Hello my “Walking with Jesus” friends all around the world,
In recent days it’s been very hard for me to watch news reports coming out of Afghanistan, how about you? It’s not the first time we’ve seen uprisings in nations that cause people and families in entire villages or cities to run for safety with only the clothes on their backs and their babies in their arms! But oh, it’s heartbreaking isn’t it? It’s terrible enough when outside invading forces attack a country, but when it’s internal, people attacking their own fellow citizens, even their own extended family members, oh my that’s so difficult to watch, and it’s almost beyond understanding! But it’s the reality of our world, isn’t it?
In our journey through the Bible we come to that exact situation in Genesis 37. Yesterday I left you standing with several of Jacob’s older sons who are out with the livestock in the fields. They are watching a lone figure coming toward them from a distance. They recognize his brightly colored garment and presume it is their younger brother Joseph, who they have grown to hate for several reasons. First, he’s the obvious favorite son of their father and jealousy is wreaking havoc in their family! Second, Joseph has been having dreams lately, and as he explains them, the dreams seem to suggest he is fantasizing about someday being a great ruler and his family bowing down to him! Oh my that just puts some of his brothers into a rage!
So, as Joseph is waving at them, far in the distance, these brothers are making a plan… they’ve had enough, and some of them have used the word “kill” as they scheme together. Reuben, the oldest son of Jacob, has asked for a little restraint. They are talking fast now, for Joseph isn’t far away and they need agreement before he gets within earshot.
The Genesis 37 record says: “So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe – the richly ornamented one his father had given him – and they threw him into an empty cistern. As they sat down to eat their meal they looked up and saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead. Their camels were loaded…” (Gen. 37:23)
Look around the circle of brothers, what do you see in their eyes, and what do you think they are contemplating in their hearts as they see that caravan of traveling merchants on the horizon? Listen, they are whispering a scheme. Do you hear an occasional cry for help from that cistern over there, as Joseph appeals to his brothers for mercy? How the brothers knew the caravan was “Ishmaelites” I don’t know, but if true it means these travelers are in some ways extended family, for you may recall Ishmael was the son of Abraham and Hagar, his Egyptian maidservant. That would make Ishmael step brother to Isaac, the grandfather of these sons of Jacob!
Oh my how jealousy and bitterness can skew our perception of reality and distort our common sense into imagining possibilities we normally would have never considered. Jacob had grown up in painful, horrible family dysfunction. He had spent many years running from his shame and trying to deal with the pain of his ‘father wound’. Now as father to 12 sons, Jacob’s home culture was even more troubling, more dysfunctional than the one in which he grew up… and Jacob is responsible for all of it. His favoritism both with his wives as well as his children, and his dishonesty with Laban his father-in-law, has ruined this family, as much as it ruined his boyhood family.
What Jacob didn’t know was that the mess he had created and nurtured in his dysfunctional leadership of his family, was about to backfire on him! And that backfire would break his heart so painfully it would nearly kill him.
Listen, Judah is speaking, he’s Jacob’s fourth eldest son and has a strong personality that the other brothers often follow: “What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? Come, let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay a hand on him, after all he is our brother, our own flesh and blood. His brothers agreed.” (Gen. 37:27) May I ask you my friends, look back over your life, is this you? Have you been the one to bring calm to an explosive situation? No matter where you look in our world, I’m sure you can see many, many very volatile situations that need people with common sense and wise discernment who can be solution thinkers and peacemakers.
If you are a follower of Jesus, do you see how this is one of the great roles of the Holy Spirit? Romans 8:6 says: “The mind of the sinful person is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace, the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God nor can it do so. Those controlled by the sinful mind cannot please God. You, however, are controlled not by the sinful mind but by the Holy Spirit IF the Spirit of God lives in you…”
So take a close look, what do you see happening here as hate filled brothers discuss the fate of their younger brother Joseph. Do you see the spiritual battle taking place? It’s important my friends, to develop the ability to look beneath the surface and see the spiritual realities happening all around us. There’s a profound spiritual war raging. Satan is determined to continue breeding mayhem and implosion in every society, every city and town in our world. God is determined that human beings everywhere at least have the opportunity to choose a better life, a life free from the bondage and self destruction of the dark kingdom, and live life as God designed you and me to live…in relationship with HIM. That relationship is only possible through the crucified and resurrected Jesus Christ who reigns in heaven today and is fully ready to help any person break free from the bondage and live ‘walking with Jesus’!
Let’s rejoin the brothers as they plot Joseph’s destiny: “When the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him to the Ishmaelites for 20 shekels of silver, and they then continued on their way to Egypt.” (Gen. 37:28) Please don’t be concerned or confused by the two different identifications for these merchants… Midianites and Ishmaelites. “Ishmaelites” refers to their family origin, their ethnicity. “Midianites” refers to the geographical region from which they came (Midian).
Twenty shekels of silver was the going price paid to a slave trader for a healthy, young slave who would then be put on the auction block in a slave market. Egypt was the biggest economy of this era of history, the most sophisticated society. Part of the reason Jacob’s sons would be grazing their animals near this trade route, was the opportunity to sell some of their animals to passerby caravans like this one.
Look closely… what look do you see on young Joseph’s face? What words did he speak which are not recorded for us? Which, of all Jacob’s sons, are involved in this treacherous transaction? Does payment of silver remind you of another betrayal in history? Remember Judas & Jesus? In that case Judas was paid 30 pieces of silver, the price of a slave in Jesus’ day. That’s inflation I suppose! (Matt. 26:15)
The Genesis record tells us the eldest brother Reuben was not present when the merchants headed down the road dragging Joseph as their newly purchased slave. The record says: “When Reuben returned to the cistern and saw that Joseph was not there he tore his clothes. He went back to his brothers and cried, ‘the boy is not there! Where can I turn now?’ Reuben’s heart immediately went to the worst possible scenario. While he had been away, those with the greatest anger must surely have killed Joseph… and now what? I don’t know who but someone stepped up and calmed Reuben and explained Joseph wasn’t dead, he was sold as a slave and was by now, miles down the road toward Egypt!
Let’s pause right here. I think they sat down under a tree to discuss this and make a plan… a plan to tell their father Jacob… something. But what? Whatever they would say would break his heart, and of course no one wanted to tell him the truth. And no one wanted to tell him the infighting and jealousy in the family was his fault! And while the brothers debate and try to figure out a plan of deception, let’s run down the road and walk along with Joseph being led by ropes around his arms like a mule. Look at the tears streaming down his face, the pain of family rejection. He is humiliated as he stumbles along. Surely he would never see his father or family again. His life would be miserable as a slave to some heartless, ruthless Egyptian slave owner. Perhaps Joseph looked up into the sky… the God of his great-grandfather Abraham was either totally ignoring Joseph and the horrific wrong done to him today, or maybe that God had given up on Jacob’s dysfunctional family long ago. We can understand how Joseph would think that, can’t we?
Have you ever been in a situation where God seemed very, very far away and totally uninterested in you and your plight? Psalm 139 is God’s answer to that very wrong thinking, and as we close today, I urge you to take a moment and read that Psalm 139 as you reflect on your life situations today. Then here’s a song to help you gain perspective… HE knows, my friends! He knows!
Today’s Scripture is Genesis 37:19-30.
Choose below to read or listen.
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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
Have a comment or question about today’s chapter? I’m ready to hear from you, contact me here.
Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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