SEPTEMBER 28, 2014 THE STORY I Dreamed a Dream Scripture Lesson: Genesis 37:18-28 Dr. Victor D. Pentz Senior Pastor When we align our lives to God s grand story, we find strength like Joseph to handle all the bad things life throws at us. Despite all evidences to the contrary, God knows what he s doing in your life. These days we are looking at the Bible as one single story. A couple of weeks ago we began our story with Adam and Eve being banished from paradise. Then last week we saw God start over with a new couple, Abraham and Sarah, whom he gave a child in their old age. Now this week we leapfrog a few generations ahead to Abraham s great grandson who literally became a rock star on Broadway. You ve all heard of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. That s our story this morning. Now in Genesis you will not find any Ozzie-and-Harriet families. These are Ozzie Osborne families.
2 The Story I DREAMED A DREAM Conflict abounds. Adam and Eve blame each other for eating the forbidden fruit. Then last week we saw Abraham bring home an extra wife, which did wonders for family harmony. After that, Abraham s son, Isaac had two sons, Jacob and Esau, who waged all-out war to get their hands on the family inheritance. That was followed by Jacob getting swindled by his father-in-law into working seven long years for a bride who, the morning after, he woke to find was the wrong woman. Then when Jacob finally does marry his beloved Rachel, most tragic of all, she dies after giving birth. The TV show Dallas has nothing on Genesis. Here s a family that lies to each other, steals from each other, even tries to kill one another other, while keeping a meticulous scorecard from generation to generation. This morning, here we go again. We read, Now Jacob loved Joseph more than any of his other sons... That s Genesis 37:3. The Little Brother from You-Know-Where There s no faster way for sibling rivalry to raise its ugly head than for a parent to favor one child over the others. Jacob didn t even try to hide it. When it came to buying clothes for the other ten boys he went online to a bargain site on and bought in bulk. Young Joseph he would march into Neiman Marcus at Lenox Square Mall. One day he bought Joseph a spectacularly ornamented coat, the so-called coat of many colors in which Joseph strutted around like a little peacock. Joseph did other things like the morning over breakfast he came out with this little gem. He announced, Last night I had a dream. We were all out in a field tying up sheaves of grain when all of a suddenly my sheaf of grain rose up tall and all of your sheaves of grain bowed down before mine. (That s not the smartest dream to share with your big brothers.) So we read, And they hated him all the more because of his dreams and what he said. (Genesis 37:8) Joseph was the little brother from you know where. Then one day Jacob sent Joseph to check on his brothers who were out tending the family flocks. (Notice they had to work; Joseph didn t.) When they saw him in the distance, all this bitterness spilled over: Here comes Daddy s fairhaired little boy; let s get him. I want us now to look at the revenge that those brothers took on Joseph. We find the story in Genesis 37:18-28. But they saw [Joseph] in the distance, and before he reached them, they plotted to kill him. 19 Here comes that dreamer! they said to each other. 20 Come now, let s kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then we ll see what comes of his dreams. 21 When Reuben [the eldest] heard this, he tried to rescue him from their hands. Let s not take his life, he said. 22 Don t shed any blood. Throw him into this cistern here in the wilderness, but don t lay a hand on him. Reuben said this to rescue him from them and take him back to his father. 23 So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe the ornate robe he was wearing [the coat of many colors ] 24 and they took him and threw him into the cistern. The cistern was empty; there was no water in it. 25 As they sat down to eat their meal, they looked up and saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead. Their camels were loaded with spices, balm and myrrh, and they were on their way to take them down to Egypt. 26 Judah said to his brothers, What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? 27 Come, let s sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him; after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and blood. His brothers agreed 28 So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for twenty
3 The Story I DREAMED A DREAM shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt. Can you imagine the trauma to this boy? He was kidnapped by his own brothers, hurled into a pit, sold like a slab of meat to strangers, and suddenly he went from being the spoiled darling to an anonymous slave in a far-away land. Can t you just see a scenario unfolding before your eyes? This boy becomes a broken bitter person who never recovers, gets into drugs and alcohol, a total train wreck. After all, his dad had been a swindler; his brothers hated him and now this. As a pastor I sometimes meet people who are crippled by pockets of pain in their past. Years ago one bright Mother s Day morning, I spoke on the fifth commandment, Honor your father and mother. Afterwards at the door a man approached who was so agitated that I had to lead him to my office to keep him from making a scene. When I closed the door he exploded: Do you mean to tell me that I have to honor that woman who has made my life so miserable? She has caused me and my family so much pain! I honestly did not know what to say. Do you have a place in your past where you are stuck? Maybe somebody hurt you once and it still hurts even now to think about it. Maybe that hurtful deed unleashed a cascade of consequences in your life. Today one of two things is true: either you ve released the anger and moved on or you haven t and it s still gnawing at your insides. If you re still seething, they re still winning. The Comeback Kid That s where Joseph can be such a help to us. Joseph never let that poison into his system. We re going to see how Joseph got knocked down again and again by life and each time he came roaring back stronger than ever. He is the comeback kid of the Bible. How? He put his pain behind him. Instead of saying, Why God? Why me? Joseph said, Well, Lord, here we are. What do we do now? This morning Joseph is going to tell us his secret so we can live that way too. Joseph arrived in Egypt a slave and before long guess what once again he was somebody s favorite. Potiphar, captain of Pharaoh s guard, took a liking to Joseph and put him in charge of running all his household affairs. There was only one slight complication. We read, Now Joseph was well-built and handsome. (Genesis 39: 6) So Mrs. Potiphar took a liking to this young Hebrew hunk. Running the household put Joseph in constant daily contact with Mrs. Potiphar. In one steamy scene Mrs. Potiphar got him alone and said, Come lie with me. Now even as a boy in Sunday School I remember my consternation at hearing Mrs. Potiphar say to Joseph, Come lie with me. Only I thought she was saying Come; let s speak falsehoods together. Come lie with me. I knew Christians aren t supposed to lie. Here is the scene: http://saltlakebiblecollege. org/images/potiphars_wife.jpg Joseph ran away, and he was fast. He was faster than a cheetah. He was faster than a cougar like Mrs. Potiphar. And notice once again an item of clothing landed him in hot water, only this time it was his cloak, which wound up in Mrs. Potiphar s hand. She used it as evidence to claim that he has dishonored her. Once again Joseph went down this time into an even deeper pit, a stinking Egyptian prison, and there he remained for the next thirteen years. Betrayed by his brothers, thrown in a pit, sold as a slave, and confined to a dungeon on trumped-up charges. So, did Joseph give up? Did he throw a poor me pity party? Did he
4 The Story I DREAMED A DREAM blame God? Joseph played the system and wound up in charge of the whole prison! Meant for Good Then later a catastrophic famine hit Egypt. People were starving. Pharaoh was desperately casting about trying to find a crackerjack administrator to run the relief effort. One of his slaves who d been in that prison said, Your Highness, I think I know just the man you re looking for. And again Joseph rose from pit to prison to palace and now Prime Minister, second-in-command to Pharaoh over all the public works of Egypt. Now the fun began. It turned out that famine had also hit the land of Canaan, where Joseph s brothers and father were hungry. Old Jacob said, I hear tell they ve got lots of grain over in Egypt. Somebody must be running that operation pretty well. You boys go get us some. So these brothers packed their bags and showed up on the palace steps in Egypt. There, in a scene Shakespeare would envy for its dramatic irony, the Grand Vizier of Egypt looked down and saw that those foreigners bowing and scraping before him were his own brothers who had betrayed him 22 years earlier. Joseph thought, Aha! That dream I had as a boy. They are bowing down before me. Then came a series of events where he messed with their minds. Of course, he didn t tell them who he was. At one point he held a dinner for them. When they walked into the room they were shocked to find that the place settings were laid out in the precise sequence of their birth order. Hmm. Then while they were eating, Joseph secretly arranged for his own royal silver goblet to be stashed in the grain sack of the youngest son, Benjamin. As they were going through customs on their way home, the Egyptians caught them with the stolen silver goblet in Benjamin s sack. The brothers begged: Oh, please, you ve got to let him go. Our father lost one beloved son years ago and, if he loses this one, it will kill him. Suddenly Joseph could not hold back any longer. He lost it. He burst into tears: I am that son. I m Joseph, your brother, whom you sold into slavery! Genesis says those brothers were so terrified they could not speak. In their minds they were toast. The only question now was how would they be killed? But don t tell me there isn t any grace in the Old Testament. In one of the most beautiful scenes in all of literature, Joseph said to his brothers, Do not be afraid, for am I in God s place? As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive. So therefore, do not be afraid; I will provide for you and your little ones. So he comforted them and spoke kindly to them. (Genesis 50) Life doesn t make any sense, does it? At least not to those who are living it. Jack Benny was once receiving an award and he said, I really don t deserve this award. Then again, I have arthritis, and I don t deserve that either. Things just don t make sense. You say, But Vic, didn t Jesus say, I have come that you might have life and have it abundantly? Yes, he did. So let s ask, what s life? It s this isn t it either way up and way down? How amazing that Joseph, whether he was up or down, whether from pits to palaces or prison again, was always upbeat, positive, making friends, helping people. He saved his nation and then on top of everything he forgave those brothers. How do you live like that? What s the secret? Joseph s Secret I ll tell you. In Joseph s mind he was not writing his own story. His lower story was simply a
5 The Story I DREAMED A DREAM part of God s upper story. And every one of his ups and downs were simply a twist in the plot of God s plan for the ages. Knowing that made Joseph unstoppable. What sinks so many of us into depression and despair is that we buy into this popular notion that you are the sum of your own choices, so that your life is what you do or what other people do to you, so of course you feel guilty and bitter and angry when bad things happen to you. But what if your life story isn t being written by you after all? Yes, you re an actor, but far above you is an author and if you speak his lines and live his role for you, if you align your lower story life with his upper story, then even the bad in your life will work out ultimately for the good. Joseph s life is one long commentary on Romans 8:28: In all things God works for the good of those who love him and are called according to his purpose. Now wait, Vic, are you saying God makes everything happen? Like when children die? No, of course not everything that happens is God s will. No. I m not saying that at all. There are random, crazy, violent forces loose in our world and there s Satan who does stuff and our human wickedness. Yet there is a God who is sovereign over all, who in all things, good and bad, is busily accomplishing his eternal purpose, and there s no stopping him. To try to stop God from bringing his blessing and purpose into your life is like trying to bring down a 747 with a butterfly net. It s not going to happen. Nothing anybody does to you will prevent God from fulfilling his purposes in your life. That means Satan s in deep trouble. Satan inflamed the brothers hearts with white-hot hatred for Joseph. In the grip of that hatred, they hurled him into a pit, planning to kill him. Then they thought, At least we ought to get a little money out of this, so they sold him into slavery. Satan was cheering, yes, but God, from his higher perspective, said, Nice work, Satan. I needed to get Joseph over to Egypt. I could have had Jacob send him as a freshman to Cairo University to study pyramidology, but this will work just as well. Satan can t win for losing. Even the people who are trying to destroy you are only furthering the purpose and plan of God for you. Even when something detestable happens to you, instead of collapsing into bitterness, like Joseph you can say, Well, Lord, here we are. What do we do now? Then the ultimate. If you really believe this, like Joseph you will look at the person who did this to you and forgive them. Can you believe Joseph? Twenty-two years after his brothers threw him under the bus, he said, Now don t be distressed and don t even be angry with yourselves. It all makes sense now. God sent me ahead of you in order to save many lives. It s all good. So let s just heal our family and move on. (Genesis 45:5-7) A woman here at Peachtree found herself in the prison of an abusive marriage that left deep wounds and troubling questions like, Who is God and where is God? and God met her in a powerful Joseph-like way. Christi Paul is a wife, a mother, an author, and a CNN anchor, and a good friend to many of us here at Peachtree. Christi Paul video testimony https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pifvob- DA6c If you look around at your life this morning and all you see are pits and prisons, you can know that waiting out ahead for you, like there was
6 The Story I DREAMED A DREAM for Christi, is a palace. The story of Joseph tells us that those who put us in our prisons are simply propelling us all the faster and further toward the palace God has for us. In the end they haven t taken anything away from us. In all things the good, the bad and the ugly God is working for the good of those who love him and are called according to his purpose. Prayer: Lord, you are the friend who gives us hope when we are down in the pit and who gives us grace when we re up in the palace. Especially I pray for those of us who are down this morning, who are hurting and struggling. Remove from us the pressure of thinking we have to write our own stories. Lord, you be the author. Let us be the actor who speaks your lines and follows the plot of your adventure for us knowing someday we will be in your presence where you ll wipe every tear from our eyes in the fairy tale ending in your eternal plans. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
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