Let's go back to the book of
Genesis this evening as we continue our study. And this is a continuation
of last week's message of Joseph and his brethren. And so this
is Joseph and his Brethren, Part 2. Earlier we saw in the 41st
chapter three times that Joseph told Pharaoh that there would
be seven years of great harvest, seven years of plenty, and then
that would be followed by seven years of famine, seven years
of dearth. But he also made certain that
this king understood that the seven years of plenty and seven
years of famine would be brought by God This is the Lord who's
going to do it. The same God who gave to Joseph
understanding of the dreams, of his own dreams, of the dreams
of the chief of the butler and the chief of the bakers, the
one who gave him understanding of those dreams, and the one
who gave him understanding of Pharaoh's dreams. This is the
God who's going to bring about the time of plenty and the time
of dearth. And I just want you to look back
at chapter 41 and notice how Joseph, he makes certain that
this man knows without a question that the one who will send the
days of feasting, the days of abundance of harvest, and the
one who's going to send the days, the years of dearth, of famine,
that's God. It's the Lord of glory. Look
at chapter 41, verse 25. And notice how, once again, three
times he insists this is God doing it. Chapter 41, verse 25. And Joseph said unto Pharaoh,
The dream of Pharaoh is won. God hath shown Pharaoh what he
is about to do. Pharaoh, you need to understand,
the dreams that you have dreamed God gave them to you. And He
gave them to you to just show you exactly what He is going
to do. Once again, notice in verse 28.
This is the thing which I have spoken unto Pharaoh. What God
is about to do, He showeth or He reveals unto Pharaoh. And this is not the God that
one of the gods that Pharaoh worshipped. He worshipped Ra
and any number of other gods. He worshipped various animals
and such things as the Egyptians did because they worshipped multiple
deities, but they were all false gods. But Joseph is quick to
tell him, God gave you these dreams to show you what He's
going to do. And then notice again in verse
32. And for that the dream was doubled
unto Pharaoh twice. It is because the thing is established
by God and God will shortly bring it to pass. He just insists that
Pharaoh understand this, that he gets a grasp of this. This
is not one of the false gods of Pharaoh who really could do
nothing. This is the God of the heaven
and the earth. This is the God who does all
of His pleasure. The reason all of this is going
to happen is because God's going to do it. Now watch this. He
wasn't doing this, the seven years of great plenty. He wasn't doing that for the
benefit of Pharaoh or for the benefit of the Egyptians. They were the enemies of the
Lord. They were the enemies of God's people. This is to fulfill God's purpose,
which was threefold. Number one, all of this will
happen to set forth glorious pictures of our Savior in Joseph. This is not for Pharaoh's benefit. Oh, they're going to have seven
years of plenty, seven years of an abundant harvest. But it's
not for Pharaoh's benefit. It's not that he's going to get
good out of this. Oh, he will, but that's, you
see, he's getting like the overflow of the good. The good is for
God's people. It's just God's provision for
His covenant people. And this is the purpose of God
being fulfilled because God, number one, is setting forth
glorious pictures of our Savior in Joseph. And secondly, the
Lord is going to do all of this in order to fulfill His promises
made to Abraham to bring His seed into Egypt. And there they'd
become a great nation. And there they would remain for
400 years. The Lord is going to remove Jacob
and his family, and He's going to put them in Egypt. And at
that time when they got there, there was only 70 of them. We'll
learn that a little later in the book of Genesis. But He takes
them into Egypt so that they could become a great nation,
a great people. And they would be under the most
favorable circumstances for a good many years. and they would grow. And then later, God would bring
them back into the land of Canaan when a great nation had been
established. Now as this story unfolds, things
would not have gone this way had the Jews been in control.
But remember, the Jews weren't in control. That is, the Israelites
weren't in control. Jacob was not in control. This
is the Lord's doings. This is the Lord who says to
us in Isaiah chapter 55, for my thoughts are not your thoughts.
Neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens
are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your
ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." If there was a better way for
this to have been done, God would have done it another way. This
was to him the way he appointed and the wisest, most correct
way and path for Israel to finally arrive as a great nation. And
then here's the third thing. The third thing, the reason that
God is doing all this, certainly in pictures, we see pictures
of our Savior in Joseph. We see this is the fulfillment
of the promises of God to Abraham. But thirdly, this is all happening
the way it unfolds in order that the Lord would teach His people
many, many lessons. Think of it. If the Egyptian
bondage had been omitted in Israel's history. Let's say that they
stayed in Canaan. They didn't go into Egypt. They
stayed in Canaan. Oh, how much of the history of
Israel would be lost, would never have happened. Think of it. There would have been no Passover
lamb. In fact, there would have been
no Moses being educated in Egypt. There would have been no passage
through the Red Sea, which pictures one way of safety. Our Lord Jesus. There would have been no manna
from heaven. There would have been no water
from a rock. There would have been no giving
of the law of God at Mount Sinai. There would have been no institution
of the tabernacle. All of those things that are
unfolding. There would have been no brazen
serpent raised up in the wilderness. the sinfulness of Israel would
not have been as manifestly brought forth if they had just stayed
in the land of Canaan. It's out in the wilderness where
they showed themselves to be, in great majority, just unbelievers. But also, another thing, through
the Egyptian experience, and all the things that happened
in the wilderness, they beheld the faithfulness of God, notwithstanding
their own unfaithfulness." Oh, their history is rich. It's full of teaching, full of
instruction. This is the way it was ordained
to be. Did it mean hardships for Israel? Well, of course it did. Jacob and his family there in
the land of Canaan, they're feeling the effects of the famine. Later
on, of course, they'll all wind up in Egypt and things will go
great for a number of years, but then things are gonna be
very difficult. But that was good for them. It
was good for them to see how utterly dependent they were on
God. And you see, David said, it's
what he said in the psalm, it was good for me that I be afflicted,
that I might learn thy statutes. I learned your faithfulness.
You see, how is it that we learn that the promises of God are
true and we can absolutely trust Him and rely on Him? How do we
learn that? It's when we put the promises
to the test. And then we find out our God
is faithful. He always keeps His word. Here's Joseph. He alone knows
the purpose of God and Joseph alone could reveal the secrets
of God. Just as our Lord Jesus is the
revealer of God and He's the revealer of the secrets of the
Father to His people. He even said this in Matthew. He said to the Father, our Lord
said this to the Father, Thou hast hidden these things from
the wise and the prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes,
even so, Father, but so it seemed good in Thy sight. The hidden
things of God have to be revealed to us. Doesn't matter how smart
you are, how high your IQ is, Certainly appreciate whatever
degree of intelligence God has given you. Whatever degree of
mental acuity that God has blessed you with. But know this, all
of that mental acuity, all of your high IQ, whatever it is,
all of your amount of intelligence, they don't help you when it comes
to spiritual things. The Gospel of God's grace has
to be revealed. The Lord has to reveal Himself
to us. We're very much in the dark.
We need the hidden things of God to be disclosed to us, made
known to us. We need our Savior to do for
us what He did for the disciples on the road to Emmaus. Then opened
He their understanding that they might understand His Word. Know this, you can't understand
the Word of God apart from the Spirit of God being your teacher. He's got to be the revealer of
truth. Certainly Joseph now has been
exalted from his state of humiliation. But he pictures our Savior who
is so much more exalted from His state of humiliation. Our
Lord from the womb to the tomb was exalted from His state of
humiliation. is set at the right hand of the
Father, having all dominion and all power over all things. Our
Lord Jesus reigns. He earned the right to do that
by His sacrifice upon the cross of Calvary. He did the work God
gave Him to do. He saved His people. And God
said, I make you Lord. Set at My right hand. Run everything. It's all under Your authority.
govern all things for my glory and for the good of my people. And just like Pharaoh had men
going before Joseph's chariot saying, bow the knee, bow the
knee, so God's preachers go before our Lord Jesus Christ. And we
say, He's the Lord of glory. Bow the knee. Bow the knee. So Joseph now is seated upon
the throne. Seven years of plenty come and
go. And then seven years of famine.
The time of dearth hits the land of Canaan. And Jacob hears the
good news. There's bread in Egypt. And he
sends his son for bread. He tells his sons, go into Egypt. Go into Egypt. by bread. And I tell you, you who are without
the Lord Jesus, should there be anybody like that here tonight
or anybody who's watching, and you're without the Savior, there's
an urgency to this. Go to Joseph. Go to Christ Jesus. And go now. Don't delay. Today's
the day of salvation. You see, the gospel is not an
offer. The gospel is a command. It demands
obedience. The King says to you, come to
Me. Come to Me. Will you continue
in your rebellion? or will you come to Him? Well,
Brother Barnard, those of you who have heard him, those of
you who have read some of his books, he preached for a verdict. We're not talking about a little
light religious decision. We're talking about a verdict.
I think about when Laban, after the servant of Abraham, he's
searching for a bride for Isaac, And it all comes down to Rebecca. And Laban says, wilt thou go
with this man? It's time for a verdict. What
are you going to do? And I said to you, what are you
going to do? You're going to sit there in your sinfulness,
in your rebellion, content to go to hell? Or will you run to
Christ Jesus who's the bread of life? There's an urgency here. Jacob said to his brethren, why
do you look one upon another? Why do you delay? There's good
news, there's corn in Egypt. Go now! That's what we say to
people. Flee to Christ Jesus now. It's
not an invitation, it's a command. A command. But you know what? I tell you
something I noticed as I read this again and again. You know,
the first 10 verses, the word by is used five times. Even Jacob uses it. He uses it. Buy. Look at verse 2. Jacob said, Behold, I have heard
there is corn in Egypt. Get you down thither and buy
for us. Buy for us. He goes on to say
this. Look at verse 3 and I'll just
read these. Joseph's ten brethren went down
to buy corn in Egypt. But Benjamin, Joseph's brother,
he stayed behind. Verse 5, And the sons of Israel
came to buy corn among those that came, for the famine was
in the land of Canaan. Joseph was the governor, and
he it was that sold to all the people of the land. And Joseph's
brethren came, and they bowed themselves down with their faces
to the earth. And Joseph knew them, but they
didn't know him, and they came to buy. Look at verse 10. They said to Him, No, my Lord,
we've come to buy food. And let me tell you something.
The natural man has this idea he's got to purchase something
from God. Either by his good intentions,
or his free will, or being good, or there's some kind of prerequisite
that God demands, some kind of precondition. I've got to buy
this, I'll be as good as I can, and Lord, I promise I'll do this,
I'll do that, I'll do something else. There are no preconditions
to be met, no prerequisites. Come now, just as you are. I like what Brother Scott Richard
said. He said, come to Christ and don't
move a muscle. Don't move a muscle. It's coming
in your heart. It's coming in your soul. You say, Jim, doesn't the Lord have
to draw? Well, you know He does. You know
He does. And yet at the same time, there's
an urgency upon us. Come now. Come now. Today is the day of salvation. These poor men thought of buying
corn. What could they give Joseph?
He had everything. He's at the right hand of Pharaoh. Let me tell you something, you
can't buy Christ, you can't bribe Christ. This salvation is a free gift. You know what God says in Hosea?
I will love them, you know what the next word is? Freely. We
have a hard time getting a hold of that. We still think, well,
but I've got to do something freely. Do you understand? Freely,
without a reason in you. Romans chapter 3, being justified
freely. by His grace through the redemption
that is in Christ Jesus. All of the buying was done by
the Savior. All of the paying of the price
was paid by the Lord Jesus. He paid to God's justice everything
His people owed. Keep your money in your pocket
when it comes to the salvation of God. Not your works, not the labors
of your hands. It's a free gift. For the wages
of sin, oh, there are wages to sin, but it's death. But the
gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. What's
it going to cost me? How do you like free? Who doesn't
like something that's free? Costs you nothing. And yet in another sense, it'll
cost you everything you got. Isn't that true? It'll cost us
everything we've got because we own Him as our Lord. Well,
let me give you a few things here real quick. Joseph knew
his brethren, but they didn't know him. We talked about that
last week. In verse 8, Joseph knew his brethren,
but they knew him not. It's sad that our Creator and
our Sustainer, our Lord and the only Savior of sinners, came
into this world, and when He came, people didn't receive Him. They didn't welcome Him. They
didn't know Him. But He knew His people. He's always known His people.
The Lord knoweth them that are His. He always has and He always
will. But we won't know Him till He
introduces Himself to us. That's what He has to do. And
it's a personal revelation to our hearts. We find out who He
is and what He did and why He did it and where He is now. But you know, then Joseph did
something else. Here's the second thing for tonight.
Joseph put his brethren in prison. Isn't that interesting? He said,
notice this, look at verse 17. And he put them all together
in ward three days. Put them in prison. Of course, Joseph had no intention
of destroying them. But they needed some time to
reflect. Some time to think about what
they had done. See, they're still defending
their self-righteousness. In fact, they said this in verse
11. And here's the way the natural man is. We're all one man's son. We're true men. Hey, I'm not
a sinner. I'm a true man. That's what they
said. They're defending themselves.
We're not spies. We're not against you. And they
kept on saying that. So Joseph, he tosses them in
the brig. He's going to jail for a while.
And they're in prison three days. Three days. Three days, that's
resurrection. That's a picture of resurrection.
And those three days, they served a good purpose. Because notice this, on that
third day, look at verse 21. And this is like when the Lord
quickens us, then we realize we've wronged God. We're sinful,
but we're in trouble. On the third day, look at this,
verse 21. And they said one to another, we are verily guilty
concerning our brother. Oh, now they're troubled. 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." I tried to tell you all that's what he said.
I tried to tell you, but you wouldn't listen to me. But there was somebody outside
the jail cell listening. Verse 23, they knew not that
Joseph understood them. He's out there listening. Because
he had spoken to them through an interpreter. And he turned himself about from
them and he cried. He wept. And then He returned
to them again and communed with them. And then He took from them
Simeon and bound them before their eyes." I'll tell you, on the third day,
their sin gripped their hearts. We've been wrong. And I'll tell
you what. When the Lord quickens us, we
very quickly are brought to see and know. We've rebelled against
the Lord, our God. We've sinned against... We're
in trouble. We're in trouble. And it takes the resurrecting
authority and power of God to bring us, to wake us up from
our sleep of death and to show us we're in real trouble. And I'm telling all of you, I'm
telling you folks at home who are watching, we're in trouble
by nature. We're in trouble with God. You
know, we're not in trouble with the law of the land. Hopefully,
we're all law-obeying people, law-abiding people. We're not
in trouble with the law of the land, but we're in trouble with
God. We've sinned against Him. He sent His Son into this world
and we crucified Him and got His blood dripping from our hands.
What are we going to do? Our only hope is that the one
we sin against will do something for us. I'm not asking any of you to
do anything for God. I'm asking God to do something
for us. He's got to do that. And then thirdly, Joseph taught
his brethren a lesson about salvation by grace alone. It's a hard lesson for us to
learn, that the gifts of God can't be bought. He's going to have his entire
family come to him. But you can't buy your way in
this family. You have to be brought. And He willingly brings us to
receive Christ as our prophet, priest, and king. Our Lord will
do whatever it takes to bring us unto Himself, to bring all
of His family unto His Son. Joseph didn't want their money.
In fact, we read, look at verse 25, Joseph commanded to fill
their sacks with corn and to restore every man's money into
his sack. Put their money in there. I don't
want their money. To give them provision for the
way. And thus he did unto them, and
they laded their asses with the corn, and they departed thence.
And as one of them opened his sack to give his ass provender
in the end, he espied his money, for behold, it was in the sack's
mouth. And he said to his brother, my
money is restored. I got a refund. Everything I
paid, I got back. He don't want your money. It's
like Simon the sorcerer in the book of Acts. Peter said, your
money will perish with you. You think the gifts of God can
be bought? You think God can be bribed?
Not by money, not by your works, not by your attitude, not by
your promises. He can't be bribed or bought.
He can't be. Because that way, you'd get a
little bit of the credit. You're not going to get any credit.
This is going to be salvation gratuitously given to you. Freely. It's a gift. No strings attached. Preacher, you preach like that
and man, your people will go out and they'll just live any
old way they want to. That's nonsense. That's nonsense. Tell you what, when this gets
a hold of your heart that God saves sinners freely, freely
by His grace, freely through the redemption that is in Christ
Jesus, you'll say, oh, this is a glorious Savior! Help me to
honor Him every single day. Not to pay for anything. It's just I just want to render Obedience to Him because I love
Him. Love's the strongest motivator there is. So, verse 29, go quick. They came to Jacob their father
unto the land of Canaan, told them all that befell them, saying,
The man who is the Lord of the land... Oh, that's who he is
to us. He's a picture of the Lord of
the land. Joseph is. He spake roughly to
us. He does that in conviction. He took us for spies of the country. And we said unto Him, we're true
men. We're not spies. We be twelve
brethren, sons of our Father. One is not, and the youngest
is this day with our Father in the land of Canaan. And the man,
the Lord of the country, said unto us, Hereby shall I know
that you are true men. Leave one of your brethren here
with me, that was Simeon, and take food for the famine of your
households, and be gone, and bring your youngest brother unto
me. Then shall I know that you are
not spies, but that you are true men. So will I deliver you and
your brother, and ye shall traffic in the land. Tell Jacob all this. Dad, he
didn't want our money. He didn't want our money. What
kind of Lord over the land is this? He said, here's your money
back. There's a wonderful verse of
Scripture and some of you probably it's already crossed your mind.
Isaiah 55 verse 1. And I've just got to read this
to you. Isaiah chapter 55 and verse 1. Isaiah 55-1. Ho! Alas! Take notice! Listen up! He says, Ho! Isaiah 55-1. Ho! Everyone that thirsteth,
hump ye to the waters. And he that hath no money..." Is that you? You're broke. Don't have anything. What are
you going to offer God? What can you give God that He
don't already have? He made everything. He owns everything. In fact, you own nothing. When
you die, it will all be left behind. He owns everything. He that hath no money, come ye
buy and eat. In other words, it's free. Yea,
come buy wine and milk without money and without price. Here's water for the thirsty.
Water, the water of the Word, purifies. The water of life refreshes. It renews. Drink and drink again. from the waters of the well of
salvation. Here's bread to the hungry. That's
the nourishment of life. Christ is the bread come down
from heaven. Here's wine. Wine, that's the
symbol of joy to the mourner. Wine, which the scripture says
makes the heart merry. This is the golden elixir of
the gospel. It makes the poor sinner happy. He's gloriously happy because
he sees God saved me by the death of somebody else. And he's always
loved me. And I make no contributions.
Good things, I don't have anything to contribute. And there's milk. Milk, that's
the symbol of strength. Satisfaction, consolation to
the weak and to the weary. This is a call to all who are
spiritually needed to come to Christ. Are you needed? Come
on to Him. Come on to Him. It's like our Lord speaking to
His disciples in John 21. They'd been out fishing, didn't
catch anything. He said, well, you need fish
on the other side of the boat. They caught so many fish, their
necks practically broke. They come into shore, they're
all tired. He said, have you eaten? They
said, no. He said, I got supper ready. I'm not asking you to bring the
bread. I'm not asking you to bring the fish. All things are
ready. And he said, come and dine. Come
and dine. And that's what I say to you.
All things are ready. Come and dine. All you need is an appetite.
And the Lord will have to give you that. He'll have to give
you an appetite for this gospel. I said, we're like Mephibosheth. David said, is there anybody
in the house of Saul who's still living? He said, yeah, Jonathan's
got a boy, but his nurse dropped him and he's lame on both feet.
David said, go fetch him. And they fetched Mephibosheth.
They brought me with Philip the chef in, and David said, I'll
tell you what I'm going to do for you. I'm going to put you
at my dinner table. You're going to eat breakfast,
lunch, and dinner every day at my table, at my expense. It'll cost you nothing. That's
what the Lord does for us. He feeds us of the bread of life. He gives us the water of life.
It's all of the Lord. Don't be tempted to think that
you can do something for the Lord prior to your salvation
that will kind of get God's attention. No. That's works. That's works. I'll tell you, God doesn't save
people because they're good people. He saves people who are needy
people. Anybody needy here? I am! Here I am, Lord! I need you! Here I am. He says, come to me, I'll give
you rest. God doesn't save people because
they're good, because there's none good, no not one. He saves helpless people. He
doesn't save people because they're smart and intelligent. People who believe sovereign
grace are accused of being too heady, too intellectually minded. All that I know about the gospel,
the Lord taught me, that don't make us arrogant. And as for
myself, I'm not a theologian. I don't claim to be a theologian. In fact, I don't think I even
know a real theologian. I'm just a simple country preacher.
What's that say? I'm a corn-and-tater-row preacher. Just set it out simply. I don't
use big flashy words. I'm not an auditor. I don't read
a theological paper to challenge your minds. I'm preaching somebody
to needy people. And I pray that God will cause
people to know how needy they are. And they'll run to Christ
Jesus because He's drawing them. Now, of course, I put no premium
upon spiritual ignorance. God teaches us. He teaches us. Let me tell you something. He
doesn't save us because of how much we know. And even now, that's
not the important thing. How much do you know, preacher?
Well, I don't know much, but I know Him who is everything.
How's that? Is that okay? I know Him. It's not how much you know, it's
who you know. Well, here's the last thing.
Joseph sent his brethren on their way and they get home. And they
tell their daddy what's happened. Verse 35, let me just read this
and I'll quit. It came to pass as they emptied
their sacks, that behold, every man's bundle of money was in
his sack. And when both they and their
father saw the bundles of money, They were afraid. And Jacob their father said unto
them, Me, ye have bereaved of my children. Joseph is not. In other words, he thinks Joseph
is dead. He has no idea that the man that
his sons stood before was Joseph. He thinks he's dead. Joseph is
not in, Simeon is not. He's shackled back in Egypt. And you will take Benjamin away? Now you want to take my youngest
son? All these things are against me. How many times have you thought
that? Everything's against me. It's
stacking up against me, preacher. Who can be against you if God's
for you? That's what Paul says in Romans
8. If God be for us, who can be against us? And Reuben spake
unto his father saying, he said, go ahead and slay my two sons
if I bring him not to thee. Deliver him into my hand and
I'll bring him to thee again. And Jacob said, my son shall
not go down with you, for his brother is dead and he's left
alone. If mischief befall him by the
way in the which he go, then shall you bring down my gray
hairs with sorrow to the grave. Jacob. You know why he's in this
kind of shape? He forgot the promises of God. That's right. Let me give you
one more passage of Scripture. Look with me back in Genesis
28. I was going to quit right there, but I'm going to read
this. He lost sight of what God told
him. And I tell you, when we work
ourselves up into a frenzy and get upset, It's then that we
lose sight of all the promises of God which are yea and which
are amen in Christ. We lose sight of the promises.
And that's what happened to Jacob. And you want to say to him, Hey
Jacob! Don't you remember what the Lord
told you back in chapter 28 of Genesis? Look at chapter 28 verse 1. And Isaac called Jacob. and blessed
him, and charged him, and said unto him, Thou shalt not take
a wife of the daughters of Canaan? Arise, go to Padan-aram, to the
house of Bethuel thy mother's father, and take thee a wife
from thence of the daughters of Laban thy mother's brother.
And God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply
thee, that thou mayest be a multitude of people. and give thee the
blessing of Abraham to thee, and to thy seed with thee, that
thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger which
God gave unto Abraham. And Isaac sent away Jacob, and
he went to Padan-Aram unto Laban son of Bethuel the Syrian, the
brother of Rebekah, Jacob's and Esau's mother." And Jacob, Have
you forgot the promises of God? And when I find myself fretting, worrying, do you ever worry about things
that hadn't ever happened? Well, we do that. And then it's like the Lord just,
Gives me a little shake and says, have you forgot my promises?
And you know what I have to say? Yes. Yes, I have. And I'm sorry again. And I'm
thankful the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, goes on cleansing
me from all sin. Next week, next Wednesday, we'll
talk about a surety. for Benjamin. Assurity for Benjamin. All right, let's pray.