If anyone thought that he could be a god in the place of God, Joseph might have thought that. After all, he was second in command of Egypt, the powerful empire of his day. The only authority higher than Joseph was Pharaoh himself. And Pharaoh thought that he was divine. So it might be that some of this thinking rubbed off on Joseph, and he could easily have thought that he was a god, as well.
When Joseph was a child, he had some strange dreams. He dreamed that one day his brothers would bow down to him and adore him–as if he were a god! Even more, now it seemed that he had the power and authority that only a god could have. He would ride through the streets of Egypt’s cities in his chariot. The people would fall to the ground as if in godly worship and praise. Thousands served him. Yes, Joseph could have easily thought that he was a god in the place of God.
His ten brothers might have thought that, too. They had come to Egypt to buy grain when famine was laying waste to the land. They had heard that Egypt had plenty of food. And, indeed, such was true.
Joseph had been storing food during the seven years of plentiful harvests that preceded this terrible famine. Because of Joseph’s earlier interpretation of Pharaoh’s dream, they had food–and much of it! There was food, not only for the people of Egypt, but for nations around them, as well.
People from Canaan, where Joseph’s family was living, were also suffering from this famine. So, they came to Egypt to buy food. Joseph’s brothers, except for Benjamin, all came and stood before Joseph, asking for the grain they needed. Of course, they didn’t recognize Joseph.
They couldn’t in their wildest dreams imagine that he was their brother they sold into slavery years earlier. He now dressed differently and looked like an Egyptian. He spoke a different language. There was no way for them to know that he was Joseph. He even seemed like a god to them, holding their lives in his hands.
Joseph, at first, spoke harshly to them, accusing them of being spies. “You are spies! You have come to see the weakness of our land,” he said, making them tremble in fear (Genesis 42:9). He asked them questions about their family, probing into intimate parts of their lives. Yes, it seemed that Joseph could see everything.
Perhaps, Joseph was a god, they thought. Their guilt over their past sins came surging back from the questions that Joseph asked them. They had mistreated Joseph by selling him into slavery. Then they deceived their father into thinking that a wild animal had killed him.
That guilt, that deception, and the lies that they had long buried, now came back to haunt them. They said to themselves, “Obviously, we are being punished for what we did to our brother” (Genesis 42:21). Yes, for them, Joseph might have seemed like a god. Fear and despair now filled their hearts.
For us, it’s not unusual to want to be god in the place of God. Go back to the Garden of Eden. That was the first temptation Adam and Eve faced. The serpent said that they would be like God, if they ate the fruit of the tree. God had forbidden them to eat it–but they wanted to be like God!
Such a hidden yearning is lurking in us all. It’s called our sinful nature. And our sinful nature would delight into being made a god. That could be why some people become so bitterly angered that we could somehow be the creation of a Creator. Part of the reason they’re so upset is that if God exists, then we are creatures, not gods, and so we are accountable to Him.
People don’t want that. We want to run the show. We want to be God. This is what sin is all about: wanting to be like God, or even to be God in the place of God. It’s about wanting to be in charge and having to answer to no one. It’s about wanting to stand in God’s place, to push Him aside, so we can do what we want to do.
The clear-cut question that Joseph asked his brothers was based on the reality that they were already thinking that same thought about him. Joseph asked them, “Am I in the place of God?”
But Joseph had something else to share with his brothers: forgiveness. He had already forgiven them when he had sent them back to Canaan after revealing to them who he was. He sent them back to Canaan to bring his father, Jacob, and all of their family, their flocks, and their herds to Egypt where he could care for them. But forgiveness, like grace, is sometimes a difficult reality to embrace.
Carl Menninger, the Chief Psychiatrist for the military during WW II, once said that if he could convince his patients that they were forgiven, 75% of them could walk out the next day. Yes, it’s hard for people to believe that they are honestly forgiven. Perhaps, it’s because we are so often unwilling to forgive.
That’s why guilt haunted the hearts and minds of Joseph’s brothers. Because they couldn’t accept that they had honestly been forgiven, guilt and fear still enslaved them. They felt they needed to manipulate Joseph to get what they wanted from him. They made up some story about their father pleading for Joseph to forgive them, when, in fact, he already had!
Hatred, resentment, and the ideas of revenge we harbor prevent us from letting go and forgiving others as God in Christ has forgiven us. True, God-given forgiveness is only possible because of God’s grace and love, who sent His Son into the world. This Son, who was God and is God, took our sin into Himself. He emptied Himself of His glory and majesty and became a servant to take the fallout of our sin.
So, you see, God didn’t simply excuse our sin. He killed it on the cross. Our Lord Jesus took our place, so we could be free. Oh, what this freedom cost our Savior, Jesus Christ! But this freedom is not a freedom to sin. It is a freedom to serve in holiness and righteousness, to forgive others as we have been forgiven. You have experienced the forgiveness and grace of God. And God expects you to share that same gift with others.
Do you see the God you have? He forgives. He can take what others intended for evil and turn it into something good–just like what happened with Joseph! At times, this is hard to believe. But that’s what God does!
That’s what Joseph said to his brothers, “You planned something bad for me, but God produced something good from it that many lives would be saved.” And that’s what Jesus did on the cross. God turned the evil of the cross into the good of our salvation. The miscarriage of Roman justice is God’s justice for the sins of the world, unleashed on His Son, instead.
In our lives, God takes this world’s confusion, chaos, and despair and turns it into a blessing of grace. He produces something incredibly beautiful, a gift offered back to us. In the cross of Jesus, we see the God who hides life in death, victory in defeat, and power in weakness. Others intended the cross for evil. God intended it for the good. In the good of the cross, Jesus, who buried His divinity deeply in our humanity, suffered and died. Yet, what was the good? He rose from the dead to give us His life!
Faith in Jesus does not seek displays of power and glory. It doesn’t demand a blessing that God has not promised–as if Jesus’ death and resurrection were not enough! Faith in the crucified and risen Jesus is content to have Him present in suffering. For faith in Jesus means that you see God as the One who can work good from the evil in your life, just as He did in Joseph’s life, just as He did on the Cross of Christ.
As Joseph recognized, God can work good out of evil. This is something to ponder and praise. This is something for which we are ever to be grateful. But this question lingers in our mind: “What did Joseph do with the good that God worked in his life?” Did Joseph only delight in the good and selfishly hoard it? Or did he let that good become good for others in his life?
For Joseph, the evil that God turned to good was, in turn, lived out toward his brothers. They were the ones who had done evil to Joseph! They were the ones who sold him into slavery! Yet, Joseph learned how to forgive. To the ones who betrayed and sold him into slavery, Joseph gave them what they needed to live.
In Jesus Christ, God has forgiven you. He gives you what you need to live forever in eternity. Learn what that forgiveness means. Live out that forgiveness toward others in your life. Every week, we pray in the Lord’s prayer, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” In that petition, Jesus teaches you to link your forgiveness from God with the forgiveness you show to others. For faith receives God’s forgiveness in a way that is willing to speak it and live it out to others. This the Lord’s Prayer teaches us.
Are there others whom you have yet to forgive for some evil done to you? Forgive them as Joseph forgave his brothers. Forgive them as Christ did–and still does–forgive you! For how can you do otherwise? That’s what God has called you to do: to live out the forgiveness shown to you in Christ.
You are forgiven. Delight in that forgiveness. Yet, also speak and live out such forgiveness toward others. Amen.
