe, that obedient faithful heart
which is in the faithful son given unto us. Next we see how
Joseph sought the welfare of his brethren. Verse 14, he said
to him, Jacob said to him, go I pray thee See whether it be
well with thy brethren, and well with the flocks, and bring me
word again. And he sent him out of the vale
of Hebron, and he came to Shechem." You think about what Joseph was
doing here. It's said back in Genesis 37
verse 4. It tells us that his brethren
hated him, and they could not speak peaceably to him. Every
word that came out of their mouth about Joseph was tearing him
down, was pointing out flaws, pointing out how much they despised
and hated him. And he knew it. He knew it. He
knew what they said about him. He knew how they envied him.
He knew how they hated him and spoke ill against him. They hated him for his dreams.
They hated him for his words. They just despised his look.
Every time they saw him, he was in the coat of many colors. They
hated him, and he knows that they hate him. And yet, when
his father sends him out to go where his brethren are in Shechem,
he's willing to go. He's willing, knowing the hatred,
knowing the enmity that is in the heart of those that he's
going for their good, to check on them, to provide for them,
to do good for them. And that's a further type of
Christ, our Savior. He was sent of the Father to
seek the well-being of his brethren and the flocks. That's why he
came. Our Lord testifying, saying,
the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which is lost. And we, being lost by nature,
despise And God is our enemy. We're turned against him. We
mistrust him. We run from God just the same
way that Adam and Eve ran from him. An idol God, sure, we love
that God. We embrace that God. We think
that God's great. But when we see the God of this
book and his light shines on this heart, it reveals the enmity
that's in us by nature and shows us our need of him. And by grace
you see it. That's grace that makes known
to us I'm the sinner, he's perfect, and this is what he's done for
me. To not leave me and abandon me in a ditch. He's come for
my good. And so we see that. And then
second, we see the character of Joseph's mission, how that
it's like the Savior's, in that it was for our good, even though
we hated him. It says, John 3, 17, for God
sent not his son into the world to condemn the world, but that
the world through him might be saved. God has a gracious purpose
in sending the son, just as Joseph had a gracious purpose in sending
Joseph out his brethren. He meant them good, not evil,
and yet they hated him just like we do by nature. And so we're
told Jacob sent him out of the vale of Hebron and he came to
Shechem. Now Hebron means companionship. In other words, it means fellowship. And so here's Joseph leaving
that warm, peaceable fellowship with his brother. Can you imagine
how nice it must have been for Joseph when it was just him and
dad and young Benjamin? And all his brethren who hated
him and spoke evil against him constantly were gone? How nice
that house was. He must have loved it. Right? That's a picture of Christ and
the glory he had with the Father in heaven for all eternity. With the Father. And then he
comes to this Shechem, to this place. He left all of that, that
veil of peace and comfort and goes out to Shechem, where we
are. And Shechem, what is Shechem?
That place of unhappy memories. It's just bloodshed and murder
and deceit and ruin. It's just vile. It's so messy.
When we were there, it was so, you couldn't even pull it apart
and fix it at all. We can't. God can, but we can't. And that's how this world is.
It's just, things just happen and they just pile on one another
so fast, it's overwhelming, we don't even know how to fix it.
And we can't. We can't. And that's not what we're called
to do. We're not called to fix the problems of the world. We're
called to look to Christ and His power, His salvation delivers
us from death. And so she comes at unhappy place. And so in this, we get a sense,
we glean something from Joseph here that tells us of Christ
and how he left that glory with the Father to come here to this
Filthy, stinking, wretched, sinful, corrupt, vile place. We don't
even recognize how bad it is because we're sinners. We're
part of the problem. But you know he knows it. He
sees it plainly. Plainly. I don't know, but I've
heard that when astronauts have been up in the capsule in space,
when they come back to Earth and they smell the air and the
atmosphere, They said, it stinks. It just stinks. And they didn't
notice it until they came back. They were breathing pure oxygen
or pure air, however they mixed it, purified air. And then they
come here, and that smell just hits them again of how it stinks. That's us, brother. That's this
world. He came to Shechem. And Shechem means shoulder, and
the shoulder that is used to bear the burden. That's the part
of the shoulder. It's that shoulder that's used
to bear the burden and also would be the part of the body that
you would lay the blows of the rod upon. If you were beating
someone with a rod, you'd be laying it right there on that
shoulder there. Because we don't turn this way
for a beating. you know, turn our back and that's where it
would land, but it foreshadows the burden that Joseph is going
to bear for his brethren's welfare, because it was after this that
we'll see that they sell him into slavery, thinking that they're
forever being rid of him, only for him to provide for them many
years later. to provide salvation for them.
He bore that burden. That's where he's going, to Shechem,
to the shoulder to bear that burden for his brethren. And it pictures Christ who left
the glory of the Father to come and bear the burden of his brethren,
of those whom the Father loves and sent the Son to save them.
That's the burden. And we see him become the willing
servant of his father. Philippians 2, 5 through 8, let
this mind be in you, which also was 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 and 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. And so the bitter evils
described in Shechem describe this fallen world that describes
our sin, our iniquity, our trespasses, our transgressions, which were
laid on him. He bore that burden for his people
to put them away forever. bear them away from us forever.
Now Joseph, when he arrived in Shechem, we see how he immediately
becomes a wanderer there. There's no time to rest. There's
no place for him to rest. He becomes a wanderer immediately
there in Shechem, a stranger and a pilgrim. It says in verses
15 and 16, And a certain man found him, and behold, he was
wandering in the field. And the man asked him, saying,
What seekest thou? And he said, I seek my brethren.
Tell me, I pray thee, where they feed their flocks. And so for
one, it shows it's a picture of us. We're not where we're
supposed to be. We're not even where we're supposed
to be. We're not even close to where we're supposed to be. We're
not there. God created us for his glory, and we're not there.
We're off doing our own thing right now. We're not there. And
then secondly, it speaks to what our Lord came here, what he would
be here in this world, the stranger. and a wanderer in this world,
finding no rest. When there was a scribe in the
beginning of our Lord's ministry, a scribe came to him and said,
I'll follow thee whithersoever thou goest. I'll follow thee.
And he said, the foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have
nests. But the Son of Man hath not where
to lay his head. And that's not all. John tells
us that later on in the ministry, there was an argument which arose
between the Pharisees over Christ, over this Jesus of Nazareth,
and whether he was the Christ or not. And it says afterwards
that every man, every one of them, went to his own house.
And John tells us in the next verse, in John 8, 1, it says,
and Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. He didn't go home. He
didn't have any place to go. He went out into the wilderness
where he was. Nobody wanted him. Nobody received
him and so he was outside. But by these types and shadows
we begin to understand the burden and the suffering that our Lord
was bearing for us in coming to this Shechem for our well-being,
for our good, for our salvation. 2 Corinthians 8 and 9 says, Ye
know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich
in that vale of Hebron with the Father, yet for your sakes he
became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich. Out of the eternal riches of
God, according to the eternal riches of God, we have life and
salvation in Christ. Now we're told in verse 17 the
man said they are departed hence or from here for I heard them
say let us go to Dothan and Joseph went after his brethren and found
them in Dothan. And so Joseph arrives on his
errand in Shechem there having traveled 60 or 70 miles only
to find his brethren aren't there so he can't even rest. He's got
to go on even further. to look for them. You think about this, rather
than finding an excuse, he knows he's going to men that despise
him, that hate him, are going to say awful things about him
and treat him despitefully and use him and just keep it on him.
He's not expecting what they do, but he knows it's going to
be painful for him. And rather than get to Shechem
and say, well, I did my best. I didn't find him. I'm heading
back home. No, he dutifully went to fulfill. He wanted to make
sure that the father's will was met. and so he went on further
to seek out his brethren and some say it's four miles away
some on modern maps it says it's about 30 miles away so he went
another four to 30 miles further to find his brethren in Dothan
and so it pictures out unwavering faithfulness of Christ not to
give up and not to throw in the towel and say, forget this. You
know, I'm going back. You think about how annoyed we
get when we're trying to help someone and do good for them
and they won't receive it. They're just being ignorant and
hard headed. And we just say, fine, forget
it. You suffer the consequences that I'm done. I give up. That's
not Christ. He didn't give up. He continued
to bear that burden. He continued to provide for us,
to deliver us once and for all from death. And so we see him
ministering faithfully to us. Peter described it as him doing
much good. Everywhere he went, he did much
good. In the beginning of the ministry, he goes from Galilee
all the way down to Jerusalem, and then back up from Jerusalem
to Galilee again, to Nazareth, all the while going into the
synagogues, there reading the word and speaking to the people,
declaring to them the truth of God, saying, the spirit of the
Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel
to the poor. Is there any here that is poor
in spirit? He said, He hath sent me to heal
the brokenhearted. Is your heart broken, ruined
in sin? That's who He came to heal. to
preach deliverance to the captives. Are you captive to your sin?
Does it burden you and trouble you and try you because you can't
be done with it and put it away forever? Are you captive of it?
That's who Christ came to save, to put away that sin and that
burden. And recovering of the sight to
the blind. Are you blind so that you can't see or understand the
true and living God and what he's doing? Christ came for the
blind, to open the eyes, to set at liberty them that are bruised,
which means shattered, cracking and breaking under the weight
of our sin, of our burden and our sin. That's whom Christ came
to save. That's who Christ came for your
well-being, you that are broken hearted, captives, blind, ruined
by the fall. Christ came to save sinners and
he's the friend of sinners. And he accomplished that redemption. And so he said he came to preach
the acceptable year of the Lord. And today, brethren, because
of the grace of God in him, today is the day of salvation. Today
is the day of grace. Look to him. Believe him. Call
upon him. Confess him. Believe in your
heart that God hath raised him from the dead and thou shalt
be saved. He is the Savior, the faithful
servant of God, our faithful brother, our faithful friend,
our faithful husband who does not turn us away or turn from
us or give up on us. He's faithful to declare to you
the gospel of what he's accomplished and to give you power to become
the sons and daughters of God through the blood of Christ.
Him bearing the burden, Him doing all the work of grace for us. We read of Dothan. Dothan means
a place of two wells. And some say that one of those
wells was one of the pits that they threw Joseph in. I don't
know if that's so. But it also means, in some Bible-named
dictionaries, Dothan means the law or custom. The law or custom. And this is where the Lord found
his people, is it not, when he came to his people, he found
them under the law, under the bondage of the law, unable to
keep the law, so that they cleverly customized it. They traded it
in for traditions and customs to bring that law down so that
when they looked at the law they said, we're doing it. This is
our righteousness and God is well pleased with us. We've done
it. This is what man does. He thinks
he's keeping the law and all he's done is by customs and traditions
brought that law down to a fleshly work whereby he puffs himself
up that he's doing it, and despises you because you're not keeping
his customs and traditions the way he thinks you should be keeping
them. That's what we do. That's what
it is. Our Lord said in Mark 7, 7 and
8, how be it in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines
the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment
of God, ye hold the tradition of men. And that's what we see
in churches dotted all over. the land, right? They have their
customs, their traditions, their books, their catechisms, their
hymns, their way of doing things, and they think this is salvation,
and if you don't do this way, you're not one of us, you have
no part in the kingdom of God, and you're shut out. That's what
man does, but Christ came, and his coming exposes the hypocrisy
of our hearts. It exposes the folly that's in
us by nature, showing forth the things that we're trusting in
that are nothing but flesh and cannot save and make us to stink
in the eyes of God because we think this is our righteousness,
this is our salvation, all the while despising Christ and despising
the doctrine of Christ, what he accomplished, what he did
for us apart from our works. Christ came to where we are in
this Shechem and this bondage of Dothim and while we were yet
enemies for his great love wherewith he loved us he bore the burden
of our sin to settle the debt to stand in our place as our
surety of his people to settle that debt and to set us free
give us life in him so that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ
we are saved you that this day believe him having heard his
word and seeing your sins seeing his salvation seeing his faithfulness
and believing him that God has sent him that he is the salvation
of God for his people and so in this type of Joseph we behold
the love of the Father and the faithfulness of the Son Jesus
Christ to provide that eternal salvation for us, which we cannot
do, even when we were, like Joseph's brethren, despising, hating him,
having nothing good to say about him, but to be established in
that covenant of grace, in the kingdom of God, in and by the
Lord Jesus Christ. For the scripture saith, whosoever
believeth on him shall not be ashamed. I pray the Lord bless
that word to your hearts, brethren.