Gooding, David: In Your Offspring Shall All Nations Be Blessed: One Study on God's Promises in Genesis 44–50
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And a very good evening to you once more. It's good to see you at this final study in the book of Genesis. I share your disappointment that Mr. Loudon is not able tonight to continue what he so nobly begu- began some weeks ago, that is to outline the final section of the book of Genesis and to bring its message home to our hearts. You are to be congratulated on persisting in these studies right to their end. It is but a small little reward that I hand you out tonight, a kind of a New Year's present. In the form of this sheaf of notes, it is simply a table of contents of the last section of the book of Genesis. It will be useful particularly to me more than to you this evening. It will help us to save a little time, and that is always of great benefit when I am the preacher, so the congregation thinks. In addition, it might conceivably be some use to you in days to come, if ever you should return to study this part of Genesis in detail, and therefore, if you so please, you are very welcome to take away that little sheaf of notes with you as you go. So now let us do some reading in the book of Genesis, three lengthy passages. It is, after all, a book of narrative, and we cannot make real sense of it unless we attend to the detail of the narrative. So now, chapter forty four to begin with. Chapter forty four. We begin at verse eighteen. Then Judah came near unto him, that is to Joseph, and said, O my lord, let thy servant, I pray thee, speak a word in my lord's ears, and let not thine anger burn against thy servant, for thou art even as Pharaoh. My lord asked his servant, saying, have you a father or a brother? And we said unto my lord, we have a father, an old man, and a child of his old age, a little one. And his brother is dead, and he alone is left of his mother, and his father loveth him. And thou saidst unto thy servants, bring him down unto me, that I may set mine eyes upon him. And we said unto my Lord, the lad cannot leave his father, for if he should leave his father, his father would die. Now saidst unto thy servants, except your youngest brother come down with you, you shall see my face no more. And it came to pass, when we came up unto thy servant my father, we told him the words of my lord, and our father said, Go again, buy us a little food. And we said, We cannot go down. If our youngest brother be with us, then we will go down, for we may not see the man's face, except our youngest brother be with us. And thy servant, my father, said unto us, You know that my wife bear me two sons, and the one went out from me, and I said, Surely he is torn in pieces, and I have not seen him since. And if you take this one also from me, and mischief befall him, you shall bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave. Now therefore, when I come to thy servant, my father, and the lad be not with us, seeing that his life is bound up in the lad's life, it shall come to pass when he sees that the lad is not with us, that he will die. Thy servant shall bring down the gray hairs of thy servant, our father, with sorrow to the grave. For thy servant became surety for the lad unto my father, saying, If I bring him not unto thee, then shall I bear the blame to my father forever. Now therefore, let thy servant, I pray thee, abide instead of the lad, a bondman to my lord, and let the lad go up with his brethren. For how shall I go up to my father and the lad be not with me, lest I see the evil that shall come on my father? Then Joseph could not refrain himself. Chapter forty eight, Chapter forty eight, beginning in verse one. And it came to pass after these things that one said to Joseph, Behold, thy father is sick. And he took with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim. And one told Jacob and said, Behold, thy son Joseph cometh unto thee. And Israel strengthened himself and sat upon the bed. Jacob said unto Joseph, God Almighty appeared unto me at Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me. And he said unto me, Behold, I will make thee fruitful and multiply thee, and I will make of thee a company of peoples, and will give this land to thy seed after thee for an everlasting possession. And now thy two sons, which were born unto thee in the land of Egypt before I came unto thee into Egypt, are mine, Ephraim and Manasseh, even as Reuben and Simeon shall be mine. And thy issue, which thou begettest after them, shall be thine. And they shall be called after the name of their brethren in their inheritance. And as for me, when I came from Padan, Rachel died by me in the land of Canaan in the way, when there was still some way to come to Ephrath, and I buried her there in the way to Ephrath, the same is Bethlehem. And Israel beheld Joseph's sons, and he said, Who are these? And Joseph said unto his father, They are my sons, whom God hath given me here. And he said, bring them, I pray thee, unto me, and I will bless them. Now the eyes of Israel were dim for age, so that he could not see. And he brought them near unto him, and he kissed them and embraced them. And Israel said unto Joseph, I had not thought to see thy face. And lo, God has let me see thy seed also. And alongside of that, an illuminating passage from one of the prophets, the prophet Isaiah, and chapter forty nine. Isaiah forty nine. Beginning in verse fourteen, then Zion, but Zion said, Jehovah hath forsaken me, and the Lord hath forgotten me. Can a woman forget her sucking child that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb. Yea, these may forget, yet will not I forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands. Thy walls are continually before me. Thy children make haste. Thy destroyers and they that made thee waste shall go forth of thee. Lift up thine eyes round about, and behold, all these gather themselves together and come to thee. As I live, saith the Lord, thou shalt surely clothe thee with them all as with an ornament, and gird thyself with them like a bride. But as for thy waste and thy desolate places, and thy land that have been destroyed, surely now shalt thou be too narrow for the inhabitants, and they that swallowed thee up shall be far away. The children of thy bereavement shall yet say in thine ears, the place is too narrow for me. Give me place that I may dwell. Then shall thou say in thine heart, who has begotten me these? Seeing I have been bereaved of my children, and am solitary, and in exile, and wandering to and fro. And who has brought up these? Behold, I was left alone. These... where were they? And God give us good understanding of his word. So now we come to sum up what remains as best we can of the book of Genesis. And in our studies, we have noticed, have we not, that God made four promises to Abraham the patriarch. He promised him that he would give him the land of Canaan. He promised him that he would give him seed. He promised him that he would bless him. And he promised finally that in him and in his seed would all the nations of the world be blessed. The book of Genesis can be viewed as the fulfillment of those four ah great promises. For in chapter twelve onward, God points to the land whether he has brought Abram, and he said, now Abram, this is the land I promised you, stay here. This land will eventually be yours, though not for many centuries to come. And then the book of Genesis from chapter fifteen onward goes to tell us how God fulfilled the second promise, that he would grant Abraham seed. What use promising Abram the land and possessing up possession of it hundreds of years hence, if Abram died childless, with no one to inherit the land that God had promised to him. And so in chapters fifteen to twenty two and onwards, Genesis tells how God fulfilled the second great promise and gave Abram the promised seed. When Abram died, Isaac succeeded him, and in Isaac's life particularly, though not in his life alone, God fulfilled this third great promise, and the Lord blessed Isaac, till even the surrounding Philistines had to admit, now thou art the blessed of the Lord. And in his life and in the early years of Jacob, God began to train and to discipline his people, to understand more clearly what blessing means. Now we've come to the last section of Genesis in these last studies, and we find therein the God fulfills, at the first level at any rate, the fourth of those great prophecies. In thee and in thy seed shall all the nations be blessed. Here in the stories that fill the latter chapters of Genesis, God's people are going to see this first level fulfillment of that promise. As they see the great empire Egypt, with all her treasures and marvelous and sophisticated civilization, about to be brought to its knees by its economic problems. They are to see God's great provision for the Gentile empire, that in Abraham and in one of Abraham's seed, namely Joseph, not only the empire of Egypt, but all the little nations surrounding her are to be blessed. That fulfillment was, as I say, a first level fulfillment. Its final glorious fulfillment still lies in the future. The nations go on. Not only do their political problems persist, but everywhere evident are the great problems of economics, are they not? And if this past twenty years has taught us anything, let me speak with all due deference to the experts, but we have discovered, haven't we, that economics is not a science. And for all our theories, the nations remain at sixes and sevens to know exactly what to do about economics. We live in an absurd world, where in some countries millions perish of starvation, and in other places, nations pay millions of pounds every year to keep food rotting in their storehouses, afraid to sell it or give it away, lest it ruin the world markets. We wait the day when the choirs of heaven shall sing, worthy is the Lamb to receive not only the honor, but the riches, and take over the economic development and control of the world. Here in the book of Genesis is the early prototype fulfillment of that great promise, in thee and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. Therefore, as we listen to Mr. Loudon and his expert expositions, we rightly saw visions of glory, and particularly in the person of Joseph, we saw a prototype of our blessed Lord Jesus. For in the history, Joseph was rejected by his brethren, was he not, and sold to the Gentiles. By the Gentiles cruelly, uh, uh, undeservedly condemned, but eventually brought out of his prison house and surrounded with the robes of state and brought to honor and to preeminence. Then the very brethren that in his youth had rejected him came to him, were obliged to recognize his authority and bow their knees to him. And in his great mercy and tenderness, he refrained from any revenge and forgave them and blessed them, and they were reconciled. And when they were reconciled, they found that this Joseph, their brother, was not only in position of worldwide glory, but he had a bride, and she was not a Hebrew, she was a Gentile. Which all of it speaks, of course, eloquently to the Christian heart. Here too is a prototype. For our blessed Lord Jesus was rejected, wasn't he, by his brethren. He came to his own, and his own received him not, and even his brothers of his own family did not believe on him. And they gave him over to the hands of the Gentiles, who unjustly condemned him. But God raised him from the dead and set him at his own right hand. And Jesus shall reign where'er the sun doth his successive journeys run. And the glorious news is that one day his brethren shall come, brought to him by their extreme need. But the severities of God's judgments are in the end kindnesses, are they not? They shall bring the nation of Israel in their perplexity to him whom they will discover is their long lost Messiah, and they shall be reconciled to him. So that if their casting away has proved the enrichment of our Gentile world, what shall the receiving of them, uh, be again be but life from the very dead. When at last Israel is restored and reconciled to their great Messiah, they shall find that their Messiah has a bride. Their bride is predominantly Gentile. Joseph is the great Old Testament character that unites both Jew and Gentile together. Now, for all those lovely things, I must not be tempted to dwell upon them this evening, for they have been expounded better than I could in the past. My job is to be a summary of what has gone before. And so now, in these final, uh, moments, we turn to consider some of the practical lessons that lie here upon the page of scripture for us. And in order to capture those practical lessons, I shall now need to ask you to come back to the actual history. And for a moment, if you can, though it's difficult, I know, to forget your typology and think about these things as actual history. And then I must ask you to do a thing that many people find very difficult. When they first hear it, it appears to be a form of heresy. Namely, that the last section of Genesis, though it says a lot about Joseph, is in fact about Jacob. That is to say, the story from a literary point of view is told from Jacob's point of view. You will notice that on that sheet, if you have still had patience to retain it, or at least can grab it somewhere to save your attention. And part of the reason for listing there for you the contents of these chapters is to show that the story is told throughout from Jacob's point of view. It falls into four parts. There is the story from chapter thirty seven onward, how Jacob dwelled in the land, loved his son Joseph, gave him a coat of many color. He was rejected by his brethren and sold, and so the story goes. And then comes the second part from chapter forty two, when the famine began to strike Canaan. But Jacob heard and saw that there was corn in Egypt. So Jacob, to preserve his family, sent some of his sons to get some corn. Then that eventually leads to the rediscovery of Joseph, and Jacob is brought down to see his darling son before he dies. And in chapter forty six verse one, Israel takes his journey very significantly. His father Isaac had been told to stay in the land and not go down to Egypt. But now here comes a different part of history, and Jacob, as responsible head of the tribe, is told in a vision by God that he is to take the tribe now down into Egypt once more. That was a very significant move. He went down with the promise that one day God would bring them back again. Finally, chapter forty seven tells us that Jacob lived in Egypt for seventeen years, and then grew old and died. And when he died, they took Jacob back to Canaan and buried him there. When Jacob is buried, Genesis story is virtually over. The last chapters of Genesis are told from Jacob's point of view. And why is that? Well, because you will notice that with the beginning of this cha- this part of Genesis, a new problem asserts itself. In Abram's day, God's great promises were to give Abram the promised seed. Abram made the mistake of taking Hagar and fathered Ishmael and hoped that Ishmael would be the promised seed, and God said, no, he's a decent enough chap, and I will bless him, but send him away, Abraham. It is in Isaac that thy seed shall be called. And Ishmael was rejected and sent away, though blessed by God, and Isaac chosen to be the carrier of the promise and the destiny. Isaac had two sons, Esau and Jacob, and they were twins. Esau was the elder. But once more, God's word said, no, Isaac, not Esau. Much as you like him and prefer him, the promises of God, the purposes of God shall be worked out not in Esau, but in Jacob. When it came to Jacob's turn, Jacob had twelve boys. And had the same pattern repeated itself, it would have been a question, wouldn't it, of taking one of those sons and telling all the others to go away and get lost. But that's not what happens. Oh, far from it. It was no longer a question of choosing one and letting all the others go. The very reverse must happen. For now the time had come when the fulfillment of God's promise would mean that Jacob's family must be built into a tribe, and then the tribe must be allowed to develop until it becomes a nation of Israel, to take as a nation its great part in human history. So now it's not a question of sending all eleven away and just choosing one, it's the opposite problem. How do you keep all twelve together? And build them first into an extended family, and then into a tribe, and then into a nation. That is the problem. And it fills the first two major portions of the end parts of Genesis. And once you've managed to keep the twelve boys together, and you've got them now into Egypt, the next problem is, how do you preserve them from being a tiny little tribe, a tiny minority in the vast Egyptian empire? How do you preserve them so that they don't lose their identity and get lost among the nations and fizzle out? How do you maintain them until they have become an independent nation? These were the big historical problems that beset God's purpose at this stage. It is at that level, of course, that Genesis talks to us, doesn't it, and has some exceedingly practical lessons to apply. Cast your mind back, if you will, then, to Jacob and his tents and his twelve boys. They are, in the Eastern fashion, the beginnings of an extended family, and perhaps they have very small ideas in their heads of the great glory that God has for them, the tremendous dignity, privilege, and responsibility in the part that they will play in history. Little Benjamin, as he toddled around the camp, and methinks also Judah, now grown to be a very powerful man, had little notions that some three thousand years there would be people in Apsley Street, Belfast, still thinking about them. Little notions at the time that their very names would be engraved on the gates of the eternal city. And now, the whole purposes of God hung on this. How will you keep these twelve fellows together? You say that's easy. Well, then you don't know life then. You don't know life. It isn't only difficult to keep unregenerate men and women together, it's sometimes very difficult to keep redeemed men and women together. Oh, we're going to sing, uh, we do sing of the glorious time when in glory all the redeemed shall meet. Praise God for it, for God is going to triumph yet. Out here in this vale of tears, it's a number one problem with the people of God. How do you keep them together? Been not only a problem with Israel, it's been a problem with Christendom, hasn't it? All down the long centuries. And the world stands by in its scorn and points the finger to. And you say you have the answer to the world's problems. You stand there and preach the Prince of Peace. You tell us that your savior has not only saved you, he's going to save the world and unite all mankind, the world through, and you can't keep together yourselves five minutes. A scandal to the gospel it is, isn't it? So why? Well, we know the story. It was told us by Mr. Loudon very eloquently in the early days, when the visions first came and were given to Joseph of the glorious future there was to be. The other eleven boys didn't rally round and say, how marvelous, Joseph, and congratulate you, and we're delighted to be your servants, and, uh, we'll work together in this great purpose of God. Not on your, uh, uh, not on your life, did they say. The old, old, old vice of jealousy and envy that fills all our hearts got the better of them. We bow down to you, they said. And then there was another thing. This Joseph had been in the habit, uh, when he made his reports to Father Jacob, of telling Father Jacob exactly what the other eleven were doing, they brought their father their evil report. And they said to themselves, you imagine what life would be like if this Joseph became the boss. Goodness me, we couldn't fiddle income tax anymore. No, no, they said. That's a very deep, ingrained human thing, isn't it? We're all like a millennium. If only the Germans would behave, let alone the Japanese and the Australians, those people that keep the world all wobbly by hanging on underneath. Are we ourselves? Now, you're not saying, are you, that we're all expected to be age? A man has got to look after himself. They're not all expected to be angels. Are we? The human heart likes its sin. And if the glorious age of peace will depend on accepting a savior who will face us and God with our sins, then really we don't want it. Uh, so they divided on that score, and they sold their potential savior, didn't they? And then Genesis goes on with a colorful, not to say lurid, story of what happened to Master Judah. He was the one who was going to bear the scepter according to the great prophecies that Jacob was about to pronounce upon him. He'd already fancied himself, didn't he? He was the great Judah. He was the head of that family. You should have seen him of a Friday night when he went downtown, you'll see. He went aside from his brethren, it says. He must have forgotten, mustn't he, about the visions of glory and God's purpose for this special nation. Deserting his brethren, he went and lived among the Canaanites and took a Canaanite girl for wife, and I'll pull a veil over the rest of the story. And watch him swaggering down the street in his great Texan hat and his signet ring. It's a sizable signet ring, you couldn't miss it. Wow. Oh. And I do see his staff. He was a boss. Finding a prostitute on the street, and you know the rest of the story. But you say, what's the point of being in politics then, if it isn't so you can indulge yourself? If you're going to be the head and the chief, are you not going to be allowed to enjoy the perks of your office? That's what being chief is, surely. It's the rulers that get all the big perks, isn't it? Not the road maker and the dustbin man. And if that's what Judah thinks it means to be the chief. Oh, Judah, Judah, Jew. Are you really going to be the patriarch father of the one who shall call himself the lion of the tribe of Judah? It's an idea that perhaps not you, but some of the early apostles had to be taught, wasn't it? There was John and James, you know, good chaps, of course, on uh, who am I to to criticize them? John and James, you'll see. And uh, they came one day, supported in no little degree by Mama, you'll see, and asked the Lord that they would grant them anything they should ask, and he said, what would you like? He said, that we should sit one on thy right hand and the other on thy left in thy glory. It's not wrong, I hope, to be ambitious, is it, in the spiritual life? Don't you want to get a bigger reward as possible? Or are you content with the drafty door inside heaven and have no reward at all so long as you're there? Well, let me tell you, that's a very, very curious ambition because there are no draughts in heaven to start with. And while we should be ambitious for the biggest reward we can get, we shall have to listen to the lesson, shall we not, that our Lord taught James and John. To be on my right hand and my left, to be the chief in the kingdom. Do you know what it means, he says, what being first means? The Son of Man came not to serve, be served, but to serve and give his life a ransom for many. All my brothers, my sisters, it will remain so eternally, won't it? You don't think, do you, that the Lord Jesus, having served us and loved us to death itself and given himself for us at Calvary, now says to himself, and there's enough of that. Now at last I'm sitting on a throne, I'm going to serve myself. No, surely. To all eternity, the exalted Lord of heaven, lion of the tribe of Judah, shall serve his people. That is heaven's scale of values, that the one who serves most is the biggest. That is so, isn't it? If we thought about it and reduced it, oh, forgive me for descending to such lowly levels, but if we thought about it, it is so. I mean, who is the bigger? The pigs? Who crawl around in the sty with their fat bellies and scream their heads off to get more food, or the patient farmer who serves them and brings them their bucket of food and puts it in the dish. Who is the bigger? You say the farmer that serves is the bigger. Yes, that's right. And Judah had a lot to learn, hadn't he? If God's vision for his people were going to come true, that the scepter shall not depart from Judah until Shiloh come. Judah has got to be trained, and his successors, as to what being the scepter bearer means. In the early days, from Jacob's point of view, his family was a disaster. He lost Joseph, deceived, though he didn't know it, by his other sons. Then Judah went off and got himself entangled with Gentiles, and the royal line that issued from him would have been forever obliterated unless it had been for a Gentile woman who was more concerned about maintaining the line, the direct line of Judah, than Judah was himself. Odd that. It is the fact nowadays that a lot of Israelis, you know, are no longer interested in the coming of Messiah. They think that's all finished, and there's no Messiah to come. All has been fulfilled, they say. There's no Messiah to come, and here are you Gentiles more concerned about the line of Judah than many Israelis are themselves. Interesting, isn't it? They're there by the way. Mm. And then he sent his, uh, sons to get corn, and Simeon was taken. And the condition laid down that the next time they came, unless they brought Benjamin, they wouldn't be allowed to see the ruler's face. In the end, poor old Jacob had to let Benjamin go as well. Joseph gone, Simeon gone, Benjamin gone. He said to his sons, gentlemen, said he, I can't stand it anymore. If Benjamin never comes back, then you will bring my gray hairs down with sorrow to the grave. A quarter of the family gone. You've no wonder, have you, that the historian is telling the story from Jacob's point of view. Oh, you parents, don't you find your hearts beating with it? What ambitions you have for your children. What ambitions for your family. Should you lose a third out of your family, pray how would you feel? That is why, isn't it, when eventually Jacob got down to Egypt, and he saw the glory of Joseph, and then it was told him that Joseph comes to see you, Jacob, and Joseph came in. Jacob, with his eyes now dim, caught sight of shadowy forms, two strapping young fellows, and he said, Joseph, who are these? And Joseph said, they're my sons, Dad. And the poor boy nearly broke down in tears. He said, Joseph, my boy, I scarce ever hoped to see your face again, and God has let me see your seed. Who are these? And the refrain is taken up in the great prophets. Isaiah talks about a time when Jerusalem city, Zion city, shall say, I'm a widow. What is the use of all God's promises to restore Jerusalem? My sons are gone from me. I'm left a widow, says God through the prophet. No, it shall not be. One day the nations will bring your sons. There'll be so many of them that they shall say to you, the place isn't big enough to contain us, and you shall say, and these, these, who are these? As you'll see the multitude of your sons. Oh, how difficult it has been for Israel down the years, hasn't it? If we can think of Jerusalem City like a mother and her children gone, oh, what shall we say of a third of the nation almost gone in the gas chambers of Hitler's Germany? No wonder many a Jew says, and how can I believe in God still? And yet the day shall come when God shall fulfill his promise, and Israel's children shall come, and Israel shall say in the unbelief of veritable joy, these, who are these? As God binds up the hurt of the people of Israel and brings them his final blessing under Messiah. But we must get back to our practical problem. How do you keep the twelve boys together? And now they're sundered, how do you get them back together? Well, you say the answer is Joseph. I thought you were bursting to get back to Joseph. He is the key, isn't he, Joseph, your hero. He's been your hero ever since Sunday school days anyway, Joseph. I better not say anything about, you know, to, to derogate from Joseph's glory. And certainly Joseph was a kingpin, wasn't he? In the whole means of Israel, the family's salvation. His suffering, of course. His innocent suffering. Accused falsely, charged falsely, put down into the pit and put down into the dungeon. All the fault of his brethren, but in his mercy and compassion, when it was in his power to hurt them. Though he treated them firmly and caused them many tears and heartaches, it was simply that he should bring them to repentance, without which repentance the old wounds could not be healed. There was no vengeance in his heart, no bitterness, no revenge. The great innocent sufferer. And Christ has left us an example that we should follow his steps, hasn't he? So Peter declares even to the slaves among the early Christians. For the Lord's sake, he says, when you work, live and work under unreasonable masters and they beat you even though you've done no wrong, will you not, for God's sake, bear it wrongfully? That your patient suffering, innocent suffering, may speak its Christian message and be a testimony to the Lord Jesus in a world that's full of revenge, and with its revenge only complicates and makes permanent the problems. There was something else beyond innocent suffering, and that is vicarious suffering. And the whole thing will now turn on the ability of being Judah, the king. When it came necessary, and there was no other way. Oh, drivel, said Jacob, remembering what Reuben had done. But in the extremity, Judah stepped forward. Said Judah to Jacob, remembering what Reuben had done. But in the extremity, Judah stepped forward. Said Judah to Jacob, look here, dad, he says, this is the only way we shall survive. We starve unless you let Benjamin go. He said, Dad, I will go surety. My life for his, if I don't bring him back. You know the eloquent story. How when they were back on their way, the officials of the court caught up with them and said, what do you mean stealing my Lord's cup? They said, we haven't stole it, but if there's anywhere here, well, the man in whose sack it is, uh, let him be taken. And the cup was found in Benjamin's sack. And with horrible dismay, they went back to Egypt. The apparently stony-hearted Joseph said, no, gentlemen, I'm perfectly just. All the others of you may go. You did agree, didn't you, that the man in whose sack the cup is found, he must stay and be my servant. They tried to argue, but no. That was justice. And at that moment, as being the only possible solution, Judah stepped forward out of the others and made his plea to Joseph. Sir, he said, may I speak to you? I can't go back. I can't go back without Benjamin, my brother. If I go back without him and my father sees the boy is not there, he'll break his heart, and I shall bring him down to the grave with sorrow. I can't stand by and see it, sir, he said. Please, please, said he, will you not allow me to take my brother's place and suffer his punishment and imprisonment instead of him? To suffer instead of somebody is not just innocent suffering, is it? It is vicarious suffering. And it proved the key to the bringing of that family together and safely through the famine. And you will at once see how Judah likewise in this is a figure of our Lord, but it takes not only Joseph, but Judah as well to speak adequately of our Lord's sufferings. He suffered who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. His sufferings were innocent, but my brothers, they were more than innocent. They were vicarious. And he was wounded for our transgression, and he gave his life a ransom for many. But listen to Peter. He tells us that our blessed Lord in suffering has left us an example, that we should follow his steps, who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he reviled not again, and when he suffered, he threatened not, but committed himself to him who judges righteously. Who his own self bore our sin in his body on the tree, that we, passing away from sin, might live unto righteousness, by whose stripe we are healed. We must not diminish the unique glory of our Lord. He only could atone for sin. No other could do it. But in becoming the vicarious sufferer, he has left us an example. For he calls us to suffer on behalf of others. He calls us to suffer that others might be saved, not that we could bear the penalty of their sin. But you know, in the course of saving people, there is a lot of suffering to be done. I'll tell you, says Paul, how it is given to me to fill up that which is lacking in this sufferings of Christ for his body's sake. Bringing the people of God home to glory is no innocent child's afternoon's play. To keep God's people together and on the road to glory, to bring them through their trials and difficulties, and indeed to go out into the world that men and women might be saved. There's no way of doing ultimate- doing it ultimately, unless we are prepared from time to time to suffer Suffer. that That others others. Might be saved. And talking to the dear Christian women, Peter says, now, my dear, says he, some of you have got very difficult husbands, haven't you? They're not converted men. What unconverted pagans would do to Christian wives would perhaps not bear repetition in, uh, genteel drawing rooms. But, says Peter, you know, in all your difficulties and your suffering, remember there's a possibility that as you suffer and yet live as a bele- as believers, if your husbands can't be won by the actual preaching, they could be won by your behavior. Suffering, so that their husbands would get converted. And so must we all learn. This is the way the Savior went. This is the glory of the lion of the tribe of Judah. We who follow him must learn to follow his steps. And finally, the final section of Genesis tells us how that when Jacob was very old, he gathered his twelve boys around him to tell them what should befall them in the coming days. For as is often the elderly and dying, their vision sometimes is all the clearer of the great ages to come. Here were uh twelve boys standing around his bed, thirteen of them now. And what a future lay before the nation, stretching out over the long centuries, to the coming of the Messiah, to his millennial glories, to the new heavens and the new earth. And these men were the carriers of that promise, and part of the process. Oh, they would need some talking to, wouldn't they? What oh they would. You know, and it wasn't any sentimental old granddaddy that sat there or lay there on his bed and talked to them either. Of course, they were a whole lot of gentlemen, you'll see. And men talking to men can be a bit direct, can't they, what oh? More than preachers dare be. But he wasn't deceived. They were his boys, so they were. Some of them were very rum customers, some of them very, very rough diamonds. Before they got to glory, they would have to be polished. Their characters have to be changed. And so he addressed them. Jacob then to his twelve sons. It is an interesting fact that in the New Testament there comes another Jacob, only we normally call him James, but in Greek his name is Jacob, as it is in Hebrew. And he writes a letter to the twelve tribes, preparing them for the glory that shall await them. And it is remarkable to see how much those addresses have in common. Time forbids that I should do more than to point out some of the similarities, but I hastily do so. For tonight we're thinking about the practical lessons, aren't we, that lie on the pages at the end of Genesis. If these boys are going to be the carriers of the great purposes of God, then to start with Reuben, he'll have to be changed, won't he? Reuben, unstable as water, thou shalt not excel in a moment of temptation, hadn't the strength nor the sense of proportion to draw back. And with his very birthright hanging in the balance, yielded to a passing temptation and lost his birthright, though thank God, not his salvation. Ruben will have to learn to overcome that instability, won't he? And so says our dear brother James to us. Count it all joy, says he, my brothers, when you fall into various kinds of testing, and seek wisdom of the Lord, that you might know how to face life's tests and life's temptations, and not for momentary indulgence lose rewards that otherwise could be bought. So ask in faith, ask the divine wisdom, not doubting, not wavering, for he that waves is is unstable, is like a wave of the sea, tossed here and there. Needs stability in your asking. Sure, we're not perfect, are we? But here's me, and I hear a good lady, and she's a delightful pianist, concert standard, you know, and I'm enwrapped in it, and you say, I say afterwards, with a certain impertinence and cheek, you know, I've often wanted to play like that, you know, um, uh, uh, in fact, would you take me on to teach me? She said, I don't think I could teach you. Goodness, no, I couldn't. Oh, I said, I have ability, great ability, and I, yes, I would like to be taught. Uh, and at length she agrees to teach me. Says she, you'll come three times a week for three hours each night. No, no, I say, no, no, that's ridiculous. I mean, I only want to play the piano. I mean, I've got a lot of other things to do. Oh, you have? Why do you think you're going to be a concert pianist then? Well, I don't know, but I mean, be reasonable. All right, she says, you come once a week then. All right, come once a week. So I come the first three weeks, ha ha, and play my one finger exercises, you see. Mm. The fourth week I don't turn up, nor the fifth. but I'm there on the sixth. And she says, hello, it's you again, is it? Um, you weren't here last, this last two weeks. Uh, no, I wasn't. Uh, well, where were you? Oh, well, I couldn't come, see. My Aunt Jane came, and she took us all out to Maud's Ice Cream Parlor, and, uh, you know, you're not saying, are you, that ice cream is wrong? I- I mean, uh, and, uh, one has to look after one's aunts anyway, so I- I mean, I- I didn't come, but well, that was the first night. Well, where were you the second? Well, I forgot, actually. I mean, you know. Uh, yes, you forgot. And the dear lady says, do you really want to play the piano, or don't you? Oh, my brothers, let me ask myself, my sisters likewise, do I really want to reign with Christ, or don't I? What is the use of asking God's help one day, but forgetting to ask him for the next six weeks. I shall need stability, shall I not? To ask wisdom of God, that I might live aright. Simeon and Levi, cursed be your wrath, it's cruel, said Jacob. I'll separate you in Israel. James reminds us likewise that the wrath of man, our little indignations, they do not work the righteousness of God. Levi was eventually given the priesthood, and a great privilege it was. Even there, Levi abused it, didn't he? Like the priest and the Levite on their way up to Jerusalem, who got so preoccupied with singing hymns that they hadn't time to show mercy to the man that had fallen among thieves, and their religion became a mere formality, devoid of that compassion that is a compassion of God. We need to listen in, do we not? Both to old Jacob talking to his twelve sons and the more modern Jacob talking to the twelve tribes. For the moment, finally. It says James, now learn, my brothers, who our blessed Lord is. He is the Lord of glory, you know. And if you say you believe in the Lord of glory, pray God's help on you to live with the dignity and respect of your fellow princes and princesses in the great royal family of God. And there we must leave it. We are on our way to glory, are we not? We do believe the visions. There are practical lessons that urge us now as we go forth into another year, that we will live consistently with our hope. And so Jacob died, was carried to Israel, and after that Joseph came to die too. And as he died, the great second in command in Egypt made the Israelites take an oath that they would not bury him in Egypt, but when they left, they would take his bones back to Israel. I don't know whether Pharaoh ever heard of the arrangements, the funeral arrangements. Do you? If he did, they must have sounded very comical. Are you really telling me, Joseph, that you imagine, I- I mean, I don't want to be rude, but your- your- your- your brethren, you call them, I- I mean, they- I keep a few cows, don't they, down in Goshen there somewhere, Joseph, you know. Well, there's no wrong in keeping cows, that's as good as anything, but I mean, Joseph. Are you really telling me that the future of this world is with your brothers and a few their cows and things, and what do you say, your name is Israel, a- and uh, you're going to be the leading nation and produce the safer of the world. Come, come, come, Joe. I mean, be real against the big empire of Egypt. How could you think that your little people carry the great purposes of the Almighty. And with due respect, Joseph heard what Pharaoh said, but he said to himself, great as my career in Egypt has been, the future lies with the people of God. I will be buried in Canaan. So it has ever been down the century. So must it be to us. The future, my brothers and sisters, though it might seem unrealistic to us, to the world it seems a fairy tale. The future is not with the common market. It's not with the great leading industrial nations of the world. The future lies with the people of God and the coming of the Savior. God equip us to serve our day and generation in whatever position we are able, if it please God, to the very heights of the world in which we live. But God keep our vision clear. The future lies not with them, the future lies with the people of God, and the Son of God, the Lamb of God, the line of the tribe of Judah. God give us grace to live as incipient princes and princesses in the royal house of heaven. Shall we pray? O God, we thank thee for these stories once more in thy holy word. The sheer glory of them as literature and as stories, the way they present human emotions so movingly, so realistically. But beyond it, Lord, we sense and know that these things are the very voice of God, carry the plans of God. We thank thee for opening our eyes to these great realities and hopes. Only we do pray thee, that what we have enjoyed of thy word this evening and over the years that have passed, may not remain just stories, but be so in our hearts by conviction of faith, that it shall help us to live in all the realities of this broken and lost world, with hope in our hearts, determination that by thy grace, thy will shall be done in our lives. Thy purpose for our sanctification be fulfilled, that when the Lord comes, we may be ready for his coming, we may share his reign with him, and be with him a blessing to the whole universe. And this we pray through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. Amen. Now may God bless you and a very happy and prosperous