Before we look at Genesis 37,
we probably should consider Genesis 36, which we did not do, but
let me read to you. Let's read together in Genesis
37. We're going to read the first
11 verses of Genesis 37 together. And Jacob dwelt in the land wherein
his father was a stranger in the land of Canaan. This is Jacob. He lived where his father Isaac
and his grandfather Abraham lived as strangers in the land of Canaan.
And we're strangers in this world, aren't we? All the ones the Lord
has saved are strangers in this world. The world is strange to
us. Paul the Apostle said that the
world by Jesus Christ has been crucified to us and we to the
world. And that makes it very strange
to us. And so, God is teaching us here in Jacob the experience
of every believer. And that's important that we
understand that. In verse 2 it says, "...these are the generations
of Jacob." Joseph, being 17 years old, was feeding the flock with
his brethren. And the lad was with the sons
of Bilhah and the sons of Zilpah, his father's wives. And Joseph
brought unto his father their evil report." Whatever they were
doing was evil, and Joseph told his father about it. Now Israel,
that's another name for Jacob, Israel 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 saw that
their father loved him more than all his brethren, they hated
him. And they could not speak peaceably
to him. And Joseph dreamed a dream, and
he told it to his brethren, and they hated him yet the more.
And he said to them, Here I pray you this dream which I 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,
bowing down 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. And he dreamed yet another dream,
and told it to his brethren, and said, Behold, I have dreamed
a dream more. And behold, the sun and the moon
and the eleven stars made obeisance to me. And he told it to his
father and to his brethren. And his father rebuked him and
said to him, What is this dream that thou hast dreamed? Shall
I and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves
to thee, to the earth? And his brethren envied him,
but his father observed the saying. And so we have the first part
of the life of Joseph. Joseph was seventeen at the beginning
of this chapter. He's going to go on and grow
up and stand eventually before Pharaoh in Egypt. And I hope
that you're somewhat familiar with the life of Joseph. I'm
going to summarize several points from his life before we go through
it, and hopefully this will help you bring into focus the truth
of Scripture taught in these few verses. Now, it's interesting
here in verse 2, it says, these are the generations of Jacob.
In the chapter before us, God gives the generations of Esau.
Look at the very first verse of chapter 36. Now, these are
the generations of Esau, who is Edom. Remember, Esau was Jacob's
older brother. And God, it says in Romans chapter
9, loved Jacob but hated Esau. Esau was a man who rejected the
eternal blessings in Christ when he sold his birthright to Jacob
for a bowl of porridge. Later on, Jacob tricked Esau
out of the blessing from his father, all according to God's
will. But Esau's generations are given
here. He had five sons. I'm not going to go through this
chapter in detail. He had five sons. And those sons
had children of their own. Their names are given in that
chapter. And his sons married into the family of the people
of Seir, which was the mountain where Esau and his family lived. He departed from Jacob from the
land of Canaan. He left Jacob because he and
Jacob had so much So many cattle and animals and so on, they couldn't
stay in the same place. Esau went to this place called
Mount Seir. There he had a family, and that family intermarried
with the people of Seir. And their generations are given
here in chapter 36. Esau was basically a man of the
world. And he married a Canaanite woman,
he married another Canaanite woman, and then married a woman
who was the daughter of Ishmael, Abraham's first son by Hagar.
But one of the things that's obvious when you read through
chapter 36, I'm not going to do that, is that most of the
names listed there were given the title among men, a distinguishing
title called dukes. And the word duke means a chief
person, a chief captain, a notable person, a person of authority
and esteem. And some of them, it says later
in the chapter, became kings in that land, even before the
children of Israel had kings in their land. So what you learn
from chapter 36 is the children of Esau were great men. Powerful
men. Notable men. And there were lots
of them. And the generations of Esau included many of them. Many men. And their families. But when we get to chapter 37
and verse 2, notice again what it says there. These are the
generations of Jacob. And the next word is Joseph.
It doesn't list the generations like it does in chapter 36 where
he says, and this one was the son of that one, and so on. He
just lists Joseph there. And that's the key to understanding
this chapter, the rest of Genesis, and all of the Bible. Is that
God makes mention here of just one man, Joseph. And He calls
Joseph the generations of Jacob. And we might think, well, that's
because later on he's going to talk about the other eleven sons
of Jacob. There were eleven. I mean, there
were a total of twelve. He could have talked about all of them,
but he just mentioned Joseph here because later on he's going
to talk about the other eleven. We might think that, and that's
true. He does mention other names, beginning with Reuben and ending
with Benjamin later in the rest of Genesis. But the point here
is that God specifically isolated Joseph from the rest. He wasn't
the oldest, he wasn't the very youngest, but he was the one
God used and set up for teaching us a very, very important purpose. Joseph is actually given here
as a living portrait, a living picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's why he is singled
out. Because in Joseph, God is teaching us what he has said
throughout all of scripture. All of scripture is going to
be taught The lesson of all of Scripture is going to be condensed
and taught in the life of this man, Joseph. What is the message
of Scripture? If you were to ask that question,
what is God teaching? If I could just condense everything
God has said in the Bible, which is a big book, if I could condense
it down to its essence, I used to say at work, just give me
an elevator speech. You've only got a few seconds
before the elevator gets to the top, and I need to know, before
I go to the meeting, what am I going to tell them? What is
the message of Scripture? Well, in the very beginning,
the message of Scripture is about the Lamb of God who would come
The Lamb of God who would come and then in coming He would offer
Himself, take away the sins of God's people, and He would be
exalted to the throne of glory. In 1 Peter 1 and verse 11 it
says this. Look at 1 Peter 1 and verse 11. This is what the entire Old Testament
is about. It's about the Lamb of God who
would come and about His glory that would follow His sufferings
and His death. 1 Peter 1 and verse 11 says this. It says the Old Testament prophets...
He says, "...searching what, or what manner of time, the Spirit
of Christ, which was in them, did signify, when it, the Spirit
of Christ, testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and
the glory that should follow." The sufferings of Christ and
the glory that should follow. That's the message of Scripture.
The glory followed because of His obedience and His success
in His sufferings. He's the Lamb of God, slain.
And that's what the message of the Old Testament is about. And
when you get to the New Testament, what does John the Baptist say
about the Lord Jesus? Behold, the Lamb of God, which
taketh away the sin of the world. That's what he says in John 129.
And then, in the book of Revelation, which is the last book of the
Bible, what is the message of that book? What is Revelation
all about? Is it about the all the catastrophic
and wonderful events that are going to come on the world at
the end of time? No. It's about the conquest of Christ
throughout history, culminated in the cross when he defeated
all of the enemies of his people by his death, and the glory that
followed and his reigning triumph over their enemies to their eternal
salvation. That's what the book of Revelation
is about. About the Lamb of God slain before the foundation of
the world, seated in glory, and reigning over his enemies for
the benefit of his people for their salvation. That's what
the book of Revelation is about. And that message is repeated
in Revelation over and over again because it's a summary of all
of history. The entire scripture is about the Lamb of God. who
is seated on the throne. That's what the heaven's host
sings about in Revelation in chapter 4 and 5 and 7 and throughout. He who sits on the throne is
the Lamb who was slain. And he was slain from the foundation
of the world because it was God's eternal purpose. And so here
we have, in the life of Joseph, we're going to get a living picture
of the Lord Jesus Christ. We're going to see Him in His
sufferings and in His glory. And so we see that's the introduction
to what we're going to see here in the life of Joseph. And that's
why the Lord says here that these are the generations of Jacob.
And he starts with Joseph, because Joseph is the only one he mentions.
And how does that help us? Well, look at Psalm 22. If you recognize this psalm,
you'll see that this was a psalm about the Lord Jesus Christ.
When he was hanging on the cross, it was foretold what he would
do. In the very beginning of this psalm, this is the prayer
that Jesus cried from the cross. He said, My God, My God, why
hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from helping
me? And from the words of my roaring.
You see this? It's about Him, isn't it? The
Lamb of God. But look at verse 30. He says
this, a seed shall serve him, just one seed, and that seed
is the Lord Jesus Christ. And it shall be counted to the
Lord for a generation. One would serve, and all those
for whom he served would be counted the Lord's generation." His people. His generation. And this is not
the only place this is spoken of. How it's isolating one man
for all the people. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. And
so we're going to see that here in the book of Genesis. But Jacob
was a very special man, and I want to just give you a little bit
here on the importance of this. Jacob was a very special man
in Scripture. Do you know it says in scripture
that God calls himself by this name, the God of Jacob, many
times. In 22 times in scripture God
is called the God of Jacob. And then Jacob's name was changed
to Israel, remember? When he wrestled, when the Lord
wrestled with him and he gave him that name Israel. And so
the name Israel is used also. God calls himself as the God
of Israel. 201 times. So this is the most frequently
used name that God gives Himself, the God of Jacob, the God of
Israel, in scripture. He's the God of Jacob. Therefore,
Jacob is very special, a very significant man in scripture.
And in Psalm 146 and verse 5, if you want to look at that text
of scripture, it says in Psalm 146 and verse 5, I'll read this
to you. It says, Happy is he that hath
the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his
God. You see, all those who have the
God of Jacob for their help and whose hope is in the Lord, they
are also blessed with Jacob. In fact, they're called the children
of Jacob, or the children of Israel, like he was. There's
many things in scripture that are said about Jacob and his
children that shows that God's declaration in Romans chapter
9 in verse 11 through 13, that God loved Jacob and hated Esau,
it shows that God had a particular, special interest in Jacob and
his sons. And I want to point a couple
of those out to you. Look at Malachi chapter 3. In Malachi, the last book of
the Old Testament, in chapter 3, something very specific in
blessing is spoken of by God of Jacob and his sons. In Malachi
chapter 3 and verse 6, it says this, I am the Lord. I change
not. God doesn't change. What he was,
Before is what he is today. What he will be in eternity is
what he is now. Remember what he told Moses?
I am that I am. God is eternal and he doesn't
change. Malachi chapter 3 verse 6 says, I am the Lord, I change
not, therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed. Now a lot of
people were consumed and will be consumed, but not the sons
of Jacob. Look at Numbers chapter 23. This is God saying by himself,
I don't change, therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed. In Numbers chapter 23, Balaam,
who God used to prophesy of Israel and Jacob. We can use those names
interchangeably most of the time in scripture. But in Numbers
chapter 23, it says in verse 19, God is not a man. that he
should lie. God doesn't lie. He can't lie.
Neither the Son of Man that he should repent or change or take
back his blessings. Hath he said, and shall he not
do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good? Behold,
I have received commandment to bless, and he hath blessed, and
I cannot reverse it. Listen to verse 21 very carefully.
Jacob was an especially blessed man. He hath not beheld iniquity
in Jacob. Neither hath he seen perverseness
in Israel. The Lord his God is with him,
and the shout of a king is among them." Now, put it all together. Jacob, God said, before he was
born, when the twins were in Rebekah's womb. Jacob have I
loved, Esau have I hated. And then in Malachi 3.6, the
reason the sons of Jacob are not consumed is because God doesn't
change. And he doesn't see iniquity in
Jacob. He doesn't see perverseness in
Israel. Well, you might ask the question,
well, who are these sons of Jacob? Are they only the physical sons
of Jacob? Well, scripture speaks about
the children of Jacob, the children of Israel, in two ways. There
were the physical children of Israel. But in the New Testament,
the revelation is given that the physical nation of Israel
was used in order to teach us about the spiritual nation of
Israel. The physical nation were born
physically to Jacob, and they were made up of a physical nation
in a physical land, Israel. But the spiritual nation were
born not by physical birth, but by spiritual birth. They were
chosen before they were born to be God's Israel. And they're
called in Galatians 6.16, the Israel of God. And in Romans
9, in the first few verses, verses 6 through 8, it says, who are
these children of Israel? Who are the children of Abraham?
They're not the children who were born after the flesh, but
they're the ones that were the children of promise. God promised
them to Abraham beforehand. And all those who are the children
of promise believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. So the true Israel,
the spiritual Israel, that God has in mind when He says, I have
not beheld iniquity in Jacob, or seen perverseness in Israel,
those who are not consumed because the Lord doesn't change, because
His purposes and His will is from eternity to everlasting,
then they are called the spiritual and true Israel. They are the
people of God, the church of the living God. It says in Romans
chapter 11 that all Israel shall be saved. All of them. All of
Israel shall be. And he's talking about all of
the church. The Lord Jesus Christ laid down his life for the sheep. He died, he gave himself for
the church. and the church will be saved.
They are his people. That's the reason this is so
significant here in Genesis 37 where it says, these are the
generations of Jacob, Joseph. A seed shall serve him. The Lord
Jesus Christ on the cross served his Father. He did his eternal
will. And he brought about the salvation
of his people by his own death in obedience to God. In fulfillment
of that eternal will. God spoke it before it was done. From the beginning God has spoken
here of the Lord Jesus Christ. Here God is speaking in Joseph
about Joseph and he's looking through Joseph to the Lord Jesus
Christ. And when we see this, we're going
to see all of scripture taught to us in this man, Joseph, and
his brethren. And so he says here, these are
the generations of Jacob, and he mentions Joseph. And if we
were to look through all of Genesis, the rest of the book of Genesis,
we'd see a lot of things about Joseph. Things that happened
to Joseph that, when we think about it just a little bit, we'll
see that these things are being taught to us about Joseph, not to teach us
necessarily about Joseph, but about the Lord Jesus Christ.
And I want to just draw your attention to a few of those things
that God has shown us here in the life of Joseph. First of
all, we see here in Genesis 37, it says here, Verse 2, he says,
These are the generations of Jacob, Joseph being seventeen
years old. He was feeding the flock with
his brethren, and the lad was with the sons of Bilhah and with
the sons of Zilpah, his father's wives. And Joseph brought to
his father their evil report. So Joseph told his father about
the sins of his brethren. In other words, he made their
sins evident when he brought the report to his father. Now,
we might think, and I've heard preachers say this, well, Joseph
did wrong in that. I mean, he was just a tattletale.
No, he didn't do wrong in that. Because God set him up in this
way to show us what the Lord Jesus would do. In John chapter
7, the gospel of John chapter 7, verse 7, it says, Jesus told
his brethren, he says, the world cannot hate you But me, it hates,
because I testify of it that the deeds of the world are evil."
Everything the world does, whether it be immoral or moral, whatever
they do, whether they call it good or bad, the Lord Jesus sums
it all up. It's evil, because they do it
out of an evil motive, with an evil heart. That's all of us,
by nature. We all, what we do, Jesus said
in Mark 7, 21-23, that out of the heart of man proceeds evil
thoughts, fornication, adulteries. All these things come from the
heart of man. And in Jeremiah 17, 9, it says
the heart is deceitful. Above all things, who can know
it? This is describing us by nature. What we are by nature
is described this way, evil. Jesus said to his disciples,
if you, being evil, can do good things for your children, how
much more your Heavenly Father, who is not evil, will do good
things for his children. And so, the first thing we see
here is that Joseph exposed the sins of his brethren. And the
Lord Jesus exposes our sin. But He doesn't do it in order
to condemn us. He exposes our sins to us in
grace in order to drive us to Christ. He doesn't expose our
sins fully because we couldn't handle that. It's one thing to
know something about yourself as a sinner. It's another thing
to know the depth of your iniquity and what you truly are. Because
when you know that, then you would be crushed. You would not
be able to survive that. But the Lord did do that. He
showed what His people truly were. But that wasn't the end
of it. It says now in verse 3, Now Israel loved Joseph more
than all his children. Israel was Joseph's father. He was Jacob. He loved Joseph
more than all of his children. And this also teaches us about
the Lord Jesus. Joseph was loved because he was
the son of his father's old age. And because he was the son of
his wife, Rachel, the woman that he loved most. And so it says
here that Jacob made his son Joseph a coat of many colors.
A coat, a special coat. A coat that identified him as
the one his father loved above his brethren. He didn't make
any bones about it. He didn't try to hide his special
favor of Joseph to his brothers. Remember when he sent all of
his children before to Esau, he put Joseph and his mother
at the very last to protect them. Who is loved above all by God
the Father? Who is the one that God the Father
loves more than any? Isn't it the Lord Jesus Christ,
His only begotten Son? It says in John 3.35, "...the
Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into His hand."
He's His only begotten Son. Now, that doesn't mean that Jesus
became God's Son when He was born. It means that as God is,
so is His Son. Is God eternal? Then so is His
Son. Is God almighty? Then so is His
Son. Know all things? Yes, so does
His Son. He has the same nature as the
Father. He's one with the Father. And
so He's called the Only Begotten of the Father. But when He was
born, and when He lived, and when He died, and especially
when He rose again, it became evident that He was the Only
Begotten of the Father, Eternal, Almighty, All-Knowing. the God,
the Son of God, God the Son. But Israel loved Joseph more
than his brethren, because God the Father loved His Son more
than all. But here's the amazing thing.
As it speaks here of Joseph, God holds up Joseph to us, not
to teach us about ourselves, but to teach us about His own
Son, whom He loves, and to teach us how He saves His people in
His Son, and the way He loves His Son is the way He loves His
people. When we see how Jacob loved Joseph, and we see how
God loved His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, then we find it even
more amazing when He says in John 17 these words. Look at John 17. I will read
this to you. In John 17, Jesus is praying
to His Father. This is the Son of God, in our
nature, on earth, praying as our mediator to His Father in
glory. And He says this in John 17. He prays, He says in verse 22,
"...and the glory which thou gavest Me, I have given them,
that they may be one, even as We are one. I in them, and thou
in Me, that they may be made perfect in one, And listen, and
that the world may know that thou hast sent me and hast loved
them as thou hast loved me. Now that's amazing, isn't it?
How could we understand that? How could we possibly begin to
understand God the Father's love for His eternal Son, who did
all of His will as our Mediator, who took our nature and humbled
Himself, and whom He exalted to the highest place as the God-Man
and gave Him all things, all glory and power. All of His will
is in His hands to do as He pleases. And God the Father says, I've
loved them as I loved him." And so what we see here when God
speaks of Joseph, when he says, the generations of Jacob, Joseph,
he's teaching us what we are before God in the Lord Jesus
Christ. And that's what we're going to
see throughout this book. Joseph exposed the sins of his brothers
to his father. Christ is the one who testifies
of our sins. Joseph was upright. Did you know
that scripture doesn't record one thing that Joseph ever did
wrong? That's an amazing thing. I'm sure he was a sinner just
like you and me, but scripture specifically mentions nothing
about Joseph committing any sin. He was tempted many times and
he never sinned. in that temptation. And so the
Lord Jesus Christ was without sin. If Jesus had any sins, then
he couldn't take our sins. If he had sins of his own, he
would have to die for them himself. And he couldn't die for his people.
So the Lord Jesus Christ was tempted and he did no sin. Joseph
dreamed. Look at what this says in verse
5. And Joseph dreamed a dream and told it his brethren. You
see, when Joseph dreamed, he was looking forward. God gave
him this knowledge. God gave it to him in a dream
that one day he was going to be exalted above his brethren
and they were going to bow down to him. Even his father, Jacob,
was going to bow down to him. And so we see in this the Lord
Jesus Christ. We just read in 1 Peter 1.11,
all of the prophets testified of the glory of the sufferings
of Christ and the glory that would follow. When they preached
in the book of Acts, you know what they preached over and over?
They preached that Jesus Christ, the one you crucified, sits on
the throne of glory. So Joseph dreamed, he foresaw,
By God's grace, he foresaw what would become of him. But in all
of Scripture, God is telling us what the Lord Jesus Christ
would do. God spoke it before it happened. He said not only
what was going to happen in history, He also said what He would accomplish
by what He would do. And then, in the Gospels, God
has written about the history Christ fulfilled, and He tells
us in the Epistles and in Revelation what He accomplished by that.
It's just like we do, you're taught when you write in school,
they'll tell you, say what you're going to say, say it, and then
say what you said. That's what God did. He said
what He was going to do, He did it, and then He told us what
He said, what He did. And he reminded us that he said
it before. And he does that in order for us to see that nothing
can prevent him from doing his will. And all of his enemies
are put to shame before him, to his great glory. And all of
his people are saved according to his eternal purpose. And so,
when he speaks of Joseph as Joseph dreaming his dream and being
exalted, he's talking about what would happen at the end, after
he would go through all the sufferings, just like Jesus is talked about
in his place in glory, after he would accomplish the will
of God in his sufferings. But notice it says, when he dreamed
his dream, in verse 4, he says his brethren hated him because
his father loved him more than all of his brethren. In verse
5, when he dreamed his dream, it says they hated him the more.
So Joseph was hated by his brethren. And the Lord Jesus Christ was
hated by his brethren. They envied Joseph, and so they
envied Christ. And they took Joseph and they
cast him into a pit. And so they took Jesus and they
crucified him on the cross. And then he was sold by them
for silver to these Gentiles, these Ishmaelites, the people
who were not called the people of God. And so the Jews sold,
Judas sold Jesus for 30 pieces of silver to the high priest
in order that they might take him and crucify him according
to their will. And then Joseph suffered. He was cast into prison for a
crime he didn't commit when Potiphar's wife accused him. And so the
Lord Jesus was crucified for sins he didn't commit. And all
of Joseph's brethren came to Joseph when he was exalted as
king and lord over Egypt. They came and they bowed down
to him. And when He saw them, He knew them before they knew
Him. And so the Lord Jesus Christ, having been exalted to the throne
of glory after His crucifixion, His people come and they bow
down to Him. And He knew them before they knew Him. They were
His brethren before. Look at John chapter 11. John
chapter 11. These are some of the things
in the life of Joseph we're going to see when we go through this.
In John chapter 11, The high priests, the people are wondering,
what can they do? Because Lazarus was risen from
the dead. Jesus raised him from the dead,
and they thought, We need to figure out what to do about this.
And so, it says in John 11, 47, Then gathered the chief priests
and the Pharisees a council and said, What do we? For this man
doeth many miracles. If we let him thus alone, all
men will believe on him. And the Romans shall come and
take away both our place and nation. And one of them, named
Caiaphas, being the high priest that same year, said to them,
You know nothing at all. Now listen to these words, "...nor
consider that it is expedient for us that one man should die
for the people, and that the whole nation perish not." And
this he spake not of himself, but being high priest that year,
he prophesied that Jesus should die for that nation. And not
for that nation only, but listen, But that also he should gather
together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad. brought to the Lord Jesus Christ,
before they were converted, before they knew Him, He died for them
and gathered them. They were scattered. They were
His children before, but He brought them. He died for them and brought
them to Himself. And so Joseph was cast into the
pit. He was taken. He was made a servant in Potiphar's
house, falsely accused, sent to prison, just like the Lord
Jesus Christ was falsely accused. delivered to the Gentiles by
the Jews in order to be crucified. And in his crucifixion, he saved
his people." When Joseph's brethren came to him, they were afraid
of him at first. And he made himself strange.
But he loved them the whole time. Though everything they did to
him was out of hatred, yet he loved them. There wasn't a time
here in all this event where it says Joseph ever thought to
get back at his brethren, nor did he ever seek vengeance against
them. They constantly doubted his love
for them, and yet he never failed to love them. at the end of his
life, after his father Jacob died, they came to him and said,
Now, while our father was alive, he told us that you should not
hold us for the crimes that we did to you. And he wept, because
they still didn't believe him. And he says, Am I in God's stead
to do this, to bring this back upon you?" He says, but you meant
it for evil, but God meant it for good. And so we see in the
life of Joseph, the Lord Jesus Christ throughout, the sufferings
of Christ and the glory that should follow. We see him suffering
for his brethren, and his sufferings for his brethren was their salvation. They didn't know it. They didn't
know when they took him in hatred and threw him into the pit and
sold him into slavery that they were accomplishing the will of
God, which would be for their salvation. This is amazing. And so he speaks of this in verses
7 and following about how they would bow down to him. You see,
God has saved His people by one man. God has exalted one man, the
Lord Jesus Christ. He's the Son of God, the God-Man. He exalted Him because He did
His will, and that will was to save His people from their sins.
They're called the sons of Jacob. They're the ones God chose from
eternity to an eternal salvation, and He accomplished it by His
own work on the cross. And that's Joseph. These are
the generations of Jacob. Joseph. When we think of Joseph,
we think of one who did no wrong, one who suffered at the hands
of his brethren, was hated by them and envied by them, and
yet his sufferings were for them. And his love for them was such
that he never held it against them. He did it all according
to the will of God, in submission to God's will, always trusting
God to do his will, and he never once did anything wrong. And
that's the way he was their Savior. God, when he came to Pharaoh,
Pharaoh gave him the highest place. Look at this in chapter
41. Chapter 41 of Genesis. It says, In verse 37, the thing was good
in the eyes of Pharaoh after Joseph told Pharaoh his dream,
suggested what he should do. In verse 38, Pharaoh said to
his servants, Can we find such a one as this is, a man in whom
the Spirit of God is? And who is it of all the people
in all the world ever had the Spirit of God without measure?
the Lord Jesus Christ. John 3.34, John the Baptist said,
God doesn't give the Spirit by measure to him. Here it is in
verse 38. And then it says in verse 39
of Genesis 41, And Pharaoh said to Joseph, For as much as God
has showed thee all this, there's none so discreet and wise as
thou art. Who is the wisdom of God? Isn't
it the Lord Jesus Christ? 1 Corinthians 1.24, he's the
power of God and the wisdom of God. And verse 40 says, Thou
shalt be over my house, and according to thy word shall all my people
be ruled. Only in the throne will I be
greater than thou. And Pharaoh said to 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 the vesture of fine linen, and put a gold chain
about his neck, and made him to ride in the second chariot
which he had. And they cried before him, Bow
the knee! And they made him ruler over
all the land. And Pharaoh said to Joseph, I
am Pharaoh. Without thee shall no man lift
up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt." And in verse
46, He goes on, but anyway, so my point is that you can see
how God exalted Joseph. Here he is ruling over Pharaoh's
house and all the land of Egypt. All the people in all the lands
where the famine were came to Joseph to buy bread. If anyone
was going to do anything in all the land of Egypt, they had to
go to Joseph to find out if they could do it. Jesus Christ is
the Lord of heaven and earth. All power, he said to his disciples,
is given to me in heaven and in earth. Whatever is done, is
done by his will and at his word, by his command. And that is our
salvation. There's no salvation but in Him.
And because of His will, we are saved. Because of His work, we
are saved. When the leper came to Jesus
and said, Lord, if you will, you can make me clean. What did
Jesus say? I will. Be thou clean. You see, it's good news. It's
good news that Christ has revealed our sin to us that we might go
to Him hungry as beggars, sinners, needing grace, having no merit,
no righteousness of our own. And yet God has said, but look
at my son. All of his obedience unto death
is the righteousness credited to the account of his people.
All of their sins were laid on him and he bore them all by himself
and purged them from their sins. Took away the wrath of God, satisfied
God's law, honored God's law, and did it all by himself. And
that's why he's exalted to the throne of glory and given all
power. So that he might save them to the uttermost by himself. This is the Lord Jesus Christ,
our Joseph. Now, look back one more time
at Genesis 37. These are the generations of
Jacob, Joseph. When God speaks of his people,
he speaks of one man, the Lord Jesus Christ. When God views
the Lord Jesus Christ, he sees his people. He sees in them. He sees Christ's righteousness
on them. Remember how his father arrayed
him in a coat of many colors? This is the garments of salvation. In Isaiah 61.10 it's called the
garments of salvation. And it says in Psalm 45, all
the king's daughters are clothed in these beautiful garments because
they're his daughters. We are the people of God and
God clothes us in the beauty of Christ. His obedience unto
death. His love from the heart. Our
sins were born by Him and taken away. When God looks at His Son,
He sees His people. And when God looks for His people,
He sees His Son. And that's why He names just
one, the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's the most wonderful
truth of all of Scripture, that God sees us in His Son, and He
looks no further than His Son, and He teaches sinners in all
of the nakedness of their need, in the helplessness of their
need, in the foulness and perverseness of all we are, He says, look
to Christ, see in Him what God sees in Him, that He sees nothing,
no sin in Him, and He sees no iniquity in Jacob, because He
sees no sin in Christ. And He blesses him, and none
of the sons of Jacob are consumed, because they're His children.
Let's pray.