Thank you all for having me back. It's a privilege to hear the
gospel, and it's a privilege to preach the gospel. And that
ain't empty words, I mean it. Mark asked me this morning, he
said, what's your favorite hymn? I said, you trying to pick hymns?
And I told him one, and I've heard three of them this morning
already. It's special too, thank you. It's a blessing. Lord be with us and we ask him
to this morning. If you will begin turning to
Genesis 40, Genesis chapter 40. I almost changed my mind and preached
out of John nine during the scripture reading, but it's the same thing
there on the back of your bulletin. The message is the exact same. The text might be different.
God's holy. He's on his throne. He does as
he pleases because he's God. That's his name. He lives up
to it. Man ain't nothing. We're grass. That's all we are. And the Lord reveals himself
to whom he pleases. And when we have eyes to see,
we behold him and we don't have eyes for another. Just like Hosea
told Gomer, he said, you won't be for another man. You will
be for me many days. That means forever. for always. And just like you love your children
or you love your spouse, there's more so. We have to have him. We have to have him. And then
the arguments are always the same, too. There in John 9, I've
got to underline in my Bible, all them Pharisees kept saying,
how, how, how, how? And at the end, the Lord comes
to them after he got kicked out of church. And they said, do
you believe in God? He said, who is he, Lord? Who?
Who? We'll learn the how later, won't
we? We need to know who. Who? Well, here in Genesis 40,
we're going to see the same thing. There's a revealer here. Revealer. Christ is going to be revealed.
I'll give you the character. This is a well-known story, but
I just want to get to the point of it. I want to give you all
the characters up front. We're going to see Pharaoh. This
is where this is taking place in his land. Pharaoh is the king.
That's the father. He's the one that's been offended.
And we're going to see Joseph. And all throughout Genesis, Joseph's
a wonderful type of Christ. Ain't nothing bad said about
Joseph. Ain't nothing bad said about him. There's one spot people
say, well, he's mean to his brothers. No, he was being kind to his
brothers. He was. And then we're going to see that
butler. You know what a butler is, don't you? Remember Mr. Belvedere
at a TV show? They're a servant. They're a
servant. They serve people. They clean
up messes. They clean toilets and bring the food. That's all
Butler does. And a baker. What do they do? They make stuff.
I've created a dish. You'll see us play out. That's
the works of their own hands, isn't it? There's two different
people and they're going to have dreams in this. There's two people and
a believer, ain't there? There's one that wants it their
way. in their works, and there's another that just serves. Just
does whatever's needed. It's useful. All of mankind was
in service to this king here in Egypt. This is what this is
portraying. And because of our great offense to the king, we're
in prison because of it. We're trapped in this body of
death, the body of this death, Paul called it. Look here in
verse 1, Genesis 40 verse 1. And it came to pass after these
things that the butler of the king of Egypt, And his baker
had offended their lord, the king of Egypt. And Pharaoh was
wroth against two of his officers, this butler and this baker, against
the chief of the butlers and against the chief of the bakers.
And he put them in ward in the house of the captain of the guard
in the prison, the place where Joseph was bound. And the captain
of the guard charged Joseph with them, and he served them. Joseph
served them. And they continued a season in
war. There are two prisoners here,
and they're under the charge of Joseph. And that's a picture
of this whole human race, isn't it? By our nature, we're under
bondage to this world by our doing. We're bound to our sin,
to our flesh, and everybody, whether they know it or not,
everybody, they're the servant of the Most High. We're under
the rule and reign of a sovereign God that does as He pleases,
and we're to praise Him. Everybody's to praise Him. to
believe him. Believe what he says about himself,
what he says about us. And we're in this bondage of
death while we're here because we've offended the Lord. That's
why. Adam sinned against him. Yeah,
well, I did too. Well, that law, we can't keep it. Yeah, but I
broke it. Well, Satan, he's mean. Yeah, he is. He's against us.
He accuses us. But he's got something to accuse
me of. It ain't the law's fault. It ain't Adam's fault. It ain't
Satan's fault. It's my fault. I've offended the king. I've
offended the king. And that's the problem. I took
a picture yesterday as we was getting ready to land out the
window. Everything's green, beautiful. And people said, did you make
it? And I texted them back. I said,
I'm back in the great commonwealth. It's my place of birth. There's
four commonwealths in these United States. You know that? Massachusetts,
Virginia, Pennsylvania, and the great commonwealth of Kentucky.
That's different than a state. I ain't going to give you a whole
history lesson. If I had offended your wife, and maybe if I was
right and she was wrong, you'd punch me in the head. And if
the cops showed up, I'd say, well, I had that coming. I ain't
going to press no charges. I deserved it. And they'd say,
OK, no charges are pressed, but we're going to take you to jail
anyway. It's for the commonwealth. You've offended the king. It's
his property on his land. That's what that represents in
our government. You're on his property, on his land, breathing
his air, and you're the wrong one. You've wronged him. Don't
matter who you've offended. You've done it in their sight.
You've sinned against him. So you're going to court. That's
the difference. And that's what happened here.
And I'm so thankful, just like Paul's thorn in the flesh, we
don't know what this baker did, and we don't know what this butler
did. Isn't that precious? It applies to all. This applies
to us. And it says, Joseph served them.
How did Joseph serve them? By having charge over them. By
providing for them. And the Lord serves and provides
and hedges about all of his creation, doesn't he? Every bit of it.
Physically. Physically. Carnally, he does.
And it says in Matthew 5, he maketh the sun to rise on the
evil and on the good. He maketh the rain come for the
just and the unjust. The just and the unjust eat his
broccoli and breathe his air and we're trespassing on his
land, ain't we? It's his. But Joseph's in prison. Remember how he got there? Trumped
up charges, wasn't he? He was there on the evil of another. That's why he was in prison.
He was innocent. Man had no guile in him. Nothing
wrong with him. And he was in prison. Lord came
to this prison of earth, didn't he? He was bound to an earthly
body. He was bound, born underneath
that law, born of a woman. And he provided all for his chosen
people. Spiritually, physically, all
of it. And eventually he was bound to that cross, wasn't he? It wasn't nails that held him
there, it was love that held him there. Nails just happened
to be present. Why? To make reconciliation for a
people, to provide a place, to make atonement for people that
had offended the king, offended the father. We see that? He was in the form of God, and
he thought it not right to be equal with God. Why? He was God.
He is God. And he made himself of no reputation,
and he took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in
likeness of me. And that's how he served us.
He took our place. And being found in fashion as a man, he
humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of
the cross. That's service, isn't it? All
mankind has offended the king, And we're in bondage. And the
very one that is placed over us, that has charge over us,
is the God-man. That's our mediator. That's our
go-between. The Lord provided himself as
the lamb, as our go-between. And everybody has dreams, don't
we? I didn't dream any last night, but sometimes I dream. And even
during the day, if we don't dream at night, we have daydreams.
We have dreams of what's right and what's wrong. There's ways
that seem right unto man, but that way's death, isn't it? Well,
I think it ought to be this way. I think that. We have opinions,
don't we? You know what the literal translation of heresy is? Opinion. Well, I think, my dad used to
tell me, you ain't getting paid to think. I ought not do anything. Look here in verse five. These
men had dreams. This Baker and Butler. And they
dreamed a dream, both of them. Each man his dream in one night.
And each man, according to the interpretation of his dream,
the butler and the baker of the king of Egypt, which were bound
in the prison. And Joseph came unto them in
the morning and looked upon them, and behold, they were sad." Both
of them were sad. Both of them had a dream, and
they were sad. All mankind has the law of God
written on their hearts. You know the difference between
right and wrong. We just talked about this this morning. I remember
being a child and offending my parents, and boy, I just tore
all to pieces. I didn't listen to mom and dad, and they knew
it. Oh, I said I cry, and then by the time I was a teenager,
I didn't really cry that much. And then by the time you're grown,
well, I know what to do. You get hardened to sin, don't
we? That's what that is. Our conscience
is pricked, and your thoughts weigh on you, and that comes
out as sadness or anger or some kind of false sense of joy sometimes.
But these emotions are present in our inward thoughts, ain't
they? What are we going to do about that? Well, us by searching
can't find God. We can't solve this problem ourselves.
That's what it said there in Job 11. Canst thou by searching
find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty
unto perfection? Can you know him, know him? He
ain't the one that's lost, is he? We are. We are. Here's another thing to see in
this. Most people are sad, and they're looking to themselves
to make them happy. Or they look to something else,
don't they? I got to find inward peace, or this job will make
me happier. If I go on that trip, that'll
make me happier. If I buy this car, it'll make me happy. If
I can finally do this, then I'll be all right. It may make my
life too long, but these gray hairs come on us. It ain't gonna
make us happy. We know that, don't we? It ain't
gonna work, not on this earth. The child of God has reason to
be happy, to have joy, to have contentment. But boy, we get
sad too, don't we? We get sad too. How come? We
don't understand what's going on around us. We don't understand
our thoughts sometimes. We don't understand our own minds.
And we're sad about it. We're sad. Well, I don't know
how this is going to turn out. Why I'm sad? We ought not be. The Lord's on His throne, isn't
He? We have an intercession. We ought
to be happy. And the only peace we're going
to find, the only way that the truth of what we are, of who
God is, how we can approach God, The only way that peace is going
to be found, that good news is going to be found, is if God's
pleased to reveal it to us, to reveal himself to us. Look here
in verse 7. And Joseph, and he, asked Pharaoh's
officers, the butler and the baker, that were with him in
the ward of the Lord's house, saying, Wherefore look ye so
sadly today? He saw them and said, What's
wrong with you? Why are you sad? Joseph's a picture of Christ,
I told you that. And I thought, for that butler at least, you
remember in Luke 24, those on the road to Emmaus? He said,
what manner of communications are these that you have one another?
What y'all talking about? And as you walk, and you're sad.
Why are you sad? We get forgetful, don't we? Everyone's
sad, we've experienced that. But some, certain people, or
peculiar people, are made to be brought so low that the gospel's
revealed to them. When there's no other hope to
be found, there's no other way to be found, Christ the way reveals
himself to them. That's a precious place to be.
Look here at Christ the interpreter, the revealer, verse 8. And they
said unto him, We have had a dream to dream, and there is no interpreter
of it. And Joseph said unto them, Do
not interpretations belong to God? You want your dreams interpreted? These scriptures are no private
interpretation, are they? Just like that Philip, that Ethiopian
eunuch, and he said, you know what you're reading, buddy? He
said, well, how can I unless some man teach me? I have to
have somebody teach me. That's how God's going to save
sinners. Secret things belong unto the Lord our God, but those
things which are revealed belong unto us and our children forever.
There's things we don't know. Somebody's got all the answers,
run from them. Paul the apostle, used more money than them all. He labored more than them all.
He saw through a glass dimly. What do you think I see? In fact,
Paul saw through that. We don't know much. But I tell
you what, what God does tell us, we know it. I know the truth
about him. I know the truth about me. And
we tell our children, don't we? And we beg to him to reveal himself
to our children. We just prayed it. I pray for
my children every day. Only God can interpret. Only
he can reveal. Only his word will stand. It
doesn't matter what we think. My opinions, it don't matter.
What's God say? Well, that's it. And we compare
scripture with scripture. That's how we know. It says in
Isaiah 8, to the law and the testimony, if they speak not
according to this word, it's because there's no light in them.
I was born in darkness. I need light. That's what I need.
Because he declares all things, he's the source of all things,
he knows all things, he truly sees things as they are. So who's
qualified to interpret providence? We have some providence, some
things are changing in people's lives right now. Who's qualified
to interpret that? The God of providence is qualified
to interpret it. Who's qualified to interpret
the law? When it says this, the law giver, we know we ain't supposed
to lie, right? Rahab lied to a government official.
And the Lord said, look at the great faith Rahab. Maybe I got something to learn. Maybe I don't know everything.
Who's qualified to interpret holiness? The Holy One of Israel
is. We need to learn of Him. Now
again, a picture in Christ here. Look at the end of verse 8. And
Joseph said unto him, Do not the interpretations belong to
God? Tell me, I pray. You tell me. It's a picture of
Christ. Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, I'll
give you rest. You tell me. Verse 90, here are the dreams
of both this butler and this baker. And they're going to seem
kind of similar, but they're vastly different. Both men have
a dream. That's what's similar. Both men
approach the king in their dream. That's similar. Both men bring
something to the king. And according to what they brought
in this dream, it's going to determine what they receive the
king after. This isn't life and death. This is eternal life and
death. Let's look at it. Verse 9. And
the chief butler told his dream to Joseph and said to him, in
my dream, behold, a vine was before me and in the vine were
three branches. And it was as though it budded
and there were blossoms shot forth and clusters thereof brought
forth ripe grapes. And Pharaoh's cup was in my hand.
I was holding the cup. And I took the grapes and I pressed
them into Pharaoh's cup and gave the cup into Pharaoh's hand.
What did this butler, this servant, what did he dream? He saw a vine
and there's growth from that vine. There's branches coming
out of that and flowers come forth and it budded and there
was fruit there. He saw ripe grapes and he saw
the king's cup. Whose cup was it? It was from
the king. Who was holding it? He was. There's a cup of indignation. There's a wrath, because we've
offended the king. That's our cup. Who took that cup? Lord did, didn't he? He said,
can you drink of the cup? I'm going to drink of it. And
like little foolish children, oh yeah, we can do that. And
I see him just patting him on the head. You will, buddy. You
don't know what you're talking about. You'll learn later. What was the only thing this
butler did in his dream? What was he responsible for in
this dream? He crushed the grapes. He broke something. That's it. He didn't own the vine. He didn't
own the branches. It wasn't his grapes. It wasn't his cup. All
he did was break something. It was his fault, wasn't it?
And that butler, he approaches the king with the king's cup
and the king's wine from the king's grapes, from the king's
branches, from the king's vine. And he said, all I did was the
breaking. This is yours. That's what's taking place. Verse
12, and Joseph said unto him, this is the interpretation of
it. The three branches are three days. And within three days shall
Pharaoh lift up thine head and restore thee unto thy place.
And thou shalt deliver Pharaoh's cup into his hand after the former
manner, when thou wast his butler." We could spend there two or three
weeks on that, couldn't we? Joseph gave a short interpretation
here. But there's so much meant by it. He spoke of three days. Three days. That's all that we
got was a sign of Jonah, wasn't it? And he talked about his head
being lifted up. Who's your head? I'm the head
of my house. I'm head of this company. I'm
ahead of Christ is our head. He's exalted. He's going to be
exalted. That's what's going to happen.
And you're about to be restored to a place. He said, Lord said,
I go to prepare a place for you. That's reconciliation. That's
atonement. He goes to make us a place. and being restored to that place,
and the butler being reconciled back to acceptance with the king
that he brought this wine to after the former manor, just
like Adam walked in the garden. It's kind of like that after
this manor, but it's better. We don't have the ability to
sin. We're not just morally innocent. We've been made holy by them
grapes, by that blood that was shed. There's an Acts 8 that Eunuch
said Philip ran thither, and he heard him preaching Isaiah,
or reading Isaiah, and he said, you understand what you read?
He said, how can I except some man guide me? Philip didn't give
him no opinions, and he didn't give the eunuch a five-step process
to understand him what he's reading. Here's how you dissect the scriptures.
No. And he didn't brush off the weight of sadness. That eunuch's
probably sad he didn't understand. He's a mighty and powerful man.
And he said, oh, well, it's OK. Don't you worry about that. You
keep a positive attitude. No, he didn't do that. He opened
his mouth and began at the same scripture and he preached unto
him Jesus. What's these grapes and these
drinks? This is concerning Christ. It's who he is and what he's
done for his people. That's it. He's divine. We're the branches. We're just
alive in him. And he produces all the fruit.
He produces everything that's required. Just like it's us. What we do, we just crush the
grapes. It's our fault. He tread that winepress alone,
But he was delivered by the determinate counsel and the foreknowledge
of God. This is purpose before eternity. The father said, this
is exactly how it's going to take place. And the son said,
that's exactly how I'm going to do it. And it's ever been
our fault. We, by wicked hands, crucified him and slain him. This is because of my wicked
hands that his blood was shed. And if we come to the father
with nothing but the blood of Christ, we can have reconciliation. And who's exalted in that? Christ
our head is exalted in it. We don't want it any other way,
do we? If we come to this holy God who's angry with the wicked
every day, with nothing but the blood of his Son that satisfied
his cup, we'll be accepted eternally. That's it. Verse 14. He said, but think on me. Here's
a talking point to have with Pharaoh. You won't have something
to say to the king. That's intimidating, isn't it?
Here's what you talk to the king about. But thank on me when it
shall be well with thee. And show kindness, I pray thee,
unto me. And make mention of me unto Pharaoh.
And bring me out of his house. For indeed, I was stolen away
out of the land of the Hebrews. And here also have I done nothing
that they should put me. into the dungeon. You go, you
go to the king and you declare nothing but the sovereignty and
the holiness and the perfect work of the son. You talk about
me, talk about him. Here's the other dreamer. This
is the baker, verse 16. And when the chief baker saw
that the interpretation was good, he said unto Joseph, I also was
in my dream. He said, well, this is interpreting
dreams, working out good. I think I'm going to try that
too. This could be fun. And behold, I had three white
baskets on my head. If you've got a marginal reference
Bible there, the white baskets, it's translation is full of holes.
There's three of them. Very appropriate, isn't it? By
nature, every one of us sees that we come into this world
with a triple crown. We're prophet, priest, and king.
And that argument has nothing but holes poked in it. It won't
hold no water. It ain't gonna hold nothing.
Verse 17, and the uppermost basket there was full of all manner
of abatements for Pharaoh. Baked meats for Pharaoh. And
the birds that eat them out of the basket upon my head. He's
got these baskets on his head and it's full of meats that he
baked. London Royals or something fancy.
I don't know, they've got them English things. He said cricket
earlier and I was thinking that's stuffed in meats. I don't even
know how you make that thing. You'd think it'd be raw in the
middle. But the bakers know how to do it. They work hard. Lots
of hard work. And that's the highest one. And birds came and
ate it. Birds came and ate it. Who bakes
the meat? The baker did. He created a dish, didn't he?
And then meat-eating birds came. Kerrigan came. Ravens came and
just consumed every bit of it. Didn't even make it to Pharaoh.
Didn't even make it to him. That baker came to the king with
what he had done, just like broken cisterns that hold no water.
Baskets with holes in it and ravens ate all of it. What's
the outcome of approaching the king that way? With your own
works, with your own doing. With your own pride and garments. Head-dressing. Look here in verse
18. And Joseph answered and said, This is the interpretation thereof,
the three baskets for three days. Yet within three days shall Pharaoh
lift up thy head from off thee. You want your head exalted? He'll
take it clean off your shoulders. And ye shall hang thee on a tree,
and the bird shall eat thy flesh from off of thee. You reckon
he was happy about having an interpretation of it as a good
outcome for him? That's what the military would call it, WIFM.
That's an acronym. What's in it for me? What do
I get out of this? He wanted something good, didn't
he? That butler was just in trouble. That's all he ever saw. I'm in
need. And this guy says, well, I got
a little bit of worth. Maybe Pharaoh owes me something. I
can bake him up something nice that he likes. No. Instead of begging for a mediator,
he was angry. He was in disbelief. Or he just
ignored it. I ain't paying no attention to
that Joseph fella. He don't know what he's talking about. Ignore it if you
want to. The Lord said there in Matthew
7, It's not everyone that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall I
enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of
my Father which is in heaven. What is it to do his will? Believe
on his Son. Look to the Son. Kiss the Son. That's it. Many will say to me
that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? We've
made that dish. Have we not cast out devils in
thy name? That's filet mignon, isn't it? And in thy name done
many wonderful works. We've got three baskets full
of them. And I will profess unto them, I never knew you. Depart
from me, ye that work iniquity. You're doing something and it's
bad. You're trying to please somebody. That iniquity is what
we think we're doing good. He said, depart from it. Look
at verse 20. And it came to pass the third
day, which was Pharaoh's birthday, And he made a feast unto all
his servants, and he lifted up the head of the chief butler
and the chief baker among his servants. And he restored the
chief butler unto his butlership again, and he gave the cup unto
Pharaoh's hand, just as he is told to. But he hanged the chief
baker, as Joseph hath interpreted to them." What the Lord says is going to
come to pass. I don't know exactly how. clouds are going to roll
back as a scroll and he's coming and there's times I see weird
storms or stuff you see. Maybe it's it. You guys have
a gas line explode. Hey, maybe it's the Lord coming. I don't know what that's going
to look like but I know he's coming. It's going to be and at the end,
we'll look back and say, well, of course, that's how it's supposed
to be. We ought to have seen that or we're done. But what
he says is going to come to pass. Remember in the beginning of
these dreams, I pray this is our dream. I pray this is our
Expected end. That butler, that servant said,
behold divine. Behold divine. And that baker
at one of the crates says, behold, I had three white baskets on
my head. That's another gospel, which is not another. That's
not right. We see it here. I pray we see
it clearly. But what about that butler? He's, boy, he's got it
made now. He's riding on high and he's never going to mess
up again. He's living the good Christian life from here on out.
Verse 23, yet did not the chief butler remember Joseph, but forget
him. This is precious, isn't it? I
like traveling and preaching because I'm working through a
whole book. I can just pick what I like. I guess it's sweet to
me. I want to be that butler. I want
to be the servant. I just, I don't want to come
with nothing of my doing and just say, Lord, here, you've
done everything for me. See that, look to just see the
blood and pass over me and make me like him. That's what I want. And you experience that and you
come to hear a message and your heart's just warmed and you say,
look how good the Lord is to us sinners. We ain't nothing. And on his worms, on his itty
bitty earth and the universe can't contain him. And he sent
his son to die for us and he's risen. We have an empty tomb. He's on his throne. And he's
making intercession for us right now, and we're going to be made
just like him. That's predestination. Conform
to his image. You want to be like Christ? I
do. Now, I'm going to go sleep tonight. I'm going to wake up tomorrow
morning. That alarm's going to go off. You ever forget him? Oh, it's
sad, isn't it? Prone to wonder. Lord, I feel
it. Prone to leave the one that I
love. I pray the Lord reminds us of Christ, of his shed blood,
that he's the brine, he's the vine, we're the branches, it's
in him, that husbandman put us in him, grafted us in there,
it's his fruit, it's the father's cup, he's the king. Our prayer
reminds us every day. And whenever I forget, he reminds
me and he'll remind you, I ain't the faithful one, he is. He is. I got a friend of mine
that's losing his mind. I know a couple people have Alzheimer's,
a believer. And he was worried. He said,
I'm going to forget everything. I won't even know my own name.
And I said, that's true. I heard a man say one time, he
said, I'll never forget the day the Lord saved me. You just might.
The Lord might take your mind from you. But it's not us remembering
him. What did the thief say? Lord,
remember me. It's your thoughts. And that's what he told us. He
said, I know the thoughts I have towards you. I don't have evil
thoughts. I ain't gonna do you harm. I
give you an expected end. And that expected end ain't just
a place, it's a person. It's a person. It's the one who
shed those grapes for us. I pray as a blessing to you.
Thank you, God, for having me.