If you would open your Bibles
now to Genesis chapter 39. I so love that song we just sung. And it's been my prayer all day
that we'll be saying in our hearts when we leave here what we just
sung. Out of my shameful failure and
loss, Jesus, I come. Into the glorious gain of thy
cross, Jesus, I come to thee. I heard Brother Henry say often,
especially when I was younger, had no idea what he was saying
about preaching for a decision. And that's what I want to do
tonight. Not a decision to make you walk an aisle, but preach
Christ in such a way. He laid out in such a way, you've
got to make a decision. Do I believe him or not? One
or the other. That's what I hope for tonight.
All right, Genesis chapter 39, we'll read the first six verses.
And Joseph was brought down to Egypt, and Potiphar, an officer
of Pharaoh, captain of the guard, an Egyptian, bought him of the
hands of the Ishmaelites, which had brought him down thither.
And the Lord was with Joseph, and he was a prosperous man,
and he was in the house of his master, the Egyptian. And his
master saw that the Lord was with him, and that the Lord made
all that he did to prosper in his hand. And Joseph found grace
in his sight and served him. And he made him overseer over
his house. And all that he had, he put into
his hand. And it came to pass from the
time that he had made him overseer in his house and over all that
he had, that the Lord blessed the Egyptian's house for Joseph's
sake. And the blessing of the Lord
was upon all that he had in the house and in the field. And he
left all that he had in Joseph's hand. And he knew all that he
had, save the bread, which he did eat. And Joseph was a goodly
person and well-favored. All right, let's bow together
in prayer, seek the Lord's blessing. Our Father, we do bow before
you. And Father, we seek a blessing
from thy hands. Father, we dare not come into
thy presence seeking what we deserve or something we think
we've earned from thee, but Father, out of your pure mercy and grace
to your people, out of your love and pity to your people, Father,
we pray you'd bless us tonight as we look into your word and
by faith enable us to see the Lord Jesus Christ and to lay
hold on him. Cause each of us tonight to come
running to Christ our Savior. He truly is everything that we
need. He's everything that you require of us. He's everything
that we need. For the believer, He is our heart's
desire. Father, I beg of you that you
would enable me to rightly divide the word of truth and enable
me to glorify and magnify the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Father, enable me to preach far
beyond my capabilities, but in the power of thy spirit. Father,
for thy great namesake, that your son would be glorified.
And for the sake of your people, that they might know more of
Christ our Savior. Father, we're so thankful that
you've given us this place where we can meet together in peace
and unity and to worship our Savior. And I pray that you would
protect it. that you protect it, preserve
it, that this might be a place where your people can always
come and hear Christ, the bread of life. Father, we thank you
for the many earthly blessings that you've given to us. You've
so richly bestowed upon us all these things, and Father, we're
thankful. And we do pray a special blessing, Father, for those that
you brought into the valley of trouble and trial. You have blessed
us beyond measure. But Father, we're also a poor
and a needy people. And how clearly you show us that
in the valley. And Father, we pray you'd comfort
the hearts of your people, that you'd be with them in a special
way. Deliver them as soon as it could be thy will. But Father,
it's in Christ's name, for his sake and his glory, we pray and
ask these blessings. Amen. Tonight, I want us to look at
Joseph as a type of Christ the servant. I titled the message,
Christ the Servant That We Can Trust. And as I said a minute
ago, I want to preach this in such a way that the Holy Spirit
will cause all of us to believe on Christ and to rest on Christ,
to rest on Him alone. Because He makes us see this
so clearly. Christ is worthy of our trust. He's worthy of it. I pray that
the Lord will either give you faith in Christ for the very
first time, or that the Lord will make you rejoice that he's
already given you faith in Christ. And this view of Christ the servant,
and what that means, he's accomplished for his people. Now Joseph, the
favorite son of his father, boy, his life turned upside down,
didn't it? He suddenly became a servant down in Egypt. And
you know, I'm just confident of this. When all this was happening
to Joseph, his brothers take him and strip him and throw him
down the pit and there's no water, sell him to the Ishmaelites and
who knows how long he was with the Ishmaelites. I don't know
how long it took them to get to Egypt and sell him to Potiphar.
Joseph didn't know why all of this was happening. Now he knew
who was doing it, just like we do, don't we? I know all these
things that happen in our world. I know who's doing it. I don't
know what God's purpose is in it, but I do know who's doing
it. And boy, that had to be so much on Joseph's mind. He knew
God was doing this, but he sure didn't know why. And what Joseph
doesn't know yet is Joseph has to be in Egypt so that he can
be made second in command in that great nation so that during
the seven years of famine that are coming, many people will
be saved alive. But Joseph is the favorite son
of his father back there in wherever they were, Shechem or wherever
they were, Hebron. Now, how's Joseph gonna get to
Egypt? If you were directing this thing, how would you get
Joseph to Egypt? I mean, I think I might have Pharaoh's right-hand
man come get Joseph and say, come with me, we need you. Take
him in a big chariot, all comfortable, somebody feeding him grapes or
something. The Lord in his providence brought Joseph to Egypt as a
slave, so that ultimately he can be raised to the throne,
so that he can be a picture of Christ the Savior, who came to
earth as a servant, so that he could save his people from their
sin. That's what is pictured, how Christ is pictured in Joseph
the servant. Now you think Joseph was something,
being the favorite of his father. The Lord Jesus Christ, the son
of God, is the favorite of his father. He is God over all. He's the son, he's God over all. He's king of kings, he's lord
of lords. He's sovereign in everything. Now you can't stress that too
much and you can't take that too far. Our God is sovereign
in everything. Everything. Yet, When he came
to earth, he came as a servant to do a work. He came as a servant
doing work. He came to accomplish the work
of redemption for his people. That's why in Isaiah 42, I read
to open the service, the Lord called his son, behold my servant,
whom I uphold. He's coming as a servant with
a job to do. Now tonight, I want us to see
five blessed points of Christ the servant. I can say I hope
each of these points will make us trust him. Number one is this,
it's so amazing. The Lord Jesus Christ humbled
himself to come down to be a servant. Verse one, Genesis 39 says, Joseph
was brought down to Egypt. And that's more than going down,
going south. Joseph was brought down when
he went to Egypt. You just think how shocking this
change of life was for the favorite son, who's suddenly a servant
in Egypt. He doesn't know anybody there.
He doesn't know the language of the people, and he's not like
anybody who's there. I mean, how strange that had
to feel for him. And he had to endure being a
servant that nobody cared about. Well, back there at his father's
house, everybody cared how Joseph felt. It's all about Joseph,
isn't it? Everybody cared about him. Boy,
down there in Egypt, nobody does. Nobody cares anything about him.
Look over Philippians chapter two. That is such a good picture
of Christ the Savior. I want to stress this because
Christ coming down to save his people indicates his great love. He's willing to humble himself
and come down, first of all, to please his father. but second
of all, to save a people that he loves. That's why he did it. Philippians 2 verse six. Who
being in the form of God thought it not robbery to be equal with
God. It's not robbery for him to say
he's equal with God because he is God. But he made himself of
no reputation and took upon him the form of a servant and was
made in the likeness of men. It wasn't humbling enough to
be made in the likeness of men He made himself come in the form
of a servant. Now that's the longest journey
that's ever been taken. For him to come from heaven as
God to appear on earth as a man. To take on him the likeness of
a man. And the son of God was just like
Joseph. He came to this world and he's not like anybody here.
He's holy, we're unholy. He's righteous, we're unrighteous. In glory, before he left glory,
he was the object of worship. Everybody there worshiped him.
When he came to earth, he's despised and rejected of men. And he endured
that. He did that so that he could
be the servant who would come and do all of the work that was
required to save his people from their sin. Now, I don't know
if Joseph ever complained about his circumstances. Maybe he did,
maybe he didn't, I don't know. But this is what I do know. There
is not one complaint recorded in scripture that Joseph made.
He didn't complain about his circumstances. And the Holy Spirit
did that that way in scripture as a picture of Christ who never
complained about any of his circumstances. Now he didn't gloss over them
and say, you know, that's all right when it wasn't. but he
never complained about it. And you know why? Because everything
that happened to our Savior happened to him because it was his will
that it happened. I mean, people did what they
did to the Lord Jesus because he willed for them to do it before
time began. He's not going to will for people
to do something to him and then complain about it. He didn't
complain about it. This was his will being done. This is what he must endure,
the work that he must do to save his people from their sin. More
than just being a servant, in all things, the Lord Jesus Christ
was a willing servant. He's the bond slave of his father. Now the bond slave was different
than other slaves. Other slaves may be a slave because
they were captured in battle or something, you know, they're
there against their will. Maybe a person is a slave because they
had debts they couldn't pay and they sold themselves into slavery
to pay their debt. They're there because they have
to be against their will. But the bond slave, he's a willing
slave. The bond slave said, I love my
master so much. I love serving my master so much.
I want to keep on being his slave. My time's up as a slave, but
I refuse to go free because I love my master. That's what a bond
slave is. And that's the Lord Jesus Christ.
He said in one of the Psalms, my ear hast thou digged. What
he's talking about there is how they bored a hole in the earlobe
of the bond slave and hung a ring in it so everybody would know
this is a bond slave. He's here willingly. The Lord
Jesus Christ is the bond slave of his father. He loved his father
so much he refused to avoid. all the pain, the suffering,
the humiliation, the hard work that it took to please his father. He refused to avoid any of it.
He did it all because he loves his father. And he loves his
people so much. He had the power to go free,
but he refused to go free from punishment, from the punishment
of the law, because that's the only way he could save his people
from their sins. If you're still there in Philippians
2, let's read on, verse seven. But he made himself of no reputation,
took upon him the form of a serpent, and was made in the likeness
of men. And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself
and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
See, he did that because that's the only way the sin of his people
could be put away. Wherefore? God also hath highly
exalted him and given him a name which is above every name, that
at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow, of things in heaven
and things in earth and things under the earth, and that every
tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of
God the Father. Now you see there the reason
for the exaltation of Christ was what he accomplished in his
humiliation. He had to go through that time
of humiliation He had to go through that time of a servant where
he would obey his own law, where he'd suffer and die for the sin
of his people so that he could be exalted as the savior over
all. Now I'm telling you, you can
trust your soul to Christ because as a servant, he's already done
everything the father requires of you and me. He already did
it as a servant to his father. And when he did it, he did it
perfectly. That's why when he cried from
the cross, it is finished. The father accepted because everything
he did was perfect. This is the only servant who
could ever truly say it's finished. There's no more work left to
do. Now you can trust him, he's finished the work. All right,
number two, look back in our text. The Lord Jesus Christ prospered
as the servant. He was a willing servant. He
appeared as a servant and he prospered as a servant. Joseph
was brought down to Egypt and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh,
captain of the guard and Egyptian bought him at the hands of the
Ishmaelites, which had brought him down thither. And the Lord
was with Joseph and he was a prosperous man. He was in the house of his
master, the Egyptian and his master saw that the Lord was
with him. and that the Lord made all that he did to prosper in
his hand. Joseph was taken down there as
a slave and everything he did just turned to gold. I mean,
this guy had the Midas touch. If Joseph planted a field, boy,
it produced a bumper crop. If Joseph bought something and
resold it, I mean, he made a killing. I mean, just the profit that
he made in everything that he did. If something got broke around
the house and Joseph fixed it, it was better than new. I mean,
just everything prospered. Everything that Joseph did made
his master, it made his master's life better. Potiphar was thrilled
to have Joseph as his servant because he could see, my life's
better because Joseph is my servant. Isn't that a good picture of
Christ, the servant of God? Everything he did prospered because
everything he did was perfect. Christ came to obey his father's
law and he did it so perfectly. Not only did he obey the law,
he honored it and magnified it. He obeyed the law so fully. He made untold millions of people
righteous by one man's obedience. You think of that. Christ came,
he had a mission from his father, a work to do. And part of it
was a message of salvation. Well, he came and spoke all the
words that the father gave him to speak. He came and gave this
message that the father gave him to speak to men. In John
17, verse eight, he said, I have given unto them the words which
thou gavest me. What you gave me to preach, I
preached. And they have received them.
Your people have received Him and believed Him. The Lord Jesus
Christ did such a good job of speaking for God. You know what
men who appear to be unbelievers, you know what they said about
Him? Never man spake like this man. Oh, never man spake. All these other yahoos I hear
preaching, you know, they're talking about the law and what
I got to do, what I don't do, and just keep showing me all
this sin and all this, you know, how horrible I am. When this
man speaks, grace drips from his lips. Never may a man speak
like this man. Christ spoke the words that the
Father gave him to speak so perfectly that if anybody ever hears him
speak, they will have eternal life. They'll have eternal life. They receive his words and believe
on him. That's eternal life. Believing
on the Lord Jesus Christ of God's end. I mean, you hear him speak,
you have eternal life. That's pretty prosperous, isn't
it? And you know what? That was no surprise. The father
knew that his son, when he came, would be a prosperous servant. 700 years before Christ was born,
Isaiah prophesied the pleasure of the Lord is going to prosper
in his hands. is going to prosper in the hand
of the servant because everything he's going to do is going to
be perfect. Now, Christ the Savior came to
this earth as a servant. He came with a job that his father
sent him to do to save his people from their sin. And he is such
a prosperous servant that he has fully and completely, completely
saved all of his people from all of their sin, so that it
is impossible for even one of them to perish. That's pretty prosperous. That's
pretty prosperous. As far as I can see, that's a
mighty good reason to trust your soul to Christ to save. He's
the prosperous servant. He's prosperous because everything
he did was perfect. Then number three, the Lord Jesus Christ
was the prosperous servant of his father. So the father gave
everything he has to Christ. Verse four says that Joseph found
grace in Potiphar's sight and he served him and he made him
overseer over all his house. And over all that he put in,
over all that he had, he put into his hand. And verse six
says he left all that he had in Joseph's hand. And he didn't
even know what he had, save the bread, which he did eat. Potiphar
didn't know what he had, except for what Joseph put in front
of him to eat. He didn't know anything else. Potiphar trusted
Joseph so much, he never checked the books. He didn't have an
annual audit to see if Joseph was stealing from him, because
he knew he wasn't. He wasn't cooking the books. He didn't
have to go check the storehouses to see, is Joseph stealing something
from me? Because he knew he wasn't. Potiphar,
he just got up whatever captain of the guard job, you know, he
had, you know, he got up and went to that job. He probably
left work early, went and played golf with the mayor or something.
He just had no worries. Joseph is taking care of everything.
I mean, I just don't have to worry about it. Joseph is taking
care of everything. I thought today, we'll get to this later,
you know the story how Potiphar had to throw Joseph in prison.
I bet that was one of the worst days for Potiphar. Now suddenly
he's got to start worrying about everything he's got again, you
know. But he didn't have to worry about it when Joseph was there,
did he? He just put Joseph in charge of his affairs, and he
forgot about it. He just didn't worry about it,
because he could trust Joseph. Now just as a side note, let
me say this. Every employee here should have
already earned that trust from our boss. I think one of the
best compliments a boss could give you when it comes time to
do those annual evaluations is, I don't have to worry about what
you're doing. I think that's the best compliment a boss could
give you. I don't have to worry about you, because I trust you.
That's Joseph. Not only is Joseph a type of
Christ, and obviously that's first and foremost, but he's
an awful good example to employees too, isn't he? What an employee
he was. Now Potiphar, turning everything
over to Joseph. That's such a clear picture of
Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ, the son of God, is so trustworthy
that the father turned everything over to his son. He turned, first
of all, all of his purpose of redemption, he turned it over
to his son. I don't know if you've ever been
a boss or a supervisor and you've got people under you and they've
been assigned a project. How many of you ever signed that
project and never thought nothing about it? No, we always stick
our finger in it. We're always knowing what's going
on all the time. The father gave his son the job
of redeeming his people from their sin and forgot about it
because his son is trustworthy. I'll tell you what a big statement
that is. If his purpose fails, to save even one, even one that
the father chose to save out of a number no man can number. If he loses one, the father will
lose all his glory and he'll lose all his credibility as God.
I mean, that's how high these stakes are. It's got to be perfect. This work of redemption must
be perfect. And the father wasn't worried
about it in a bit because he trusted his son And he always
has. Ephesians 1 verse 12 says that
it was the father who first trusted in Christ. When did the father
first trust in Christ? Way back there in the council
halls of eternity when there was only God. And they entered
into that covenant of grace where the son said, Father, I'll do
it. I'll become a servant, and I'll
do everything that it takes to redeem these people that you
gave me. I'll redeem them from their sins. The father trusted
his son to get the job done. And it was well-placed trust,
wasn't it? Oh, what a servant, what a Savior
Christ is. When He came into flesh, He did
everything perfectly that it took to save His people from
their sin. So the father everything into
his hand. Everything. He put all judgment
into the hand of the Son. John 5, 22. The Father judgeth
no man, but hath committed all judgment to the Son. He committed
to his Son, he trusts him. The Father put all flesh into
Christ's hand. John 17, verse two. Thou hast
given him power over all flesh. And you know why the father gave
the son power over all flesh? That he should give eternal life
to as many as thou hast given him. He turned everything over
to his son. I'm gonna give you many, many,
many examples of all these individual things that's been turned over
to the son. But let me just put it, sum it up this way. The father
put everything, everything into the hand of the son. There's
nothing you can think of that's outside of his hand. Acts 10
verse 36. says the word which God sent
under the children of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ. He is Lord of all, just in case
you don't know that. He is Lord of all, that's what
it says. Ephesians 1 verse 22, he hath
put all things, all things under his feet and gave him to be the
head over all things to the church. Now the father has put all things
into the hand of the Son. Everything is His to dispose
of. Now, if Christ the Savior is Lord of all, if He's in charge
of everything that ever happens in His creation, then that tells
me there's nothing can happen, no event can ever happen in creation
that would make Him lose even one for whom He died. Because
He's in charge of it all. That's a pretty good reason to
trust your soul to Him, don't you think? because he cannot
fail to save. He can't fail. Then fourthly,
all of God's elect are blessed for Christ's sake, the sake of
the servant. Verse five in our text says,
and it came to pass from the time that he made him overseer
in his house and over all that he had, that the Lord blessed
the Egyptians' house for Joseph's sake. And the blessing of the
Lord was upon all that he had in the house and in the field. Now God blessed Joseph because
he loved Joseph. That's why he blessed Joseph,
because he loved Joseph. Potiphar was just a bystander in all this. And the only reason he ever benefited
was he's connected to Joseph. You see that? Don Fortner said
something, his commentary that I think was just magnificent.
He said Egypt was altogether insignificant, except for the
fact that Joseph was there. Isn't that good? Potiphar's insignificant,
except that Joseph is there, but he was blessed because he's
connected to Joseph. And later on, not only will Potiphar
be blessed for Joseph's sake, all of Egypt will be blessed
for Joseph's sake. People from all over the world
will be blessed for Joseph's sake. And here's the reason God
did it all, Israel. will be blessed for Joseph's
sake. They're gonna be kept from starving
to death for Joseph's sake. Because God showed Joseph what
he was going to do and gave Joseph the wisdom to know what to do.
All of those people are blessed for Joseph's sake. But Egypt
and all the other people in the world, they're just bystanders. They're insignificant in this
thing. God's doing all of this to bless Israel. the children
of Israel, the children of Jacob, and they're gonna be blessed
for Joseph's sake. Can you read anything that Jacob
or one of those other boys did that would give you cause to
think that's why God would bless them? I can't. Why were they
blessed then? For Joseph's sake. Now that's
the life story of every believer. Oh, God's blessed us. God's blessed
us. Why? Well, it's because we're
doctrinally straight and we've taken a stand for the right doctrine
and we're faithful. We're blessed for Christ's sake.
For Christ's sake. That's true of every blessing
we have. We have the blessing of righteousness for Christ's
sake because Christ earned it by obeying the law and gave it
to us. We have redemption for Christ's
sake. because Christ died to pay the
redemption price with his precious blood. We have the forgiveness
of sin for Christ's sake, because Christ shed his blood to buy
it. We have eternal life for Christ's sake, because Christ
died in our place so that we'd have eternal life. Even right
now, right now, the gospel is being preached and it's for Christ's
sake. Now we benefit from it, don't
we? I mean, you just can't really overestimate the importance of
the preaching of the gospel. What a blessing that is to God's
people. I mean, it's not everywhere.
God's given it to us here. And we benefit from it. Christ
is revealed to us. Christ the Savior. How God saves
sinners. That's revealed to us by the
preaching of the gospel. God's people are fed. They're
strengthened, they're comforted, they're encouraged by the preaching
of the gospel. We benefit, there's no question
about it. There's no greater benefit that
we could have. But I'm telling you, the gospel is not preached
for our sake. The gospel is preached for Christ's
sake. For Christ's sake. So that the
name of Christ will be honored and glorified in the earth. Now that'll fix our wagon. What
is it that we're supposed to do as a church body? Huh? Are we supposed to carve out
a place for ourself and a name for ourself and get all these
things for ourself? Or are we to glorify the name
of Christ? That's why the gospel is preached.
That his name will be glorified in the earth. I mean, just even
the preaching of the gospel, even having a place to come hear
the gospel, it's for Christ's sake. You just can't think of
any blessing that you have that's not given to you for Christ's
sake. Scripture says, the Father has
blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places.
Where? In Christ. It's in Christ, it's
for Christ's sake. Every blessing God asks for a
sinner is in Christ. Everything he requires of us
to have is in Christ because he's given everything he has
to his son. Now, everything you need is in Christ. I just can't
be more simple than that. Everything you need is in Christ.
Let me tell you one more time. Go to Christ and go right now.
All right, here's the last thing.
Christ the servant is a goodly person. Verse six says that he
left all that he had in Joseph's hand and he knew all he had,
save the bread which he did eat. And Joseph was a goodly person
and well-favored. And that word goodly means a
beautiful visage. Joseph had a, when you looked
at him physically, a beautiful visage. And that word well-favored
means a phenomenon, a phenomenon. Now that has to mean Joseph was
a good looking guy. I mean, on top of being smart
and resourceful and hardworking and God bless and everything
he ever put his hand to, he's handsome too. I mean, he's just
that guy. Now that's a picture of Christ.
He's all together lovely. Every attribute, every characteristic
of Christ is altogether lovely. His mercy is lovely. His grace, His truth, His justice
is lovely. His love, how that He could love
unlovable sinners like you and me. That's lovely, isn't it? It's beautiful. Now here's some
good news. Christ's beauty, He's altogether
lovely. His beauty is the beauty of his
people. As he is, how is he right now? Glorified. He's not like he was
and his visage marred so much he didn't even look like a man
as he hung on Calvary's tree. He doesn't look like that anymore.
He doesn't look like a helpless baby in a manger. He's glorified. He glorified flesh. He's so glorious
John said, heaven doesn't have need of the sun, because the
lamb is the light thereof. Oh, his beauty, how it shines
forth, as he is, so are you in this world, if you believe. His
beauty is your beauty. Now, giving his beauty to his
people, that came at great cost to the Savior. In order to make
dead, vile, ugly, guilty sinners like you and me beautiful, Our
savior had to be sacrificed in our place for our sin. And when
he was sacrificed, that beautiful visage was so marred, you couldn't
tell he was a man. He was so phenomenally beautiful. He was marred more than any other
man. Now that shows us how much he truly suffered. His physical
sufferings give us a glimpse of his soul sufferings. His soul
suffered when he made his soul an offering for sin. And it showed
in his body. It showed in his body. Someone
enduring great grief and sorrow and her heart's just being crushed
in a trial. it shows physically. That's what
happened to our Savior. And He endured all of that because
He loves His people so much, He was determined to give them
His beauty and tell them, look how beautiful you are with my
beauty that I put on you. Now this servant makes his people
as beautiful in the eyes of the Father as He is. I'll say it one more time, as
far as I'm concerned, that's a mighty good reason to trust
Him. And I pray God will make it so that we'll leave here tonight
trusting Him, because He's worthy of our trust. All right, let's
bow together. Our Father, how can we even begin
to sufficiently thank You for the gift of Your Son? how he
perfectly accomplished all of the redemption of his people. Father, I pray you take your
word as it's been preached this evening, that you'd use it to
glorify the Savior in such a way in the eyes of each one of us
here, that Father, we leave here tonight trusting him and resting
in him, having eternal life in him. Father, it's for his glory
sake, the glory of his name, we pray. And we ask this great
blessing. Amen. All right, Sean, come lead
us in a closing hymn, if you will.