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Pastor of Fellowship at Cross Creek in Branson, MO

Gen 49:28 Going Home 7-13-14

Intro… Question: What were the Egyptian pyramids all about at the time they were built?

I would be tempted to ask and or explore some of the whys of how we observe or honor death or a person’s passing away. Why do we do what we do at the time of a loved one’s passing? Are these good things or not? Which ones tend to connect with you more? Which ones less and why? Why does observing death tend to get such a free pass concerning form following function or the preserving or regarding certain traditions?

Now put what the pharaohs did, along with what we do today, in context with what was actually taking place with Jacob’s body being returned to Canaan? How does all this compare to God’s children and their final Spiritual reward?

Recently, we began a new unit or section or person of, study…the life of Joseph. Essentially, the story of Joseph, is for the most part, our story. Chosen by God for a special purpose, Joseph must first endure much suffering and injustice before arriving at his God-ordained purpose and calling, and what a purpose it will be.

As we read, I want you to continue pondering, your special identity in Christ, and that just because you may be going through difficult days, your suffering…your waiting is NOT in vain. As God’s child…as God’s children, just as with Joseph and his brothers, you…we…all have a purpose in Christ (Romans 8; Eph. 1; 1 Peter 1).

Your servant,

Series INTRO…

The Bible’s very first word is the Hebrew word Bərēšīṯ, which means “in [the] beginning.” “Genesis” is actually the Greek word for “beginnings” or “origins,” and thus the origin for both the Latin and English transliteration: Genesis.

So what’s our goal? Just to explore. Like an archaeologist exploring ancient ruins, we are going back to the Scripture’s beginnings to do a little Spiritual digging and poking around to see what was God doing before God’s Son was Spiritually conceived in his mother Mary’s womb? What were the world, people and life like from the very beginning?

Summary of Recent Explorations…

• The Creation: The Creator Creates His Creation and its Caretakers (Adam and Eve). Gen. 1-2.

• The Fall: But a Crafty Adversary Emerges, Infecting the Creator’s Caretakers with a Virulent Strain of Deceptive Evil (non-beneficial actions). Gen. 3-4.

• The Flood: The story of the righteous Servant and a devastating Flood. In order to Save his Creation from a self-destructive and merciless evil, the Creator Must radically purge or cleanse his Creation Gen. 5-7.

• Creation’s New Beginning…Gen. 8-11.

• Creation’s New Caretaker: The Creator Raises up, Chooses and Greatly Blesses a righteous and trusting Caretaker named Abraham. Gen. 12-25.

• The Torch of the Creator’s Trusting Caretaking Now Passes to Succeeding Generations (Isaac, Jacob, Joseph…) Gen. 26ff.

Joseph’s Story…Gen. 37-50.

• Jacob’s older sons grow deeply resentful of their favored younger brother, Joseph. Gen. 37:1ff.

• Joseph’s jealous older brothers cruelly sell their younger brother Joseph, against his will, into slavery, and then inform their grieving father, Jacob, that Joseph has been killed by wild animals. Gen. 37:12ff.

• Despite being trafficked as a slave and falsely imprisoned, God’s favor mysteriously still accompanies Joseph. Gen. 39:1ff.

• Despite correctly interpreting the baker and cupbearer’s dreams while in prison, Joseph’s good deeds, go momentarily unrewarded. Gen. 40:1ff.

• Finally, when Pharaoh has two strange dreams that neither he, nor his priests, can’t interpret, the cupbearer remembers Joseph. Joseph is released from prison and is able to interpret Pharaoh’s dreams as seven years of plenty followed by seven years of severe famine. Gen. 41:1ff.

• Pharaoh empowers Joseph to guide Egypt through these next fourteen years of plenty and famine. Gen. 41:38ff.

• When Joseph’s brothers come to Egypt in search of grain, they have no idea that the Egyptian official that they are seeking to purchase the grain from is their brother Joseph. Then still portraying himself as an unknown Egyptian official, Joseph accuses his brothers of spying and forces them to leave their brother Simeon behind as surety that they will return with Joseph’s brother Benjamin. Gen. 42:1ff.

• When Jacob’s sons tell him of the bargain that they were forced to accept for their grain, Jacob initially refuses to risk losing a third son. Gen. 42:19ff

• Finally, accompanied by Benjamin, Joseph’s brothers are able to persuade their father to allow them to return to Egypt where the Egyptian official hosts a great banquet in their honor. Gen. 43:1ff.

• When a planted missing missing silver cup of the Egyptian official is found within Benjamin’s grain sack, Judah must now offer himself in place of his younger brother. Gen. 44:1ff.

• Finally, no longer able to contain his emotions, Joseph finally reveals himself to his brothers and their need to return to Egypt with their father to survive the famine. Gen. 45:1ff.

• Pharaoh, in gratitude for all that Joseph had done for both Egypt and his realm, offers Joseph’s family, the children of Israel, the best that Egypt has to offer. Gen. 45:16ff.

• With God’s blessing Israel takes his entire family and flocks to Egypt where he is reunited with his son Joseph and settles in the land of Goshen. Gen. 46:1ff.

• Israel, close to his death, makes Joseph swear that he will return his body to in the Promised Land to be buried. Gen. 47:1-12; 27-31.

• During the famine, Joseph saves many lives from starvation, as well as, solidifying Pharaoh’s great wealth. Gen. 47:13-26.

• Jacob, shortly before his death, doubles Joseph’s inheritance by adopting Joseph’s two oldest sons. Gen. 48:1ff.

• Jacob (Israel) prepares to die and prophetically blesses his 12 sons. Gen. 49:1ff.

Pray; read three times (perhaps just twice) and ask questions…

49:28 All these are the twelve tribes of Israel, and this is what their father said to them when he blessed them. He blessed them, every one with the blessing appropriate to him.

Note: these blessings, listed in vv. 1-27, are not necessarily that easy to understand or interpret, especially for younger children, so I am bypassing them for the moment. It is interesting to note that v. 28 clearly says “with the blessing appropriate to him.” Are we to assume that these blessings are divinely-inspired? And what was their purpose? Did the sons really understand them, and or did it really matter, as long as they were receiving a blessing from their Father? Is this the Abrahamic Covenant split 12 ways? Is this similar to the blessing that according to custom was to go to his older brother, Esau, but Jacob himself deceived his father Isaac out of?

29 Then he charged them and said to them, “I am about to be gathered to my people; bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite, 30 in the cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which is before Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought along with the field from Ephron the Hittite for a burial site. 31 There they buried Abraham and his wife Sarah, there they buried Isaac and his wife Rebekah, and there I buried Leah- 32 the field and the cave that is in it, purchased from the sons of Heth.”

Note: Gen. 23 and 25 record not only the legal purchase of the cave, but both Sarah and later, Abraham’s burials. Isn’t it interesting that Rachel was not buried here as well, but at Ephrath (Bethlehem) where she was headed to with Jacob and the rest of his family from Bethel when she died giving birth to Benjamin (Gen. 35:16ff).

33 When Jacob finished charging his sons, he drew his feet into the bed and breathed his last, and was gathered to his people.

50:1 Then Joseph fell on his father’s face, and wept over him and kissed him.

2 Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm his father. So the physicians embalmed Israel.

Was this so his body could be carried back to the cave at Mamre to be buried without decaying, and wasn’t this what the Egyptians did to the Pharaoh’s bodies when they died? So in essence, wasn’t Jacob, in his death, being treated much like a Pharaoh?

3 Now forty days were required for it, for such is the period required for embalming. And the Egyptians wept for him seventy days.

This is a great loss, and even the Egyptians are mourning his loss. No doubt, Joseph, being Jacob’s son, leads to Jacob being treated like a god or pharaoh himself in death.

4 When the days of mourning for him were past, Joseph spoke to the household of Pharaoh, saying, “If now I have found favor in your sight, please speak to Pharaoh, saying, 5 ‘My father made me swear, saying, “Behold, I am about to die; in my grave which I dug for myself in the land of Canaan, there you shall bury me.” Now therefore, please let me go up and bury my father; then I will return.'” 6 Pharaoh said, “Go up and bury your father, as he made you swear.”

7 So Joseph went up to bury his father, and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders of his household and all the elders of the land of Egypt,

This memorial only becomes grander and grander. The father of Joseph has died and is to be buried back in his own land. Amazing.

8 and all the household of Joseph and his brothers and his father’s household; they left only their little ones and their flocks and their herds in the land of Goshen.

9 There also went up with him both chariots and horsemen; and it was a very great company.

10 When they came to the threshing floor of Atad, which is beyond the Jordan, they lamented there with a very great and sorrowful lamentation; and he observed seven days mourning for his father.

If the funeral procession crossed the Jordan, does this imply that it proceeded on much the same route that the Children of Israel would take four hundred years later, thus entering the Promise Land from the east, perhaps even crossing the Jordan near Jericho?

11 Now when the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, “This is a grievous mourning for the Egyptians.” Therefore it was named Abel-mizraim, which is beyond the Jordan.

Note: Abel Mizriam…means “the mourning of Egypt.”

12 Thus his sons did for him as he had charged them;

13 for his sons carried him to the land of Canaan and buried him in the cave of the field of Machpelah before Mamre, which Abraham had bought along with the field for a burial site from Ephron the Hittite.

14 After he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt, he and his brothers, and all who had gone up with him to bury his father.

Who?

Where?

When?

What?

• After prophetically blessing each of his 12 sons with a blessing that appropriately fit each of them and instructing his sons to bury his body after he dies in his family’s burial tomb back within the Promise Land, Jacob (Israel…the one who wrestled with God and survived) now dies.

• After his father dies, Joseph hugs his father’s face, weeping over him and kissing him.

• Then Joseph has the embalmers to embalm the body of his father, which takes about forty days.

• After all of Egypt mourns Jacob’s loss for seventy days, Joseph asks Pharaoh if he can take his father’s body back to Canaan to be buried in the tomb of his fathers?

• Pharaoh agrees, with Egypt giving Jacob a funeral process back to Canaan equal to that of perhaps Pharaoh himself.

• Finally, after having arrived back in Canaan, the sons of Israel, fulfill their father’s final request and bury their father in his family tomb

Summary: After blessing his sons, Jacob dies, and his sons fulfill his wish to take his body back to Canaan to be laid along side the bodies of his fathers.

Why did God include this event in his record or what would we not know–about God, life, myself, others, etc.–if this story were not in the Bible?

• By making his sons promise to take his body back to Canaan, one can sense the tenacity of the man who 1) connived from his older twin brother and father his older twin’s birthright and blessing, as well as, 2) most of his father-in-law’s wealth and flocks, despite his father-in-law’s own conniving and 3) after having lost his own son, Joseph, once again, having found him. Israel was not to be denied God’s promises to him or his heirs. In essence, his body would serve as GPS beacon calling his children back home over four centuries later. Jacob knew what he was doing. Jacob was indeed a driven Spiritual survivor.

• One can sense the deep grief that Joseph experienced for his father at his father’s death.

• Jacob (Israel), despite being a shepherd all his life, in his death, he was treated like a king as his body is returned to Canaan accompanied by a royal entourage.

So What?

Thanks… Have spent the week with my wife and daughter, touring portions of Missouri that we had seen before and portions that we have never seen, and in doing so, have partially retraced the Confederacy’s last failed military campaign in Missouri on its 150^thanniversary. Amanda wanted to see the campground and swimming hole that we vacationed at when the kids were young at Johnson Shutins.

After that, we drove up to St. Louis, went to the St. Louis Zoo, toured the beautiful Missouri Botanical Gardens, the grand cathedral or Basilica of St. Louis with the largest collection of Byzantine mosaic tile in the world, the federal courthouse in downtown St. Louis where the famous Dred Scot decision was rendered before the Civil War, as well as, the St. Charles historic district on the Missouri River just up from the St. Louis. We also saw the Cardinals, with a walk off home run in the bottom of the ninth, defeat the Pirates at Busch Stadium. Then we followed the Missouri River west through Babler State Park and the historic towns of Washington, Hermann, Jefferson City, Columbia, Boonville and Kansas City. In Kansas City, after eating wonderful barbeque at B. B.’s Lawnside Bar-B-Q and driving through some older beautiful neighborhoods south of the Plaza, we retraced a portion of the South’s last hurrah in Missouri, the Battle of Westport.

It begins back in the mountains near Johnson Shutins, at nearby Pilot Knob. In the early fall of 1864, Confederate Gen. Sterling Price, the hero of the Civil War’s first major battle at Wilson’s Creek in 1861, becomes momentarily distracted from his very achievable objective, the strategically-invaluable city of St. Louis, with a small Union earthen-wall armory called Fort Davidson. When Price’s army fails to take the earthen fort in a timely manner, the Union commander blows up the armory’s valuable armaments in the middle of the night and begins to retreat across Missouri. In the end, Price will end up being the pursued. One of his last stands will be the major Civil War Battle of Westport. But unlike, Wilson’s Creek or Shiloh or Gettysburg, the Battle of Westport does not have its own military park because it the park would occupy much of Kansas City today. There are a few memorial markers strategically placed through out the city and a partial visitor’s center, but in comparison to other major military parks, nada. It’s almost a crime to the memory of the soldiers who fought in these battles. At the visitor’s center, I did stumble into an expert of Sterling’s entire Missouri campaign and spent more than an hour plying him with all my questions, not only concerning the battle but why is there NO REAL PARK here in Kansas City! I was a kid in a candy store. This guy is actually out there killing poison ivy and trimming branches on his own so he can blaze trails to two of the battle’s hottest spots, Bloody Hill and Byrum’s Ford on the Big Blue River near Swope Park. Incredible! Today it’s the Truman Library in Independence and onto my Aunt Betty’s near Sedalia. Along the way, we have also eaten at some wonderful restaurants. It’s been nice, restful, and yet, still an exploratory adventure with my wonderful wife and daughter. Thank you, Lord.

Struggle(s)…

Truth(s)… Israel’s steadfast hope in God fulfilling his long-term covenant promises to him and his father’s lives even in the grave and beyond; a son demonstrates his deep love and grief for his now deceased father, and in the light of his father’s passing and a grateful foreign power and its people pay their respects to the father of the man who saved their nation from death.

Application… Hope, grief, honor…Great hope, love, grief and honor…all being expressed during a powerfully pregnant moment within human history….the passing of one of the last great biblical patriarchs…and founders of our biblical faith tradition. So how might this passage have anything to do with my puny problems of getting caught up on my writing blog? No doubt from what we have learned in Genesis, God has his own way of catching up history. Life will take its twists and turns. It will have its setbacks, and then just about the time when all appears lost, God saves. God delivers. God redeems. The story of Genesis and particularly Joseph’s story again and again demonstrates to its readers that we need not despair when life takes an unpredictable turn or twist or becomes momentarily stuck. Be faithful. Persevere. Pray, hope, be faithful, love…even hope…and most certainly beyond the grave…because God’s plan is bigger than any one person or lifespan or generation or generations.

Your application:

Biggest Struggle at the moment:

How does what happen here relate to you?

What about your kids?

Biggest Struggles (Imagine these or several–put yourself in their shoes–walk through a day with them at school, at home. What might they encounter?)

Now how does what happen here possibly relate/ (Remember this is only to give you a feel or an introductory hook or a reinforcing took; in there looking, they may come up with something entirely different.)

Remember to have fun, sense the Spirit’s leading and develop a love for these kids.

As always, thanks!

Joe

Scripture quotations taken from the New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968,1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation Used by permission.” (www.Lockman.org).

Gen. 49:off Oh Sons, Gather Together and Hear… 6-29-14

Intro… 1) Do the sins of the fathers fall to their children, as the Old Covenant stated concerning Israel, or how do both one or a generation’s good and bad choices affect later generations, or do you think this is the case, and if so, how so? And if so, is it fair? Can you think of any examples from your life or from others’ experiences? Do you think about this with respect to your own decisions—that your actions could be affecting later generations of descendants?

2) If what God says about us his New Testament or New Covenant children is true—that we have the Spirit of God as down payment towards something much more, including heaven, joy and the presence of God forever–how does this shape your thoughts and choices now? Does knowing you have heaven, God, angels, the Spirit of God, joy, prayer, the Scriptures and the community of believers affect how you live, or do you even understand these blessings or rewards or their implications? Or do you take them for granted?

Your servant,
jc

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Gen. 48:1ff God’s Cross-Handed Blessing 6-22-14

© 1998-2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek
Gen. 48.1ff
God’s Cross-Handed Blessing
6.15.14

Intro… Ever been jealous of someone else’s blessing or good fortune or someone else’s seemingly good or better times? Wish it were you going on that trip, enjoying life’s greater joys and benefits? So why does God allow some to seemingly enjoy life better than others?

Bu then on the other hand, why in Scripture, does God so often choose the lessor to eventually become greater than the great–the younger twin Jacob over his brother Esau or his father-in-law, the wealthy Laban? The younger Joseph over his older brothers? The outcast Moses leading the fledging slave nation Israel out from under the heavy-handed yoke of Egyptian oppression? The young shepherd David over his brothers, as well as, the Philistine Goliath and King Saul? The young prophet Daniel’s influence within the Babylonian empire? Esther within the Persian empire? The baby Jesus over Herod the Great? The one “unusually-born,” Paul, being chosen by God to take the gospel to the Gentiles over the rest of the original apostles? God’s choice of the “foolish” over the “wise” to believe, embrace and receive the rich rewards of the cross’ foolishness (1 Cor. 1-2)? Or an infant church eventually triumphing over the mighty Roman empire?

And if God does choose to bless the lessor over the greater, is that blessing an overnight occurrence and if so, why?

Seemingly, Joseph’s brothers for a time had it much better than Joseph. Then Joseph had it much better than his brothers. Then Joseph saves his brothers, but not without some accountability. Then Joseph is vastly rewarded over his brothers. So even if Joseph’s life is a partial template for us as believers, what then do we learn from viewing others’ seeming good fortune while we apparently are unjustly suffering?

And haven’t you noticed that time has a way of leveling things out or even reversing fortunes, if we will only give things long enough time to be fully played out? Therefore, be thankful for what you have–good or bad, up or down…because odds are–it will change.

DO NOT COMPARE! God is a just, merciful God, even if his justice is delayed—it will never be denied. And yet, on the other hand, who, of any of us, wants true justice? I certainly do not. I want mercy. Perhaps justice compared to someone else… But do I, cloaked within a flawed self-interpretation of my own personal righteousness and evil, want to risk this kind of judicial measurement? Hardly.

Be merciful to me, LORD. Give me grace to handle and endure the difficult, if indeed, by enduring it, I bring you greater glory–but always mercy, Lord. Always, mercy. Your mercy is my only salvation. My only hope. Man’s only hope.

So how does one wait and hope when life doesn’t seem fair? God. God has to be my salvation in the moment. God is the eternal constant that allows men, despite seeming injustice, to wait in peace for many years. Our tendency…man’s tendency is now. God’s… life’s… is much more elongated. God’s children are called to be turtles, not rabbits. Why is this so? Why does the race go to the tortoise and NOT to the hare? 1) Because, despite there being a place for both at times, when one gets the roles mixed up–being the hare when life requires being the tortoise, or being the tortoise when life requires being the hare–one fails, and 2) because life’s complexity demands lots of patient learning along the way, in time, despite the hare’s large initial lead, the race tends to go back in the tortoise’s favor because, as opposed to quick decision-making and often discouraged hare, the tortoise slows down long enough to learn from its mistakes and in the end, does not quit. It is the tortoise’s steadfast Spiritual endurance fed by hope, love, trust, obedience and discipline that wins the day.

God, be my treasure in the moment when I am tempted to covet someone else’s momentary pleasures. Teach me to be the Spiritual turtle. Stretch out my endurance.

Your servant,
jc

Recently, we began a new unit or section or person of, study…the life of Joseph. Essentially, the story of Joseph, is for the most part, our story. Chosen by God for a special purpose, Joseph must first endure much suffering and injustice before arriving at his God-ordained purpose and calling, and what a purpose it will be.

Continue reading →

Value and Worth – The Elliot Rodger Story

© 1998-2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek

The Uncomfortable Mirror of Elliot Rodger…

6.6.14

On the evening of May 23, the last day of Spring classes this past semester, Elliot Rodger, a 22 year-old part-time UCSB college student, ended up killing six people, besides himself, and injuring 13 more, as well as rocking Southern California and perhaps, even if only momentarily, the world.

Hate, narcissism, sadness, lonely, questionable values, materialistic, broken, self-absorbed, worldly, arrogant, shallow, jealous, insecure, seemingly-rejected, bitter, sick, entitled, godless, confused, hopeless, foolish, wanting to be loved or adored, lustful, worthy, idolatrous, spoiled, mislead, seemingly invisible, socially-challenged. These were some of the terms you used to describe what you observed in two of Elliot Rodger’s self-posted videos—videos he reposted shortly before he enacted his planned Day of Retribution for having been, as he interpreted it, rejected romantically by women.

This past Sunday I made the case, like an uncomfortable mirror held up to our faces, Elliot Rodger, his life, his family, his videos and his 141-page manifesto, whether we like it or NOT, is our…America, each and every family in America, each and every one of us… uncomfortable mirror. Sadly, we are Elliot and Elliot is us….hopefully perhaps,

not in one insane, misguided exploding nutshell, but certainly in undeniable portions as described above. And although Elliot had been diagnosed as having the autistic social disorder of Asperger’s Syndrome, what Elliot seemed to be saying underneath it all was that he just wanted to be validated. Like all of us, he wanted value and worth, or as Dr. Larry Crab describes human’s greatest emotional needs—to be significant and safe…to be valued and okay.

Elliot, in his own warped worldview, thought that the validation he so craved would only come through sexual intimacy with a beautiful girl. Ironically and tragically, he construed a world in which that was never going to experience it. Besides dressing nicely and appearing in public, he never reached out to any girls. Therefore, he created an existence in which he was never going to receive what he believed would make him truly happy. Trapped, in his “living hell,” as Elliot describes it, he decided that if he wasn’t going to have sex, others wouldn’t either. He became a god and attempted to play God, but as it turned out, Elliot was not a very good god.

And in fact, Elliot was never intended to be God or a god. Rather, the Scriptures tell us that there is only true source of lasting, sustainable significance and safety, or value and worth, and that is the Creator himself. Not only did God create us in his own image, after our Fall into sin and imperfection, through his Son’s sacrificial atonement for our Fall and the gift of his Spirit of truth and power, God is also recreating us into the image of his Son. Therefore, we HAVE VALUE! It was given to us on the cross. Our redemption—our value and eternal safety–according to Mark 10:35ff, was bought with the life of God himself. God so loved the world, that he gave…(He gave what?)…his Son…(to suffer, die and therefore make atonement for mankind’s imperfection) so that whoever puts his trust in him…his atonement…will live forever (with God) and will not die (forever). John 3:16.

No human, job, family, event, experience, moment, accomplishment, amount of money, fame or prestige will ever be able to give me the significance and safety that my broken soul so deeply craves. Why? Because they are not perfect. They are NOT God. They are NOT God enough. Too fragile; too imperfect, too fallen and flawed themselves. For a bit, perhaps? Moments, perhaps? But never enough to satisfy our desperate thirst. Only God can do this. And his well, water fountain…river of significance and safety… never ever runs dry. Every moment of every day, I can drink it in. I have value. I have worth, and NO ONE can take it away from me. Eternal fact. Trust. Faith. Believe. Say it again and again and again. God’s truth for my flawed truth. God’s value for man’s incomplete value of me.

Yes, sadly, we are Elliot and Elliot is us, but instead of angrily taking out our revenge upon the world for not having loved or admired us the way our souls so desperately crave to be loved or admired, by faith and trust, we can drink from the wellspring of value and worth that never runs dry (John 4:13ff; 7:37-39)—God or the eternal Spirit of God—and immediately have our soul’s thirst quenched. It makes all the difference in the world, and it could have made the difference in both Elliot and the lives of his victims and their families. And it can still make a difference, in the lives of a million, billion other partial-Elliots like all of us out there. The uncomfortable mirror ought to drive us to a savior, a deliverer…a validator. That savior…that validator is Jesus.

Joe

Gen. 47:1-12; 27-31 In Goshen, Still Holding out Hope in God 6-1-14

© 1998-2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek
Gen. 47:1-12; 27-31
Shepherding in Goshen, while still Holding out Hope in God’s Promises…
6.1.14

(Source: Wikipedia) Lights at night reveal civilization along the Nile River and its Delta. Israel is revealed by the lights to the right and east of the delta.

Intro… One question: why, despite having been reunited with his long, lost son, despite having his family not wiped out by the severest of famines, despite being given the best lands of Egypt to graze his sheep and despite blessing the greatest leader in the world at the time, the Pharaoh of Egypt, does Israel, shortly before he dies, make his son Joseph radically swear to NOT bury him within Egypt, but rather to bury his bones with his fathers within Israel’s promised inheritance?

Is it because, despite having been granted the best lands in Egypt, Egypt is NOT home for Israel? That Israel’s Promise Lands, though not ready for them, are home to Israel—the home that God, out of his gracious goodness to Israel, has promised to Israel?

Which leads to this perhaps thoughtful, perhaps abstract question: is a part of our struggle…man’s struggle…God’s children’s struggle…my struggle… with Terra Firma…or Earth…despite all of its incredible grandeur and mystery…that we were NOT made for Earth, but we were made for heaven? That we were NOT made for Goshen–it is only our temporary home…and a home that ultimately will decline under a later, harsher master? We were made for our Promised Inheritance?

If true, what does this mean? What might this look like now on earth and then in heaven? And if this is our temporary home and shepherding sheep is our profession, how do we best cope with and live in our temporary home?

Egypt pictured with her fertile Nile Delta and where Goshen was located

Recently, we began a new unit or section or person of study…the life of Joseph. Essentially, the story of Joseph, is for the most part, our story. Chosen by God for a special purpose, Joseph must first endure much suffering and injustice before arriving at his God-ordained purpose and calling, and what a purpose it will be.

Your servant,

Series INTRO…

Summary of Recent Explorations…

The Creation: The Creator Creates His Creation and its Caretakers (Adam and Eve). Gen. 1-2.

• The Fall: But a Crafty Adversary Emerges, Infecting the Creator’s Caretakers with a Virulent Strain of Deceptive Evil (non-beneficial actions). Gen. 3-4.

• The Flood: The story of the righteous Servant and a devastating Flood. In order to Save his Creation from a self-destructive and merciless evil, the Creator Must radically purge or cleanse his Creation Gen. 5-7.

• Creation’s New Beginning…Gen. 8-11.

• Creation’s New Caretaker: The Creator Raises up, Chooses and Greatly Blesses a righteous and trusting Caretaker named Abraham. Gen. 12-25.

• The Torch of the Creator’s Trusting Caretaking Now Passes to Succeeding Generations (Isaac, Jacob, Joseph…) Gen. 26ff.

Joseph’s Story…Gen. 37-50.

• Jacob’s older sons grow deeply resentful of their favored youngest brother, Joseph. Gen. 37:1ff.

• Joseph’s jealous older brothers cruelly sell their younger brother Joseph, against his will, into slavery, and then inform their grieving father, Jacob, that Joseph has been killed by wild animals. Gen. 37:12ff.

• Despite being trafficked as a slave and falsely imprisoned, God’s favor mysteriously still accompanies Joseph. Gen. 39:1ff.

• Despite correctly interpreting the baker and cupbearer’s dreams while in prison, Joseph’s good deeds, go momentarily unrewarded. Gen. 40:1ff.

• When Pharaoh’s cupbearer recalls how Joseph correctly interpreted his dream of restoration to Pharaoh’s court while he was imprisoned along side Joseph, he recommends Joseph to Pharaoh to interpret Pharaoh’s dreams. When Joseph is able to interpret Pharaoh’s dream correctly, as seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine, Joseph is finally delivered from his false imprisonment. Gen. 41:1ff.

• Pharaoh empowers Joseph to guide Egypt through these next fourteen years of plenty and famine. Gen. 41:38ff.

• Due to the famine, Joseph’s brothers, come to Egypt in search of grain. Unknowingly, the Egyptian ruler that they seek to purchase grain from is their younger brother Joseph. Sensing a divine plan, Joseph accuses his brothers of spying and forces them to leave their brother Simeon behind as surety that they will return with their youngest brother Benjamin. Gen. 42:1ff.

• When Jacob’s sons tell him of the bargain that they were forced to accept for their grain, Jacob initially refuses to risk losing a third son. Gen. 42:19ff.

• Finally, with grain supplies running low, Joseph’s brothers are able to persuade their father to allow them to return to Egypt, accompanied by their youngest brother, Benjamin, to purchase more grain. Their return to Egypt with Benjamin is rewarded with a great banquet held in their honor in the presence of the Egyptian ruler whom had originally sold them the grain. Gen. 43:1ff.

• Once again, the brothers have their departure from Egypt momentarily aborted under the false pretenses that one of them has stolen a silver cup. When the missing cup is found in Benjamin’s sack, his older brother Judah now offers himself to serve in Benjamin’s place in order that Benjamin might return home safely to their father. Gen. 44:1ff.

• When he can no longer contain his pent-up emotions, Joseph finally reveals himself to his brothers, warning them of the famine’s severity and their need to return here with their father to live in the shadow of Egypt’s great providence. Gen. 45:1ff.

• Pharaoh offers the children of Israel the best that Egypt has to offer. Gen. 45:16ff.

• With God’s blessing Israel takes his entire family to Egypt, where he is reunited with his son Joseph and settles down in the land of Goshen to care for their flocks. Gen. 46:1ff.

Nile River

Pray; read three times (perhaps just twice) and ask questions…

47:1 Then Joseph went in and told Pharaoh, and said, “My father and my brothers and their flocks and their herds and all that they have, have come out of the land of Canaan; and behold, they are in the land of Goshen.”

2 He took five men from among his brothers and presented them to Pharaoh.

3 Then Pharaoh said to his brothers, “What is your occupation?” So they said to Pharaoh, “Your servants are shepherds, both we and our fathers.”

So why does Pharaoh ask this? To see where Joseph’s family might fit in?

4 They said to Pharaoh, “We have come to sojourn in the land, for there is no pasture for your servants’ flocks, for the famine is severe in the land of Canaan. Now, therefore, please let your servants live in the land of Goshen.”

5 Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Your father and your brothers have come to you.

6 The land of Egypt is at your disposal; settle your father and your brothers in the best of the land, let them live in the land of Goshen; and if you know any capable men among them, then put them in charge of my livestock.”

Though his brothers didn’t deserve this honor because of their connection with Joseph and God’s providential plan, Joseph’s brothers are not only being allowed to pasture their flocks in the land of Goshen, but Pharaoh is offering them a job—to care for the Pharaoh’s flocks.

7 Then Joseph brought his father Jacob and presented him to Pharaoh; and Jacob blessed Pharaoh.

8 Pharaoh said to Jacob, “How many years have you lived?”

9 So Jacob said to Pharaoh, “The years of my sojourning are one hundred and thirty; few and unpleasant have been the years of my life, nor have they attained the years that my fathers lived during the days of their sojourning.”

In essence, Jacob is complaining here when he says both few and unpleasant have the years of my life? They don’t seem few. 130 seems like a lot, but in comparison to his forefathers, I suppose they are. The age of the Israel’s patriarchs is coming to a close. The times, they are a changing…

10 And Jacob blessed Pharaoh, and went out from his presence.

Why Jacob blesses the mighty Pharaoh, a seemingly great honor, and the Pharaoh allows it. Israel has come far since Abraham was called by God to father a nation and move to the Promised Land.

11 So Joseph settled his father and his brothers and gave them a possession in the land of Egypt, in the best of the land, in the land of Rameses, as Pharaoh had ordered.

Note: the current Pharaoh need not be Rameses. This could be Moses’ editorial note added four centuries after these events to allow his current readers to know the specific place where this land is located, or there may indeed been an earlier Pharaoh named Rameses that history has of yet not discovered.

(On an interesting side note, many scholars date Ramses I to the 1290s BC, which is about a century and half later than the Bible’s conservative dating of the Children of Israel’s Exodus out of Egypt. In addition, it was only about a decade ago that what many believe to be a royal Egyptian mummy was returned to Egypt after spending almost a century and a half in a private Canadian museum. And whose mummy was it? Many now believe it to be the lost mummy from Rameses I’s empty sarcophagus which was discovered in the Valley of the Kings at Luxor. So in essence, the great Rameses I’s mummified body spent almost a century and a half in North America as a cheap tourist attraction! [See http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/04/0430_030430_royalmummy_2.html]

Though he be a king, he is still just a man…

Let the name of God be blessed forever and ever for wisdom and power belong to Him. It is He who changes the times and the epochs;
He removes kings and establishes kings. Dan. 2:20-21.

James 4:13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit.” 14 Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. 15 Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that.”)

12 Joseph provided his father and his brothers and all his father’s household with food, according to their little ones.

Interesting modifier according to their little ones.

27 Now Israel lived in the land of Egypt, in Goshen, and they acquired property in it and were fruitful and became very numerous.

Property they owned? It doesn’t surprise me. Everywhere Israel has gone it ends up thriving…

28 Jacob lived in the land of Egypt seventeen years; so the length of Jacob’s life was one hundred and forty-seven years.

29 When the time for Israel to die drew near, he called his son Joseph and said to him, “Please, if I have found favor in your sight, place now your hand under my thigh and deal with me in kindness and faithfulness. Please do not bury me in Egypt,

Kindness and faithfulness…checed and ‘emeth…loyal love and reliability?

30 but when I lie down with my fathers, you shall carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their burial place.”

And he said, “I will do as you have said.”

31 He said, “Swear to me.”

Apparently, this was very important to Israel and he did not want Joseph placating him with false words, as if Joseph would ever do this?

So he swore to him.

Then Israel bowed in worship at the head of the bed.

While the Hebrew allows for in worship to be added to bowed, one wonders if here bow simply means to bow one’s head back down as if one is weak to begin with and has now received resolution concerning their most and final concern. Now they can rest and thus bows their head?

Who?

Where?

When?

What?

• First, Joseph informs Pharaoh that Joseph’s family has arrived and are staying in the land of Goshen.

• He then introduces his brothers to Pharaoh who asks their occupation?

• The brothers reply as Joseph had earlier instructed them—they are shepherds that desire to graze their flocks in Goshen.

• Pharaoh not only graciously grants their request, but offers them the job of keeping his flocks as well.

• Then Joseph introduces his father Israel to Pharaoh. Israel blesses Pharaoh.

• Israel lives in the land of Egypt for another seventeen years. His family flourishes and grows rapidly.

• As the time approaches that Israel is about to die he calls Joseph in and makes him swear that Joseph will bury Israel back in their Promised Land.

• Joseph swears and Israel bows his head.

Summary: That while Israel even blesses Pharaoh for granting Israel and his sons’ request to settle down and graze their flocks in the rich lands of Goshen, Israel, close to his death, still makes his son Joseph promise him that he will not bury his body here in Egypt, but with his fathers back in Israel’s Promised Lands.

Why did God include this event in his record or what would we not know–about God, life, myself, others, etc.–if this story were not in the Bible?

• That while Israel accepts the deal to accept his son Joseph’s deliverance to move to Egypt’s best grazing lands in order to survive the severe famine, near his death, Israel makes Joseph swear to him that he will return his body back to his father’s burial ground in order to be buried. He will not be buried in Egypt. Israel is the Promised Land, not Egypt, not Goshen and certainly not forever. God’s promise to bless Israel and his fathers with a special land, great people and great blessing, still holds true. Residing in Egypt, while being God’s obvious providential protection, is only a temporary solution. Israel exists in his promise lands, not Egypt, which all makes for a great comparison or foreshadow of God’s children existence on Terra Firma or earth now, until heaven. Earth is incredible, as Goshen was. Earth allows mankind to grow up and develop, but earth is NOT our final promised destination. Heaven is. Heaven and life in the presence of God is and always will be the prize…our prize. We accept Goshen. We get it. But our bodies will be buried back in our inheritance. Despite Egypt’s greatness and sheltering shade, we will dwell within God’s promise.

So What?

Thanks… 1) A lot of difficult, good, challenging pastoral counseling these days. Almost nothing mild. Lots of sin or imperfection, but God seems to grace me with some very special, specific insight, either within the session or even before. I mean clear as day. And even when I think it won’t happen, it happens, almost exactly as I saw it would go.

2) God is graciously using Shelly to hold me accountable to publish.

3) Teaching went well again. Had an outline and was able to stick with it. No Keynote again.

Revisited John 10. I think they got it.

Not only has the Good Shepherd come to save his flock from destruction, giving each sheep a second chance or eternal life with God through the sacrificial giving of his own life, but through the giving of his Spirit and the Spirit’s truth and power, to give his flock super-abundant life in the here and now.

And how does he do this or what does this super-abundant life look like now? 1) Being able to Spiritually hear and respond to the Good Shepherd’s voice as opposed to many who do not hear and therefore do not respond to the Good Shepherd’s voice and call; 2) forgiveness or the joy that is rooted in the divine, heavenly and Spiritual release from all my wrongs, sin and shame. I am forgiven and NO ONE can take that away from me; 3) the gift of God’s Spirit, who through his Word and truths encourages, changes and strengthens me for the difficult journey ahead. Such truths and Scriptures include: a) Converting unmet rights and expectations into privileges (Eph. 4:26-27); b) Learning to ride God’s Spiritual Bike by exchanging my flawed, bankrupted truth for God’s perfect timeless truth (Eph. 4:17ff; Rom. 12:1ff; Col. 3:1ff; 1 Peter 1:1ff), including c) that my most fundamental emotional, Spiritual and cognitive needs have been fully satisfied in Christ—through his redemption (Mark 10:35ff), I am eternally safe and significant. I have value and I have value forever through his atonement and Spirit; d) Be quick to listen; slow to answer and slow to answer and slow to become angry…Feedback…James 1:19-20; e) I can suffer, deflecting the enemies’ many blows or insults because I have been especially equipped with Christ’s Spiritual Kevlar…EGEGE (1 Peter 2:18ff)…and many many more tools, truths, skills, thoughts and Scriptures. I am comforted…4) the ability to communicate with God….prayer; 5) answered prayer; 6) miracles; 7) real authentic, difficult change…8) Spiritual endurance 9) musical intimate worship with and praise of God and 10) the body of Christ…I do this NOT alone. Truly, even in the now, not only do we have the promise of eternal life with God forever through the Shepherd’s atonement, we have abundant life in the here and now through his Spirit. Praise be to God. John 10:10.

Truth(s)… That while Goshen or Earth can be and is mysteriously wonderful, Goshen or Earth is temporary. The promise…or heaven, our promised inheritance…life wit and in the presence of our Creator and Redeemer, is what lives forever.

Struggle… That even while pastoring my flock and living in wonderfully mysterious Goshen or Earth, I still rebel. I still struggle. I still get tired, am tired, procrastinate, resist, put off, delay, tend to avoid etc.

Application… I would like to say because Goshen is not my home; heaven is, but the reality is, while still incredible at times and in many ways, me and Goshen don’t totally mesh. Me, because of my sinfulness and Goshen, because it is still difficult. Perhaps, if I was not sinful or as sinful? But Goshen would still be difficult. In turn, if Goshen were not so difficult? But if I am still sinful, what would Goshen still look like?

Of course, the reason that Goshen is made that much more difficult is because I and my fellow dwellers are still sinful, rebellious, foolish and lazy to begin with.

Now there will become a day when Goshen, in the shadow of the mighty Egypt, will morph into what amounts a mistreated slave labor colony…a people group whose only purpose then becomes to make its masters’ lives better.

Thus I get the pain, sorrow and difficulty even in a different Goshen, but in my NOW-Goshen, I am NOT as mistreated as the plenty of others living throughout the world who are either living in or on the edge of a later-enslaved Goshen, but NOT here and now for me.

Someday, perhaps, but not now. Where I live…Goshen…is in transition. A mixture of both good and bad…growing less good and more bad with each passing day and year, but not yet enslavement and injustice.

And yet, living in early Goshen is still difficult. Goshen is still challenging. Goshen challenges me. I challenge me. The sheep challenge me. Life, sin and evil challenges me.

But am I really ready for my exodus and a reclaiming or living of my promised inheritance…a land, or time, flowing with milk and honey…with no threat of the robber, thief or wolf…in the absolute presence and peace of God? There seems to be something stirring within me that craves some kind of growth, change or victory over both mine own and the world’s imperfection or sin. Something seems lacking if somehow I get pulled in the middle of the game and I have never figured out how to play the game or to play it better. It’s as if my journey is not complete. Before I receive life or eternal life, I want to more fully grasp, accept, embrace, understand or enjoy the abundant life in the here and now (John 10:10), and NOT so because life was easy on the outside, but because I truly got it on the inside AND was able to pass the how to on to others. I want victory, hope and peace in the midst of the struggle—good Goshen or bad, on the way to the Promise Land or reclaiming it.

Tell me this: was Israel supposed to merely exist within the Promise Land with no struggle…no challenges?

Of course not. Israel’s mission was to reclaim the Promise Land at in fact, a great cost of life, which ultimately Israel failed to do or pay and which would ultimately cost Israel greatly because she ended up mixing and becoming one with the same decadent cultures God was intending to judge in the first place (Gen. 15:12ff). Thus Israel ended up never fully redeeming or reclaiming her Promised Land, with the result that Israel was judged as harshly as the wicked nations she had replaced.

In the end, when only one of original twelve tribes that took possession of the Promise Land in the first place survives God’s devastating judgment, and that, only after a divinely-imposed exile and return to the Land, it is through the tiniest of remnants that God keeps hope alive with the eventual incarnation and birth of a Deliverer—and NOT one who just delivers Israel (or now Judah) from her outward tyrants, but a Deliverer who offers every human being ever born on the planet deliverance from sin’s devastating consequences.

And how is this divine deliverance offered and then received? Death. Death to one’s stubborn will and very flawed understanding of how one’s deliverance is ultimately obtained in the first place.

And how does this Spiritual death occur or transpire?

When an individual gives up his foolish fight to secure his own personal deliverance from all the world’s evils, and in turn, then humbly and Spiritually releases this arduous task, struggle and fight back over to his Creator—a Creator who is not only fully capable of delivering his broken, fallen creature through a broken, fallen world’s many deadly and trying perils, but who, through the incredible gifts of his Son and Spirit to his fallen creature (the Son’s atonement for the creature’s sins, both past and ongoing, and his Spirit’s gradual revealing of truth in a new fight to overcome sin’s devastatingly, enslaving attraction), passionately seeks to save his fallen, struggling and desperate creatures.

In fact, it is a part of the Creator’s divine nature, not only to be just, holy and righteous, and therefore, do as he must, judge and condemn sin and evil, but, through his Son’s sacrifice for sin and thus the Divine’s offer for atonement for the creature’s many sins, to be merciful, compassionate, loving and saving as well. In other words, it is a part of the Divine Creator of the Universe’s nature to save. We were created by a Creator who not only creates, but who saves…who delivers.

In other words, it isn’t Oops! Sin, Satan or evil have outsmarted the Creator, but rather the Creator not only has the ability to create, but to redeem, restore and save as well. Our God saves! And he saves first through his Son, Jesus, whose name means Yah or God Saves! Yeshua.

And what does he save us from? Sin. Our sins (Matt. 1:21).

And secondly, through his Spirit, who not only gives us THE TRUTH, BUT continues to reveal and convict us of the REAL TRUTH, he gives us the power to overcome our propensity towards sin, imperfection and evil. Our God truly saves! And not just outwardly, but where sin begins, in the heart of man…our heart. Amen! It is true!

Thus while Goshen is rich and has its temporary purpose within my life and our lives, Goshen still kicks my tail.

Because both I, as a shepherd, and my sheep, as a flock, are definitely being transformed from our very imperfect, rebellious, naïve, lazy, hard-headed, self-centered, devious, deceptive, foolish, temperamental, distracted and tempted natures, shepherding definitely has its many challenges.

In addition, besides being an imperfect shepherd of an imperfect flock, according to Jesus’ words in John 10, there are also thieves and robbers who seek to sneak into my sheepfold through a back-gate or some hole in the fence in order to exploit the sheep. Like naïve Pinochios, the sheep exist for thieves’ pleasure and exploitation, and yet, the sheep who should be aware of this, still don’t get it…like lambs led to slaughter, they tend to be easily mislead.

Then there is the wolf, who is not only on the prowl, but may even disguise himself in sheep’s clothing in order to get a closer look at the sheep. The wolf, according to the Good Shepherd, comes only to steal, kill and destroy the flock. So the already imperfect shepherd must not only attempt to shepherd rebellious, naïve, stubborn sheep, but he must shepherd the flock in the midst of not only thieves and robbers who will attempt to sneak in and exploit the sheep, but a disguised killer of the sheep…whose sole mission it is to steal, kill or destroy sheep.

And then there are the hirelings, who, on the surface seem to care for the flock, especially when things are good or non-threatening, but when push comes to shove, or the vicious wolf begins to savagely attack the flock, in order to save their own skins, abandon or sue for a quickie divorce from the flock. Were they ever sheep to begin with? I’m not sure. Rather, because of their outward giftedness, they seem to have rushed through being a sheep in order to imitate being a shepherd.

No, it’s not easy being a shepherd…a true shepherd that is.

So do I want, crave, desire my final Sabbath rest in the presence of God’s heavenly court now?

I think I do. I crave ease. Wouldn’t we all?

But at the same time, I also realize that whether I live free in Goshen or as a mistreated slave in Goshen, as many of the early Christians lived, and as some still live today, or whether I am in route to the Promised Land, or attempting to subdue or reclaim it, as the children of Israel were clearly instructed, but failed to do, without the incredible, amazing, gracious gifts of the Christ’s atoning forgiveness and the Spirit’s truth and power—I am nothing and have little hope of ever accomplishing anything.

In the end, I suppose, it simply just does not matter where I am in the Divine’s long chain of redemption. Regardless of my role or the season I perform my role within, my only hope and sure salvation lies only in the Son and Spirit, and for that truth, I am both eternally grateful for and mindful of.

Your application:

Biggest Struggle at the moment:

How does what happen here relate to you?

What about your kids?

Biggest Struggles (Imagine these or several–put yourself in their shoes–walk through a day with them at school, at home. What might they encounter?)

Remember to have fun, sense the Spirit’s leading and develop a love for these kids.

As always, thanks!
Joe

Gen. 46:1ff Living in Goshen! 5-25-14

© 1998-2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek
Gen. 46.1ff
Living in Goshen!
5.25.14

Intro… At first glance, this passage might seem too much of a bite, but it is actually three sections, of which the middle and largest one, vv. 8-27, a genealogical record, I would not spend much time on. Not that it is not important, but it can be easily skimmed in order to return to the main and concluding narrative.

Bottom line: this chapter gets Jacob’s family to Egypt, as well as, the reuniting of father and son. It begins with an act of worship which is rewarded with a Spiritual confirmation of what may seem like a slam dunk decision, but indeed has its longer term risks—can God grow my family up in Goshen until he is ready to take it back to the Promised Land?

Thus, this story is about the in-between. We want NOW! We want heaven now! Or perhaps not the biblical abstract heaven that we don’t fully understand, but we certainly want the benefits of heaven now. While we might not admit it, and while still seeking to indulge in a little man-made fun or sin, so to speak, we want no suffering or the consequences of our risky choices, do we? I mean really. We want fun, but we want safety. Fun without risks. Pleasure without pain. We want heaven, or at least a portion of heaven…perhaps an even higher hybrid version of what we have on earth here now? It’s as if we really don’t fully trust God’s definition of perfection or righteousness or holiness or goodness. As if too much of a good thing is too much of a good thing. Come on, God, everyone has to have a little fun. You are a little too uptight, Old Man. Loosen up, live a little.

We are so clueless. So how does Man control or manage a little evil. I mean, isn’t that what got us where we are now? One bite of one fruit because it looks good, had to taste good and would perhaps make me more like God—aware of everything that is good and that is not so good…or evil! Oops! The cat is out of the bag, and since the beginning of Man, we don’t seem to be able to put that elusive sinful cat back into the bag. It just won’t go.

So how do we live on the edge of heaven and hell or these earthly hybrids—Rome and the church? The body of Christ and city of man or sin? Not in Egypt proper, but somewhat separate on the edge of Egypt? Under her protection, in the shade of her wealth, might, history, glory, learning, industry, arts and culture, but still just on the fringes…in lush pastures and meadows…awaiting all these seemingly long-distant promises…of a promised land west of the Jordan for the children of Israel, or heaven, in the presence of God and without the fear of that darned evil cat ever jumping out of the bag again—for God’s Spiritual children?

I mean isn’t that what this life, your existence, your church, your reading this study, your being engaged in a Bible study on this passage, the rearing of your family, your making a living, as well as coexisting within this world is all about–learning to live in Goshen until we or our children are called to go back?

We are in Goshen. We await our Promised Land—heaven. This is all temporary. It’s not our final destination, but it is where we are supposed to be for now. The child of God, as well as, the Church’s, full and final Spiritual inheritance or destiny as God’s redeemed children (1 Peter 1) exists with God in heaven forever. I mean, isn’t that what the Bible teaches and what we profess?

And while living in Goshen, for the most part, we are safe, Goshen is still NOT heaven. It is a part of Egypt. It is NOT our perfect destiny. It is NOT our Promised Land, and thus it is NOT perfect. It has problems. This Goshen we live in incredibly has something called the internet…an amazing technological advance, on the scale of the Pyramids perhaps, and yet the internet is awash in sin and abuse. Goshen is NOT heaven, thank God!

I suppose for the most part, we still herd sheep—within the church–but some seasons, as will later become the case for the children of Israel, are more difficult and harsher than others–as is the case for many Christians even today in different parts of the world…and at different times…or seasons of persecution or rejection…as occurred for the most part during the first three hundred years of the church’s existence. It’s Goshen!

So here is my question: how do we exist in Goshen? As strange as this might sound at first hearing, pretty much the same as in any place, I suppose, including the Promise Land…including in Heaven with God. We ought to seek to be faithful in his presence, including how we treat and deal with others. Therefore, thank God for Goshen… and his church… where we can come and share our struggles and be Spiritually-supported while living in and amongst and next to the mighty and seemingly vastly and culturally-superior Egypt. In fact, Christ prayed to his Father…

John 17:13 But now I come to You; and these things I speak in the world so that they (his disciples) may have My joy made FULL in themselves. 14 I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 15 I do not ask You to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 17 Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. 18 As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. 19 For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth. 20 “I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; 21 that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me.

So now, set apart in his truth, can we as his sheep and under-shepherds learn what it means to live in a Christ-like, Spirit-inspired transitory land known as Goshen…or at least until he comes for us once again to take us back to our Spiritual forefathers’ Promised Land… a land that overwhelmingly dwarfs Egypt’s mighty wealth and glory because, untainted by evil’s threat, the children of God dwell fully in the safety, provision and pleasure of God?

Recently, we began a new unit or section or person of study…the life of Joseph. Essentially, the story of Joseph, is for the most part, our story. Chosen by God for a special purpose, Joseph must first endure much suffering and injustice before arriving at his God-ordained purpose and calling, and what a purpose it will be.

Your servant,
jc

Continue reading →

Gen. 45:16ff The Best of the Best…

Intro… This story you are about to study is incredibly rich in what amounts to parallels to our Spiritual journey today. I mean it has it all. This story represents the culmination of God’s promises. It’s all here. The reward that makes the journey, and all the aches and pains along the way, worth while. My hope and prayer is that you will never be tempted to just think of Joseph’s story as mere biblical history again because if foreshadows everything that is to come. Everything. The truth of its story is primed to explode across your heart and consciousness, if you get it, and I pray that you will GET IT!

As you read the story, ask yourself, what role does Joseph seem to play in the story of our Spiritual journey? Pharaoh? Egypt itself? Joseph’s brothers? The gifts and provisions sent back with the brothers? Jacob or Israel himself, and by extension, the brothers’ wives and children who had been left at home?

Once you get it, you will totally amazed. The parallels seem to never end. And the irony of all of this, is that this occurs at the end of the very first book of the Bible–2,000 years before Jesus and 4,000 years before us, almost as if this was all planned out from the very beginning . In addition, what role or roles do you most identify with and why? In what ways could you play all the roles?

If you can’t see the parallels, or need help, when you get to my whys and application, there will be plenty of illustrations to get your Spiritual juices flowing.

Your servant,
jc Continue reading →

Gen. 45:1ff The Loudest of All Tears… 5-11-14

Intro… Three possible intros..1) Have you ever cried your guts out? Why? How did you feel afterwards? Did it help to cry? Have you ever been a situation in which you wanted to cry, but couldn’t? Why couldn’t you? Do you want to cry now? Can you find a safe place or person to cry in or with? Why is crying so so important? Why do people cry in the first place? What are tears? Emotions? How do emotions connect with thoughts? What is grief?

2) Have you ever lost a meaningfully important relationship due to some conflict…one that you understood or perhaps you didn’t understand the reason or cause of the breakup? Struggling with a parent, sibling or family member? Why do people have conflict in the first place? Why do conflicts cause people to break apart? In your best case scenario, what would it take to reconcile the broken relationship of friendship? What about offering up a specific, sharp cutting-edged “tomato” prayer for the reconciliation’s presumed essentials?

3) Could the suffering or injustice you recently experienced be a part of God’s greater plan for your or someone’s deliverance? In other words, can or is God using your patient endurance of unjust suffering for a greater purpose, a purpose you can’t even imagine? If so, does knowing that there is or could be a purpose to what you are going through give you hope or make the suffering less painful?

Your servant,
jc Continue reading →

Gen. 44:1ff The Silver Cup…

Fellowship at Cross Creek

Gen. 44:1ff

The Silver Cup…

5.4.14

Intro… Is Joseph pushing things a bit too far? After a wonderful family reunion, albeit, his brothers still don’t know it, Joseph has one last difficult play up his sleeve. Is this one cruel? Why or why not? Could you ever imagine yourself acting in such a way as Joseph has with respect to his brothers? Is this all about revenge? Or is there something else much greater occurring here? I mean who has these kind of guts or courage to do what Joseph is attempting here? Someone, hardened by continually injustice and mistreatment?

Why is true change or repentance so so difficult? Why does it seem to take so much pain to really change? Ever had something that you thought you had changed about, but had really not, because the next time it happened, you did the same foolish thing again? What is it about human nature that seems to require such painful interventions or consequences?

Your servant,

Series INTRO…

Summary of Recent Explorations…

• The Creation: The Creator Creates His Creation and its Caretakers (Adam and Eve). Gen. 1-2.

• The Fall: But a Crafty Adversary Emerges, Infecting the Creator’s Caretakers with a Virulent Strain of Deceptive Evil (non-beneficial actions). Gen. 3-4.

• Creation’s New Beginning…Gen. 8-11.

• Creation’s New Caretaker: The Creator Raises up, Chooses and Greatly Blesses a righteous and trusting Caretaker named Abraham. Gen. 12-25.

• The Torch of the Creator’s Trusting Caretaking Now Passes to Succeeding Generations (Isaac, Jacob, Joseph…) Gen. 26ff.

Joseph’s Story…Gen. 37-50.

• Jacob’s older sons grow deeply resentful of their favored youngest brother, Joseph. Gen. 37:1ff.

• Joseph’s jealous older brother tell their grieving father, Jacob, that Joseph has been killed by wild animals, when in actuality they have sold Joseph into slavery. Gen. 37:12ff.

• Despite being wrongly trafficked as a slave and then falsely accused and imprisoned God’s sustaining grace still accompanies Joseph. Gen. 39:1ff.

• Despite rightly interpreting the baker and cupbearer’s dreams, Joseph’s grace seemingly goes unrewarded. Gen. 40:1ff.

• Finally, Joseph is delivered from his false imprisonment by being remembered by the cupbearer and correctly interpreting Pharaoh’s two dreams. Gen. 41:1ff.

• Pharaoh now empowers Joseph to be the supreme authority to wisely guide Egypt through these next years of predicted plenty and famine. Gen. 41:38ff.

• Due to the famine, unknowingly Joseph’s brothers have been reunited with their younger who now controls all the grain in Egypt. Gen. 42:1ff.

• Jacob refuses to risk losing another son when his sons tell him that they were forced to leave their brother Simeon behind back in Egypt as surety that they would bring back their youngest brother Benjamin in order to prove that they are NOT spies. Gen. 42:19ff.

• When Joseph’s brothers are able to persuade their father Israel to allow them to return to Egypt to purchase more grain WITH their youngest brother Benjamin as they had been previously instructed to, they are rewarded with a great banquet in the presence of the mysterious Egyptian ruler. Gen. 44:1ff.

Pray; read three times (perhaps just twice) and ask questions…

44:1 Then he commanded his house steward, saying, “Fill the men’s sacks with food, as much as they can carry, and put each man’s money in the mouth of his sack.

Been here before. Did the brothers ever think to check their sacks this time? I certainly would have. No way I am leaving Egypt without checking for a repeat performance concerning the cost of the grain. And how hard is this to do?

2 Put my cup, the silver cup, in the mouth of the sack of the youngest, and his money for the grain.” And he did as Joseph had told him. 3 As soon as it was light, the men were sent away, they with their donkeys. 4 They had just gone out of the city, and were not far off, when Joseph said to his house steward, “Up, follow the men; and when you overtake them, say to them, ‘Why have you repaid evil for good? 5 Is not this the one from which my lord drinks and which he indeed uses for divination? You have done wrong in doing this.'”

Isn’t divination some type of approach for ascertaining the will of the gods, such as the interpreting of the arrangement of bird bones that have been cast upon the table or ground or the reading of a sacrifice’s internal organs? Did Joseph practice divination? We know he could interpret dreams. Or was this still a part of his private performance before his brothers?

6 So he overtook them and spoke these words to them. 7 They said to him, “Why does my lord speak such words as these? Far be it from your servants to do such a thing. 8 Behold, the money which we found in the mouth of our sacks we have brought back to you from the land of Canaan. How then could we steal silver or gold from your lord’s house?

In other words, if we brought back the money that was placed in our sacks the last time, why would we dare steal anything now?

9 With whomever of your servants it is found, let him die, and we also will be my lord’s slaves.”

So knowing that they have been falsely accused, as Joseph had been with Potiphar’s wife, they put of the ultimate assurity or pledge…one of their lives…whoever has the missing silver cup.

10 So he said, “Now let it also be according to your words; he with whom it is found shall be my slave, and the rest of you shall be innocent.”

The steward accepts their proposal.

11 Then they hurried, each man lowered his sack to the ground, and each man opened his sack.

Notice that they “hurried.”

12 He searched, beginning with the oldest and ending with the youngest, and the cup was found in Benjamin’s sack.

Can you just imagine, with each sack being searched and no cup being found, the brothers’ confidence growing that indeed they had NOT taken the silver cup, and then finally, the last sack searched and the missing cup is discovered? Oh my! The worst possible scenario had occurred. Unwittingly, with the pledge of assurance, they had sealed their youngest brother’s fate.

13 Then they tore their clothes, and when each man loaded his donkey, they returned to the city.

No doubt, incredibly dejected.

14 When Judah and his brothers came to Joseph’s house, he was still there, and they fell to the ground before him.

Is this now a third time they have bowed before him…just as his dreams had foretold?

15 Joseph said to them, “What is this deed that you have done? Do you not know that such a man as I can indeed practice divination?”

Because of my practice of divination I can ascertain the guilty party? This does make you wonder if the Egyptians were crediting Joseph’s predictive powers, particularly concerning both times of plenty and want, to some sort of divination?

16 So Judah said, “What can we say to my lord? What can we speak? And how can we justify ourselves? God has found out the iniquity of your servants; behold, we are my lord’s slaves, both we and the one in whose possession the cup has been found.”

Remember Judah had staked his life to protect his brother before their father Israel. In other words, Judah, would seek to replace Benjamin, if anything were to happen to Benjamin, so that Benjamin would return home and Judah would remain.

Is the “iniquity” that Judah is referring to this latest event or their having sold their brother into slavery many years before?

17 But he said, “Far be it from me to do this. The man in whose possession the cup has been found, he shall be my slave; but as for you, go up in peace to your father.”

Joseph sticks the dagger in. Only Benjamin will remain as a slave. The rest of you are free to leave. But again, Judah has much at stake here.

18 Then Judah approached him, and said, “Oh my lord, may your servant please speak a word in my lord’s ears, and do not be angry with your servant; for you are equal to Pharaoh.

Judah, like a defense attorney, relates the case’s history…

19 My lord asked his servants, saying, ‘Have you a father or a brother?’ 20 We said to my lord, ‘We have an old father and a little child of his old age. Now his brother is dead, so he alone is left of his mother, and his father loves him.’ 21 Then you said to your servants, ‘Bring him down to me that I may set my eyes on him.’ 22 But we said to my lord, ‘The lad cannot leave his father, for if he should leave his father, his father would die.’

23 You said to your servants, however, ‘Unless your youngest brother comes down with you, you will not see my face again.’ 24 Thus it came about when we went up to your servant my father, we told him the words of my lord.

25 Our father said, ‘Go back, buy us a little food.’

26 But we said, ‘We cannot go down. If our youngest brother is with us, then we will go down; for we cannot see the man’s face unless our youngest brother is with us.’

27 Your servant my father said to us, ‘You know that my wife bore me two sons; 28 and the one went out from me, and I said, “Surely he is torn in pieces,” and I have not seen him since. 29 If you take this one also from me, and harm befalls him, you will bring my gray hair down to Sheol in sorrow.’

“Sheol”…the place of the dead…not necessarily hell, but more like the body and soul ceasing to exist, as many suggest even now…that after we die, there is nothing. No heaven, no hell, no soul, like a plant that ceases to exist in its plant-like form. Thus, Israel is saying, I will die in sorrow.

30 Now, therefore, when I come to your servant my father, and the lad is not with us, since his life is bound up in the lad’s life, 31 when he sees that the lad is not with us, he will die. Thus your servants will bring the gray hair of your servant our father down to Sheol in sorrow.

If you keep our youngest brother Benjamin, our father will not only die, but die in sorrow.

32 For your servant became surety for the lad to my father, saying, ‘If I do not bring him back to you, then let me bear the blame before my father forever.’ 33 Now, therefore, please let your servant remain instead of the lad a slave to my lord, and let the lad go up with his brothers. 34 For how shall I go up to my father if the lad is not with me-for fear that I see the evil that would overtake my father?”

Who?

Where?

When?

What?

• Joseph commands the steward to once again, without his brothers’ knowledge, place into the brothers’ sacks, the money they had brought to purchase the grain, along with a silver cup that is to be placed in Benjamin’s sack.

• When the steward catches up with the brothers and asks to search their sacks for the missing silver cup, the brothers are so confident that their sacks will NOT turn up the missing cup that they pledge the guilty party’s life if the cup is turned up.

• Finally, the cup is found in Benjamin’s sack and the brothers are devastated.

• They return to Joseph’s house where Judah not only rehearses before Joseph all the events leading up to this moment, but in order to spare his aging father a sorrowful death, offers himself as a slave in the place of his youngest brother.

Summary: Once again, the brothers are returned to Egypt under false pretenses…a stolen silver cup. When the missing cup is found in his youngest brother’s sack, Judah offers himself as the ruler’s slave in order that Benjamin might return to their father.

Why did God include this event in his record or what would we not know–about God, life, myself, others, etc.–if this story were not in the Bible?

• We are really not told if God is the one directing Joseph, justified or not, in his manipulation of his brothers, but even if not, Joseph is weaving a masterful disciplinary intervention. In other words, rather than a direct verbal intervention, which is what most of us, including a billion mothers on the planet, would have been tempted to do, Joseph is using the providential platform that God has afforded him in order to bring his brothers to a more genuine brokenness and repentance. It’s as if, Joseph sees the entire field. The clouds are parting before him, and it is obvious what he is supposed to do which each new situation. It’s as if he is a human angel, doing God’s bidding. Almost instinctively, after this wonderful banquet in which Joseph chooses NOT to reveal his identity to his brothers, he knows to put them through one more gut-wrenching test. I mean what coach, parent, teacher or boss has the backbone or spine to put those we truly care about through such a back and forth testing?

It kind of reminds me of a scene from Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew, in which Petruchio, in his attempt to tame the Bianca’s older sister, the shrew Katheriana, very humorously, goes back and forth with her concerning whether it is the sun or moon that hangs above them. Whenever Katherina finally gives in and admits to calling it whatever Petruchio is referring to it at the moment, he then switches back to calling it the opposite of what she has just called it.

But in reality, genuine, lasting remorse and repentance typically only follows a great cost of pain. For a change to really take place, typically the pain or cost must be great. Gradually, Joseph has been setting his brothers up for a true test of genuine remorse and character. Will someone protect Benjamin, as they failed to do for Joseph many years ago, although Reuben did try. He just was not successful.

So this all leads me to the Spiritual question, does God want to use us as his agents of aggressive, strategic Spiritual intervention? Are we to be human angels in a world of deep moral darkness? And if so, how so?

• Because of our limited perspective, as was the case of Joseph’s brothers, kind of like a judge listening to our attempt to plead our way out of a traffic ticket, isn’t it kind of interesting to listen to Judah rehearse the entire story before his brother, as if there was this great misunderstanding to all that has taken place. In some ways, Judah sounds kind of pathetic until he gets to the punch line…allow me to take the place of my brother…. which is what Jesus Christ, who will descend from the tribe of Judah will do for his brothers. He will take our place. He will take our sin. He will assume our punishment, so that through our trust or acceptance of his sacrifice, we go free, no longer a slave to sin’s death penalty or perpetual enslavement.

So What?

Thanks … It’s been a good week of pastoral ministry. Got to check on quite a few folks and do some counseling. The ministry typically goes in spurts. Sometimes it is more study, teaching or writing-driven, sometimes more pastoral, counseling or prayer-driven and sometimes more practically or administrative-driven. This week it was checking on the sheep-driven, which is what I knew I needed to do, and by God’s grace, it worked out that way. Of course, there are tons more sheep that I need to check on, but the Spirit so seemed to arrange it that I was able to check on quite a few in a meaningful way this week, and for that I am very thankful. Also thankful for God’s gracious financial provision. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Lord.

Struggle…Not so much a struggle as a pondering as to the true Spiritual needs of my flock. Of course, there are individuals, but there is also the body…Just doing some thinking, pondering and praying. Trying NOT to assume or presume.

Truth… 1) As with Joseph, being willing to be a patient agent of God’s intervention within people’s lives, including God’s painful intervention; 2) Sacrifice…being willing as Judah to offer myself as a sacrifice for others safety and deliverance; 3) Much like a very secure Christ before the Sanhedrin or the Roman authorities–NOT pleading or wah wahing all the unnecessary details of my own personal righteousness to God or others. God knows who I am and what I have done. And what others may or may not think, is it really that important? To those that really are interested in my Spiritual well-being, I suppose it will all come out, but to those who are NOT really interested, why waste my Spiritual breath?

Application… God, if I am to Spiritually stir the pot or waters so to speak, either for individual or the body or elements within the body, or even others outside the body, you are going to have to open up the field, so that it is obvious to me. In order to obtain a better, deeper repentance, help me not give away too much truth or too many cards too soon. Help me to be wise, shrewd as a serpent, but innocent as a dove. Help me to see and act appropriately, Lord.

Your application:

Biggest Struggle at the moment:

How does what happen here relate to you?

What about your kids?

Biggest Struggles (Imagine these or several–put yourself in their shoes–walk through a day with them at school, at home. What might they encounter?)

Remember to have fun, sense the Spirit’s leading and develop a love for these kids.

As always, thanks!

Joe

Gen. 43:1ff A Place to Cry 4-27-14

Intro… Israel bemoans the fact that he has to entrust his youngest son in the hands of his older brothers in order to obtain grain to save the entire family. When his sons do reach Egypt and are escorted to the home of the harsh, mistrustful ruler that they have been having to deal with, they fear that the slavery they sold their younger brother into many years ago is about to unjustly overtake them. Joseph, gazing upon the younger brother whom he thought he would never see again, as well as, witnessing the fulfillment of his youthful visions, is now caught off guard by the thoughts, feelings and emotions he is experiencing and must find a private place to weep. Fears and tears.

Have you ever caught yourself feeling all or any of the emotions being described within this story…whining about water that has already gone under the bridge or fearing the worst case scenario or being suddenly brought to tears without having even see it come to pass?

I had a small moment like this just last night. It seemingly came out of nowhere. I was watching a film in which the dog reminded me of our Cairn Terrier Gracie which we had for just under 15 years and whom we lost almost five years ago. I would take winter naps with her on the couch in which she would lay on my stomach. I treasured those days. And then she was gone. I remember looking heavenward and telling God that it’s not fair that a pet can live long enough to become deeply rooted into one’s heart, but not long enough to go the full distance. So far we have not replaced her. And I have had perhaps hundreds of other moments within my lifetime when emotions suddenly came exploding out to the surface.

These are not bad. They just mean that something in the present is lancing a boil of previous pent up hurt, anger, sorrow, fear, trauma or joy. Thoughts are connecting. The brain says I know this thought, this feeling. We have been here before because I filed it right over…oops! Already there are you? In tears? Yep. I was about to tell you that this previous moment was powerful, so you had better be prepared to cry, and crying is not bad. Crying can be very cathartic. Very healing. So go ahead and have your cry…

If you have had one of those moments, then you know what Joseph may be feeling within this story…

Your servant, 
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An Imperfect Pastor for An Imperfect Church

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Joseph’s Story…Gen. 37-50.

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Gen. 47:1-12; 27-31 In Goshen, Still Holding out Hope in God 6-1-14

Gen. 46:1ff Living in Goshen! 5-25-14

Gen. 45:16ff The Best of the Best…

Gen. 45:1ff The Loudest of All Tears… 5-11-14

Gen. 44:1ff The Silver Cup…

Gen. 43:1ff A Place to Cry 4-27-14