In Genesis, we are introduced to the story of Joseph.
Well, kind of that one but less camp and garish and more…
erm….
Biblical.
One of the central themes that runs through Joseph is God’s sovereign Providence.
It’s a story about how, despite outward appearances, God is working all the events together for a glorious outcome.
That can be a challenging concept to grasp. Most of us will suffer at some point in our lives and we’re to be encouraged that it was God’s idea and it has the ultimate purpose of glorifying God.
How do we reconcile that?
Well, let’s look at the concluding part of Joseph’s story in Genesis 45.
The Story So Far & Our passage Of Interest…
So, up to this point, Joseph has been betrayed by his jealous brothers.
They sold him into slavery and lied to their father, convincing him Joseph was dead.
Joseph is sold to Potiphar and begins working under his household as a slave.
Potiphar’s wife accuses Joseph of rape and he’s thrown into prison.
in Prison Joseph interprets the cup-bearer and baker’s dreams.
When the cup-bearer is released, many years later as Pharaoh is troubled by a dream, Joseph is remembered.
Joseph finds himself working for Pharaoh as Prime-minister of Egypt.
Joseph’s brothers, suffering from famine, come to Joseph (unaware it’s him) to beg for food.
And that leads us to the passage I’d like us to focus on:
Then Joseph could no longer control himself before all his attendants, and he cried out, “Have everyone leave my presence!” So there was no one with Joseph when he made himself known to his brothers.
Genesis 45:1-20
2 And he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard him, and Pharaoh’s household heard about it.
3 Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still living?” But his brothers were not able to answer him, because they were terrified at his presence.
4 Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Come close to me.” When they had done so, he said, “I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt!
5 And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you.
6 For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will be no plowing and reaping.
7 But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance.
8 “So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God. He made me father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt.
9 Now hurry back to my father and say to him, ‘This is what your son Joseph says: God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me; don’t delay.
10 You shall live in the region of Goshen and be near me—you, your children and grandchildren, your flocks and herds, and all you have.
11 I will provide for you there, because five years of famine are still to come. Otherwise you and your household and all who belong to you will become destitute.’
12 “You can see for yourselves, and so can my brother Benjamin, that it is really I who am speaking to you.
13 Tell my father about all the honor accorded me in Egypt and about everything you have seen. And bring my father down here quickly.”
14 Then he threw his arms around his brother Benjamin and wept, and Benjamin embraced him, weeping.
15 And he kissed all his brothers and wept over them. Afterward his brothers talked with him.
16 When the news reached Pharaoh’s palace that Joseph’s brothers had come, Pharaoh and all his officials were pleased.
17 Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Tell your brothers, ‘Do this: Load your animals and return to the land of Canaan,
18 and bring your father and your families back to me. I will give you the best of the land of Egypt and you can enjoy the fat of the land.’
19 “You are also directed to tell them, ‘Do this: Take some carts from Egypt for your children and your wives, and get your father and come.
20 Never mind about your belongings, because the best of all Egypt will be yours.’”
Then, skipping ahead a few years…
Joseph’s father dies and his brother’s become afraid that Joseph will want to exact revenge for betraying him all those years ago.
And Joseph reassures them in Genesis 50:19-20:
19 But Joseph said to them, “Don’t be afraid. Am I in the place of God?
20 You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.
Two Big Questions about God.
This passage forces us to confront two quite weighty questions about God.
- Is God really in complete control?
- If he is, does that make him in control of evil?
In order to tackle this, we need to understand a doctrinal term: sovereignty.
God is a sovereign God.
One of my favourite contemporary Christian leaders and thinkers, John Piper, puts it like this:
When we say God is sovereign, we mean he is powerful and authoritative to the extent of being able to override all other powers and authorities
In other words, God gets what God wants. It’s all His plan.
But we don’t just get this idea from John Piper. The sovereignty of God is everywhere in the bible.
Take the following passages as just three examples:
📖 Job 42:2
📖 Daniel 4:35
📖 Isaiah 46:9-10
From A Coat To The Cross.
Another beloved modern teacher and Christian leader R. C Sproul once used the illustration from Joseph’s story to demonstrate just how interlinked all of history is when you spot God’s sovereign hand at work.
(This is R.C by the way ☝️ he sadly passed away in 2017)
Imagine Jacob never gave Joseph a coat…
Well his brother’s would have never got jealous.
So they wouldn’t have sold him into slavery.
Which means Joseph would never have worked for Potiphar or been accused of raping Potiphar’s wife.
That means Joseph would never have landed in jail where he interpreted dreams.
Which means Joseph would never have found himself interpreting Pharaoh’s dream.
Which means Joseph and his brothers would have never lived in Egypt.
As a result, Joseph’s descendants, the people of Israel would never have ended up enslaved to Egypt.
So Moses would never have been born, bundled, basketed (it’s not a word but it works with the aliteration), bobbed down the river and brought into Pharaoh’s household.
Which means he’d not have grown up the way he did leading Israel into the Exodus.
Which means Israel would never have (eventually) settled into the promised land.
As a result, we’d never have had King David.
Or his children.
Or their children.
All the way down to one particular child.
Jesus wouldn’t have been born.
Which means he wouldn’t have died on a cross.
Or risen from death.
Which means the church would never have happened.
Which means Saul of Tarsus would never have gone blind after seeing the risen Lord Jesus.
He wouldn’t have been called Paul. He wouldn’t have carried a mandate to take the gospel far and wide.
Which means that England circa 400 after the Romans cleared off would have stayed pagan and never been conquered by the gospel.
Which means the country would never have undergone a successsion of Christian monarchs.
Which means you and I might never have been born.
It certainly means this post would not exist.
All because a man living in a middle-eastern dessert some 4500 years ago didn’t gift his son a coat one time.
And when you consider God’s sovereign hand at work in all that detail, weaving it all together for His desired outcome – it blows your mind.
If God’s Running The Whole Show – Is He Responsible For Evil?
Joseph didn’t think so in Genesis 45:5 or Genesis 50:20.
He sustains that God was in control AND is brothers were responsible for their evil actions.
When we’re required to hold two seemingly opposing ideas together in the bible, it’s often called a divine mystery.
In so many ways, reconciling these two truths (God’s absolute sovereignty and man’s absolute responsibility for sin) is a mystery.
But I think Genesis 50 is key to understanding the mystery at a greater depth.
God planned the whole thing.
God even plans things that we can look at and determine: “that’s wicked”.
God planned every war that’s been fought.
God planned every act of corruption the world has ever seen.
God planned it all.
But we cannot say God’s intentions in these plans were evil.
Jonathan Edwards (this guy 👇) put it in a good analogy.
He described the sun. The sun does two things by its very nature:
- The sun shines light
- The sun radiates heat
It would be wrong-headed to point at the sun and say the sun was responsible for cold and dark, that’s not the sun’s nature.
But, following its nature, when the sun sets on the land – darkness and cold proceed.
God is pure and good. That’s his nature. When God decrees something to happen he’s doing so out of his nature. Sometimes the outward effect of God acting according to his nature looks like sin and evil. But that doesn’t mean God is evil just as the sun can’t be cold.
The Ultimate Biblical Illustration: Jesus
We can ultimately look to the cross and see this perfect juxtaposition between God’s sovereign hand and man’s responsibility.
There’s no scenario in which Judas had a lie-in and didn’t betray Jesus. God intended it to happen the way it did.
The wicked and evil event of the crucifiction was entirely the plan of God.
Yet Judas is rightfully implicated as evil.
I think this is best explained by Peter just after pentecost in Acts 2.
“Fellow Israelites, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know.
Acts 2:22-24
23This man was handed over to you by God’s deliberate plan and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, d put him to death by nailing him to the cross. 24But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him.
Was the cross an act of human evil?
The answer HAS to be yes.
Peter accuses the Jews: You and WICKED men put Jesus to death.
Was the cross the perfect plan of a good God?
The answer HAS to be yes.
Peter explains it happened by God’s DELIBERATE plan.
A Radical Thought…
What if everything that ever happened (even the really bad stuff) was planned to happen exactly that way by God in order to display something about God.
Let’s return back to Jonathan Edwards’ sun analogy.
In so many ways, you cannot begin to know what warmth and light is without first knowing what the absence of these things feels like.
The cold and dark might be unpleasant but we need to experience it in order to feel and appreciate warmth and light.
Why does God choose to reveal Himself to us in these terms?
I don’t know.
It really is a mystery.
When Job tried to work it all out, God took him on a tour of creation and showed him a whale – go figure.
It was God’s way of saying to Job: you let me be who I am. It’s not for you to worry about the why. But look at my work, know that I am good and trust me.
God demonstrates this in the cross.
Because of the cross we can trust God into eternity.
I’ll leave you with the words of someone who truly understood what it was to experience suffering and evil. This same person deeply believed in God’s total sovereignty.
Read what he said to Christians in Rome:
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.
~ Paul, in Romans 8:28-30
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