Genesis 37:1-36: Consuming Jealousy

Genesis 37:1-36: Consuming Jealousy

We’ve been working our way passage by passage through the book of Genesis, and today the next passage we come to is Genesis 37:1-36, so I’ll be reading a selection of verses from that passage. It says,

1 Jacob lived in the land of his father’s sojournings, in the land of Canaan. 2 These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph, being seventeen years old, was pasturing the flock with his brothers. He was a boy with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, his father’s wives. And Joseph brought a bad report of them to their father. 3 Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his sons, because he was the son of his old age. And he made him a robe of many colors. 4 But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him. 5 Now Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers they hated him even more. 6 He said to them, “Hear this dream that I have dreamed: 7 Behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and behold, my sheaf arose and stood upright. And behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.” 8 His brothers said to him, “Are you indeed to reign over us? Or are you indeed to rule over us?” So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words. 9 Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, “Behold, I have dreamed another dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” 10 But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?” 11 And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind. 12 Now his brothers went to pasture their father’s flock near Shechem. 13 And Israel said to Joseph, “Are not your brothers pasturing the flock at Shechem? Come, I will send you to them.”… 17 …So Joseph went after his brothers and found them at Dothan. 18 They saw him from afar, and before he came near to them they conspired against him to kill him. 19 They said to one another, “Here comes this dreamer. 20 Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits. Then we will say that a fierce animal has devoured him, and we will see what will become of his dreams.” 21 But when Reuben heard it, he rescued him out of their hands, saying, “Let us not take his life.” 22 And Reuben said to them, “Shed no blood; throw him into this pit here in the wilderness, but do not lay a hand on him”—that he might rescue him out of their hand to restore him to his father. 23 So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe, the robe of many colors that he wore. 24 And they took him and threw him into a pit. The pit was empty; there was no water in it. 25 Then they sat down to eat. And looking up they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, with their camels bearing gum, balm, and myrrh, on their way to carry it down to Egypt. 26 Then Judah said to his brothers, “What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? 27 Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.” And his brothers listened to him. 28 Then Midianite traders passed by. And they drew Joseph up and lifted him out of the pit, and sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty shekels of silver. They took Joseph to Egypt.

May God bless the reading of his Word.

Let’s pray: Father, every word we find written in this passage is a priceless treasure because it’s your self-revelation. Thank you that we don’t have to guess about who you are or how we can know you or live in the realm of your blessing. You’ve already told us in your Word. So help us to understand everything we need to understand and be changed in every way we need to be changed through the power of the Holy Spirit. It’s in Jesus’ name we pray, amen.One of the most common ways in which children often complain to their parents is to say that something isn’t fair. It’s not fair that their sibling gets to enjoy a certain privilege that they don’t get to enjoy. It’s not fair that their friends get to play a video game that they’re not allowed to play. Or, for a younger child, it’s not fair that their sibling gets to eat off of a blue plastic plate while they’re stuck eating from a green plastic plate. And, of course, we all know the classic response parents have to the complaint that something isn’t fair, right? We remind them that “life isn’t fair.” 

And there’s a lot of truth in that statement. It’s best for children to get used to the fact that things don’t seem fair, because, as they grow into adulthood, they’re going to discover that a lot of things don’t seem fair. The fact is that there are a lot of inequities in this world. That’s actually been a topic of frequent discussion in our society over the past several years. There seems to be greater awareness than perhaps ever before of the inequities that exist in society. And to be clear, a lot of these things are genuine inequities that impact people’s lives in very significant ways. We’re not just talking about what color plates people are eating off of. We’re talking about real issues that sometimes involve real hardships. And I don’t think there’s any debate over that. There’s, of course, a lot of disagreement over how to address those inequities in society, but pretty much everyone seems to acknowledge that inequities exist. 

However, the question I’d like to focus on this morning is one that I don’t hear a lot of discussion about—even though it seems to be a pretty important question. How can we experience genuine and lasting contentment in a world of inequity? Inequity is an undeniable feature of the world we live in. It’s a basic fact of life. Other people have more wealth than we have, greater intelligence than we have, and more friends than we have. They have nicer possessions than we have and get to go on more exotic vacations than we can afford to go on. Other people also seem to have greater opportunities for education and career advancement than we have. Perhaps they’ve also been raised in families that have offered them more stability and less chaos than the family in which we’ve been raised. Once you start thinking about it, there’s no shortage of inequities that exist. 

So, how can we keep ourselves from harboring jealousy toward those who have more than we have and instead experience genuine and lasting contentment in a world filled with inequities? That’s the question we’ll be addressing as we look at Genesis 37. 

This chapter marks the beginning of a new section of the book of Genesis—a section that revolves around a man named Joseph. In the previous chapters, we’ve learned that Joseph is high favored by his father Jacob. Jacob had four wives—or, to be more specific, two official wives and two concubines—and Joseph is the firstborn son of Jacob’s favorite wife Rachel. And we’ll see in this chapter just how favored Joseph is. Look at how the chapter begins in verses 1-2: 1 Jacob lived in the land of his father’s sojournings, in the land of Canaan. 2 These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph, being seventeen years old, was pasturing the flock with his brothers. He was a boy with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, his father’s wives. And Joseph brought a bad report of them to their father. 

So, it seems like Joseph’s a bit of a tattletale, doesn’t it? He “brought a bad report of [his brothers] to their father.” We’re not told if this was a legitimate report or an exaggerated report. The only thing we know is that it was a bad report. Apparently, Joseph’s brothers did something he found objectionable, so he told their father Jacob about it. And since Joseph was daddy’s favorite, I’m sure Jacob listened to what Joseph told him. 

We then read in verses 3-4, 3 Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his sons, because he was the son of his old age. And he made him a robe of many colors. 4 But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him. So, Jacob takes a bad situation and makes it worse. Joseph’s brothers probably already sensed that Joseph was their father’s favorite, but now Jacob removes all doubt by giving Joseph “a robe of many colors.” 

Not only was this a visible reminder to everyone of Joseph’s favored status, it also likely communicated that Jacob intended to treat Joseph as his firstborn son. Now, technically, Reuben was the firstborn. But if you remember back to chapter 35, Reuben had the audacity to sleep with Bilhah, Jacob’s concubine. So, it seems very possible that the “firstborn” status—which would ordinarily belong to Reuben—was now up for grabs and that, by giving this fancy robe to Joseph, Jacob was signaling that Joseph would now have firstborn status, along with the double-portion of the inheritance associated with that status. As a result, verse 4 says, Joseph’s brothers hated him so much that they couldn’t even have a peaceful conversation with him.  

The story then continues in verse 5-8: 5 Now Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers they hated him even more. 6 He said to them, “Hear this dream that I have dreamed: 7 Behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and behold, my sheaf arose and stood upright. And behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.” 8 His brothers said to him, “Are you indeed to reign over us? Or are you indeed to rule over us?” So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words. 

So, here’s a tip for those of you who are the favorite child of your parents. If you ever have a dream like the one Joseph had, it’s probably not the best idea in the world to share that dream with your siblings—particularly if they’re already jealous of you. Like, what was Joseph thinking? I don’t know. I’m not sure if he’s deliberately taunting them or if he’s somehow not fully aware of how his dream will come across to them. Either way, his brothers receive the message loud and clear. Now, interestingly, this dream will come true in the subsequent chapters of Genesis. But for now, as verse 8 tells us, it just makes Joseph’s brothers hate him even more. By the way, this is now the third time the passage has stated that Joseph’s brothers hate him, which underscores just how intense their hatred was. 

We then read about another dream in verses 9-11: 9 Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, “Behold, I have dreamed another dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” 10 But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?” 11 And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind. So, again, if you’re Joseph, this is probably not the best thing to share with your brothers. They already hate Jospeh, and he’s now giving them reason to hate him even more. And, if you notice, this dream surpasses the first in that it’s now not just Joseph’s brothers bowing down to him but his parents as well. 

The subsequent verses then record how Joseph’s brothers go to pasture their father’s flocks at a location about 50 miles away. And Jacob gets a little worried about them while they’re gone, so he sends Joseph out to go and check on them. We then read in verses 18-20 that 18 They [Joseph’s brothers] saw him from afar, and before he came near to them they conspired against him to kill him. 19 They said to one another, “Here comes this dreamer. 20 Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits. Then we will say that a fierce animal has devoured him, and we will see what will become of his dreams.”

After that, Reuben tries to save Joseph. Reuben, as you’ll remember, was already on thin ice with his father due to that whole sleeping-with-his-father’s-concubine thing and therefore can’t afford to also be blamed for the death of his father’s favorite son. And that is probably what would have happened since Reuben was the oldest son and, because of that, would be held accountable for whatever happened under his watch. So, Reuben intervenes and convinces his brothers to just throw Joseph into a pit instead of killing him. 

The story then continues in verses 25-28: 25 Then they sat down to eat. [Wow, that’s pretty callous] And looking up they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead, with their camels bearing gum, balm, and myrrh, on their way to carry it down to Egypt. 26 Then Judah said to his brothers, “What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? 27 Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.” And his brothers listened to him. 28 Then Midianite traders passed by. And they drew Joseph up and lifted him out of the pit, and sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty shekels of silver. They took Joseph to Egypt. 

The rest of the chapter then records how the brothers return home and lie to their father Jacob and tell him that a fierce animal must have killed Joseph. They even present Joseph’s robe, dipped in goat’s blood, as supposed evidence that some sort of animal must have gotten him. By the way, the fact that Jacob’s sons use goat’s blood to deceive him seems to be allude back to the time when Jacob himself had used goatskins to deceive his own father Isaac by pretending to be his brother Esau. If you remember from Genesis 27, Jacob had used goatskins to disguise himself as Esau in order to obtain his father’s blessing. And now, here he is being deceived with goat’s blood. As they say, “what goes around comes around.” 

So, the main idea of this chapter is that Joseph’s brothers sell him into slavery because of their jealousy. Joseph’s brothers sell him into slavery because of their jealousy. Verse 11 even specifically states that they’re “jealous” of him. They resent him for his privileged status as their father’s favorite. 

And the terrible thing that their jealousy led them to do—selling their own brother into slavery—is a striking picture of how ugly jealousy is and what dreadful consequences it can have, which applies just as much today as it ever has. Even if our jealousy of others never leads us to do to them anything close to what Joseph’s brothers do to him in this chapter, the fact remains that jealousy still has a way of sabotaging our relationships or even ruining our relationships—not to mention making us miserable in the process. 

And let’s just acknowledge that jealousy is an issue for us. We’ve already observed how young children are often jealous and express that jealousy in rather obvious ways. That’s why, as those of you who are parents know, if you, let’s say, bring home gifts for your children one day, you’d better get them exactly the same gifts. Because if you don’t, or if you even get your children two different colors of the same gift, it’s probably going to provoke at least one of them to jealousy. If a child receives a red lollipop and their brother gets a blue lollipop, the child with the red lollipop is probably going to be jealous of that blue lollipop—whereas if they had both just gotten red lollipops, everyone would have been happy. 

But make no mistake: this isn’t limited to children. Adults do virtually the same thing. When we notice that others are blessed in a way that we’re not, it’s not uncommon for us to resent them for it. Just to review a few of the things that can cause us to be jealous of other people, there’s wealth, material possessions, professional success or other achievements, physical appearance, popularity or social status, a happy marriage, children, well-behaved children, awards or recognition, friendships, freedom and flexibility, parental approval, or even visibility in the church. That’s right: it’s possible to become jealous of others even over church-related things. If someone else seems to have more visibility or influence in the church than you do, it can sometimes provoke jealousy. So, basically, just about anything can provoke jealousy. Any blessing God gives someone else can cause us to resent them—even if that resentment is very subtle. 

By the way, I do believe this is one of the pitfalls of social media. One of the ways social media can have a negative effect on us is when it leads us to constantly compare ourselves with other people and envy the things they seem to be enjoying. In picture after picture and video after video, we see people who seem to look better than us or have more exciting lives than us or be more successful than us, and we envy them. We become jealous. 

In addition to that, as we think about our society as a whole and the strife and animosity that currently exist in our society, I believe a lot of it actually comes backs to what we’ve been talking about—to people being jealous of others. You know, there’s been a lot of talk in recent years about concepts like Critical Race Theory and systemic racism and other similar concepts. And obviously, these are very complex concepts that we don’t have time to address at length. However, I’d simply like to point out that a lot of these things, at their core, seem to be related—at least, to some degree—to envy and jealousy in the human heart. 

Now, that’s not to deny that racism and oppression are very real things—and things that can sometimes become embedded in societal system and structures. I’d think Christians would be the first to admit that. As Christians, we believe that we live in a fallen world and that people are sinful by nature. So, of course people are going to oppress each other and treat each other unfairly. And wherever we see such behavior, we need to unequivocally stand against it and seek to put a stop to it. However, I still believe it’s true that a lot of the strife we see in our country right now is, at least in part, tied to jealousy. It seems that the leading proponents of Critical Race Theory and other similar concepts are deliberately trying to stir up envy and jealousy in a segment of the population in order to accomplish a larger agenda. As a result, even though phrases like Critical Race Theory and systemic racism are tossed around quite a bit even on the popular level these days, it seems highly likely that, at least in many cases, they’re just a thinly veiled expression of envy and jealousy. 

And we have to understand that, within the worldview of Critical Theory, there’s no end to the conflict. There’s no solution. There will always be a bitter struggle between those who are oppressed and those who are oppressors. Today’s oppressed become tomorrow’s oppressors and so on and so forth. It’s an endless cycle of supposed oppression thoroughly infused with envy and jealousy. And that philosophy and the kinds of behaviors it often leads to are absolutely disastrous for a society. Just as jealousy can consume an individual, it can also consume a entire society and tear that society apart. 

Thankfully, though, the gospel’s able to bring healing to a society torn apart by jealousy and strife. You see, the gospel, at its core, is a message of love—specifically of God’s love for us. When we were thoroughly sinful and hopelessly condemned and deserving of nothing but eternal wrath, God had mercy on us. He loved us even when there wasn’t anything about us that was lovely. And in his love, God the Father sent his own Son Jesus to come to this earth as a man, live a perfectly sinless life, and then die on the cross to pay for our sins. Jesus took our sins on himself and suffered the penalty for them in our place. It’s the greatest expression of love this world has ever known—especially when you consider the fact that Jesus was dying not for his friends but for his enemies. He died for the very people who had defied him and lived in rebellion against him. Then, after that, Jesus resurrected from the dead so that he now stands ready to rescue everyone who will put their trust in him. That involves turning away from our sinful and selfish ways and directing all of our confidence to Jesus and him alone to save us from our sins. 

And this gospel message creates loving people. God works through this gospel message to change people from the inside out and to give them new hearts—hearts that are filled with the love of Christ. As Paul states in Romans 5:5, speaking of those who are Christians, “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” When God saves us, he pours his love into our hearts. We also learn in 1 John 4:19 that “We love because he [God] first loved us.” The reason we’re able to love other people is because we’ve experienced God’s love toward us. When we embrace Jesus as our Savior and begin to comprehend the astonishing love he demonstrated for us on the cross, it fundamentally changes the mentality with which we go through life and makes us want to love other people. 

And that’s what a society that’s being torn apart by jealousy and strife so desperately needs. That’s what our society needs. The answer to the envy and jealousy and strife all around us is the gospel. Only the gospel can create the change in people’s hearts that needs to happen, so that, instead of thinking, “How can I get what others have?” they begin to think, “How can I give to others and serve others?” So, the gospel is a message of love that creates loving people who are more concerned about the welfare of others than they are even about their own welfare. Secularism can’t produce that love; only the gospel can. The gospel is the only viable solution for a society that’s consumed by strife. Our society will never know harmony apart from the gospel. 

And as Christians, we have the confidence that, one day, we’ll experience perfect love and harmony in heaven. We understand that, even though the gospel has the power to change people’s hearts, there’s still going to be a certain amount of jealousy and strife in this world. However, it won’t be like that in heaven. Heaven will be a place where perfect love and harmony are finally achieved. 

I think Jonathan Edwards describes it quite well in a sermon entitled “Heaven Is a World of Love.” According to Edwards, the reason this is the case is because heaven is the dwelling place of the God of love. Edwards writes, “God is the fountain of love, as the sun is the fountain of light. And therefore the glorious presence of God in heaven fills heaven with love, as the sun placed in the midst of the hemisphere [on] a clear day fills the world with light. The Apostle [John] tells us that God is love. And therefore, seeing that [God] is an infinite Being, it follows that he is an infinite fountain of love.” Edwards then writes, “There [in heaven] this glorious God is manifested and shines forth in full glory, in beams of love; there the fountain overflows in streams and rivers of love and delight, enough for all to drink at, and to swim in, yea, so as to overflow the world as it were with a deluge of love.” Not only that, Edwards goes on to describe how God’s love is reflected in us. He describes how, in heaven, we’ll reflect God’s love as the moon reflects the light of the sun. 

And here’s what’s truly amazing and most relevant for the subject of our discussion this morning: there won’t be any jealousy among those who have less rewards in heaven toward those who enjoy more rewards. Edwards writes, “Those who have a lower station in glory than others suffer no [reduction] of their own happiness by seeing others above them in glory. On the contrary, they rejoice in it. All that whole society rejoice in each other’s happiness.” How can that be the case? Edwards explains, “Sincere and strong love is greatly gratified and delighted in the prosperity of the beloved. And if the love be perfect, the greater the prosperity of the beloved is, the more is the lover pleased and delighted….So that the superior prosperity of those who are higher in glory is so far from being any damp to the happiness of saints of lower degree that it is an addition to it, or a part of it.” 

In other words, those who enjoy less rewards in heaven won’t envy or resent or be jealous of those who enjoy more rewards because everyone will love one another, and true love delights in the prosperity of the other. Similarly, Edwards goes on to explain that those who enjoy more rewards won’t look down on those who enjoy less rewards because they’ll have perfect love and therefore perfect humility. 

And friends, this should be not only our expectation for the future but also our ambition for the here and now. You know, the church is designed to be what we might call an embassy of the future Kingdom of God in that the church should give people a foretaste of heaven. So that should be our ambition—to demonstrate God’s love within the community of believers and thereby give the world a picture and a foretaste of the much greater love that will characterize heaven. 

So, whenever we notice that others have been blessed in ways that we haven’t, what does God call us to do? “Rejoice with those who rejoice.” That’s what the Bible says in Romans 12:15. “Rejoice with those who rejoice.” Instead of being jealous of others or resenting them for the ways in which they’ve been blessed, rejoice with them in their blessing. That’s what love looks like. 

For example, I’ve known godly women in the church who have deeply desired to have children but who haven’t been blessed with children. And coming to church on Mother’s Day is very difficult for them. One woman shared with me how, for most of her life, she’s stayed home on Mother’s Day because it’s just been too painful for her to come. However, for the first time in a while this past Mother’s Day, she attended church. And not only did she attend, she actually came specifically for the purpose of celebrating the mothers of the church and rejoicing with them and being a blessing to them in several very practical ways. That’s just one example of how Jesus changes our hearts and enables us to live a life of love instead of a life of jealousy. So, let me encourage you to pray that God would help you do that. Think about ways in which you’re tempted to be jealous of others, and then ask God to help you love people instead of being jealous of them. 

And in order for us to have this kind of love and avoid being jealous, it’s critical for us to have a deep and abiding contentment in Jesus. The Bible teaches us that Jesus is all-satisfying. Listen to these words of Jesus in John 7:37-38:37 …If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’”  Think about that. Jesus satisfies the thirsty soul. And not only that, when we believe in him, “rivers of living water” will flow “out of” our hearts. That means we’ll have a joy and contentment in Jesus that fills our hearts to such an extent that it overflows out of us. We won’t need outside things to flow into our hearts to make us happy and content. We’ll already have happiness and contentment within our hearts because of Jesus, and we’ll have them in such great measure that they’ll naturally flow out of us. So, ask yourself, are you dependent on external circumstances to make you happy, or do you have a joy and contentment in Jesus that transcends your circumstances? 

You know, at the beginning of the message, I asked how it’s possible to experience genuine and lasting contentment in a world of inequity. Inequity is an undeniable feature of the world we live in. As they say, “life isn’t fair.” It wasn’t fair for Joseph’s brothers in Genesis 37, and it’s not fair for us, in many ways—in a certain manner of speaking. So, how can we keep ourselves from harboring jealousy toward those who have more than we have and instead experience genuine and lasting contentment? Only through Jesus and the joy and contentment found in him. 

Understand that, until you have that kind of joy and contentment, you’re going to struggle with jealousy. If your own heart is empty, you’re going to resent those whose hearts seem to be full. But when Jesus fills your heart with his love and joy and satisfaction and contentment, you won’t feel the desperate need to have what others have because you’ll already be satisfied in Jesus. As Paul says in Philippians 4:12-13 (NIV), 12 I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. 13 I can do all this through him who gives me strength.