7/23/2020
Desk of Dennis Piller
In the story of Joseph and the spectacular sins of his brothers we are being prepared to see the Glory of Christ – His patience, humility, and servanthood, all the while saving the very ones who were trying to get rid of him.
The great good mentioned in Genesis 45-5 is “to preserve life” and 2ndly in Genesis 50:20 “to bring about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” – the people to whom the Messiah will come.
These two descriptions of God’s design in this sin are pointers to God’s global purpose. This/Joseph will prove to be a powerful foreshadowing of the glory of Christ and how the murderous sin against him will also be a saving sin.
First, we see the general pattern of this transaction over and over in the Bible, namely that God’s saving victory for his people often comes through sin and suffering. Joseph’s brothers sinned against him, and he suffered for it and in all this, God is at work to save his people-including the very ones who are trying to destroy the Savior.
Joseph was a foreshadowing of the coming of Christ. That Jesus came this way should not have been a surprise. He was sinned against and suffered on the way to save His people is what we would expect from this pattern that turns up again and again in scripture. In this case, because the very one who is suffering and being sinned against is so righteous. Jesus infinitely more so than Joseph. Even though many rejected this righteous stone, God made him the cornerstone Matthew 21–42
Finally, Acts 7-52 and John 2:1 says, Jesus is the final and ultimate perfect righteous one! To others, it seemed as if Jesus’s life was going so badly that He must be a sinner. But in the end, all the sin against him, and all the suffering He endured, in perfect righteousness, led to His vindication and, because of it, to our salvation
But in all of this is a prophecy about the coming of Jesus, which could not have happened if Josephs’ sinful brothers had starved in the famine. The sins of those brothers were God’s way of saving the tribe of Judah, so that the line of Judah, Jesus Christ, would be born and die and rise and reign over all the peoples of the world.
Tomorrow final thoughts about Joseph and his foreshadowing of Christ.
Casting Crowns Voice of Truth
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcuiuIwtpa4
condensed from John Pipers book Spectacular Sins
