Please turn to Genesis chapter 45 there is a Bible in the seat and beneath the seat in front of you It's on page 47 Genesis chapter 45 We'll read verses one to fifteen and then twenty-five to twenty-eight Then Joseph could no longer control himself before all his attendants and he cried out had everyone leave my presence So there was no one with Joseph when he made himself known to his brothers and he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard him and Pharaoh's household heard about it Joseph said to his brothers I am Joseph is my father still living But his brothers were not able to answer him because they were terrified at his presence Then Joseph said to his brothers come close to me When they had done so he said I am your brother Joseph the one you sold into Egypt and Now do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here Because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you For two years now there has been famine in the land and for the next five years there will not be plowing and reaping But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by great deliverance So then it was not you who sent me here, but God he made me father to Pharaoh Lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt Now hurry back to my father and say to him. This is what your son Joseph says God has made me lord of all Egypt come down to me. Don't delay You shall live in the region of Goshen and be near me you your children and grandchildren your flocks and herds and all you have I Will provide for you there because five years of famine are still to come Otherwise you and your household and all who belong to you will become destitute You can see for yourselves and so can my brother Benjamin that it is really I who I'm speaking to you Tell my father about all the honor accorded me in Egypt and About everything you've seen and bring my father down year quickly Then he threw his arms around his brother Benjamin and wept and Benjamin embraced him weeping And he kissed all his brothers and wept over them Afterward his brothers talked with him now verse 25 So they went up out of Egypt and came to their father Jacob in the land of Canaan They told him Joseph is a still alive in fact. He is ruler of all Egypt Jacob was stunned. He did not believe them But when they told him everything Joseph had said to them and when he saw the carts Joseph had sent to carry him back The spirit of their father Jacob revived And Israel said I'm convinced my son Joseph is still alive I will go and see him before I die This is the word of the Lord The year was 1812 The place was a little village near Paris France called Kufrei and There was a little three-year-old boy named Louis who lived there his father Made things out of leather He made saddles he made harnesses for horses and Little Louis loved being in his father's workshop One day Louis picked up an all AWL looked something like this his father would use this kind of thing this type of tool to punch holes through leather One day little Louis picked up his father's all and tried to put it through a piece of leather But his hand slipped and They all went into his left eye The injury at first didn't appear to be too serious But it soon got infected and Louis lost the use of his left eye The infection soon spread into his other eye And in no time he lost the side of his right eye as well little Louis Would never see again One little slip of the hand and a little boy's life Was never the same It was what the saints of old used to call a dark Providence Providence it's a word that has pretty much fallen out of our vocabulary unfortunately When you hear the word providence perhaps your mind goes to the state of Rhode Island The capital city of Rhode Island founded of course by Roger Williams 1636 He left the Massachusetts Bay colony because of his religious convictions And he named the area that he settled in providence because as he said He had a sense of God's merciful Providence to him in his distress See Roger Williams believed in a God who manages the universe down to the smallest little detail who guides our lives in such a way That everything that happens has an overarching overall purpose Both good things and bad things that go our way and things that don't go our way even Even when a little boy sticks an all into his eye and goes blind God is working a plan a plan that's Glorifying to him and a plan that is good for us in a word Providence means that God is in control I know that that has become a truism. I know that we say that little phrase so much It might have even lost a little bit of its meaning and a little bit of its importance But it it's still biblical that God is in Control and we're going to talk about that this morning as we talk about the subject of providence We've been looking at the life of Joseph in the Old Testament book of Genesis We've followed Joseph on his journey from Canaan where he was his father's favored son to where he went in Egypt where he was first a slave and then a prisoner Eventually Joseph was freed from that prison and became the prime minister of Egypt He single-handedly prepared Egypt for a seven-year famine and through an amazing series of events that we've been looking at in the last couple of weeks He and his eleven brothers met again, although his brothers didn't recognize him and last week we saw that They were finally broken about what they had done to bring such pain and heartache into Joseph's life The eleven brothers finally sort of came to the end of themselves and realized that it was their fault in the first place that Egypt had that Joseph had been sold into slavery in Egypt and so when we arrived here in Genesis 45 Joseph is standing there right in front of his eleven brothers. He burst into tears and he blurt's out in verse three guys It's me It's Joseph your long-lost brother What an amazing story of the providence of God and we're going to break it down today in the three parts I want to share with you today the mystery of providence and then the comfort of providence and finally the power of Providence, so let's dive into the mystery of providence When Joseph reveals his identity to his brothers as you heard when she read this text to you They are absolutely speechless. I mean Wouldn't you be I just love the drama of this story We saw last week this elaborate scheme that Joseph went through to help his brothers get to the point where they were ready to admit That they had done Joseph wrong and so here in Genesis 45 the brothers are standing right in front of him when he makes this announcement It's me. I'm Joseph. See they didn't recognize him He had been very long before that they had sold him into slavery 20 years or so He looks different Besides they thought he had died somewhere along the way so they're completely don't expect that this man standing in front of him this This Egyptian ruler Is none other than Joseph and so they're speechless when he breaks the news and they're also terrified because They're afraid that Joseph is now going to do to them what they had done to him They were afraid that he was going to get some type of vengeance So let's look at verses four and five at the mystery of Providence verse four Says that Joseph said to his brothers come close to me when they had done so he said I am your brother Joseph The one you sold into Egypt Verse five and now don't be distressed and don't be angry with yourselves for selling me here Because it was to save lives that God Underline God sent me ahead of you Notice what looks to be a paradox in verse four Joseph says you sold me in Egypt in verse five God sent me here You sold me into Egypt he says to his brothers verse seven God sent me ahead of you You sold me into Egypt You you know what verse eight Joseph says It was not you who sent me here But God See providence is a mystery because it consists of two things that seem to not fit together Let me tell you what these two are Providence means in the first place that God has a definite plan and purpose for the world And every second of every day he is in control of every thing and everybody as he works out that plan and that purpose So there's really no such thing as an accident. Let's remove that word from our Lips there's really no such thing as a mere coincidence or a hand of fate And there is really no such thing as luck even tragic evil things Somehow fit into God's plan You and I may Certainly say that that oil that's pouring up into the Gulf of Mexico was an accident But the truth of the matter is if you believe the Bible you know that ultimately It is part of God's plan As was the earthquake and Haiti last year As was the bursting of the housing bubble a few years ago As was 911 As was any tragic event you want to name somehow And this is touching upon the mystery of it all somehow even those tragic things that we know about that we've experienced that we read about every day The news Somehow fit into an overarching plan That originated with God Listen to a couple of Bible verses that bring this out It says in Isaiah 45 verse 7 God is speaking He says I form the light and create darkness I bring prosperity and create disaster I the Lord do all these things Interesting It says in lamentations 3 verses 37 38 Who can speak and have it have it happen If the Lord has not decreed it Is it not from the mouth of the most high that both calamities and good things come See what the Bible is attributing to God It's attributing to God everything that happens in life Everybody everything fits into a plan that started with God If ever there was a micro manager It's God You might say that the universe is kind of like an enormous airport With God sitting in the control tower he's always there he's always on the job He's never asleep He's always guiding the airplanes of our lives to their appointed destinations Jerry Bridges said it well. He's one of a rider with the navigators He says nothing is too large or small to escape God's governing hand The spider building its web in the corner and Napoleon marching his armies across Europe are both under his control God's in control when bad things happen God's in control when people sin against you and when you sin against other people God's in control when you suffer tragedy and heartaches and loss and injustice Doesn't make it right or good or happy or fun But God's in control so that Ephesians 111 is true when it says that God works all things According to the counsel of his will Not just good things not just happy things, but all things according to the counsel or good pleasure or purpose Of his will So in the first place the mystery of providence means that God has a definite plan a definite purpose Which he is working in the world every single moment of every single day now. Let's look at the other side of this paradoxical coin God is not the author of sin
See what I mean. It's hard to put these two together. God is not the author of sin Friends God hated it when 9-11 happened He weeps with victims of injustice and cruelty God is furious when a little child is abused or a woman is raped or an alcoholic takes another drink His heart breaks over death and sin and man's inhumanity to man. He hurts when you hurt Deeper than you hurt He does But somehow and and actually once you get this it becomes the source of great hope Somehow in a way that will never understand this side of heaven The evil that God hates serves God's plan The sin that God will one day judge Fits into God's decree He ordained that it should be But he's not to blame for it Human beings choose to sin without coercion by God All the time as do you as does as do I And unless your sins have been paid for by the blood of Jesus you will pay for them yourself for all eternity
That's why I call it a mystery Evil and sin and injustice and hate and unrighteousness are the product of Satan and we human beings often willingly and gladly cooperate with him in it But providence says that up there in the control tower above your sin Above the Gulf of Mexico above the World Trade Center above your unjust situation right now in a way that we cannot comprehend There is a wise good sovereign Loving God and his hands are on the controls Is that not what Joseph says here in verse four? He says to his brothers you guys made a bad mistake and it's your fault You sinned against me you sold me in the slavery It was your unjust action that wound me up in prison for those 10 to 12 years and I hated every minute of it I'm sure Joseph might have said to them later But he goes on to say It was all part of God's plan God used your evil decision to accomplish a great good Because of you says Joseph to his brothers I was able to become a leader in Egypt and help the Egyptians prepare for the famine Because of you and your sinful act God has saved many lives Listen If that's not enough of a paradox for you The worst act of evil ever perpetrated upon an innocent human being took place two thousand years ago When Jesus Christ was arrested and tried and tortured and nailed to a cross And the apostle Peter looking back on the crucifixion of Jesus a couple Weeks months later said on the day of Pentecost Acts 223 it's on the screen. He said this man speaking of Jesus was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge And you With the help of wicked men put him to death by nailing him to the cross Now do you see the mystery there in one verse It was God's purpose. It was God's foreknowledge that sent Jesus to Calvary But it was your hands that nailed the nails into his flesh as what Peter says See if you'd been standing there at the foot of the cross on good Friday when Jesus was dying for us You would have looked up into the face of Jesus and you would have probably said something like no stop What is happening here that man did nothing wrong. He is only a man guilty of love He only cared for us Why is he being put to death and Jesus would have looked down at you and said it's all a part of the plan of God See this would have made no sense to you at the time the death of Jesus Christ but now looking back on the cross you understand it It was an essential part of the plan of God to redeem us from our sins If the worst act of injustice humanly speaking in all of history was scripted by a sovereign wise God How much more all the injustices and all the trials we face in our lives A poet once put it this way she said things don't just happen to us who love God They're planned by his own dear hand then molded and shaped and timed by his clock Things don't just happen They're planned so that's the mystery of providence God plans it all and yet he's never the author of sin
What effects should this truth have upon you and me Two things first it should produce comfort and secondly it should produce power To live the Christian life. So let's look next at the comfort of providence The comfort of providence Romans 8 28 is a verse that I suspect many of you have memorized and it says this And I shared it with the children earlier Romans 8 28 says and we know that for those who love God All things work together for good for those who are called According to his purpose was that verse say it says that if you are a follower of Jesus God allows nothing to happen in your life that isn't for your ultimate good nothing And do you hear that God allows nothing into your life that's not somehow ultimately for your good
Who at the time would have predicted the chain of events that we've been looking at the past few weeks Who when they were happening would have looked at Joseph's life and said oh that's a good thing Nobody it didn't look good at all But the chain of events as it unfolded proves Romans 8 28 Let's review First Jacob favors Joseph. He's like his pet son, right His brothers are jealous of Joseph and they sell him to a group of traders on their way to Egypt This man named Potiphar buys Joseph makes him his own slave He becomes steward over Potiphar's house. Potiphar's wife takes a liking to Joseph tries to seduce him He refuses her advances. She accuses him of being a pervert Joseph is imprisoned for 10 years or so. He interprets these two guys dreams One of them says I'll remember you. I'll put in a good word for you He completely forgets Joseph a little bit later So he spends another two years in prison and then Pharaoh the king of Egypt Dreams these two dreams one about cows and one about stocks of grain Joseph interprets those dreams and gives Pharaoh advice about dealing with the coming famine and then Egypt Becomes the supplier of food for the Middle East Who in their right mind if they had jumped into anything along the way would have been able to predict the outcome of those series of events and yet once again Romans 828 informs our minds and we're able to look back in retrospect and see and be comforted What if those Midianite traders had not come by just happened to come by just coincidentally happened to come by at the very same moment that Joseph's brothers were wondering what to do with him The rest of the story wouldn't have happened and I'm sure you can look back in your life And see times when at the time it was taking place You thought it was utter chaos you thought it was utter nonsense that God had abandoned you completely And yet now in the light of the passage of time you can see God is working all things together for good Well It may not feel like good at the time But later you look back on it and you wonder why was I so worried Why was I so distraught when I was going through that situation See you should be comforted by the truth about providence Charles Virgin said Christian there is no sweeter pillow than providence There's no sweeter pillow than providence but the truth of the matter is let's let's be real The truth of the matter is some of us spend a lot of our time regretting yesterday's mistakes Bringing our hands over tomorrow's decisions and fretting about things that might or might not happen I got to be honest with you. I'm your pastor and some of you are absolutely paralyzed by fear about the future worry about the present and guilt about the past I want to ask you are you really an atheist The word atheist means no God Are you somebody who doesn't really believe in the God of the Bible in those moments? An atheist says there is no God perhaps you're a deist A deist says yes, there's a God, but he's sort of so aloof and so removed He really doesn't care about my life. He's not really orchestrating things according to a plan No, I know better than about you than that. You're not an atheist. You're not a deist. You're a Theist and do you know what a theist is a theist is a person who believes that God in heaven is sovereignly in control of the world Atheist is someone who believes Jesus when he says in Matthew 10 that not one sparrow falls to the ground apart from the will of your father You know what that's saying that saying that there's a leaf falling in some rainforest in Africa even as we speak By the command of God the God of the universe He's that in control He is just that sovereign a theist is someone who believes what we say every Christmas To us a child is born to us a son is given and the what government Will be upon his shoulders do you believe that God is the governor of this universe you say that You're a theist Act like one You know, I'm really talking to me. I'm the biggest warrior in this room often a practical atheist Colossians 117 says he is before all things and in him all things hold together That verse means that Jesus Christ is the glue keeping everything in one piece your family your health Your past your present your future your guilt Guess what it's his responsibility Jesus Christ removed your guilt if you're in Jesus this morning he removed your guilt the day he died for you and threw it away never ever to look at it again That's what justified means Shame over past failures and past disappointments. Why do you keep hanging on to them? The blood of Jesus has removed your record of sin forever Jesus didn't just wipe your slate clean. He threw away the slate He throated away too I love the title of the best more book that many of you women are reading this summer so long insecurity You've been a friend a bad friend to us What a great title Because it speaks to the providence of God so be comforted today Christians fall back on the pillow of God's providence So that's one effect or one byproduct of believing that God's a God of providence The other effect or byproduct is power power to live the Christian life. Let's talk about the power of providence The fact that Jesus believed in the sovereignty of God explains why he could suffer with such grace I hope that you've been inspired by his example as much as I have the way that that this man who has been literally Through hell on earth Through all of the things that he's suffered still suffers very very graciously He refused to get revenge on his brothers Instead as we've seen in this text he embraced his brothers He kissed them he invited them to stay there in Egypt and be well fed and well provided for I'm gonna ask you what was Joseph's secret It was his belief and faith in the providence of God Turn with me a few pages. We're gonna leave 45 and go to chapter 50 and give you a little preview of coming attractions here look at Genesis 50 verse 19 He's he's still talking here with his brothers that some time has gone by his father Jacob has died now But he's still talking to his brothers and they're still scared His brothers are still frightened of him They still think that he's gonna take it out on them But look at Genesis 50 beginning verse 19 Joseph says Don't be afraid Am I in the place of God? You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good To accomplish what is now being done the saving of many lives See Joseph because he believed in the God of providence Looked beyond his trials and beyond his tribulations to the God up there in the control tower He believed in a God who cares about people who cares about famines A God whose grace is greater than all of our sin a God who holds the world in his hands And that gave Joseph power you see Power to trust God power to hope power to forgive his brothers power to trust him for the future There is both comfort and power In the providence of God You remember Louie the little three-year-old boy who went blind Well Fast forward 12 years into the future and Louie was a teenager of 15 When he picked up another all Another all AWL and invented something with it He invented a system whereby People who can't see can read by touching Little dots on pieces of paper Yes, that's right Louis Braille he in 1829 wrote a book when he was just 17 years old he titled the book a method of writing words music and plain songs by means of dots For use by the blind And ever since then Braille has been a means of extraordinary blessing for millions and millions of people God works all things together for good What's your all AWL what's your all What is your dark providence your source of pain heartache loss disappointment Well, I want you to know God has an all ALL for you All things work together for good To those who are trusting in Jesus Christ for their salvation Have you repented of your sins and put your trust in Jesus? If not why don't you stop trying to live life on your own You think you're in control Every day you find out how you're not Go to Jesus today admit your need of him ask him to give you a new life. He will not turn you away And if you are a follower of Jesus let God's providence comfort you and empower you to love to forgive to hope to trust And let it allow you to sing with the hymn writer What air my God ordains is right His holy will abiteth I will be still what air he does and follow where he guideeth He is my God Though dark my road He holds me that I shall not fall wherefore to him I leave it all Let's pray Father We don't begin to say that we understand your ways We really don't understand how tragedy and evil and pain fit into a good wise plan But Lord Honestly when I think of my life, I'd much rather you be in control than me Help us to trust you Let the truth of providence go from our heads into our hearts and give us comfort in the dark times Let it empower us to trust and love and hold on to hope and serve you with joy And we pray this in Jesus name. Amen