Genesis 45:1-46:34: The Invisible Hand of God

Genesis 45:1-46:34: The Invisible Hand of God

We’ve been working our way passage by passage through the book of Genesis, and today the next passage we come to is Genesis chapter 45 verse 1 through chapter 46 verse 34, so I’ll be reading a selection of verses from that passage. It says,

1 Then Joseph could not control himself before all those who stood by him. He cried, “Make everyone go out from me.” So no one stayed with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers. 2 And he wept aloud, so that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard it. 3 And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still alive?” But his brothers could not answer him, for they were dismayed at his presence. 4 So Joseph said to his brothers, “Come near to me, please.” And they came near. And he said, “I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. 5 And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. 6 For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. 7 And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. 8 So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt. 9 Hurry and go up to my father and say to him, ‘Thus says your son Joseph, God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me; do not tarry. 10 You shall dwell in the land of Goshen, and you shall be near me, you and your children and your children’s children, and your flocks, your herds, and all that you have. 11 There I will provide for you, for there are yet five years of famine to come, so that you and your household, and all that you have, do not come to poverty.’ 12 And now your eyes see, and the eyes of my brother Benjamin see, that it is my mouth that speaks to you. 13 You must tell my father of all my honor in Egypt, and of all that you have seen. Hurry and bring my father down here.” 14 Then he fell upon his brother Benjamin’s neck and wept, and Benjamin wept upon his neck. 15 And he kissed all his brothers and wept upon them. After that his brothers talked with him. 16 When the report was heard in Pharaoh’s house, “Joseph’s brothers have come,” it pleased Pharaoh and his servants. 17 And Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Say to your brothers, ‘Do this: load your beasts and go back to the land of Canaan, 18 and take your father and your households, and come to me, and I will give you the best of the land of Egypt, and you shall eat the fat of the land.’ 19 And you, Joseph, are commanded to say, ‘Do this: take wagons from the land of Egypt for your little ones and for your wives, and bring your father, and come. 20 Have no concern for your goods, for the best of all the land of Egypt is yours.’” 

May God bless the reading of his Word.

Let’s pray: Father, we’re told that the one who delights in your Word is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in season and that has leaves that do not wither. We want to be that tree. So please, open up your Word to us this morning so that we can be rooted in your Word, nourished in your Word, and sustained by your Word. Holy Spirit, use the things taught in this passage to change us from within. It’s in Jesus’ name we pray, amen.

Deism is the belief that God created the universe but then took a step back and no longer has any involvement with what he created. The god of deism is often compared to a watchmaker who makes a watch but then doesn’t really need to do anything else in order for that watch to function properly. The watchmaker’s able to leave the watch alone, and it works just fine. Likewise, deists believe, God created the universe but then was able to take his hands off of it and essentially let the universe run itself. God no longer has any involvement whatsoever with the world or with us. 

And even though I imagine most of us in this room probably wouldn’t consider ourselves to be deists, perhaps we’re often more deistic than we sometimes imagine. You see, it’s so easy for us to fall into the mentality—almost without even realizing it—that, when it comes to our circumstances, God’s up there and we’re down here and that God’s not really actively involved in most of the circumstances we find ourselves facing. Like, maybe he intervenes from time to time, but for the most part he’s somewhat distant and disconnected from the things we go through in our day-to-day lives. Now, as I describe that mentality out loud, most of us probably recognize that that’s not an accurate view of God. But if we’re honest, isn’t that the view of God in which we often function? Are we not, in certain ways and at certain times, functional deists? 

And this functionally deistic mentality shows up in numerous ways in our lives. It shows up, for example, in our frequent lack of contentment with the way things are going and the discouragement we often battle related to our circumstances. It also shows up in the anxiety we often have about how something’s going to turn out or about what the future will hold. All of these things are symptoms of the fact that we’re not living with enough of an awareness of how intimately involved God is with every circumstance we find ourselves facing or that we ever will face. 

That’s why I’m so thankful for the passage of Scripture before us today—Genesis 45-46. This passage is a wonderful reminder of just how involved God is with every detail of every event of our lives. 

To remind you of the background here, we’ve been reading about a man named Joseph and how Joseph’s brothers were so jealous of him that they sold him into slavery in Egypt. Yet Joseph eventually rose to become the second-in-command of Egypt. He was then given the task of selling grain from the Egyptian storehouses to people from Egypt and from surrounding nations in the midst of the severe famine that was taking place in that region of the world. 

And guess who came to Egypt in order to buy grain? Joseph’s brothers, of course—the very same brothers who sold him into slavery. Yet even as they were speaking with Joseph, they didn’t recognize him. Joseph undoubtedly looked a lot different as a high-ranking Egyptian official than he had as a country boy in Canaan, so it’s understandable that Joseph’s brothers didn’t recognize him. 

Yet Joseph did recognize them and used that to his advantage. He decided to test them to see if they’d changed at all since he last knew them—because he needed to know who he was dealing with and make sure that his brothers weren’t the same ruthless lot that had previously discussed the idea of killing him and then greedily decided to line their own pockets by selling him into slavery. Because if Joseph’s brothers hadn’t changed and he did welcome them with open arms in Egypt, it was very possible that they’d cause significant trouble for him there. So, Joseph had to know their character. And that’s why he tested them by arranging for them to be in a very dire situation. He made it appear as though they had stolen from him and would have to face a severe penalty for doing so. Yet, in reality, he was watching them to see how they’d respond. Thankfully, they passed the test.  

And that brings us to where we are this morning. The tension and the emotional intensity of the story have been gradually rising and are now at a climax. We read in Genesis 45:1-3, 1 Then Joseph could not control himself before all those who stood by him. He cried, “Make everyone go out from me.” So no one stayed with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers. 2 And he wept aloud, so that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard it. 3 And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still alive?” But his brothers could not answer him, for they were dismayed at his presence. 

Now, just think for a moment about what this must have been like for Joseph’s brothers. This whole time, they’ve assumed they’ve been dealing with a rough and stern Egyptian official who would just as soon imprison them as sell them grain. And now, they discover it’s even worse than they thought. This stern official who has the power to do virtually whatever he wants to them isn’t some random stranger they’ve never met before but is actually their brother whom they’d sold into slavery. Can you imagine what must have been going through their minds? Like, “Ohhh…no…, this is not good.” Verse 3 even tells us that Joseph’s brothers were so “dismayed at his presence” that they were speechless.

We then read in verses 4-8: 4 So Joseph said to his brothers, “Come near to me, please.” And they came near. And he said, “I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. 5 And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. 6 For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. 7 And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. 8 So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt.

So, Joseph here changes his tone completely from what it’s been in previous chapters. Previously, when he was testing them, Joseph spoke to them in a pretty rough manner. But we now see him comforting them. And he does that by explaining how, even though they did sin against him in a pretty significant way, God was actually the one who was behind everything that happened and was working the whole time—even through their sin—to accomplish his perfect purposes. 

Joseph then tells them in verses 9-11, 9 Hurry and go up to my father and say to him, ‘Thus says your son Joseph, God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me; do not tarry. 10 You shall dwell in the land of Goshen, and you shall be near me, you and your children and your children’s children, and your flocks, your herds, and all that you have. 11 There I will provide for you, for there are yet five years of famine to come, so that you and your household, and all that you have, do not come to poverty.’”

This invitation is then confirmed by Pharaoh himself in verses 16-20. It says, 16 When the report was heard in Pharaoh’s house, “Joseph’s brothers have come,” it pleased Pharaoh and his servants. 17 And Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Say to your brothers, ‘Do this: load your beasts and go back to the land of Canaan, 18 and take your father and your households, and come to me, and I will give you the best of the land of Egypt, and you shall eat the fat of the land.’ 19 And you, Joseph, are commanded to say, ‘Do this: take wagons from the land of Egypt for your little ones and for your wives, and bring your father, and come. 20 Have no concern for your goods, for the best of all the land of Egypt is yours.’” So, Pharaoh not only repeats Joseph’s invitation but actually enlarges it. He offers Joseph’s family not just a place to live in Egypt but also the promise of generous material provisions. 

We then read in verses 25-28: 25 So they [Joseph’s brothers] went up out of Egypt and came to the land of Canaan to their father Jacob. 26 And they told him, “Joseph is still alive, and he is ruler over all the land of Egypt.” And his heart became numb, for he did not believe them. 27 But when they told him all the words of Joseph, which he had said to them, and when he saw the wagons that Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of their father Jacob revived. 28 And Israel said, “It is enough; Joseph my son is still alive. I will go and see him before I die.” 

Then, after that, chapter 46 records Jacob taking his massive family, totaling 70 people in all—plus all of his servants and livestock and other possessions—and moving to the land of Egypt. God appears to him in a dream and tells him that it’s okay to go to Egypt in order escape the famine and promises that, one day, he’ll bring Jacob back to the Promised Land. We also find an extensive list of the people in Jacob’s family, including his children and grandchildren. We then read about the tearful reunion between Jacob and his long-lost son Joseph. 

So, the main idea of this passage is that God was working behind the scenes through all the events of Joseph’s life to accomplish his perfect purposes. Again, God was working behind the scenes through all the events of Joseph’s life to accomplish his perfect purposes.

We see this idea come to the foreground especially in verses 5-8 of chapter 45. Notice all the statements Joseph makes about God’s sovereignty—or the fact that God’s in control. He tells his brothers in verse 5 that “God sent me before you to preserve life.” He then says it again in verse 7: “God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant.” And then in verse 8, “So it was not you who sent me here, but God.” And once more in the second part of verse 8: “He [God] has made me…ruler over all the land of Egypt.” Four distinct statements all saying essentially the same thing. God was the one orchestrating it all to accomplish his purposes—namely, saving Joseph’s family from starvation. 

I love the observation one commentator named Kent Hughes makes about this passage. He writes, “Ultimately, and above all, the story of Joseph is about God working his will through the everyday events of life. There are no miracles here. God does not suspend his natural laws to make things happen. The story is about the hidden but sure way of God. God’s hidden hand arranges everything without show or explanation or violating the nature of things. God is involved in all events and directs all things to their appointed end…[And] What a God he is—because he is not just a God of the extraordinary but a God of the ordinary.”

Isn’t that a great insight? There aren’t any dramatic miracles in these chapters. There’s no parting of the Red Sea as would be the case several centuries later. There’s no grand display of God’s power through other miraculous phenomena. Instead, what we find is God at work silently, in a very behind-the-scenes kind of way, to bring about the things he desires. His invisible hand has been guiding Jacob and Joseph and Joseph’s brothers and Potiphar and Potiphar’s wife and Pharaoh’s cupbearer and even Pharaoh himself to accomplish his perfect will. 

And that’s a great reminder that God’s at work in our lives as well. Even if we don’t see any grand miracles, God’s still at work in every detail of every event of our lives. His sovereignty is woven into it all. Contrary to what we often imagine, he’s anything but the distant and disconnected god of deism. Instead, the God of the Bible is intimately involved with every aspect of our circumstances. Whether we’re conscious of it or not, his invisible hand is writing our stories. 

And there are three primary ways in which all of this should make a difference in our day-to-day lives. Three ways. I’ll list them so you can write them down if you want, and then I’ll explain them. Forgiveness for past hurts, joy in present circumstances, and peace about future uncertainties. Again, forgiveness for past hurts, joy in present circumstances, and peace about future uncertainties.

So, first, forgiveness for past hurts. As we think about the ways others have hurt us in the past, it’s easy to allow resentment to build up within us and eventually calcify, as it were, into deep-rooted bitterness. Yet when we remember that God’s actively involved in all of our circumstances—including the wrongs done against us in the past—and that he uses evil to accomplish good, that helps us forgive people for what they’ve done against us. 

This is something we see very clearly in the story of Joseph. Here in Genesis 45, a key reason why Joseph’s able to resist the temptation to punish his brothers and instead extend forgives to them is because he sees how God was at work through their evil actions. He says to them in verse 5, “And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life.” So, Joseph’s very aware of the sin they’ve committed against him. Yet he tells them not to be distressed or angry with themselves because God had a purpose for their evil actions. 

Likewise, with us, others might have sinned against us in some rather serious ways. The reality of their sin might be undeniable. And God will hold them accountable for what they’ve done. Yet, at the same time, we can also be sure that God was using their evil actions to accomplish his own good purposes. And that should help us extend forgiveness to them. 

The great Reformer Martin Luther once said, “For I myself…must be very thankful to my [enemies] for pummeling, pressing, and terrifying me; that is, for making me a fairly good theologian, for otherwise I would not have become one.” Luther, of course, lived back in the 1500’s and endured more than a few trials in his quest to reform the corrupt church of his day and eventually to establish a church that was true to the gospel. Things were so intense that Martin Luther’s life was often in very real danger. His enemies were also all too willing to publicly slander him and seek to humiliate him in any way they could. Yet he says that he’s actually “thankful” to them for the terrible things they’ve done against because, he says, those trials have made him a “fairly good theologian.” His enemies were undoubtedly trying to harm him, but God used their evil deeds to accomplish his own good purposes in Luther’s life, forming him and shaping him into the man God wanted him to be. Similarly, it’s good for us to recognize that the wrongs committed against us have made us into the people we are today. 

All of this also helps us resist the mentality that seems to be all too common today of embracing an identity of victimhood. Now, victimhood is a real thing. People really do suffer because of the sins others commit against them. But it’s very problematic when someone embraces victimhood as core component of their identity. Instead of seeking to move past what others have done against them, there are many people who seem to desire to wallow in self-pity. And Joseph could have easily done that if he had wanted to. Plenty of people had wronged him. And let’s be honest: that’s probably what our society would encourage him to do. Yet Joseph’s conduct in this passage reminds us that, even though others might wrong us in very significant ways, we don’t have to be held hostage by a victimhood mentality. And one thing that helps us break free from that mentality is remembering that, no matter how serious the wrongs done against us have been, we serve a God who’s able to take those wrongs and use them for good. That doesn’t make those things okay or in any way morally permissible. And it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t seek justice for those wrongs through the appropriate channels. But it does give us a starting point for moving on with our lives—not as perpetual victims but as dearly loved children of God. 

Then, second, not only does remembering these truths about God’s sovereignty enable us to extend forgiveness for past hurts, it also enables us to have joy in present circumstances. If life isn’t going the way we want it to, it’s very easy to become weighed down with discouragement and discontent. At times, it even seems like some people live in a perpetual state of discouragement and discontent. 

Yet when we remember that God’s intimately involved in our circumstances—even the ones we’re experiencing right now—we can rejoice in the fact that those circumstances are accomplishing his purposes. No matter how difficult or uncomfortable the things we’re currently facing are, God’s using them in some way to do something glorious. 

As Romans 8:28 so famously says, “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good….” “All things work together for good.” That means, dear friends, that everything we encounter is a tile in the beautiful mosaic of God’s perfect plan. We may not be able to see how that tile fits into the mosaic and contributes to the beauty of the mosaic, but it does. And if we could see the full mosaic the way God sees it, we’d understand why each tile is so necessary. I’m anticipating that when we get to heaven, we will have that understanding. But for now, we simply take God’s word for it and rest in his promise that “all things work together for good.”

And notice that there are no exceptions to that. God doesn’t say “some things work together for good” but rather “all things work together for good.” That means God’s never like, “Oops…I missed that one.” No. He causes every circumstance to work together for our good. No exceptions. 

And this applies not only to the difficult things that happen to us but also to the desirable things that we want to happen that don’t happen—or, at least, that don’t happen as quickly as we’d like them to. When you don’t get a certain job, there’s a reason for you not getting that job. If your desire for a spouse is deferred or your desire for children is deferred, there are reasons for those deferments. God’s working through it all. All the difficulties and disappointments we face have a purpose. 

And we have to learn to believe that and to rest in that even when we can’t imagine what the purpose of these things might be. I’ve heard it compared to a young boy who plays at the feet of his grandmother as she’s working on a cross-stitching project. Now, for all of you Gen-Z’ers who don’t know what cross-stitching is, we have a picture of what it looks like. It’s basically a kind of sewing that people will use to create homemade decorations. And the thing about a cross-stitch is that the back of it looks a lot different than the front. It looks messy and jumbled and sometimes unrecognizable. So, imagine a young boy playing at his grandmother’s feet while she’s working on a cross-stitching project. All that little boy can see as he’s looking up at her project is the chaotic pattern of loose threads and jumbled colors on the back. In all likelihood, he probably has no idea what she’s making. But the reason he’s confused isn’t because there’s anything wrong with the cross-stitching. It’s simply because of his own limited perspective. He can’t see the beautiful artwork being created on the other side. 

Similarly, God’s always at work in all the circumstances of our lives. And even when we can’t imagine how those circumstances could possibly accomplish anything good, we’re nevertheless called to trust that they are accomplishing profound good in some way that we don’t understand in the present but that we will understand in the future. 

Then, third and finally, our confidence about God being at work in all things all the time gives us peace about future uncertainties. And, of course, when I say “uncertainties,” I’m only speaking from a human perspective. In reality, there actually aren’t any uncertainties because God’s at work and won’t fail to accomplish everything he desires both now and in the future. And our confidence of that reality is precisely what enables us to have peace—even as we think about aspects of the future that appear uncertain from our limited human perspective. 

Maybe, this morning, you’ve been struggling with feelings of anxiety about what’s going to happen with your finances or with your health or how a certain situation with your children is going to turn out.  Or maybe just reading all of the news headlines makes you anxious. There seem to be so many uncertainties related to global events. Are we headed toward armed conflict with Russia or perhaps China? Will there be nuclear war at some point? Or even within our own nation, is economic disaster just around the corner? What’s going to happen in the next presidential election? There are so many things we don’t know the answers to and that seem terribly uncertain from a human perspective—and that can make us anxious. Yet, instead of being anxious about our future, we can rest in the truth we see in Genesis 45-46—the truth that our future and the future of this world is in the hands of a sovereign God who always works for our good. 

Brothers and sisters, never forget that, even though certain people like to think they rule this world, the fact is that God rules this world. And one day, God’s sovereign and supreme rule over this world will be seen by everyone in a very visible way. One author compares it to the game kids sometimes like to play called “King of the Hill.” Listen to this description. “In that game, all the kids push and fight as they battle over who will stand atop the hill as the king. Eventually the biggest, strongest kid wins and stands on the hill gloating in victory. The other kids who lost then band together as an alliance, hoping that their combined efforts can overthrow the king of the hill. Eventually they wear down the king of the hill, and someone from their group becomes the new king. Those who are not the king then repeat the process of plotting and overthrowing the current king of the hill.” 

The author then goes on to observe that, in reality, “[A]ll of human history is a version of [that] kids’ game played by adults who fight to get their way with legal maneuvering, personal threatening, public attacking, and private deal making. If you pay any attention to what is happening culturally, you can quickly grow despondent. Different sides fight to get their king on the hill, and even if they make it, eventually someone else knocks their king off the hill, and the culmination of all the battling seems to get us nowhere.”

Thankfully, though, that’s not the end of the story. This current state of affairs won’t continue forever. Because, one day, Jesus will return and proclaim himself to be not just the “king of the hill” but the King of every hill. And he’ll establish his reign for all eternity. So, history has a destination, and that destination is Jesus. 

As a result, we don’t have to worry about what the future holds—because we know that God’s sovereign and is working through every detail of every event not only in our lives personally for our personal good but to accomplish his cosmic purpose of Jesus being established as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. 

And our main passage in Genesis reminds us of these truths. It pulls back the curtain and shows us how God was actively working behind the scenes throughout all of the events of Joseph’s life—from his brothers selling him into slavery, to Potiphar’s wife falsely accusing Joseph of trying to rape her, to Joseph being imprisoned because of that false accusation, and finally to Joseph eventually rising to become the second-in-command of Egypt and rescuing his family from the famine. God was working in and through it all to accomplish something glorious. 

Yet all the workings of God we read about in Genesis are merely preparatory for an exponentially greater example of God working in unforeseen and unexpected ways to accomplish his perfect purpose. You see, just as Joseph’s family needed to be rescued from starvation, we needed to be rescued from our sins. The Bible teaches that our sins have separated us from a holy God and made us deserving of eternal punishment. Yet, in his love, God came to our rescue. He sent his own Son Jesus to come to this earth and live a perfectly sinless life in our place and eventually die on the cross in our place. Jesus endured God the Father’s wrath on the cross so we wouldn’t have to endure it in hell. Our sins cried out for God’s judgment, but Jesus stepped in and suffered that judgment as our substitute. He then resurrected from the dead three days later so that he now offers forgiveness and rescue and eternal life to everyone who puts their trust in him. 

So, just like God worked in an unforeseen and unexpected way through Joseph to save his family from starvation, he also worked in an unforeseen and unexpected way through Jesus to save us from our sin. And this is actually the purpose of God that encompasses all other purposes. God’s continually at work in every detail of every event in this universe not just to do a bunch of random and unrelated things but to accomplish various aspects of this one grand and all-encompassing purpose—the purpose of redeeming us from our sins.