Do you want to give a welcome to those who are visiting with us this morning? We're delighted to have you with us, and we trust that as we worship God, you do have a sense of his presence among us. I want to encourage you, if you've ever been curious about Presbyterian worship service, what that would look like tonight at 6 p.m. It really is a high-ovalid Presbyterian that's hosting the worship service as we install Reverend Paul Calvert to be the organizing pastor of a work in Troy. Or if you just want to help fill in the room so it doesn't feel so empty, it would be a good way to show love and support to him as we meet to install him as pastor. Before I read the text today, I want to give you some book announcements or book recommendations. We've been looking at Jacob's life and now we'll be turning to the sons and then Joseph and such. And these are all books that I think are great read. Some of them have more to do with the topic of the dysfunctional family and some less. This one, Death by Love, by Mark Driscoll, is the main author anyway. This is about the work of Christ, but what he writes here is just an incredibly refreshing work on the doctrine of Christ's sacrifice on our behalf, the work that Christ accomplished on the cross. And what he does is he takes real life scenarios, people who have suffered various things, whether it's an abuse or victimization or victimizing other people or all sorts of different lifestyles including covenant kids. And he shows how the significance of the cross of Christ applies to that situation. One of the most enjoyable reads I've had in a long time, it is not theology for dummies, it's theology for real life and I highly recommend it to you. As relates to broken families, I want to recommend to you a book by John Miller and his daughter Barbara called Comeback Barbara. John Miller, Jack Miller, was a PC pastor and he had I think five kids and his youngest child, Winnestray went far and wide sewing those wild oats. And this book is written chapter by chapter first by Jack Miller, who kind of talks about it from his father's perspective and then each chapter is followed up by Barbara's response. She does come back to faith and she talks about where she was or was in the situation, great read. Kind of the sequel to it, the wife, mom of the group, Rosemary Miller, wrote from Fear to Freedom also an excellent, excellent read, the mother's stand, where she's coming from, where she was coming from. And I highly recommend that to you as well. Now we need to read the text and then away we go. The text is found on pages 10 and 11, outline follows after that, you also have everything on the overhead. Please pay close attention to what God Himself says to you, as I read to you from His Holy Word. This is the account of Jacob. Joseph, a young man of 17, was tending the flocks with his brothers, the sons of Bilha and the sons of Zilpa, his father's wives. And he brought their father a bad report about them. Now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons because he had been born to him and his old age and he made him a richly ornamented robe. When his brothers saw that their father loved him, more than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him. Joseph had a dream and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more. He said to them, listen to this dream I had, we were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheep rose and stood upright while your sheaves gallored around mine and bowed down to it. Joseph said to him, do you intend to rain over us? Will you actually rule us? They hated him all the more because of his dream and what he had said. And then he had another dream and he told it to his brothers, listen he said, I had another dream and this time the son and moon in 11 stars were bowing down to me. When he told it to his father as well as his brothers, his father rebuked him and said, what is this dream you have had? Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bowed down to the ground before you? His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the matter in mind. Brothers are out there tending the flock. Israel sends Joseph out to see how his brothers are doing. He says he'll go and the story picks up at verse 17. So Joseph went after his brothers and found them near Dothan. They saw him in the distance and before he had reached them they plotted to kill him. Here comes that dreamer. They said to each other, come now. Let's kill him and throw him into one of these sisters and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then we'll see what comes of his dreams. When Rubin heard this, he tried to rescue him from their hands. That's not take his life. He said, don't shed any blood, throw him into the sister here in the desert. But don't lay a hand on him. Rubin said this to rescue him from them and take him back to his father. So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe. The richly ornamented robe he was wearing. And they took him and threw him into the sister. Now the sister was empty. There was no water in it. As they sat down to eat their meal, they looked up and saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead. Their camels were loaded with spices, bomb, and murder. And they were on their way to take it down to Egypt. Judah said to his brothers, what will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? Come. Let's sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him. After all he is our brother, our own flesh and blood. His brothers agreed. So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the sister and sold him for twenty shackles of silver to the Ishmaelites who took him to Egypt. When Rubin returned to the sister and saw that Joseph was not there, he tore his clothes. He went back to his brothers and said, the boy isn't there! Where can I turn now? Then they got Joseph's robe, slaughtered a goat, and dipped the robe in the blood. They took the ornamented robe back to their father and said, we found this, examine it to see whether it is your son's robe. Quick review from last week, we looked at this text from Jacob's point of view. We also looked at the bigger picture that Moses was writing this to the very descendants of Israel and the twelve tribes showing them that God indeed keeps his promises. They can trust him. We can trust the Lord because he always keeps his promises and is not thwarted because of the rebellion, even of his own people. And we saw that we are not to sin that grace may have bound, but we are to live for the glory of God. And Moses made this abundantly clear by condemning through the law the very deeds of the sons of Israel. We want to build on that this morning and talk about, as the title of the message says, breaking free from destructive family dysfunction. As we talk about this, one of the burdens that I bear is wanting to tell you about an hour and a half worth of stuff in 30 minutes. I want to make you bear it. We'll only cover some of it, but pay close attention. One of the things I wish I could spend most of the first 30 minutes talking about is the beauty of Jesus Christ, that He is the way the truth and the life, that He is health, that He is most beautiful. And that all the saints adore Him. And when we see Him as He really is, we will cast our crowns before His feet and worship. He is worthy of praise. And if we don't hold that then breaking free from the destructive family dysfunction really means very little. We won't progress very far. So just in those few words, let me call upon you to remember what you know to be true about our Lord, about the one who makes martyrs willing to lay down their lives, the one who changes lives, the one who rescues and delivers the one who came to heal the sick, the one who restores the heart and soul of His children, no matter how great the dysfunction. Well, as we talk about dysfunction and breaking free from it and focusing primarily on the brothers, I'm kind of leaving Rubin out only because we don't have time to deal with His particular brand of the dysfunction and the relationship. Again, we just don't have the time. The Lord willing will have a conference someday to deal with all this stuff. And I'll get my heart's desire and talk all I want about it. But for now, we'll focus just on the majority of the brothers and such. I want to make this point now. It is possible. It is possible to break free from destructive family dysfunction. It is possible. Let me give Joseph as an example. And I start with him, understanding that at least in this chapter, I hold the minority view. Most of the commentaries, your study Bibles will tell you about Joseph being arrogant about his being a bit cocky with the telling of the dream and all and maybe even giving a bad report. What did that look like? And maybe I don't think we necessarily need to show disrespect to teenagers by saying, well, he was young and brash when there's really no evidence of it when we compare it to the context of context of Joseph's life from chapter 37 to 50. We should consider him more like Daniel or Hadrak, Misha, can have been to go godly in his behavior. So that verse two, when the scripture says he brought his father a bad report that this is a sign of health that he is responding in a healthy way. He's just saying what is true, not hating his brothers, not being a little whiny, little brother, something like that. Or sucking up to his dad, just stating it that way. If you won't give that to me, okay, I understand I'm in the minority. But let me show you his faithfulness in a place that I think is hard to argue with. And that is in verse 13, verse 13 talks about the fact that his father, it's not in your text. I apologize for that. You'll have to look it up at home. In verse 13, Israel or Jacob sends his son to check on his brothers. There's some 50 miles away. And he says, go check on your brother about their welfare. And Joseph says, okay, I'll go. And Joseph understands that his brothers hate him. He knows it very clearly because they can't speak a kind word to him, verse 4. And yet he obeys his father. He honors his father and he goes to do what his father says. And he shows respect and honor to his brothers. Even though he knows they hate him and won't speak a kind word to them, he goes and does what is right because that's what healthy people do. They do what is right. You say to me, well, it didn't do much for changing the family dynamics to which I say, yes, that's exactly right. And as we talk about breaking free from destructive family dysfunction, I want you to know that I'm addressing you. And if you're healthy, praise God, you will have the opportunity if it's not in your family to share with someone who's hurting. So it's okay because just because your healthy doesn't mean you're going to change your unhealthy family. Your dysfunctional family. I give you one more example and then we move on. Our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who said, I am the way, the truth and the life. The one who said, I came to give you life and life to the full. Life abundantly. The one who is perfection, you know, early on in Mark's Gospel it says that his family, his kin came to take him away because they thought he had lost his mind. His brothers and John's Gospel kind of get his goat and say, hey, why don't you go to Jerusalem, you're trying to make yourself known. I don't mean to make fun of his family or to say that they were way out there just that Jesus was healthy and it didn't change his family from being who they were. It is possible. It is possible to change it. It is possible. Let's move on. Number two, develop a passionate pursuit of knowing, loving, trusting and obeying God. I thought you needed to work out. So I'll let you write that down for a few minutes. I'm going, loving, trusting and obeying God. Develop a passionate pursuit of this. I use this phrase instead of saying develop your faith in God or your relationship with God. I could say it either way. It's the same thing. Look at the verses that I have that go with this. They're in the outline. I think they'll show up. There you go. First, second Timothy 222. Now flee from youthful lust and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. Two parts to this verse that are important to notice. Now flee. And he talks about what to flee. And we're going to look at that in just a minute under the next point. Maybe the next couple of points. But then he says and pursue. And that's what we're looking at now. There's the putting off for the fleeing that which is inappropriate wrong in our context. The family dysfunctions, the unhealthy ways we relate to one another. And then there's the pursue and the pursues incredibly important. And look what he says, pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace with those who call upon the Lord from a pure heart. Ephesians, the next passage says the exact same thing. I'm not going to, well, you don't have to read it if you can on the overhead. I wanted it all there. And let me just point out the first verse and what it ends with. It says in verse 17. Now this I say and affirm together with the Lord that you walk. Walk no longer. That's the same as saying flee or in other places put off. And we'll talk about that in a second. And it goes into some detail about the dark and understanding and the hard hard and that sort of stuff. And then he changes when he says you didn't learn Christ that way and skipping down to verse 23 says that we're to be renewed in the spirit of our minds verse 24 and put on the new self. That's in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth. That's the part we're focusing on under this part, pursue, develop a relationship to God. Now I need to tell you if you do come from a dysfunctional family, the chances are very good that you picked up some of your family patterns of dysfunction as well as created some of your own. And if you just hear me say look you need to start coming to church. You need to start reading your Bible. You need to start praying. I'm afraid you will just take one set of dysfunctional patterns of living and transfer them to the church because there's too many people who go to the church because there they'll be affirmed that they'll be loved and that makes them want to do and so they do and they're thanked and wow this is great. And they become dysfunctional members in the church being used and taken advantage of by their own. They become manipulative dysfunctional habits. Maybe I should say by our own we all don't want to leave myself out of that. It's easy to slip into it. It's easy to hear. Add a boy. You're doing a great job. Now the point is develop your relationship with God, pursue knowing him, knowing him intimately personally in that personal relationship, loving him, developing that love for him to where you're looking forward to that service of worth. The relationship where you cast down the golden crown upon the glass, you see trusting him, you're going to need that when we get to the next point. There's no way you're going to flee youthful lust. There's no way that you're going to walk no longer in the dark and thinking like the Gentiles used to live. Unless you trust and obey. So develop that. It's at the very center of what it means to be healthy in whole. Okay number three, let God expose the motives of your heart. The verses we printed for this are important as we think about them first the three verses that are in your outline. Jeremiah 17.9 the heart is more deceitful than all else and desperately sick who can understand it when we ask God when we start to think okay God. Maybe what he's saying is true that that I pick up some of these family dysfunctions and maybe create my own is how to how to cope with an angry or alcoholic parent or whatever it is. I want to let you expose the motives of my heart when we say that we need to understand that our hearts are deceitful hearts are deceitful desperately sick who can understand that proverbs 28 26 he who trust in his own heart is a fool. But he who walks wisely will be delivered the proverbs also talk about how a wise man draws out what is in the heart the heart is deep. And we don't know it from the beginning Romans chapter two and verse four do you despise the goodness at the riches of his goodness for parents among suffering not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance. You hear this there's a you have a pastor say the heart of the problem is the problem of the heart and he's right and it's a big problem and we willingly become self deceived and come up with motivations that are at the surface level at least partially sometimes mostly true but we don't go deep. We don't go deep and we won't go deep we I would say we can't go deep unless the spirit of God brings conviction of sin. But even when the spirit of God is bringing conviction of sin brothers and sisters there's two different places where Paul will command us not to quench or grieve the spirit of God by which we have been sealed for the day of redemption. The spirit of God is willing and will move us to deal with the motives of our heart for the sake of hell we have to be willing to go there so let's let's look at this Joseph story or the brother story now and just ask it some questions the first one I want to ask is why did the brothers hate Joseph. Well verse two talks about Joseph ranting them out you know he brought a bad report they could hate him about that but the text says nothing about that and verses 25 to 28 they talk about what profit is there for us we could talk about the fact that there's some selfishness and self-centeredness going on which is at the core of self- idolatry right I love myself more than God and what he says and brother and anyone else but that's not really focused on either there's there's two main focuses the first one is because of the father's love for Joseph. Three three three and four now Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons because he had been born to him in his old age and he made him a richly ornamented road made a richly ornamented road for him and then verse four when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than any of them they saw the robe every day they saw the father's behavior every day. They hated him and they couldn't speak a kind word to him. I'll leave verse five off you see that they hated him because it because the father loved him and there's something about that road that richly ornamented road because when we jumped down to verse 23 it tells us so when Joseph came to his brothers they stripped him. They stripped him of his robe the richly ornamented road he was wearing you see that you know they talk about here comes that dreamer we'll talk about that in a minute but the second he's there the first thing that happens is off comes the jacket buddy off comes that symbol that shows that you're loved that daily reminder of where our fathers factions really are what's the other reason there's another reason and it has to do with his dreams verse five talks about it. Joseph had a dream and when it was told to his brothers they hated him all the more verse eight when his brothers his brothers said to him do you intend to rule over us will you actually rule and they hated him all the more because of his dream and what he had said verse 11 after he tells it to his father the second dream to his father and brothers it says his brothers were jealous of him but his father kept it in mind. So it looks like there's at least two reasons why they hated him right one is the robe and what that represents dad loves Joseph more than us and the other would be the dream what's up with that dream that's that's asking another question what do they really want what are the brothers really want this is something we need to ask ourselves when we find ourselves in dysfunctional family conversation or conversation. You know this this Thanksgiving when people are going away mad or there's a shouting match or or something like that or during the Christmas holidays or someone's drinking too much or whatever it looks like in your family or again if you have a healthy family and none of these things happen when you're sympathizing with someone who's talking to you after the fact you can ask or who who's the focus of this what's the focus of their their hatred and then what do they really want what do you really want. What did the brothers really want let's think about this first aspect didn't they want their father's love now if their father had not neglected them if their father loved them in such a way that they felt loved would it have bothered them that their father loved Joseph a lot let me ask you another question is it legitimate for them to want their father's love. Absolutely absolutely it's a legitimate desire and in a sense it's their right a father should love his children in a very healthy very loving way forgive me for my lack of words there in the way he loves in the way he disciplines in the way he speaks. Blasting into the life of the child in every way there should be this demonstration of love of affection of desire for their persons welfare and success in life what they want is legitimate what about the way they went after it. It's easy to see here with these guys that it is our own hearts this is really hard most only spirit helps us with this will never get there but but at least with them it's easy right. They want their father's love and it's right for them to want their father's love but are they are they going about it right way obviously not they hate Joseph and they want to kill him and instead sell him so there's some profit to them. That should tell us something about some of the family dynamics there can be some legitimate desires things that are rightfully owed to us in terms of our dignity and respect as made in the image of God and being born into the family we were born into and it's right it's right to want that but it's not legitimate to go after it in illegitimate way. Let me just ask the question one more time because I'm hoping these questions will help you as you think about family dynamic whether it's you or others in the family. Why did the brother who did the brothers lash out at with the obvious answer is Joseph right they hated him and they lash out at him they were jealous of him. They lash out at anyone else is so deeply hurt by this isn't there I think this goes a little bit deeper they love their dad and they want their dad to love them and then there's there's a punishment that goes in the way they treated Joseph that gets back a dad. Do you see I left out the part where do you excuse me Jacob says I will go to my grave grieving over the death of my son I think there's some unintended consequences to their behavior there's no doubt that they didn't realize that that would take it that bad which is often what happens unintended consequences who didn't think about that somewhere below the surface isn't that going on. I saw someone malding the word God that they were lashing out at God and and I agree completely and I think the text shows that very clearly because who in family dysfunctional relationships they certainly sat down at the table and talk right and dad did tell all the people all the sons at one time or another about when he ran away from his their uncle Esau and how God showed up remember how God showed up to him when he was running away. And they knew that God had blessed him just as he had promised in the dream and what about grandpa Laban they knew the grandpa Laban had a dream where God said don't speak to him good or bad they knew that the only reason their grandfather didn't take matters into his own hands is because God said I've got this in hand. They knew because behind every every dysfunction every dysfunctional act it's like Shrek you know onion boy there's there's these layers and and this there's the superficial there's the easy to see layer they hate Joseph that's on the surface. They're feelings toward their dad they're wanting a little bit of revenge or justice a little further hidden can't talk about getting back at God they would never shake their fist at God and say how dare you give him that dream how dare you say that he will be the one who rules okay let me. Let me just give you a couple things to think about we've looked at it in in Joseph's life maybe some things that if you do have dysfunction in your family these will will ping enough to where you say okay God I'm willing to go there with you I trust you I love you I know you are my health often when there's family dysfunction there's family secrets don't tell them about we can have people into the house because we don't want them to. Let's see what's going on we lie or make excuses to cover up people get a little too close to home which has simply changed the subject maybe start talking about how nice they look in that is that a new outfit you really look good in it I guess I have seen it before the last 20 years. There's some manipulative methods that often take place in dysfunctional families there's the use of guilt to get someone to do something and and and by this I mean they'll bring up the past or there's hungry people in the world or how can you do this when when people are making such sacrifices and there's the guilt manipulation that way or and next to that cousin to that is the use of shame shame on you I can't believe it won't you. If you do this for me don't you care about your mother there's the the pout silent treatments where the person after a couple days done being grateful for the quietness and it's like okay please can we talk about it you hurt me or the opposite which is in Southern language to pitch a fit right and you just man and we see this we see this in restaurants or wherever you know we just we just go crazy I can't believe the way I'm being treated here this is just not right and everyone knows okay given what he wants he'll be caught the other side of that is there are those who have become and this is often what will happen in the church they're very good at complimenting oh you look so great you're so smart you're so wise you're this I'll make you feel so good because there's going to be something I want from you it's good to be complimentary that that's not necessarily in itself a sign of this. Function a sincere compliment a manipulative one is the problem you do things for someone you do you do all sorts of stuff for them and then all of a sudden they're beholden to you and you call for it and you call for it to do things that they know that are not right and maybe this has happened to you you've been oh man how do I say no to this person after all they've done for me sense of loyalty I think that's enough it's time to finish up look at number four in this this point I'm giving to you really quickly almost each one of these could be its own topic for a seminar sermon but commit to working through the relational dynamics it is possible to change you need to pursue passionately a loving loyal faithful relationship to God you have to be open to a spirit looking at your life and then as this these things are going on commit to working through the relational dynamics let's say that that Joseph's brothers get here and they say man this is all messed up look at this this is crazy and they they come to you for counsel I guess to me because and I'll tell you what I'll tell him I say well first of all let's talk about your dad and why you know all the things we look at at verse three and now I'll talk about the fact that you know you really have to accept the reality of your situation your dad has neglected you it's just the reality you don't have to accept it as being okay you just have to accept it as this is what really happened so you have to accept of appearance in alcoholic you have to accept if there was abandonment you have to accept what the reality of the situation is and if you do that that brings the next point into stark realization there is the grieving of loss if it was right for the brothers to want their father to love them and he didn't any neglect of them that's a loss it's a loss and it hurts and it's okay to agree we looked at last week the fact that Jesus grieved over the city of Jerusalem Jerusalem you who stoned the prophets I even hate to mention the next one forgive those who hurt you this one would be its own conference wouldn't it work through what's what's what's guilt and shame what's what's grieving what's forgiveness how do these interact you know how do I interpret my feelings if I really forgiven the person I said I have I want to but it's part of the process isn't there is this continual committing yourself to the choice I forgive which enables you to do the last thing which is do what is right in God's sight you know some people are so dysfunctional what is right is staying away from them that is sometimes the right thing to do often it's moving toward them again it depends if their sexual predators stay away if they're only verbally abusing you all the times stay away they're willing to talk initiate if they're willing to talk honestly go there we'll see that with Joseph especially when it's the forgiveness stuff you know as brothers come they're all apologetic and he'll say stuff like this what you did you did what you did was evil and you meant it for evil but I do see the invisible hand of providence God minute for good and I forgive you that's helping man is that helping where over time Jesus is the one from the Father sent to rescue us from our dysfunction Jesus is health his way is help if you will just come to him we'll rescue you he doesn't offer a quick fix he offers a full fix a healthy life will you trust him let's pray Lord please do your work in our hearts and lives and have mercy upon those who have suffered with dysfunction of various sorts we ask in Jesus name