It always was. Think about that for a second.
Now I can be honest, and there's some Sundays that are like, ugh,
Sunday. Why? Because we posture and pretend
sometimes in our own minds that, you know, yes, we love to worship.
We love to be in the assembly. And even when we don't want to
be, when we get here, God does a work and it changes us. It
helps us to express the gratitude that we have to him for the gospel
and for the work that he's done through Jesus Christ and for
the work that he's doing in us through his word and then together.
And there's always a blessing. But to sit there and say that
it's always your favorite day, is really just nonsense. Why? Because it's also the hardest
day. It's the hardest day. It's got the most spiritual warfare.
You get up, you know, six days a week and things, you know,
you're going to have trials, you're going to have problems, whatever. But Sunday,
it's almost like you feel the worst. You think the worst. Your
kids act the worst. You know, your spouse starts
an argument. I mean, it's the way it is. And
so why can't we just be honest about things like that? Why can't
we say, you know what? I enjoy Sundays most of the time. Because I'm not the type of person
that does anything authentically in my own brain. It's like, that's
not right. That's not the way it's supposed
to be. Let me make myself perfect. So we lie to ourselves. We lie
to ourselves and we say, no, it is the greatest thing in the
world when we know good and well that we have times where it's
not even a fondness. Does that say, well, you know
what? My wife, my husband, my children, I love them more than
anything in the world. That's a lie. I mean, quit lying.
I love them this moment because I feel this way. I express these
things and all of these emotions and the world and everything's
aligned in the cosmos. And it's just so perfect. And
I love them so much. But then there are moments we
go, I could kill them all. Oh, my God, he's a murderer.
I've told you all for years I'm a murderer. I've been telling
you that since the first time I ever stepped before some of
you over on Park Avenue 12 years ago. I'm a murderer. Get over it. You're still alive.
Nobody's died yet. It's okay. I've got a good track
record. But why do we do these things?
Why do we say that we love things the way we do and then we're
just not honest? Love is one of those things that,
as I've said before to myself and to you, is that it's an overused
expression. It's a misunderstood reality. It's something that if we're
not careful, we will malign the reality of what love is. and
we have in our culture. Love is what we feel, love is
what we experience, love blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah
blah, but in ultimate, the greatest theologian that ever lived in
the context of love is that, I think you said love is a verb
and that is a joke, okay. Love is a verb, but the greatest
theologian that ever lived, if y'all know what I'm talking about.
Love is action. Love is what one does in the
context of commitment covenant. based on passion, based on discipline,
based on affection. But listen, the attitude, the
actions and the affection ebb and flow, they wane, they come.
The feelings that come, the enmeshment that comes, the emotional attachment
that comes with things and circumstances and experiences is nothing but
a bunch of chemicals in our minds and our bodies rolling around,
and we're always wondering how we can not escape this amazing
feeling. And then if we're emotional,
if we're in a place where our emotions are controlling our
thoughts and then that is controlling our actions, we can really find
ourselves seeking after things that are not necessarily good
for us. And then we can mistake what
love is and isn't with what we're doing. So I want to ask the question. When the word of God says in
Ephesians that in love God predestined us, Love God saved us And when God the Son speaks to
John of the speaks to Nicodemus in John 3 when he says that God
loved the world in this way When John writes his first epistle
he says God is love Do we really understand what
that means Do we look at it and really find a way to live that
to live in that And yes, off the top of my head, I could get
an 18-point sermon, and I could give you four ways to next week
on how to apply love in your life, 18 ways of which the scripture
teaches us this is prudent, and honestly, probably write a poem
to boot. And we're all, oh my God, that's
the greatest thing in the world. I loved the message today. No,
you didn't. You felt some things in the message
today that you'll probably feel when you have that nice meal
afterward. Just a different context. And so I'm gonna give you the
ending of my sermon, the application in the expression so that when
we go through this text in the Old Testament, we're going to
be in Genesis 37, we're going to be in Genesis 39, 41, and
45. Not all of them at once. I'm going to tell you the story,
I'm not going to read all that to you. So my hope today is for you to
understand that love, some of you who follow me on social media,
you see these thoughts as I work through my week. But when the
Bible tells us that in love God, it is not about the inner sense
in which God feels. It's not even about the actions
that God does. It's not the manner in which
He loves, it's the marrow from which He loves. Now what is marrow? Marrow is that stuff that's in
the center of your bones. And inside your bones, the marrow
in your bones, is rich. It has things that your body
needs. It has codes in there and stuff
that we've just in the last short time of history have been able
to look at and understand and unpack. And what's amazing is
those little things like DNA and all this other stuff that
when we unpack it, there's smaller levels to see. There's more amazing
things to understand. But knowing love is not about
digging down to the microscopic. It's not about having a full
knowledge and a full understanding of everything and being the greatest
mind when it comes to understanding love. And knowing and experiencing
love is not about really exercising the application of love in our
understanding to the point that the world looks on and goes,
oh my gosh, that's the most loving person ever. which if I had to
put an epitaph on my grave, I want it to say one thing. Compassionate. Isn't that great? Nah. It doesn't matter what it
says. It doesn't matter what it says.
What it needs to say is resting. If you've not written your obit,
you need to write it. I've done it twice this year.
I know that's morbid, but it really puts things in perspective.
Shoot me. I'm a poet. A weirdo. Experiencing love and knowing
love really is about taking a deep breath in and beholding it and
resting. being vulnerable without fear,
being naked without shame, being full but still eating, being
satisfied. That's what it's about. And the
Christian world has made it frou-frou silliness or dogma to the point
that it becomes an anchor at the bottom of the Marianas Trench,
one of the deepest places in the sea. and we're drowning or we're starving. But beloved, I found a way of
seeing and beholding. I found the positive side of
drowning. of really just embracing the
resting place of Christ and the gospel, embracing it in such
a way that you really fall into Christ, into baptism, into his
death, into his life, into his fullness, and you just inhale,
and then you can't breathe anything else in because your lungs are
full, your soul is full, your mind is full with the fullness
of Christ who fills all things. And it's like, teach me how,
people are like, teach me how. I can't teach you how, you have
to be there. And then tomorrow I can wake
up and it can all be dumped out, but that's okay. I know the well
from which it comes, and I know the Father who puts me there. See, there's the difference. So the end of the sermon is this. In 1 Corinthians 13, verse 8,
the Bible, Paul says, love never fails. And I've already quoted Ephesians
1, 4, and 5, where it says, in love, God predestined us for
adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ in accordance after the
counsel, if you will, of his will and the pleasure of his
will. I've said this, but I want to
emphasize it because it will be probably my closing thought.
in love is not merely the manner, but the very marrow or the core
from which our actions, attitudes, and affections flow. This love is the essence of God's
character. The idea that love never fails,
never gives up, never quits, is seen all through the scripture
with failing human beings, men and women, young and old, pretty
and ugly, Yet no one can ever succeed in
that but Christ. Love never giving up is the root
of true fulfillment. It is what makes us full. Knowing
that and breathing that in and resting in that reality and that
promise and that power is truly being full. Love does not run.
It does not hide. It remains and it rejoices till
the end. So the enduring unfailing love
that doesn't give up is the same love that enables us to be full.
And when we are full of the love of Christ, it is then we truly
overflow. And you see the piggyback from
last week. So that's the close. Now I wanna open in Genesis chapter
37. And I wanna look at the life
of Joseph. And I wanna think about Joseph in light of Christ,
in light of the love of God. In light of this true reality
that out of the marrow, love is found in the marrow. So, think
about it for a moment. In Genesis 37, Let's just read it. Jacob lived in the land of his
father's sojournings in the land of Canaan. These are the generations
of Jacob. Joseph, being 17 years old, was
pastoring the flock with his brothers. He was a boy with the
sons of Bilhah and Zilphah. or Zilpah, his father's wives.
And Joseph brought a bad report to them to their father. Now
Israel loved Joseph more than any of his sons, because he was
the son of his old age. And he made him a robe of many
colors. But when his brothers saw that
their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated
him, and they could not be peaceful to him. Now Joseph had a dream. And when he told it to his brothers,
they hated him even more. He said to them, hear this dream
that I've dreamt. Behold, we were binding sheaves
in the field, and behold, my sheave arose and stood upright.
And behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my
sheave. His brothers said to him, are
you going to reign over us? You bigger than us? You going
to jump bad, boy? So they hated him even more for
his dreams and for his words. Then he dreamed another dream
and told it to his brothers and said, behold, I've dreamt another
dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and even the stars were bowing
down to me. But when he told this to his
father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said,
what is this dream you've dreamt? Shall I and your mother and your
brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you? And
his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the
saying in mind. Now think about that for a second.
For us who have children, if one of them comes to us and says,
you know what, dad, you're gonna bow down to me one day, I mean,
the dental costs are gonna go up in the house. I'm joking. We're not taking
him to the dentist. And when things like that have
been said to older siblings, it's always a trial, it's always
a fight, it's always something that's about to go bad. But these
dreams, Joseph was just telling his family about these dreams. Now his brother, verse 12, went
to pastor their father's flock near Shechem. And Israel said
to Joseph, are you, are not your brothers pastoring the flock
at Shechem? Come, I'll send you to them.
And he said to them, here I am. So he said to him, go now, see
if it is well with your brothers and with the flock and bring
me word. So he sent him from the valley of Hebron. And he
came to Shechem. And a man found him wandering
the fields. And the man says, what are you seeking? He says,
I'm seeking my brothers. Tell me, please, where are they
pasturing the flock? And the man said, they've gone
away, for I've heard them say, let's go to Dothan. So Joseph went after
his brothers and found them at Dothan. They saw him from afar. Before he came near, they conspired
against to kill him. They said to one another, here
comes the dreamer. Let's kill him and throw him into one of
these pits. Then we'll say that a fierce animal devoured him,
and then we'll see what comes of his dreams. But when Reuben
heard it, he rescued him out of their hands, saying, let's
not take his life. And Reuben said to them, shed no blood,
throw him into the pit here in the wilderness, but don't lay
a hand on him, that he might rescue him out of their hand
to restore him to his father. So when Joseph came to his brothers,
they stripped him of his robe, the robe of many colors that
he wore. And they took him and threw him into a pit, and the
pit was empty, and there was no water in it. And they sat down to eat,
and looking up, they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead,
and their camels bearing gum, balm, and myrrh on their way
to carry it to Egypt. And Judah said to his brothers,
What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood?
Let's sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon
him, for he is our brother, our own flesh. And his brothers listened
to him. So the Midianite traders passed by, and they drew Joseph
up, lifted him out of the pit, and sold him to the Ishmaelites
for 20 shekels of silver. And they took Joseph to Egypt.
When Reuben returned to the pit and saw Joseph was not in the
pit, he tore his clothes. And he returned to his brothers,
this boy is gone, where shall I go? And they took Joseph's robe,
slaughtered a goat, dipped the robe in the blood. And they sent
the blood of many colors brought to their father and said, this
is what we found. Identify whether it is your son's robe or not.
And he identified it and said, this is my son's robe. A fierce
animal devoured him. Joseph is without doubt torn
into pieces. Then Jacob tore his own garments,
put sackcloth on his loins, and mourned for his son many days.
All his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he
refused to be comforted and said, No, I shall go down to Sheol
to my son mourning. Thus his father wept. Meanwhile,
the Midianites had sold him to Egypt to Potiphar, an officer
of Pharaoh, the captain of the guard. So here's Joseph. this
boy hated by those who supposedly love him, left for dead, sold
in the agony of his father. So here's this early years of
Joseph in the pit, right? Joseph in the pit. In Romans
chapter eight, verse 28, it's a problem. We know what that
says. And God calls us all things to
work for good for those who love him and are called according
to his purpose. Now, when Joseph was in the pit, could he rest
in that promise? And when Israel got the robe,
could he rest in that promise? No. He said he could, but he
didn't. He could, but he didn't. He said,
I'm going to go to the grave with him. Sheol hades. Not a place, it's just dead. It caused emotional trauma. I
mean, have you ever been thrown in a pit by your family, left
for dead, sold into slavery? Not me. I mean, it's felt like
that. Go to your room. I'm enslaved.
I mean, you know, it's felt like that. But it's not like that. The trauma
that these human beings went through in this context, and
not just that, imagine Reuben. Imagine his brothers waking up
every day for years, knowing what they'd done, knowing that
this boy was beloved and that if the truth came out, their
father would hate them and be justified. Probably have them
put to death according to the law and be justified legally But in this betrayal in this
trauma there's a truth that rings Remember Psalm 40 when it talks
about the pit And it says that we're in the pit and God will
bring us out. But while we're there he lends
his ear to us We need to remember that We need to remember that
in the pit, that's still the love of God performing. That's
still the love of God acting. That's still the love of God
investing. That's still the love of God that's active. It doesn't mean absence of purpose.
It doesn't mean that it's a wasted life. Beloved, when we find ourselves
in the pit, we find ourselves in a place for greater things. Now, what? What greater things? I mean, this betrayal? Being sold into slavery? Who
else does that sound like? Sounds like Jesus, right? Here's
Jesus being born into the world, the creator of the cosmos, being
born into the world as Messiah, Meshaic, Christ. And yet, what
does he have to do? He has to flee to Egypt. So here's
Joseph being taken under slavery to Egypt, and there's Jesus being
taken to escape death to Egypt. Joseph escaped death by going
to Egypt, Jesus escaped death by going to Egypt. You see the
parallels? What trauma? So when Paul writes
to the Hebrews and he says that our Savior, our Lord, in every
way has experienced everything that we've ever experienced in
the human emotion, in the human temptation, in the human trials,
He has. Jesus, the person, Jesus, the
boy, Jesus, the child, Jesus, the teenager, Jesus, the young
man, Jesus, the 30-year-old has experienced every emotional thing
that this world could ever encompass. but sinned not. He never failed
to rest in the midst of great pain and suffering. If we go to Genesis 39, he was
sold into Potiphar's household. Joseph had been brought down
to Egypt, and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, the captain of the
guard, an Egyptian, had brought him from the Ishmaelites, who
had brought him down there. The Lord was with Joseph. That's powerful. I mean, was Joseph walking around
with his spirit of fire on him and all this kind of stuff? No,
there was a sense in which Joseph was probably unconsciously with
the Lord. It wasn't sort of obvious like Moses,
hearing the voice of God, meeting God in the bush, meeting God
at the tempest on Sinai, meeting God and seeing the hand of God
and the fiery tornado and the tornado of smoke and all this
kind of stuff. Watching the miracles. But there
was an inner peace. There was an inner rest. There
was an inner hope. There was an inner trust. Joseph had an
opportunity to be bitter and vengeful. To exercise his rights under
justice. It was unjust. It was illegal
what was done. It was illegal. It was deplorable. It was wicked. But yet, the Lord
was with him. And he became a successful man. And he was in the house of his
Egyptian master. His master saw that the Lord was with him. I
wonder how. Let's just put it this way. I
think that Potiphar saw that the Lord was with Joseph because
Joseph wasn't shaken because of his circumstances. And he
probably said to himself, this boy serves me like he's my own
son. Like this is his house. He doesn't
speak ill of his brothers. He doesn't even concern himself
that he's my slave. I own him. He's my property. Look at him, he's just doing
the job as if this is his house. That is absolutely the reality
of it. How do you know? Because no one
puts someone who's haughty, frustrating, and entitled in charge of their
own house. Who puts who in charge of a house?
The one who treats it as their own. Now as Paul's writing the Hebrews,
start to ring a bell about Moses and Jesus. Now as it start to
ring a bell, what does it start to pop into your head and sort
of settle in your soul when you think about when Jesus says the
Son indeed will set you free? For who stays in the house? Is
it the slave? Absolutely not. The Son stays. The child stays. The adopted stays. In love, God predestined us for
adoption, to be children, sons and daughters of the living God,
that we may abide in the house and rule over it. Genesis chapter
one, chapter two. You see the picture? If you haven't
listened to my teaching in Genesis chapter one through three, do
it. Get the imagery of that poetry. So that the Old Testament starts
to make sense, because it is the outline of the Old Testament,
remember? And so we know the we know the
point. You know, you heard me say the ugly people and the handsome
people, the good looking people. And there is, because the Bible
says that Joseph was a very good looking guy. He was a handsome
guy. And he goes on to say. But the Lord blessed the Egyptians
house and for Joseph's sake, for Joseph's sake, for Joseph's
sake. The blessing of the Lord was
on all that he had in house and field, so Potiphar left all that
he had in Joseph's charge. He had no concern about anything
but the food he ate. Now, Joseph was handsome in form
and appearance. And after a time, his master's wife cast her eyes
on Joseph and said, Hey, what's happening? Sexy? What's happening?
Cutie? And he goes, Nah, that's not
happening. I'm a steward of this man's house,
and I'm not doing this. Everything he has put in my charge,
he is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back
anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How
then can I do this wickedness against God? And as she spoke
to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her. But one day
when he went into the house to do his work and none of the men
of the house was there, she caught him by the shirt. And she demanded him. But he tore away from her and
left his shirt in her hands. And what happens? She called
the men of the house and said, look, he's brought this Hebrew
among us to laugh at us. And he came in here and he did
this and he did that. I have his shirt as evidence. So they
put Joseph in prison. They put him in prison. Now, where's the parallel here?
Well, we know what happens. But think about Jesus. Think
about the life of Jesus all of a sudden in this context. I mean,
Jesus goes out into the temptation for 40 days. He's tempted. He's
tempted. Joseph is tempted. This is the
picture. This is why this was recorded. Not for us to say,
Joseph is such a good guy. Joseph wasn't a good guy. The
Lord was with Joseph. Let's stop there right now and
let's go ahead and let's be honest about good guys and bad guys
and good girls and bad girls. When someone overcomes temptation,
it's not because of their discipline, it's not because of their resolve,
it's not because of their morals, it's not because of their ethics,
it's not because they're good, it's because the Lord is with
them. And they can't say, I can't believe.
Because see, self-righteous people don't notice the Lord is protecting
them from things. And they go, I can't believe
sister so-and-so did this, that and the other. Or I can't believe
brother so-and-so said the things he said. I'd have never said
those. I'd have never. Don't ever say
what you wouldn't say, do or think. Because I will promise
you this. The more haughty we get in those
resolves, You will go to the doctor and say, why am I having
these thoughts in my head? Or you'll lie and pretend like
Sunday's my favorite day of the year. All of them. Just one big day. Just as Joseph was accused, Jesus
was accused. The importance of this is to
see That isolation and trial build
our character. Joseph could not go where he
was going had he not gone through what he went through. Jesus could not have gone to
the cross had he not suffered the way he suffered. He could
not sympathize with you had he not been tempted as you are tempted. And see, stop looking at temptation
as just the bad things that you think about. Look at temptation
as any time that you're not resting and secure in the love of God.
So how much temptation is in our lives? It's non-stop. It's constant. Sorry, didn't
mean to bust your bubble. But that's the reality, we are
not able to escape. And then we war, we talk. I was
telling one of my children yesterday that I have the most intimate
relationship that I've ever had with anybody is with myself.
Conversations, I remember being four having conversations with
me. And the clearer my mind gets
and the more focused I get about here and now, the more vivid
those memories become. Man, I've been saying the same
dumb stuff since I was four years old. Almost. 46 years. That's crazy. What do I expect? Joseph then as we see over in
chapter 41 We see that he interprets some prisoners dreams in chapter
40 and over in chapter 41 after two whole years See Joseph wasn't
put in prison for a couple of weeks and survived Joined the
gang kept him safe, you know about three months. He was there
for two years and there's some food issues there and some other
things there and we'll see that too, but after two years Pharaoh
dreamed a dream. And what did Joseph do? He just
interpreted dreams. God had gifted him that. He didn't
know that. He just understood them and said, this is what it
means. Look at that young boy telling us what our dreams mean.
And so Pharaoh has a dream and it scared him. And all of the magicians, and
all of the wise men, and all of the soothsayers, and all of
the doctors, and the lawyers, and the debaters could not interpret
the dream. But the chief cupbearer said
to Pharaoh, I remember my offenses today. When Pharaoh was angry
with his servants and put me on the chief baker in custody
in the house of the captain of the guard, we dreamt on the same
night, he and I, each having a dream of its own interpretation.
And he goes, verse 12 of chapter 41, a young Hebrew was there.
This young Hebrew boy, I remember very clearly, a servant of the
captain of the guard. See, because even in prison,
Joseph served as if it was his prison. I don't like that. I don't want
to emulate that, and I'm not going to apply that to my life,
so I'm not telling you to. I would love it to be true, but
I'm not going to lie. I'm not going to sit here and pretend
like every irritating person in the world, I'm going to try
to serve them. It is what I should do, but I'm not going to stand
here and tell you that. And I'm not even going to say shame,
shame, shame. There's no shame. We are who we are and God prepares
us. Out of all the prisoners, Joseph is the only one recorded
of being a servant. And we should be a servant to one another.
So serve who you can, where you are, as God's equipped you to
be. Quit trying to serve everybody. Sometimes I think my dissonance,
I needed to listen to that. I need to listen to my irritation
some, so that I wouldn't try to do everything for everybody
and in essence, do nothing for anybody. A young Hebrew. When we told him, he interpreted
our dreams, giving an interpretation to each man according to his
dream. And as he interpreted to us, so it came about. I was
restored to my office and the baker was hanged. Pharaoh said, go get that boy.
Go get that boy and bring him in here. And so they quickly brought him
out of the pit. And when he had shaved himself
and changed his clothes, he came before the Pharaoh. And Pharaoh
said to Joseph, I have a dream, and there's no one who can interpret
it. And I've heard you can, when you hear a dream, interpret it.
And Joseph answered Pharaoh, it is not me. God will give Pharaoh
a favorable answer. And Pharaoh said, okay, look
right here. In my dream, I was standing on the Nile, seven cows,
plump and fat, came up out of the Nile. and fed in the grass.
Seven other cows came up after them, poor and very ugly, such
as I'd never seen in the land of Egypt. And the thin, ugly
cows ate the first plump, fat cows. And when they had eaten
them, no one would have known what they had eaten them, for
they were still ugly as they started. Then I woke up, and
I saw in my dream seven ears growing on one stalk, good and
full, seven ears withered thin and blighted by the east wind,
sprouted after them, and thin ears swallowed up by the seven
good ears. And I told it to the magicians, but no one can explain
it to me. And Joseph said, the dreams of
Pharaoh are one. That means they have one meaning. God revealed
to Pharaoh what he is about to do. And the seven good cows are
seven good years, the seven ears are seven years, the dreams are
one. The seven lean and ugly cows
that came up after the seven are the seven years, and the
seven empty ears blotted by the east wind are also seven years
of famine. It is, as I told Pharaoh, God has shown to Pharaoh what
he's about to do. And he basically told him, there's
going to be seven years of plenty and there's going to be seven
years of famine. And if you don't have your act together, your
people are going to starve and everybody's going to die. And the Pharaoh afterwards said,
there's not a whole man like this ever to walk the grounds
that we live on, who is in the spirit of God. You shall be over my house, Joseph. Excuse me. You shall be over
my house, Joseph. I am the king of all Egypt and
all that my eyes see, I rule and you shall be my hand. I think about that. And he put him in that place,
reminds me of the temptation of Jesus, right? When the devil,
when the enemy took him up and took him out on the cliff of
Jerusalem and said, as far as you can see, I'll give you all
this if you bow down before me. Joseph didn't ask, Joseph didn't
grovel, Joseph just served and God established it. And it's
not even the point. God didn't do it because of Joseph's
servanthood. God calls to the servanthood
as the means through which God would put him in charge. Because it's not quid pro quo.
Love is not quid pro quo. If you do this, then I'll do
this. God is not. I mean, there are some conditional
promises that we see in the Old Testament, but this isn't one
of them. And those conditional promises
that we see in the Old Testament are always invalidated because
the people who said they would never did. Hence why Christ had to come. Why? This is God's divine timing. This is God's divine purpose.
This is God's love. Working. Acting. Living. But why? What was good for Joseph? What was God's purpose? This.
Chapter 41. I mean, chapter 45. I've got
to skip over. Well, there's a lot there. Let
me tell you the story. Famine starts. Joseph is in charge. He makes great preparation. He
puts things away. He rations. He prepares. And
when the famine comes, Egypt eats as though it had never seen
famine. The storehouses are full. But
the people are starving. So they go to Egypt. His brothers
come to Egypt to stand before the king, to beg for food because
their families are dying. Luke 15, the prodigal son. These
pictures, I mean, read the Bible. They'll come to you. And they don't know that it's
Joseph. They don't know that it's him because he's different.
He's older. He was a boy, you know, it's older. He's clean
shaven. He's probably got on Egyptian
regalia as a ruler. And in chapter 45, it says, Joseph
could not control himself before all those who stood to him. And
he cried, make everyone leave me. Have you seen TV, right? Get out. And everybody, like
thousands of people, get out. Get away, I want the room. I want the court. I want the
castle. I want whatever the heck they were standing in. I want
the room. I got to talk with these people.
Get out. Joseph made himself known to
his brothers. And he wept aloud. So that the Egyptians heard it.
And that the household of Pharaoh heard it. And Joseph said to
his brothers, I am Joseph. Is my father still alive? But his brothers, they couldn't
speak because they were dismayed at his presence. And Joseph said
to his brothers, come near to me, please. And they came near and he says,
I am your brother Joseph whom you sold. And now do not be distressed
or angry with yourselves because you sold me. For God sent me
before you to preserve your life. And God sent me before you to
preserve for you a remnant to keep you alive. So you didn't put me here. Now think about that. Boy, the people who hurt you
and then you have steadfast resolve and you serve and you stay quiet
and you rise to be the most powerful human being in the world. And the people who put you in
a hole for death stand before you and dare ask for food and
all you gotta do is break wind and they die. But you don't. Knowing love. You see how I open my sermon
about the positive side of drowning? You can't escape that as a divine
gift. You cannot see this and go, oh,
I want to do that. No, I see this and go, there's
no way I would be like that. I might have fed them because
I really am a sucker. But I would have made them squirm. Do you know who I am? I mean,
see, this is good cinema, right? So I take off my headdress, look
into my eyes, look deep. No, we don't know you, sir. Look. The last thing you saw as you
threw me in the pit. Oh, it's Joe the Hunter. They'd
have groveled, and two or three minutes had gone by. Guards would
have come around, chink, chink, chink, you know. and I'd have
let him go and been the hero. See, that's what ego does. Love never fails. It doesn't keep a record of wrong. And God sent him so that they
would live. The only reason that this history
exists is so that we on this side of the cross can look at
it and say, oh my God, you are amazing. You even portrayed the
coming of your son in the life of Joseph, in the life of Moses,
in the life of David. These weird people with nothing
to do but live in a place of antiquity. The life of Rahab, the life of
Ruth. And the list goes on and on. And so come near to me. Come
near to me. That's love. That's the love of Christ. And only the Spirit of God can
give us these things. This humility, this compassion,
this exercise of resting and understanding that the significant
pain and trauma that we experience is for the sake of Christ's name. That we might be compassionate
and loving to the very people sometimes who hurt us. Now that's
not a prescription for us to go out and find all the devils
who have destroyed our lives and fix it. Because if we're going to place
a application, apples to apples, they came to him. The prodigal son came home. But in the divine sense, Jesus
came to us. Then he brought them to Egypt
so that they could live with him. Remember my clothes. Love never fails. God predestined us for adoptions,
adoption as children. After the council of his own
goodwill. In love, love is not the manner,
but the very marrow or the core from which our actions and our
attitudes and our affections flow. But these things will ebb and
flow, they will change, we won't feel them, but we can be and
we can do because Christ has done. This love is an essential
aspect of God's character, and it is evident in the life of
Joseph as a picture of the life of Jesus. You've heard this before. I just read it 40 minutes ago. So as Joseph shows the love of
God operating from the core of unfailing love, so Jesus perfects
it. As Joseph forgave his brothers,
the very people who sought to destroy him, he forgave them. Jesus in his life and his death
and his resurrection forgives us. He sets the record clean
and he restores us. And brothers and sisters, the
beautiful thing is that so many people in our camp don't want
to hear is that the gospel and the love of God also transforms
us. I cannot make judgment of a man
or a woman's place before the Father, but I can make judgment
on whether or not the Spirit of God is ruling in that heart.
And persons without compassion are not spiritual. Persons that
aren't willing to say, you know what, I don't have any compassion,
because there are eight out of ten times I don't have it. That's
why I think it would be a farce to put that on my tombstone.
Just say resting. But love never fails. Love never
gives up. Love does not stop. It endures. And in the end, oh
beloved, in the end, look at the love of God and the life
of Joseph. He became co-regent. He became the king's hand. He
restored life to the future of his own family and generations
to come. The remnant of Israel survived. without which Jesus would not
have been born. So there's the thing. We think about the cross as the
apex of history. A lot of people think that that
means it's just the most significant event, which is true. But it
is the central reality, the central fullness, the central fulfillment
of the very reason that life exists on earth. And every molecule,
every piece of matter, every calculation, every distance,
every measurement of everything in the universe, in its infinite
measurements, exists that Christ, who upholds it by the word of
His power, may stand before God the Father with us, His bride,
and say, we are clean. That is love. When we love, those
who have offended us are clean before they ever come. And we frame our minds to look
at one another in the light of the gospel. We don't look at
one another through the pain they've caused us. We look at
one another through the love we have for them. Because what
we expect is always what we get. It's always what we find. If
we're looking for hate, if we're looking for disgust, if we're
looking for frustration, it's there. It doesn't take a lot
of search. You don't have to dig like, you
know, Indiana Jones to dig it up. You just got to open your
eyes. It's there. You want to find problems with
me? Just hang out after service. I'll show them to you. Ask my
wife or my children. They'll lie to you. No, he's
awesome. I'm not awesome. You're not awesome
either. But guess what? We are awesome.
Because Christ. Came to us. He gave himself for
us. So we can live. At rest in the
love of God, I do not live this life. In the flesh. This is not mine. That's what
Paul says. But I live this life by faith
in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. In whose
name we stay, stand, and are sustained. Be full. Let's pray. We thank you, Father, for the
truth of the gospel. And Lord, I thank you that I
could come here today with my sinfulness, with my failings,
and with a history of just constant knuckle-headedness. And Lord,
proclaim the truth of your gospel, of your good report, tell the
story from Scripture about your unfailing love. The very fact
that that is possible proves your divine power. For nothing is hidden from your
sight, Father. You can see everything that even I cannot see about
me. But you love me. And you do not love us in spite
of our sin, because you have taken it away. Father, the writ is gone. The
indictment has been burned because the case has been handed down
guilty to the son whom you have sent so that there are no charges
pending against us. Father, please help us to love
this way. Please help us to share it, to
say, I know a love like this. that we may grow into a beautiful
suffering arrangement of glory for your sake. We thank you for
this in Christ, in whose name we pray. Amen.