God's Independence: Acts 17:24-25, Romans 11:33-36, Psalm 135:5-14

Last week, we begin a new series on the attributes of God, which are simply characteristics that are true of Him.  This series is an effort to be a people who know God as He has revealed Himself in the Bible.  Theologians normally arrange God’s attributes into two categories: communicable and incommunicable, meaning that some of His attributes are more shared (communicable) with us and that others are less shared (incommunicable) with us.  In my estimation, God’s most important attribute is His holiness, which I think is the sum total of all of His attributes.  All of His attributes contribute to what sets Him apart from the rest of creation, but this is especially true of God’s incommunicable attributes.  When it comes to this category, I want us to feel an incredible amount of distance between God and ourselves.  In these attributes, I want us to think about how “unlike” Him we really are. We will begin today with the first of God’s incommunicable attributes: God’s independence.  God’s independence basically means that God has no dependency upon anyone or anything and also that He is free to do whatever He pleases.

We’ll begin by turning our attention to Acts 17:24-25, where Paul confronted the pagan idolatry of the Athenians and declared to them who the one true God of the universe was and how they could only come to know and please Him by repenting and putting their faith in Jesus Christ. 

[24] The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, [25] nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.  (Acts 17:24-25 ESV)

I.              God’s Independence Means that He has NO DEPENDENCY

That God is independent means that He is not dependent upon anyone or anything for anything.  The context in which Paul preaches these words was one of superstitious polytheism.  Athens was a town full of idols that wanted to make sure every “god” in existence was represented.  They even had built an altar to what they called “The Unknown God” (23) in case they had missed one!  Polytheism carried with it what D. A. Carson calls a “mutual back-scratching” theology, where one must find ways to keep all the “gods” happy in order to fare well.[1]

Paul proclaims to the Athenians that there is a God whom they do not know about, and that He is the one true God of the universe.  He is the Creator (“who made the world and everything in it”), the Lord (“being Lord of heaven and earth”), and Sustainer (“He himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.”) of EVERYTHING.  And it is by virtue of His being the Creator, Lord, and Sustainer of all that He is independent of anything or anyone.  He “does not live in temples made by man”: meaning He is not confined to a temple nor does He need one.  Also, He is not “served by human hands, as though he needed anything.”  This is the problem with a “mutual back-scratching” theology: the God of the Bible has never and will never need His back scratched. God does not need anything from us, not even our worship, to be who He is.  Tozer uses the following illustration: “Were all human beings suddenly to become blind, still the sun would shine by day and the stars by night, for these owe nothing to the millions who benefit from their light.  So, were every man on earth to become atheist, it could not affect God in any way.  He is what He is in Himself without regard to any other.  To believe in Him adds nothing to His perfections; to doubt Him takes nothing away.”[2]

God never experiences need.  As A.W. Tozer says, “need is a creature word,”[3] and God is no creature; He is the Creator of all.  In contrast to God, we along with the rest of creation are utterly dependent upon God.  We need Him for life and breath and everything.  Our life comes from His life and is sustained by His sovereign will and power.  My heart will not take another beat unless God wills it.  When you stop to think about it, everything in creation is in some way dependent upon some other created thing, and ultimately upon God.  Not God, He needs nothing to exist to be who He is. 

God’s independence is implied in His name, “YAHWEH,” which comes from the Hebrew verb, “to be.”  He tells Moses, “I AM THAT I AM” (Exodus 3:14).  He simply “IS.”  This means that He is completely self-sufficient and self-existent.  And consider the form in which God appeared to Moses: the burning bush.  God appeared to Moses “in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush,” yet this fire did not consume the bush that it was in.  Have you ever been able to build a fire that was not dependent upon certain materials to keep it burning?  Yet here God appears as a flame that needs no part of the bush to keep it burning; it is a completely self-existent and self-sufficient flame, independent of anything.  It simply is. 

Consider one more passage: Romans 11:33-36: [33] Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! [34] “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?” [35] “Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?” [36] For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen. 

Whom has God ever needed counsel from?  He hasn’t.  Who has ever put God in their debt with a gift?  No one ever has because God can receive no gift that does not originate with Himself to begin with.  He created and owns everything!  As Paul says, “all things” are “from him and through him and to him.”  This aspect of God’s independence means that God can never be manipulated.  He cannot be bartered with.  No one can ever say to God, “you owe me one!”

We need to pause here to ask a question: Does the reality that God does not need any of us mean that we are insignificant and meaningless?  Far from it!  The fact that we even exist in the universe of a God who has no needs means that even though we are not needed, we are wanted.  It is much more meaningful to be wanted than to be simply needed, to be desired and delighted in than to simply be necessary. 

So our existence means that God wants us here and the fact that God wants us infuses us with true meaning and significance.  The idolatry that we want to avoid is that of ever viewing God as needy, even needing us.  Our service to God must never be motivated by any sense of God’s needing us.  If we are not careful, we can approach church and ministry this way.  This is evident in many worship songs today that seem to place us at the center of God’s universe.  We are not; He is.     

II.            God’s Independence Means that He is FREE to do WHATEVER HE PLEASES

The second meaning that God’s independence has is that God is free to do whatever He pleases.  He is under no obligations to His creatures to do anything.  One of the clearest places that we see this truth is in Psalm 135:5-14: [5] For I know that the LORD is great, and that our Lord is above all gods.  [6] Whatever the LORD pleases, he does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps. [7] He it is who makes the clouds rise at the end of the earth, who makes lightnings for the rain and brings forth the wind from his storehouses. [8] He it was who struck down the firstborn of Egypt, both of man and of beast; [9] who in your midst, O Egypt, sent signs and wonders against Pharaoh and all his servants; [10] who struck down many nations and killed mighty kings, [11] Sihon, king of the Amorites, and Og, king of Bashan, and all the kingdoms of Canaan, [12] and gave their land as a heritage, a heritage to his people Israel. [13] Your name, O LORD, endures forever, your renown, O LORD, throughout all ages. [14] For the LORD will vindicate his people and have compassion on his servants.

I want to first call your attention to verses 5-6. One of the things that makes God “great” and “above all gods” is that He alone does whatever He pleases.  He is completely independent in all that He does, and whatever He does, it pleases Him or He would not do it.  So in some sense, God is always pleased (happy) because whatever he pleases, He does.

This seems like a simple reality until you begin to pay attention to what all God does that pleases Himself in this passage: (1) He makes the clouds rise at the end of the earth; (2) He makes lightnings for the rain; (3) He brings forth the wind from His storehouses; (4) He struck down the firstborn of Egypt, both of man and of beast; (5) He sent signs and wonders against Pharaoh and all his servants; (6) He struck down many nations and killed mighty kings; (7) He gave their land as a heritage to the people of Israel; (8) He sees to it that the fame of His name endures forever; (9) He will vindicate His people and have compassion on His servants.  These nine things seem to be the unpacking of the statement that, “Whatever the LORD pleases, he does.”   These are the things that He is doing, has done, and will do. 

The question that I want to briefly think through for a second is how God can be pleased with some of these things when scripture seems to indicate in other places that He is not.  For example, this passage says that God was pleased to strike down many nations and kill mighty kings and yet in Ezekiel 18:23: “[23] Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked, declares the Lord GOD, and not rather that he should turn from his way and live?”  So which is it?  Does God have pleasure in what He does or not?  This is not simply “chasing a rabbit trail.”  This is vitally important to knowing our God accurately, because as we said last week, inaccurate thoughts about God are idolatrous thoughts about God. 

The answer to this question, I believe, is that God has the capacity to be both pleased and displeased with the same events because He views them from two different perspectives simultaneously.  Consider the following example: When I was a child, my parents took my sister and I to a zoo.  I was overly excited the entire time and kept running off from my parents to look at all these wild animals I had never seen before.  My dad repeatedly instructed me not to get out of their sight out of concern for my own safety.  However, I continued to wander off from them.  So at some point my dad decided to hide just out of sight so that he could see me but I could not see him and would think that I had become lost.  When I discovered that I couldn’t find my parents, I became terrified and had a near meltdown.  One of best days of my life had now become a nightmare!  Just before complete meltdown, my dad stepped out and scooped me up.  I had learned my lesson and did not wander off from my parents again for the rest of the trip.  Here is my point: in letting me think I was lost, my dad was both pleased and displeased at the same time.  It did not please him to see me frightened and crying.  It did not please him to see me experience that.  It did, however, please my dad for me to learn my lesson and become an obedient son who now knew not to put myself in danger.  So my dad was able to look at one event and be simultaneously pleased and displeased. 

So it is with God, only on a much grander scale.  He is able to consider one event be simultaneously pleased and displeased.  He is able to take no pleasure in the death of the wicked and at the same time be pleased with what their judgment accomplishes for His people and puts on display about Himself. 

What is mind boggling about God’s independence is that He is a God who needs none of us and is under no obligation to any of us and yet is a God who wants us and delights in us and allows us to delight in and bring glory to Him.  He is a God who, though He needs none of us and is under no obligation to any of us, was pleased to crucify His only Son to have us.  Let me just say that if you really ponder that, you will find that it is a reality that does not cause us to make much of ourselves but of God!  Let’s just always be careful not to commit the idolatry of thinking that God is ever under any obligation to us.  He is not. 

Let’s close with the remainder of Paul’s message in Acts 17:30-31: [30] The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, [31] because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”  Will you repent today and confess your utter dependency upon Him alone for your salvation? 

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[1] D. A. Carson, The God Who is There, 45

[2] A.W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy, 33

[3] A.W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy, 32

Knowing God: Jeremiah 9:23-24

We are beginning a new series today on the attributes of God, and I’d like to start with a quote from A.W. Tozer’s, The Knowledge of the Holy.  He begins the first chapter of his work with this statement: “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.”  What is it that comes into your mind when you think about God?  One critique of our day and time is that we are not a people who know what it is to think very deeply about anything, much less God.  How often do you think of God and how deeply do you think of Him when you do? 

Let me read you the words of Charles Spurgeon, who at twenty years old was thinking far more deeply about God than many of us ever have: “The highest science, the loftiest speculation, and the mightiest philosophy, which can ever engage the attention of a child of God, is the name, the nature, the person, the work, the doings, and the existence of the great God whom he calls his Father.

There is something exceedingly improving to the mind in a contemplation of the Divinity.  It is a subject so vast, that all our thoughts are lost in its immensity; so deep, that our pride is drowned in its infinity.  Other subjects we can compass and grapple with; in them we feel a kind of self-content, and go our way with the thought, “Behold I am wise.”  But when we come to this master science, finding that our plumbline cannot sound its depth, and that our eagle eye cannot see its height, we turn away with the thought that vain man would be wise, but he is like a wild ass’s colt; and with solemn exclamation, ‘I am but of yesterday, and know nothing.’  No subject of contemplation will tend to more humble the mind, than thoughts of God.

But while the subject humbles the mind, it also expands it.  He who often thinks of God, will have a larger mind than the man who simply plods around this narrow globe…Nothing will so enlarge the intellect, nothing so magnify the whole soul of man, as a devout, earnest, continued investigation of the great subject of the Deity. 

And, whilst humbling and expanding, this subject is eminently consolatory.  Oh, there is, in contemplating Christ, a balm for every wound; in musing on the Father, there is a quietus for every grief; and in the influence of the Holy Ghost, there is balsam for every sore.  Would you lose your sorrow?  Would you drown your cares?  Then go, plunge yourself into the Godhead’s deepest sea; be lost in his immensity; and you shall come forth as from a couch of rest, refreshed and invigorated.  I know nothing which can so comfort the soul; so calm the swelling billows of sorrow and grief; so speak peace to the winds of trial, as a devout musing upon the subject of the Godhead.”

In Jeremiah 9:23-24 Jeremiah charged God’s people with the importance of knowing God.  The Israelites had become a people who had forsaken God and were hoping, trusting, and boasting in everything but God.  To these people, God would say through the prophet Jeremiah: [23] Thus says the LORD: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, [24] but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the LORD.”

Today I want to us to contemplate the importance of knowing the only true God of the Bible and look at three truths that will be foundational for us to become people who are desperate to know our God. 

I.              We Must Beware of the Danger of Idolatry (9:23)

Jeremiah first warns the people of God not to boast in themselves or their resources.  This is a warning against idolatry, which is the worship of that which is not God.  All people will either worship God or an idol (Rom. 1:18-32).  What we see in Jeremiah 2:12-13 is that idolatry is not only a worship of something else but also a forsaking of God: Be appalled, O heavens, at this; be shocked, be utterly desolate, declares the LORD, [13] for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.

While we can all identify with the temptation to boast in and trust in idols like the ones that Jeremiah mentions here, I want to draw our attention today to one of the subtlest idols of all: an inaccurate view of God.  Even if we think we are worshiping the God of the Bible, we are committing idolatry if our view of God does not match what God has revealed about Himself in the Bible because we are still calling something “god” that is not God.  Commenting on this type of idolatry, A. W. Tozer would say: “Among the sins to which the human heart is prone, hardly any other is more hateful to God than idolatry…  The idolatrous heart assumes that God is other than He is – in itself a monstrous sin – and substitutes for the true God one made after its own likeness.  Always this god will conform to the image of the one who created it and will be base or pure, cruel or kind, according to the moral state of the mind from which it emerges. 

A god begotten in the shadows of a fallen heart will quite naturally be no true likeness of the true God.  

Let us beware lest we in our pride accept the erroneous notion that idolatry consists only in kneeling before visible objects of adoration, and that civilized peoples are therefore free from it.  The essence of idolatry is the entertainment of thoughts about God that are unworthy of Him.”

“Wrong ideas about God are not only the fountain from which the polluted waters of idolatry flow; they are themselves idolatrous.  The idolater simply imagines things about God and acts as if they were true.”[1]  Inaccurate thoughts about God are idolatrous thoughts about God.  One of the reasons this is so important to understand this type of idolatry is that we can find ourselves living much like the Israelites were in Jeremiah’s day, wearing God like a badge and then living however we want to.  We must remember that a god who is god of the head but not god of the heart is not the God of the Bible. We would do well to heed the words of J.I. Packer, that “those who hold themselves free to think of God as they like are breaking the second commandment.”[2]

II.            We Must Understand the Importance of Knowing God (9:24)

Jeremiah calls God’s people to boast in understanding and knowing God.  Do you know God?  What does it mean to know God?  Now there is a sense in which we both can and cannot know God.  Firstly, we cannot know God apart from His intervention into our lives (2 Cor. 4:3-6).  Apart from the grace of God, we would remain stuck in Romans 1:18-32 to our own eternal destruction.  Also, we cannot know God fully, or exhaustively, because God is incomprehensible!  [7] “Can you find out the deep things of God? Can you find out the limit of the Almighty? [8] It is higher than heaven—what can you do? Deeper than Sheol—what can you know? [9] Its measure is longer than the earth and broader than the sea. (Job 11:7-9) [145:1] I will extol you, my God and King, and bless your name forever and ever. [2] Every day I will bless you and praise your name forever and ever. [3] Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable. (Psalm 145:1-3) Our knowledge of God will never be exhaustive (John 21:25, Romans 11:33), which is one of the things that will make heaven joyful: an eternity of knowing God more and more! 

There is a sense in which we can know God though.  First, we can know God personally, which is a far greater privilege than knowing God exhaustively.  It is a far greater joy to me to know my wife personally and to experience life together with her than it would be to simply know all the facts that I could about her.  Another very important sense in which we can know God is that we can know God accurately as He has revealed Himself in Scripture.  For instance, in this passage, God reveals to His people (1) Who He is: YAHWEH, (2) What He is like: He practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth, and (3) What He delights in: He delights in these things.  In the Bible, there are many ways in which God reveals Himself: His names, His images, His actions, and also what are called His attributes, which is where we will focus over the next few months. 

Knowing God is the most important matter in the universe!  Consider the following passages: John 17:3: And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.  This is what eternal life is!!!  This means that there will be eternally terrible consequences for not knowing God.  According to 1 John 2:14, knowing God is the mark of maturity for a believer: [14] I write to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one.  In Jeremiah 31:31-34, we see that the aim of the New Covenant is that God’s people might know Him: [31] “Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, [32] not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the LORD. [33] For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. [34] And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.”  Nothing matters more than knowing God, which is why Paul would say in Philippians 3:8-11: [8] Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ [9] and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—[10] that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, [11] that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

Do you know God?  Does this passion to know God burn deep in your heart?  I am not speaking of mere head knowledge and lip service.  I am talking about the most joyful and deeply satisfying experience available to a human being: knowing their Creator. 

III.         We Must Understand the Path to Knowing God (9:23-24)

In this passage, Jeremiah’s presents us with three paths to knowing and understanding God.  The first path is that of humbling one’s self.  I say humbling one’s self because this charge is one of repenting from self-boasting to God-boasting.  Notice that a humble person is not someone who isn’t boastful: a humble person is simply someone who boasts in that which most deserves to be boasted in, namely, God.  The second path we see is to knowing God is that of making the pursuit of knowing and understanding God our boast and delight.  This is not just a call to understand and know God, but a call to boast in understanding and knowing God.  It is a call to make this pursuit our boast and delight.  Finally, the third path we see to knowing God is that of God’s self-revelation.  What we can know and understand of God is what God reveals to us about Himself.  We learn about God by revelation, not speculation. 1 Cor. 2:14: The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.

Paul’s prayer for the Ephesian believers is my prayer for us as we journey through this series: [15] For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, [16] I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, [17] that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him,” (Ephesians 1:15-17).

How are we going to avoid the danger of this becoming merely a pursuit of learning about God?  Packer gives us some simple but demanding advice here: “we must turn each truth that we learn about God into a matter of meditation before God, leading to prayer and praise to God.”[3] May we become a people who humble ourselves and become desperate to know our God, and in studying God, may we be led to God Himself.  God brought some of you here today to reveal Himself to you so that you, by faith, could know Him. 

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[1] A.W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy, 3-4

[2] J.I. Packer, Knowing God, 47

[3] J.I. Packer, Knowing God, 23

Never Failing Providence: Genesis 49:28-50:26

It is no coincidence that we come to the end of the book of Genesis on Father’s Day.  This great book that teaches us how men (and women) were created in the image and likeness of God ends by showing us how to die like men.  Genesis 49:28-50:26 records the death of Jacob and Joseph to encourage faith in God’s certain providence that will never fail. 

One thing we learn from the Bible is that faithful men (and women) are faithful because they are persuaded that they have a great God.  Their God is not small, but BIG.  One question I’d like all of us to consider today is simply, “How big is your God?”  Is He so big to you that He changes the way that you live and the way that you would die?  Scripture tells us that faith is the only way that we can please God and is the only way any of us can be faithful men and women.  The question we will be moved to ask today is what kind of God is so great and so big that He would be deserving of such radical devotion as we see in these two men.   

I.              TOUR OF THE TEXT:

a.     The Death and Burial of Jacob (49:28-50:13)

[28] All these are the twelve tribes of Israel. This is what their father said to them as he blessed them, blessing each with the blessing suitable to him. [29] Then he commanded them and said to them, “I am to be gathered to my people; bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite, [30] in the cave that is in the field at Machpelah, to the east of Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite to possess as a burying place. [31] There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife. There they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife, and there I buried Leah—[32] the field and the cave that is in it were bought from the Hittites.” [33] When Jacob finished commanding his sons, he drew up his feet into the bed and breathed his last and was gathered to his people.

I want to point out a couple of items here.  First, notice that Jacob and the author of Genesis describe his death as being “gathered to his people.”  This implies the reality of an afterlife, because it will be months before Jacob’s body will be buried in Canaan.  He is gathered to his people at death, not when his body is returned to Canaan. 

Second, I want us to notice again the radical covenant faithfulness displayed by Jacob here.  He is more concerned about being buried in the place God has for His people than being buried with the woman who was the love of his life, Rachel.  God has now become the love of his life and has also redeemed the testimony of this man whose life was such a mess.  Isaac’s old age shamed his youth, but Jacob’s old age redeems his. 

[50:1] Then Joseph fell on his father's face and wept over him and kissed him. [2] And Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father. So the physicians embalmed Israel. [3] Forty days were required for it, for that is how many are required for embalming. And the Egyptians wept for him seventy days.

[4] And when the days of weeping for him were past, Joseph spoke to the household of Pharaoh, saying, “If now I have found favor in your eyes, please speak in the ears of Pharaoh, saying, [5] ‘My father made me swear, saying, “I am about to die: in my tomb that I hewed out for myself in the land of Canaan, there shall you bury me.” Now therefore, let me please go up and bury my father. Then I will return.’” [6] And Pharaoh answered, “Go up, and bury your father, as he made you swear.” [7] So Joseph went up to bury his father. With him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his household, and all the elders of the land of Egypt, [8] as well as all the household of Joseph, his brothers, and his father's household. Only their children, their flocks, and their herds were left in the land of Goshen. [9] And there went up with him both chariots and horsemen. It was a very great company. [10] When they came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond the Jordan, they lamented there with a very great and grievous lamentation, and he made a mourning for his father seven days. [11] When the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning on the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a grievous mourning by the Egyptians.” Therefore the place was named Abel-mizraim; it is beyond the Jordan. [12] Thus his sons did for him as he had commanded them, [13] for his sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field at Machpelah, to the east of Mamre, which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite to possess as a burying place. (Genesis 49:28-50:13 ESV)

Ecclesiastes 3:4 tells us that there is a time to mourn and I think that it is good to mourn for a time.  Death is not a natural part of God’s creation, but a part of the curse creation is under currently.  It is an intruder and an enemy.  But it is an enemy that we become more than conquerors of in Christ. 

b.    The Death and Blessing of Joseph (50:14-26)

[14] After he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt with his brothers and all who had gone up with him to bury his father.

[15] When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “It may be that Joseph will hate us and pay us back for all the evil that we did to him.” [16] So they sent a message to Joseph, saying, “Your father gave this command before he died: [17] ‘Say to Joseph, “Please forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, because they did evil to you.”’ And now, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father.” Joseph wept when they spoke to him. [18] His brothers also came and fell down before him and said, “Behold, we are your servants.” [19] But Joseph said to them, “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? [20] As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today. [21] So do not fear; I will provide for you and your little ones.” Thus he comforted them and spoke kindly to them.

What we have here is one of the most profound insights into the ways of God in the entire Bible.  This is a massive affirmation of God’s providence.  Joseph here points his brothers away from himself and to the sovereign God who rules all of history.  This is also a magnificent explanation of providence.  In providence, there can be dual intentions on the part of two parties.  One intends evil, but God intends good with the same set of events.  Two intentions that appear contradictory are affirmed to be simultaneously true.  In the end, however, only God’s intentions matter.  Joseph has a big God! 

Notice what character having such a big God produces.  Joseph is capable of a radical forgiveness that baffles many of us because he had such a confidence in God’s providence.  And notice also how a gracious, forgiving attitude can unite a family.  The Hebrew at the end of verse 21 literally says that Joseph, “spoke to their heart.”  In a world where so many families have fallen out, may we remember that the gospel enables believers to extend such grace and forgiveness to others who have wronged us.  Such grace and forgiveness speaks to the heart. 

[22] So Joseph remained in Egypt, he and his father's house. Joseph lived 110 years. [23] And Joseph saw Ephraim's children of the third generation. The children also of Machir the son of Manasseh were counted as Joseph's own. [24] And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” [25] Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.” [26] So Joseph died, being 110 years old. They embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt. (Genesis 50:14-26 ESV)

II.            THOUGHTS FROM THE TEXT:

a.     We See a God Whose Promises NEVER FAIL

Jacob and Joseph are both seen on their deathbed to be fully persuaded of God’s faithfulness to keep His promises.  They believe that the future for their descendants will not be in Egypt but in Canaan.  For them, Israel’s future will not be decided by a mighty Pharaoh but by an Almighty God.  They are persuaded that they have a big, faithful God.  They are so persuaded that they make burial preparations accordingly.  As a matter of fact, it is interesting that all the land the patriarchs of Genesis ever owned was a cemetery. 

As God’s people, we too must trust in His faithfulness to keep the promises we have in His Word, the Bible.  And we must be willing to live and die out of and according to those promises.  People who are persuaded do so.

b.    We See a God Whose Plans NEVER FAIL

While Joseph’s brothers intended evil against Joseph, God, whose plans are never thwarted, ultimately thwarted their evil plans for good.  Joseph understands both God’s place and God’s providence and this understanding empowered Joseph to be capable of radical forgiveness and a perspective that entrusted vengeance to God.  This is what Romans 12:19 admonishes us to do: “Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” 

We must so wrap our minds and hearts around God’s sovereignty that we too can respond to death and injustice in God honoring ways.  People who are persuaded of God’s sovereignty do so.

c.     We See a God Whose People are NEVER FORSAKEN

Joseph was never forsaken in all the injustices committed against him.  Neither Jacob nor Joseph was forsaken in their death.  Even in their dying, God, not the grave, had the last word.  This chapter that is so saturated with death is also saturated with hope.  Imagine what a beacon of light Joseph’s coffin was to the Israelites while enslaved in Egypt and during the Exodus.  The original readers remember as they are carrying Joseph’s bones back to the Promised Land that God too has not forsaken them all their time as slaves in Egypt.

Scripture tells us that we too will face suffering, injustice and death in this life.  Hebrews 9:27 says that all of us have an appointment with death.  But there is good news!  Jesus Christ has conquered death and eternal life is available to us now through Him.  That’s how big our God is.  This is how our big God fixes the problem that is unresolved in Genesis.  And we do not look to a coffin full of bones as a reminder that God will deliver His people; we look to a grave that is EMPTY and are reminded that there is a greater Exodus still to come.  In the meantime, as His people, we too must remember that we are never forsaken in our injustices or in our death. 

Reading about the deaths of these men of faith reminds me of the death of missionary David Livingstone.  He went to Africa as a medical missionary desiring to “preach the gospel beyond every other man’s line of things.”  He would suffer greatly during his years as a missionary, being attacked by a lion, spending most of his missionary years away from his wife.  He would eventually lose his wife and newborn baby girl on a later expedition.  When he died on May 1, 1873, they found his dead body at 4:00am in the morning, kneeling by his bed with his face in his hands as if he had been in prayer.  Before sending his body back home to be buried, they cut out his heart and buried it in Africa.  He died like a man who had a big God.  Fathers, what about you?  Church, what about you?  How big is your God?