J is for Joseph

 This is the sermon I preached on Sunday, July 21 at St. Timothy Lutheran Church. The text is Genesis 50:15-21.

J is for Joseph. Families are complicated. Jacob, Joseph’s father, doted on Joseph. Jacob had a coat of many colors made for Joseph. He was clearly his father’s favorite son. His brothers had reason to be jealous! And Joseph wasn’t perfect, either. He also told them about the dreams he had, showing him in a superior position over them. It is not a smart thing to do.

How could Joseph be so forgiving? These are the brothers who threw him into a pit, and sold him to the Egyptians because they were jealous of him. 

None of us is perfect. Joseph was forgiving, but first, he put his brothers to the test when they were reunited. He accused them of being spies. He put some of them in prison, as well as testing them in other ways. “It is not until the brothers ‘pass’ all of the tests that Joseph finally breaks down, weeping ‘so loud that the Egyptians heard it,’ and finally announcing: ‘I am Joseph. Is my father still alive?’” (Genesis 45:2-3) (Karla Suomala, workingpreacher.org)

But if Joseph didn't forgive, his family and Israel would have died in the famine that hit Israel, while Egypt had plenty. In the position that Joseph was elevated to in Egypt, he possessed the authority to save them, and he did so.

I have to reiterate again that families are complicated, sometimes difficult. In the e-ministry, I told you of the difficulty with my sister-in-law. When my brother was dying in the hospital, whenever I spoke with her, mentioning I was planning to see him, she always told me that he didn’t want visitors—even though he was my brother. My pastor helped me work through that and told me to just go there and see him. It was a good visit, and at least she did call the day he died so we could see him beforehand. However, this was such a painful time of my life, especially after my brother died. 

And let’s not forget how people change when there’s something for them in a will! I know of a case of the daughters of a friend, struggling over who got what and upset over who was chosen to be the executor of the will. 

How many times, when going through difficulties, do we hear people say, “It must have been God’s plan… It was God’s will?” We may have even said it. It sounds like that’s what Joseph said, but it isn’t. It is clearer in The Message that we’re using today. “…you planned evil against me but God used those same plans for my good” (v. 20). In the NRSV, which we usually use, it’s translated, “Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it for good.” That doesn’t sound nearly as malicious as the brothers having “planned evil” against Joseph. 

People can justify any action with misappropriated, twisted words of scripture. Oppression and slavery have been justified in God’s name. Other Bible translations say, “God meant it for good.” People in abusive relationships are to stay put because it was “God’s plan.” A good translation and reading scripture in context, “keeps us from easy assertions that we intend, God intends; that our plan, whatever it is, had God’s blessing and input from the start; that God meant for it to happen all along, because it was all part of God’s mega plan for us” (Anna Carter Florence, A is for Alabaster).

God’s megaplan; oh how I struggled with that concept when my first marriage was falling apart. My first husband and I met at church. We shared a common faith and dreams. We wanted to be missionaries—and it happened. But the doo-doo really hit the fan when we returned from serving overseas. It just didn’t make sense to me that our marriage should be breaking up. God used that mess and turned it over for good. I like my life now. I’ve been able to accomplish much more than I ever could have in my first marriage. 

Do you sometimes find yourself “stuck” in bad circumstances, wondering what you must have done wrong? Maybe you did nothing wrong. Doo-doo happens, but so does grace. 

Just as Joseph was the rescuer of his people, even so, Jesus is ours. “God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him” (John 3:17). God in Christ rescues us from sin, death and the power of the devil. “He has done all this in order that I may belong to him, live under him in his kingdom, and serve him in eternal righteousness, innocence, and blessedness, just as he is risen from the dead and lives and rules eternally. This is most certainly true” (Martin Luther, The Small Catechism). Amen.

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