Good morning. I talked to our
pastor this morning and the word he used to describe their meeting
so far was, it's been wonderful. So I'm happy it is, and we hope
that they have journeying mercies, him and his family, back home
to be with us tonight. We also keep Cody in our thoughts
and prayers. He's with the brethren in West
Virginia and preaching there, and hopefully they'll have a
good service this morning. And he comes safely home because
he'll be doing the message this evening. If you would, open your
Bibles to the book of Genesis. The book of Genesis, Genesis
chapter 37. Genesis chapter 37. The title of my message this morning
is what we deserve versus what we get. What we deserve versus
what we get. Now the thought of what we deserve
is something that is always on our minds. It's something that's
always in our heart and something we're always aware of. Most of
the things in our life deal with this. We send our children to
school so they can learn and they can deserve to get into
the right college. Then we go to school and work
hard so that we can deserve the best job. We work really hard
so we can deserve the praise and recognition we want, the
promotion. We work long hours so that we
might deserve to retire one day. And now we don't always think
of it in that mindset. And first thinking of this, I
thought, well, I don't really think about that way. I don't
really think of what I deserve that often. But with a couple
examples, we can quickly realize how much what we deserve guides
almost everything we think about and do in our lives. After one
of my kids' baseball games, if I'm supposed to bring the snacks,
and the 10 kids walk over, and I hand nine of them a snack and
don't hand it to the 10th one, Does anyone think that parent
is going to immediately ask me why my child didn't get one?
Why didn't Johnny get one? Which what they're really asking
me is, my kid deserves it. You better justify why you didn't
give him one. Tell me the last time you heard
someone say they didn't get into a college and the follow-up response
was, you know, they just weren't really smart enough. No, we make
excuses. We say things like, well, they
just don't know what they're doing. They're going to really
miss out on this one. My kid deserves to go there.
And when we don't get a job and someone's hired over us, we always
think to ourselves, well, I was just sick that day of the interview.
Or they must have known someone in the company. Somebody, that's
how they got the job. Or when we're doing something,
excuse me, And our boss comes in on a big
project with the whole company, and they start calling individuals
out saying, so-and-so did really well, and so-and-so did really
well, and they don't say our name. How often do we think to
ourselves, you know, maybe I didn't pull my weight. Maybe I didn't
deserve to be called out. Or how often do we think to ourselves,
I'm going to have to work harder next time. No, what we think
to ourselves is we get a little anger sometimes and we think,
I deserve it. If we were in a good mood, we might even think to
ourselves, you know, they just forgot to say my name or they're
going to call me into the office later and tell me specifically. No, we don't do those things
because we think we deserve everything. And when it comes to salvation,
we're the exact same way. By nature, we honestly think
that we deserve to be saved. Now, sometimes that comes from
someone telling us that we deserve it, someone telling us that you
can get there, you can do it. Sometimes it's us convincing
ourselves. We think so highly of ourselves,
we think, well, maybe I can do it. But this book, the Bible
specifically tells us over and over again a description of who
we are. And in a quick search, we can
find so many verses such as these. How much more abominable and
filthy is man which drinketh iniquity like water? Abominable
and filthy? In Psalms it says, they are all
gone aside, they are altogether filthy, there is none that doeth
good, no, not one. No one does any good. We are
all as an unclean thing. All our righteousnesses are as
filthy rags. O wretched man that I am, who
shall deliver me from this body of death? Wretched, unclean,
and in Revelation it covers a few of them in the same verse. And
knowest not that thou art wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked? David wrote, Thou lovest evil
more than good. We like to call ourselves good,
but we actually love evil. Men loved darkness rather than
light because their deeds were evil. It's described in Ephesians
by Paul, those who were dead in trespasses and sin. For us
to claim that we deserve anything from God is just foolish and
ignorant. But then to say that we deserve
for him to save us? What is the price of our sin? What is the payment? What is
required for us to be saved? The payment for sin is death. Salvation can only be procured,
can only be found in the Lord Jesus Christ. When I preached
a few weeks ago, the message was the difference between two
men. And the difference between someone who is saved and someone
who is lost is simply the Lord Jesus Christ. The only way to
get from hopeless to find hope is through the Lord Jesus Christ.
The only way to get from certain death is through Christ for eternal
salvation. That's the only place to find
that. And if you look here in Genesis chapter 37, there's a
story about a man named Joseph. This is a story that most of
us know well, and Joseph is someone that I enjoy reading about. It's
a long story, and poor Joseph went through so much. But when
we talk about what we deserve versus what we get, there's someone
else in this story that we can relate to and we need to focus
on this morning. So as I go through this story,
all of us need to put ourselves in the shoes of Joseph's brothers. So let's look at the very beginning
of this and we'll meet who's gonna be us for this story. Genesis
37, look at verse one. And Jacob dwelt in the land wherein
his father was a stranger in the land of Canaan. And these
are the generations of Jacob. Joseph being 17 years old, this
is his son Joseph, was feeding the flock with his brethren.
And the lad was with the sons of Bilal and with the sons of
Zilpah, his father's wives, and Joseph brought unto his father
their evil report. Joseph told something on his
brothers. Now Israel, or Jacob, loved Joseph more than all his
children because he was the son of his old age and he made him
a coat of many colors. And when his brethren, his brothers,
saw that their father loved him more than all his brethren, they
hated him and could not speak peaceably unto him." The first
thing we see about his brothers is something we can relate with.
They hated him. They hated their own flesh and
blood because he was loved. And they also hated him because
he was given a coat. We find so many things to hate
people. We find so many reasons to convince
ourselves to dislike, to hate, to speak evil of others. be with the brothers on this.
So look at verse 5. And Joseph dreamed a dream, and he told
it his brethren, and they hated him yet the more. And he said
unto them, Here I pray you this dream which I have 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, and made obeisance to my sheaf. And his brethren
said to him, shalt thou indeed reign over us? Or shalt thou
indeed have dominion over us? And they hated him yet the more
for his dreams and for his words. Now Joseph told his brothers
that he had a dream. And in the dream, basically what
it meant was, I had a dream that you all had to stand around me
and bow to me and do what I said. Now I understand why the brothers
disliked him for this. But let's see what they do. Look
at verse 18. And Joseph went to his brothers,
because his dad sent him, so in verse 18, And when they saw
him afar off, when the brothers saw Joseph, 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, and 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 become of his dreams. So his brothers see Joseph coming. The brothers were with the sheep
and away from their home, away from their father, which of course,
they're never gonna do anything in front of their father. But
now that they're separate, when he starts coming, they say to
themselves, let's see how this dream's gonna come true if we
throw him in a pit and leave him there. We'll go home and
tell our father that something happened to him. Okay, keep going. Verse 21, And Reuben heard it,
one of his brothers, and he delivered him out of their hands, and said,
Let's not kill him. And Reuben said unto them, Shed
no blood, but cast him into this pit that 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. Reuben, one of
his brothers, steps up, and it says, He delivered him out of
their hands. Reuben said, you know guys, we shouldn't kill
him. And I remember as a boy hearing this thinking Reuben
did a good job standing up for his brother. But what Reuben
did is just said, you know, let's not kill him. Let's just throw
him in a hole. Not exactly standing up for his
brother there, but that's important to see later. Verse 23 says,
And it came to pass, when Joseph was come unto his brethren, that
they stripped Joseph out of his coat, and his coat of many colors
that was on him. And they took him, and they cast
him into a pit, and the pit was empty. There was no water in
it. And they sat down to eat bread, and they lifted up their
eyes, and locked. And behold, a company of Ishmaelites
came from Gilead with their 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? Come, let us sell him to the
Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our
brother and our flesh, and his brethren were content. Then there
passed by Midianites, merchantmen, and they drew and lifted up Joseph
out of the pit, and sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites for twenty
pieces of silver, and they brought Joseph into Egypt." So as the brothers, can we relate
to we're first going to kill him and someone speaks up and
says, you know, let's not actually kill him because then people
will actually say we killed him and then we'll have to, we did
kill him. So let's put him in a hole and he'll just die on
his own. And then they think to themselves,
but how does that benefit us? We're such sinners that while
we're committing a sin, we try to figure out a way that we can
sin more on top of that. It wasn't good enough that they
were just gonna kill him. So they thought, but that doesn't
profit us. We won't benefit from it. We'll just be rid of him.
So they sell him. So they sell him and they make
money off of him and he goes with the Ishmaelites to Egypt. Okay, look at verse 31. And they
took Joseph's coat and killed a kid of the goats and dipped
the coat in the 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. And he knew it and said, it is
my son's coat. An evil beast hath devoured him.
Joseph is without doubt rent in pieces. So it's not good enough
that we send him off to die and we sell him, but now we want
to disguise it. So we kill a lamb, we put the
blood on the coat and take it back. And they don't say we found
Joseph's coat. They take it to their father
Jacob and says, well, you'll know if this is his coat. We
don't know. So then they're, now we're lying on top of this.
And can you imagine the pain that they caused and had to watch
on their father? They hated Joseph partly because
his father loved him so much. Those ten boys stood in front
of their father and watched him say, an evil beast hath devoured
him. Joseph is without doubt rent
in pieces. They just had to, in front of
their father, lie to him and tell him, your son has been killed
and he's dead. Look at verse 34. And here's
the reaction of Jacob. He rent his clothes and put sackcloth
upon his loins and mourned for his son many days. And all his
sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him. Can you imagine
this? This is how sinful we are. We
are the reason why our brother, we think, is dead. So we lie
to our father and tell him, we don't know what happened, but
he's probably dead. And then we go in to comfort
him. There's an extra level of evil
in that, that these brothers, that we would go in and try to
comfort our father. I mean, what do you say in that
moment to your father? I'm so sorry it happened. I mean,
what do we say in these moments? Oftentimes we wish it wouldn't
have happened. Like all the things we say, we're
the cause of it. In our lives and our sin, we
are the cause of all the things we do. We cannot blame other
people. We have to look within on this.
Okay, pack up in 34. Jacob rent his clothes, and put
sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days.
And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort
him, but he refused to be comforted. And he said, For I will go down
into the grave, and to my son mourning. Thus his father wept
for him. And the Midianites sold him into
Egypt unto Potiphar, an officer of Pharaohs, and the captain
of the guard." Okay, let's go forward to chapter 41. So over the next so many years,
Joseph was 17 when this happened, and over the next 13 years, Joseph
went through trial after trial. He went to Potiphar's house,
the man who was captain of a guard in Egypt, and everything that
he did, the Lord made it to prosper. Everything worked out great for
Potiphar, and Potiphar raised him up, put him over his house,
and excelled him. He was doing so well. Well, Potiphar's
wife, deceived Joseph. She consistently asked him to
come into her, and he would not. He told her, he said, he said,
I love Potiphar. He has treated me well. This
is wrong. I'm not going to do it. And this
happened over and over for a long time, and he wouldn't do it.
Well, one day he went into the house when everyone was gone,
and she came up to him and grabbed his garment. And to get away,
he ran, and so she still had the garment. So she called out
to the guard and said that Joseph came in and did this to her,
that he came in to her. It was his idea. He's the one
who wanted to have this happen. And Potiphar was furious with
him and threw him into prison. So now David, I keep saying David,
Joseph is in prison. So Joseph is in prison in the
Baker and the Butler story. Pharaoh's baker and his butler
get sent to prison. He's upset with them, and they
have dreams now. So Joseph interprets the dreams
and tells the butler, you'll be raised up. In three days,
you'll be brought up. And he says, don't forget me.
He says, tell Pharaoh about me. The baker's story is that he's
gonna die in three days, and both of those events come true.
And the butler, who Joseph has told him exactly what's gonna
happen, forgets. So now Joseph spends more years in prison,
at least two more years, until the day comes And Pharaoh has
dreams. Pharaoh dreams of things that
are gonna happen. And the butler all of a sudden comes to his
mind and says, I know someone who can do this. All the magicians
and the sorcerers and all these different people of Egypt, no
one could figure it out. So they brought Joseph in front of Pharaoh
and he was 30 years old. So we know that Joseph was cast
off at 17. For 13 years, he's been away
from home. And this is where we pick up
here standing before Pharaoh in chapter 41 verse 39. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph,
Forasmuch as God hath showed thee all this, there is none
so discreet and wise as thou art." Joseph declares to Pharaoh
what the dream is. He says there's going to be seven
years of a great harvest. We will have more food than we
know what to do with, followed by seven years of famine. So
Pharaoh says there's no one smarter, no one that we know of that could
do this, so Pharaoh promotes him to be second in command. Pharaoh puts him over everything,
so he is on the right hand of Pharaoh. Okay, verse 40 Thou
shalt be over my house, and according unto thy word shall all my people
be ruled. Only in the throne will I be
greater than you, only I will be greater. And Pharaoh said
unto Joseph, See, I have set thee over all the land of Egypt.
And Pharaoh took off his ring from his hand, and put it upon
Joseph's hand, and arrayed him in vestures of fine linen, and
put a gold chain about his neck. And he made him to ride in the
second chariot which he had, and they cried before him, bow
the knee, and he made him ruler over all the land of Egypt. And
Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall
no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt. And
Pharaoh called Joseph, name Zaphnath-Panaeth. And he gave him to wife Asenath
the daughter of Potiphar, priest of On. And Joseph went out over
all the land of Egypt. And Joseph was thirty years old
when he stood before Pharaoh, king of Egypt. And Joseph went
out from the presence of Pharaoh and went throughout all the land
of Egypt." So in this story, as we continue,
his brothers are gonna come back into play in a minute. We're
gonna come back in. And in this story, as we are the ones who
are his brothers, Joseph here is the one who is the Lord Jesus
Christ, the Savior. And this is a great picture of
this. The king put the ring on his finger, sat him on his right
hand, and no one will ever do anything to you. You are the
ruler over all, as the Lord Jesus Christ sits on the throne in
glory. Okay, look in chapter 42. in verse 1. So we've gone through the seven
years of plenty. Joseph has filled up the storehouses
to save money, or save all the things they needed for food in
the seven years of famine. So in chapter 42 verse 1 it says,
ìNow when Jacob saw that there was corn in Egypt, Jacob said
unto his sons, Why do ye look one upon another? And he said,
Behold, I have heard that there is corn in Egypt. Get ye down
thither, and buy for us from thence, that we may live and
not die. And Joseph's ten brethren went
down to buy corn in Egypt. But Benjamin, Joseph's brother,
Jacob sent not with his brethren. For he said, Lest peradventure
mischief befall him. And the sons of Israel came to
buy corn among those that came, for the famine was in the land
of Canaan. And Joseph was the governor over the land, and it
was that sold to all the people of the land. And Joseph's brethren
came and bowed down themselves before him with their faces to
the earth. And Joseph saw his brethren,
saw his brothers, and he knew them, but made himself strange
unto them and spake roughly unto them. And he said unto them,
Whence come ye? And they said, From the land
of Canaan to buy food. And Joseph knew his brethren,
but they knew him not. And Joseph remembered the dreams
which he dreamed of them, and said unto them, Ye are spies,
to see the nakedness of the land ye are come. And they said unto
him, Nay, my lord, but to buy food are the servants come. We
are all one man's sons. We are true men. Thy servants
are no spies. And Joseph said unto them, Nay,
but to see the nakedness of the land ye are come. You're spying
this out so you can take us over. And the brothers said, Thy servants
are twelve brethren, the sons of one man in the land of Canaan.
And behold, the youngest is this day with our father, and one
is not. As for us, when we approach the
king, when we approach the Lord Jesus Christ, we will have no
idea who he is. These brothers had no concept
of who Joseph was. Now it seems Joseph was 17, and
that's important to know because at 17, it's a pretty good idea
of what we're gonna look like for the rest of our lives. And
yet he was just 37 now, 37, and they didn't have a clue who he
was. And that's a picture of us not
having any idea who the Lord Jesus Christ is. We can't see
it, though we should know, though we should recognize it. But we
don't really believe, like these brothers, that He exists. They
thought their brother was dead, so they had no reason to even
look for Him. They had no reason to even think
He would be alive. Verse 14, And Joseph said unto
them, That is it, that I spake unto ye, saying, Ye are spies.
And also think about this, Joseph listened to those brothers, and
their justification to say they weren't spies was to say, We're
all brothers. We come from twelve brothers
from a family in Canaan. And one is Benjamin, and he's
at home, and the other is just not. They just told him that
the other brother is dead, you're dead, right to his face. Verse
15, Hereby, Joseph says, ye shall be proved by the life of Pharaoh,
ye shall not go forth hence, except your youngest brother
come hither. I am not going to let you guys
go. You are spies unless your youngest brother comes and you
can prove otherwise. Send one of you, and let him
fetch your brother, and ye shall be kept in prison, that your
words may be proved, whether there be any truth in you, or
else by the life of Pharaoh surely ye are spies. And Joseph put
them all together into ward three days. And Joseph said unto them
the third day, This do and live, for I fear God. If ye be true
men, let one of your brethren be bound in the house of your
prison. Go ye, carry corn for the famine of your houses, but
bring your youngest brother unto me. So shall your words be verified,
and ye shall not die, and they did so. So he finally said, I'll
let you all go to prove yourselves, but one of you is staying. He
said, one of you is going to stay in prison until you come
back with your youngest brother. So he sent them away, and in
verse 21 it says, and they said one to another, we are very,
these are the brothers talking, and listen to this closely. This
is, they're saying this in front of Joseph. We are verily guilty
concerning our brother, in that we saw the anguish of his soul
when he besought us, and we would not hear. Therefore is this distress
come upon us. And Reuben answered them, saying,
Spake I not unto you, saying, Do not sin against the child,
and you would not hear? Therefore, behold, also his blood
is required. And they knew not that Joseph
understood them, for he spake unto them by an interpreter.
So Joseph told them all, you can go home, but one of you stays,
and you have to bring back your little brother to prove you're
not spies. And they had no idea he could hear them and understand
them. So then that's when they all said, we're undone. Our sin
is coming back to get us. What we did to our brother, this
is why this is all happening to us. And Reuben, who we often
give credit for trying to help, wants to take credit in the moment.
He says, spake I not unto you saying, do not sin against the
child, and you would not hear? Reuben says, didn't I tell you
not to do anything to him? This is just the same as our
justification before our God that we are not guilty. We are
willing to say everyone else, all nine of you, it's your fault,
it's not me. And as silly as Reuben's explanation
here is the same as us saying we don't need, we're not guilty. We don't need any help. We're
okay on our own. Remember, Reuben here says, spake out on you saying,
do not sin against the child. If we recall, what did Reuben
actually do? He said, let's not kill him.
Let's put him in a hole and abandon him. That is an example of us
trying to say that we have not ever sinned. That's the justification
that we come up with, and it's just foolish. And everyone can
see, you imagine what his brothers all did in that moment? They're
all in there sitting there like, how are we going to go back to
dad and tell him the one son you wouldn't send with us, we
got to bring him back. And we had to leave another son
in prison to do this. And one of the ten stands up
and says, well, if you guys would have listened to me, we wouldn't
be in this predicament. It's just foolishness. Okay, let's
keep going. Then Joseph commanded to fill
their sacks with corn, and restore every man's money in his sack,
and to give them provision for the way, and thus did he unto
them. This is how the Lord deals with
His children. He shows them who He is, but
they don't see it. Then, well, the Lord teaches
us, but he doesn't reveal himself to us. And then he gives them
all of their money back and all of the provision they need. So
they didn't buy corn, he gave them corn. Joseph gave them everything. They didn't buy it, they didn't
deserve any of this, but he, out of mercy, gave them. Not
to mention, Joseph gave the people who tried to kill him and hate
him this. So the sinner sins against God. We hate him, we despise him,
we talk evil of him, we act like he doesn't even exist. And what
he does for his children is he gives them everything they need,
full provision, and treats them as if they haven't wronged him.
All right? Now, move on to verse 36. All
the brothers go home to Jacob. In verse 36, it says, And Jacob
their father said unto them, Me, have ye bereaved of my children? Joseph is not, and Simeon is
not. And ye will take Benjamin away?
All these things are against me." Poor Jacob thinks Joseph
is dead. They have Simeon, and you know
he had to think he's never getting Simeon back. You send your boys
to a foreign land, they're claimed to be spies, one of the brothers
is thrown in jail, and the only way he can get out is if you
send your other youngest child over there? Jacob has to be thinking
here, if I send him back, I may not see any of these boys ever
again. And Reuben spake in verse 37 unto his father, saying, Slay
my two sons, if I bring him not to thee, deliver him into my
hand, and I will bring him to thee again. Reuben again shows
us the depth of our sin. Reuben says, let me be the person
who takes the responsibility, and if I don't bring Benjamin
back, you can kill my two children. I mean, what in the world? I mean, did he would say something
like this? Again, this is us. Reuben is
saying something that we would say. This is awful. Reuben thinks
that somehow his father thinks, if I don't bring Benjamin back,
then kill my two sons. So, Dad, you've lost Joseph,
you don't have Simeon, let me take your other son to there,
and if we don't come back, so now that's four sons are all
gone and dead, you kill two of your grandsons? Verse 38, and
Jacob says, my son shall not go down with you, for his brother
is dead and he is left alone. If mischief befall him by the
way in the which ye go, then shall ye bring down my gray hairs
with sorrow to the grave. Jacob says, no, no, he's not
going with you. I'm not sending him down. Jacob
has the unenviable task here of a son that is in prison, and
yet he has to send a different son to go get that son out of
prison. and he doesn't want to make that
trade. He can't be sure that even his own son, Benjamin, will
be okay. So look in chapter 43, verse 1, ìAnd the famine was
sore in the land, and it came to pass when they had eaten up
the corn which they had brought out of Egypt, their father said
unto them, ìGo again, buy us a little food.îî We do not want
to go back to the Lord. The commandment was to send Benjamin
to him, and Simeon would be freed. If Benjamin came, he would be
free. But what happens here is they stayed and Jacob did not
send. He left his son there. And Jacob, once they ran out
of food, only when we come to a place in our lives where we
truly fear for death, when we truly see what predicament we're
in, will we ever go back to the Lord. And it's only because He
makes us to do so. Joseph could have sent more food
to them, he could have provided for them forever, but he put
them in a position, as he does to us, we're put in a place of
travail that we must entreat to the Lord to be saved. Look
here at verse 3, And Judah spake unto his father, saying, The
man did solemnly protest unto us, saying, Ye shall not see
my face, except your brother be with you. If thou wilt send
our brother with us, we will go down and buy thee food. For
if thou wilt not send him, we will not go down. For the man
said unto us, Ye shall not see my face, except your brother
be with you. The brothers all say here, We
cannot go back without Benjamin. If we go back without that boy,
he's going to kill all of us. It was very plain. The word was
very plain. You bring Benjamin back or you
will be spies. You'll be treated as spies. Verse
6, And Israel said, Jacob said, Wherefore dealt ye so ill with
me as to tell the man whether ye had yet a brother? Jacob says,
Why did you tell him there was another one? And the brother
said, The man asked us straightly of our state, and our kindred
saying, Is your father yet alive? Have ye another brother? And
we told him according to the tenor of these words, Could we
certainly know that he would say, Bring your brother down?
And Judah said unto Israel his father, Send the lad with me,
and we will arise and go, that we may live, and not die, both
we, and thou, and also our little ones. I will be surety for him,
of my hand shalt thou require him. If I bring him not unto
thee, and set him before thee, then let me bear the blame for
ever. for except we had lingered, surely
now we had returned a second time. And their father Israel
said unto them, if it must be so, now do this. Take the best
of the fruits in the land and your vessels and carry down the
man a present, a little balm and a little honey, spices and
myrrh, nuts and almonds, and take double money in your hand
and the money that was brought again in the mouth of your sacks,
carry it again in your hand, peradventure it was an oversight.
Take also your brother and arise, go again unto the man. They're
so worried about what will come that they think, let's take in
presents, let's take gifts and take all the money to buy new
food and the previous money too. We don't want them to, maybe
that was an accident. Maybe we need to take double
the payment. Maybe that's the difference. If we take more money,
we'll be fine. Verse 14. And God Almighty give
you mercy before the man, that he may send away your other brother
and Benjamin. If I be bereaved of my children,
I am bereaved." Jacob wisely said, God Almighty give you mercy
before that man. We have no hope before the Lord
Jesus Christ unless God have mercy upon our souls. We are
totally in his hands. Jacob knows in this moment, as
he sends off his children, he sends 11 sons off to Egypt, and
he knows, I have no control or no hope apart from whatever it
is this man, whatever Joseph does, we're in his hands, as
we're in the hands of the Lord Jesus Christ. Okay? And the men
took that present, and they took double money in their hand, and
Benjamin, and rose up, and went down to Egypt, and stood before
Joseph. And when Joseph saw Benjamin
with them, he said to the ruler of his house, Bring these men
home, and slay, and make ready. For these men shall dine with
me at noon. And the man did as Joseph bade,
and the man brought the men into Joseph's house. And the men were
afraid because they were brought into Joseph's house. And they
said, because of the money that was returned in our sacks at
the first time are we brought in. They think because they didn't
keep the money the first time, our payment. That's the reason
he took us into his house. that he may seek occasion against
us, and fall upon us, and take us for bondmen, and our asses. And they came near to the steward
of Joseph's house, and they communed with him at the door of the house,
and said, O sir, we came indeed down at the first time to buy
food. And it came to pass when we came to the end that we opened
our sacks, and behold, every man's money was in the mouth
of his sack, our money in full weight, and we had brought it
again in our hand. And other money have we brought
down in our hands to buy food. We cannot tell who put our money
in our sacks." The brothers talk to the first person they can
because they think they're in trouble because their money got
returned to them. They think that's the sin that
we're in trouble for. They've forgotten about the past
sin they've committed. They forgot about what they've
done to their brother. And they start to make excuses and try
to justify themselves of this previous sin. They say, we didn't
mean to get the money, it was there, we just found it, so we
brought it back to you, don't hold it against us. And the porter
of the house in verse 23 said, peace be to you, fear not, your
God and the God of your father has given you treasure in your
sacks. I had your money, and he brought
Simeon out unto them. This man says, Peace be to you,
fear not. Your God and the God of your
father hath given you treasure in your sacks. He says, God is
the one who did this. Joseph is the one who put this
in your sack. And the man brought the men into
Joseph's house, and gave them water, and they washed their
feet, and he gave their asses provender, and they made ready.
The present against Joseph came at noon, for they heard that
they should eat bread there. And when Joseph came home, they
brought him the present, which was in their hand, into the house,
and bowed themselves to him to the earth. And he asked them
of their welfare, and said, Is your father well, the old man
of whom you spake? Is he yet alive? And they answered,
Thy servant our father is in good health, and he is alive.
And they bound down their heads, and made obeisance. And he lifted
up his eyes and saw his brother Benjamin, his mother's son, and
said, Is this your younger brother, of whom ye spake unto me? And
he said, God be gracious unto thee, my son. And Joseph made
haste, for his bowels did yearn upon his brother, and he sought
where to weep, and he entered into his chamber and wept there.
Joseph was totally overcome with joy at seeing his younger brother
Benjamin. He was so overcome that he left
them, and went into his chamber, and he wept. He cried. He rejoiced
to see his brother. Now look at chapter 44, verse
1. And he commanded the steward
in his house, saying, Fill them in sack with food, as much as
they can carry, and put every man's money in his sack's mouth,
or the top of the sack. and put my cup, the silver cup,
in the sack's mouth of the youngest, and his corn money. And he did
according to the word that Joseph had spoken. As soon as the morning
was light, the men were sent away, they and their asses. And
when they were gone out of the city, and not yet far off, Joseph
said unto his steward, Up, follow after the men, and when you dost
overtake them, say unto them, Wherefore have ye rewarded evil
for good? Is not this it in which my Lord
drinketh and whereby indeed he divineth? Ye have done evil in
so doing. And he overtook them, and he
spake unto them these same words. So Joseph commanded his men to
give them all the corn. The eleven brothers were going
home, and he took his cup, the cup of the house of Joseph, and
he put it into Benjamin's bag. He said, Hide this and the money
in Benjamin's bag. And then after they left, he
set this up, and he sent his men and said, Go out there and
go and trap him. Go get him in this ruse. Verse
7. And they said unto him, Wherefore
say ye, My lord, these words? God forbid that thy servants
should do according to this thing. Behold the money which we found
in our sack's mouth we brought again unto thee out of the land
of Canaan. How then should we steal out of thy lord's house
silver or gold? We would never have done that.
You're saying we stole money? We would not steal money. We
would never do it. Last time we brought the money
back, we would never. These brothers all justifying
themselves. Verse 9, with whomsoever of thy
servants it be found, both let him die and we also will be my
Lord's bondmen. Boy, these brothers, you talk
about something that we just don't learn from mistakes. Joseph's
men come upon them and say, you stole. We do all this good for
you, and you reprieve us with evil? And their response to this,
it says, with whomsoever, any of us, if you find it be found,
let him die. If you find one of us has stolen
something, kill him, and the rest of us will be bondmen. And
he said, Now also let it be according unto thy word. So Joseph's men
say, Okay, whatever you say. He with whom it is found shall
be my servant, and ye shall be blameless. Then they speedily
took down every man his sack to the ground and opened every
man his sack. And he searched and began at the eldest and left
at the youngest, and the cup was found in Benjamin's sack. Then they rent their clothes,
and laden every man his ass, and returned to the city. You
talk about distraught. We open our mouth, and we just
make it worse on ourselves. We just put ourselves in situations,
and the Lord guides us. I mean, this plan and everything,
what Joseph's doing here, we'll see in a second, is just perfect
for these brothers, to provide for them. But we open our mouths,
and we ruin everything for ourselves. Verse 14. And Judah and his brethren
came to Joseph's house, for he was yet there, and they fell
before him on the ground. And Joseph said unto them, what
deed is this that ye have done? What ye not that such a man as
I certainly divine? And Judah said, what shall we
say unto my Lord? What shall we speak, or how shall
we clear ourselves? God hath found out the iniquity
of thy servants. Behold, we are my Lord's servants,
both we and he also with whom the cup is found. And he said,
God forbid that I should do so, but the man in whose hand the
cup is found, he shall be my servant. And as for you, get
you up in peace unto your father. Judah says, our word, we were
caught, we will stay here. But Joseph says to him, that's
not what I'm going to do. Benjamin will just stay here
with me. So now what does Judah respond in verse 18? Then Judah
came near unto him, and said, O my lord, let thy servant, I
pray thee, speak a word in my lord's ears, and let not thine
anger burn against thy servant, for thou art even as Pharaoh.
My lord asked his servant, saying, Have ye a father or a brother?
And we said unto my lord, We have a father, an old man, and
a child of his old age, a little one. And his brother is dead,
and he alone is left over, left of his mother, and his father
loveth him. And thou saidst unto the servant, Bring him down unto
me, and I may set mine eyes upon him. And we said unto my Lord,
The lad cannot leave his father, for if he should leave his father,
his father would die. And thou saidst unto thy servants,
Except your youngest brother come down with you, ye shall
see my face no more. And it came to pass when we came
up unto the servant, my father, we told him the words of my Lord.
And our father said, go again and buy us a little food. And
the brothers there keep going, and brothers say, we can't go
without it. And then Jacob says to them, you take him. And what
Judah ultimately says here is he says, if I don't come back
with Benjamin, this is gonna kill Jacob. It's gonna kill our
father. He will die from this. So, if
we look in chapter 45, after all the evil these men
had committed, after everything they've done, this is where we
get. What they deserve is very obvious
here. They deserve to be bondmen, to
be killed, to be slain. They deserve for the wrath of
Joseph to come upon them. No one would give Joseph any
grief if he did whatever he wanted to these ten brothers. In Joseph's
mercy, in a great example of our Lord's mercy unto us, look
in Genesis 45 and let me give a couple quick comparisons as
we see what Joseph ends this with as a cross to what our Lord
has done for us. Then Joseph could not refrain
himself before all them that stood by him. And he cried, "'Cause
every man to go out for me, everyone else get out of here.' And there
stood no man with him, while Joseph made himself known unto
his brethren." The Lord Jesus Christ, the Savior, must make
himself known unto his children. He has to do it. We will never
recognize him. There's nothing that we can do
to ever recognize the Lord apart from Him revealing Himself to
us. He has to show us. Verse 2, And
he wept aloud, and the Egyptians and the house of Pharaoh heard. Joseph here is overcome. There is a price for our forgiveness. Joseph had to suffer and endure
so many trials and travails to get to the place where he could
forgive his brothers. The Lord Jesus Christ had to
make himself a man, had to come to this sinful place so that
he might save his children. He had to come here and he had
a great price to pay. As Joseph here wept aloud and
everyone heard it, the Lord Jesus Christ paid the price and gave
his life for his children. He did that for them. Look in
verse 3. And Joseph said unto his brethren,
I am Joseph. Doth my father yet live? And
his brethren could not answer him, for they were troubled at
his presence. These brothers were troubled
at what they had just found out. Every child of God is truly frightened
when the Lord reveals himself to them and then reveals themselves
to themselves. Once the child of God has their
eyes opened and sees who they truly are, what they are, and
themselves and their sin, it is a scary thought. These men,
these are grown men standing before their brother, and he
tells them, I'm the one who you tried to kill. I can't, the shock
on their face. This is the second time he said
it. So look at verse four. And Joseph said unto his brethren,
come nearer to me, I pray you. And they came near, and he said,
I am Joseph, your brother, whom you sold into Egypt. He had to
reaffirm this three times now to say that, and the Lord has
to do that to us over and over and over again. These brothers
heard him say who he was, and then he said, I'm Joseph, I'm
your brother. So he tells them the name, and
then he tells them again, and then he starts giving them details
so that they'll believe him. I'm the one you sold, remember
that? I'm that one. The Lord Jesus Christ has to
constantly prove us, remind us, show us who He is. That song
we sang right before, prone to wonder, Lord, I feel it. We just
turn and walk away, run away as fast as we can, but thankfully,
the Lord continues to bring us back and show us who He is. Look
at verse five. Now therefore, don't be grieved
nor angry with yourselves that ye sold me hither. for God did
send me before ye to preserve life." Joseph says to them, don't
be sad, don't be angry, this isn't of you, God did this. The Lord Jesus Christ tells us,
don't fret, don't worry, you're not the ones who did this. You've
sinned against God, but in the Lord Jesus Christ, you're perfect. you're with me, I have you now,
don't worry. This is all about the Lord Jesus
Christ. And he says there in verse 6,
end of verse 5, for God did send me before you to preserve life.
The Lord Jesus Christ was sent to save the lives of His children,
to save them. Verse 6 says, For these two years
hath the famine been in the land, and yet there are five years
in the which there shall neither be earing nor harvest. Joseph
says to them, You must endure a little while longer, but I
will preserve you. The Lord tells His children,
Your time has not yet come, but it will come. And until that
day, I will provide everything you need. I will hedge you about,
I will keep you, I will take care of you. Verse 7, And God
sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth,
and to save your lives by great deliverance. The Lord Jesus Christ
was sent to save the lives of his children. And oh, what a
great deliverance it was. Joseph was sent here. His brothers
thought they did it, but they're not the ones who did it. God
sent the son to this place to die for his children. That's
the only reason he came. He came to provide a great deliverance,
salvation for his sheep. Look at verse 8, So now it was
not you that sent me hither, but God. And he hath made me
a father to Pharaoh, and Lord of all his house, and a ruler
throughout all the land of Egypt. Joseph said, God is the one who
sent me and put me in this position. It wasn't you. The Lord Jesus
Christ tells His children, it wasn't you who did anything.
It wasn't you who takes blame, credit, anything. The Lord Jesus
Christ has been put on the right hand of the King, and He is in
control and has the power. He has made Him Lord and Ruler
throughout all the land. And then look down in verse 9,
Haste ye, go up to my father, and say unto him, Thus saith
thy son Joseph, God hath made me lord of all Egypt. Come down
unto me, tarry not. In verse 10, And thou shalt dwell
in the land of Goshen, and thou shalt be near unto me, thou and
thy children, and thy children's children, and thy flocks, and
thy herds, and all that thou hast. Joseph says to him, go
get our father, go get your family, bring everyone here. The Lord
Jesus Christ tells his children, come to me, come unto me and
I will provide you in the land of Goshen, or the land of plenty,
the land of comfort. The Lord Jesus Christ will take
all of his children to him. He will bring them to him because
of the price he's paid. He will bring them to a land
of plenty and a land of comfort. And what we see here is what
we deserve is death. What we deserve is to be cast
out. But in the Lord Jesus Christ,
the child of God gets all these things. They get a savior, they
get someone who will watch over them, protect them, provide everything
they need in salvation, will hedge them about, reaffirm who
he is over and over to them, We need not be sad, we need not
be angry. He provides us with a hope, with
our pleasure. And God sent him to save us. That's the only reason he came
to be our deliverer. So what we deserve is actually
what we do get. But what we deserve is death. So how do we deserve these things
that we talk about? We deserve them because a child
of God is put into the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord paid for our
sins. He paid the sin debt. He paid
for the things that we were going to be killed for. He died on
the cross bearing our sin so that in Him we can get what He
deserved. He deserved from His perfect
life salvation and eternal life, and because of what the Lord
Jesus Christ has done, we get what He deserved. Thankfully,
through the Lord Jesus Christ, we have eternal life and salvation
in Him.