Genesis 37

Who can understand the mind of God? We bow before the One who not only reveals, but also conceals. He knows all things. It is His glory to choose when to keep a matter to Himself, and when to show it to the sons of men. It was His choice to use the favorite son of Jacob, Joseph, as the one who would receive His revelation and communicate it among men.

That special gift was known to Joseph even as a young man. When he was seventeen years old and living in Canaan, his brothers began to hate Him. The fact that Joseph spoke for the Lord did not change that hatred. It added to it.

In his dream, Joseph saw his preeminence over his brothers and even over his mother and father, and he spoke of this to his family. Even Jacob rebuked Joseph for his report of his dreams, but his father kept the words of his son in his mind.

The hatred of Joseph's brothers led to a horrible attack against him, and a ruthless deception against their father Jacob. The older boys sold him into bondage in Egypt, and gave his special clothes to his father, blood-stained with the life of a goat, and presented them to their father for him to draw his own conclusions.

The story is a very powerful one which began years of lowliness for Joseph that speak to us of the humiliation and suffering of the Son of God. Through the story of Joseph, we are prepared to feel the facts of the abuse of Jesus more forcefully.

An long period of intense grief began for Jacob, the boy's devoted father. If Joseph's sufferings prepare us for the coming of Jesus, and for the cross, Jacob;s grief reminds us that the Father loved the Son, but gave Him up for us all. The illustration must fall short, since Jesus was a willing victim, and His Father, while truly feeling grief, did not allow Himself to be deceived by us.

We find our place in the drama of the ages in the position of the brothers. It is because of us that Jesus went to the cross. In the flesh, we would be those who bring the blood-stained garment back to Jacob, acting innocent. We would allow a man to grieve for years if we could maintain the fiction that we were guiltless.

The brothers did have some struggle and intrigue before settling on the eventual plan that would lead to Joseph's slavery in Egypt. Their first inclination was to kill him themselves. “Here comes this dreamer. Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits. Then we will say that a fierce animal has devoured him, and we will see what will become of his dreams.”

It was Reuben, the oldest, that told them not to take the boy's life, and who even had a private intention to get Joseph out of the pit after a little brotherly discipline to teach the boy a lesson. But that was not to be.

They were all a part of the tearing down of the one who truly had a Word from God, a Word of his royal authority that would fit into the Lord's plans for the salvation of his people. They would not hear that Word in their hearts. They tore off the boy's robe and threw him into a pit.

Reuben stepped away for a moment, and the rest of the brothers came up with the wicked idea to sell Joseph to some slave-trading Ishmaelites who were on their way to Egypt. They even made themselves sound good in their restraint. “Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.” Think of the chief priests and the elders of Israel. They wanted to be ceremonially clean so that they could eat the Passover. ...Let Judas do his part. Let the Romans be the ones to strike the final blow. We can remain guiltless regarding what happens to Jesus of Nazareth.

When Reuben returned he saw that his own intention to secretly rescue Joseph had now been thwarted, and he despaired of the consequences to himself, the oldest brother, because of what the others had done to their father's favorite son. “The boy is gone, and I, where shall I go?”

That is when they took Joseph's robe, dipped it in blood, and brought it to their father. “This we have found; please identify whether it is your son's robe or not.”

Something died in Jacob that day. Grief and unending sorrow began. The only thing that could have taken away this loss would be to overturn it with resurrection.

He thought he knew for certain what had taken place. “It is my son's robe. A fierce animal has devoured him. Joseph is without doubt torn to pieces.” The deception had worked. But God knew. And Joseph knew. Would the brothers every tell the truth? Will we ever admit that our sin brought Jesus to the cross?

The Lord who not only reveals, but also conceals, knows the truth, and He knows the right time to reveal it openly. Though men do what they will by their own hands and by the hands of others, God works all things for good.

Joseph's going down to Egypt would fit in with the Lord's good plan. The cross of Christ would also work tremendous good centuries later. His resurrection would bring joy to the Father and to all those who would be cleansed by the blood of the Lamb. Draw near to God and tell Him the truth about yourself that He already knows.