IV.
Joseph
Sold Into Bondage
a.
Genesis
37:18 - And when they saw him
afar off, even before he came near unto them, they conspired against him to
slay him.
·
Matthew 12:14 -
Then the Pharisees went out, and held a council against him, how they might
destroy him.
·
Matthew
27:1 – When the morning was
come, all the chief priests and elders of the people took counsel against Jesus
to put him to death.
b.
Genesis
37:19 - And they said one to
another, Behold, this dreamer cometh.
·
Dreamer - בעל
ba`al, owner, husband, lord
·
Matthew
27:39- And they that passed
by reviled him, wagging their heads
·
1 Samuel
8:7 - And the LORD said unto
Samuel, Hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee:
for they have not rejected thee, but they
have rejected me, that I should not reign over them.
o
They hated Joseph
because of the gifts that God blessed him with, it wasn’t Joseph they were
rejecting it was God. Just like the
Israelites when they wanted a king, they rejected God.
c.
Genesis
37:20 - Come now therefore,
and let us slay him, and cast him into some pit, and we will say, Some evil
beast hath devoured him: and we shall see what will become of his dreams.
·
Matthew
21:33-39 - Hear
another parable: There was a certain householder, which planted a vineyard, and
hedged it round about, and digged a winepress in it, and built a tower, and let
it out to husbandmen, and went into a far country: And when the time of the
fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the husbandmen, that they might receive
the fruits of it. And the husbandmen
took his servants, and beat one, and killed another, and stoned another. Again, he sent other servants more than the
first: and they did unto them likewise.
But last of all he sent unto them his son, saying, They will reverence
my son. But when the husbandmen saw the
son, they said among themselves, This
is the heir; come, let us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance. And
they caught him, and cast [him] out of the vineyard, and slew [him].
·
John 1:11 - He
came unto his own, and his own received him not.
d.
Genesis
37:21 - And Reuben heard
[it], and he delivered him out of their hands; and said, Let us not kill him.
e.
Genesis
37:22 - And Reuben said unto
them, Shed no blood, [but] cast him into this pit that [is] in the wilderness,
and lay no hand upon him; that he might rid him out of their hands, to deliver
him to his father again.
·
Note that of all
the brothers, Reuben had the most reason to want to harm him, yet he proved to
be an advocate even among Joseph’s enemies.
·
Reuben likely was
eager to gain his father’s favor again and possibly saw this as an opportunity
to do so.
f.
Genesis
37:23 - And it came to pass,
when Joseph was come unto his brethren, that they stript Joseph out of his
coat, [his] coat of [many] colours that [was] on him;
·
Matthew
27:28 – And they stripped him,
and put on him a scarlet robe.
·
Psalm 22:18 –
They part my garments among them and cast lots upon my vesture.
·
Matthew
27:35 – And they crucified
him, and parted his garments, casting lots: that it might be fulfilled which
was spoken by the prophet, They parted my garments among them, and upon my
vesture did they cast lots.
g.
Genesis
37:24 - And they took him,
and cast him into a pit: and the pit [was] empty, [there was] no water in it.
·
Psalm 88:4
– I am counted with them that
go down into the pit: I am as a man [that hath] no strength.
·
Proverbs
27:4 - Wrath [is] cruel, and
anger [is] outrageous; but who [is]
able to stand before envy?
·
There was no
water in it:
o
John 4:11 - The
woman saith unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is
deep: from whence then hast thou that
living water?
o
John 7:38 -
He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.
o
The well being
symbolic of death and the grave has no water or no life in it. Joseph who as a Messiah type is cast into the
pit and later retrieved out of the well.
Joseph is representative of the
living water which is Christ for Joseph through his gifts saved Egypt Israel
h.
Genesis
37:25 - And they sat down to
eat bread: and they lifted up their eyes and looked, and, behold, a company of
Ishmeelites came from Gilead with their camels bearing spicery and balm and
myrrh, going to carry [it] down to Egypt
·
Genesis
42:21 – And they said one to
another, We [are] verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the anguish of his soul, when he
besought us, and we would not hear; therefore is this distress come
upon us.
o
They freely admit
that they observed his anguish, yet they did not even lose their appetite
because they sat down to eat bread.
·
Matthew
27:36 – And sitting down they watched him
there;
i.
Genesis
37:26 - And Judah said unto
his brethren, What profit [is it] if we slay our brother, and conceal his
blood?
·
We should always
be in a mindset to weigh the cost of our sin
j.
Genesis
37:27 - Come, and let us sell
him to the Ishmeelites, and let not our hand be upon him; for he [is] our
brother [and] our flesh. And his brethren were content.
·
Note here that it
was Judah who sold Joseph , Judah
o
Matthew
1:2 - Abraham begat Isaac;
and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas
and his brethren;
·
We have a shadow
picture of Judas betraying Christ for 30 pieces of silver
k.
Genesis
37:28 - Then there passed by
Midianites merchantmen; and they drew and lifted up Joseph out of the pit, and
sold Joseph to the Ishmeelites for twenty [pieces] of silver: and they brought
Joseph into Egypt
·
Psalm 16:10 –
For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy
One to see corruption.
·
Midianites or
Ishmeelites?
o
Midianites – מדיני Midyaniy, "strife",
a tribe descended from the son of Abraham by Keturah and progenitor of the
tribe of Midianites or Arabians
o
Ishmeelites – ישמעאלי Yishma`e'liy,
"God will hear", descendents from the son of Abraham and Sarah's
handmaid Hagar and the progenitor of the Arabian peoples
·
Matthew
26:14-15 - Then one of the
twelve, called Judas Iscariot, went unto the chief priests, And said [unto
them], What will ye give me, and I will deliver him unto you? And they
covenanted with him for thirty pieces of silver.
·
Appendix 10:
o
20 – disappointed
expectancy
a.
2 – Difference
b.
10 – Ordinal
perfection
o
Opposed to 30 –
Divine perfection, applied to order
a.
3 – Completeness
b.
10 – Ordinal
perfection
l.
Genesis
37:29 - And Reuben returned
unto the pit; and, behold, Joseph [was] not in the pit; and he rent his
clothes.
·
Luke 24:12
– Then arose Peter, and ran
unto the sepulcher; and stooping down, he beheld the linen clothes laid by
themselves, and departed, wondering in himself at that which was come to pass.
m.
Genesis
37:30 - And he returned unto
his brethren, and said, The child [is] not; and I, whither shall I go?
·
Being the oldest
son, Reuben would have been expected to give an account of Joseph’s
whereabouts.
·
Though Reuben
thought he was doing the right thing, it was not part of God’s plan for Joseph
to be rescued, similarly Peter when Jesus revealed to him what events were to
transpire:
o
Matthew 16:21 -23 -
From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must
go unto Jerusalem
o
Like Reuben,
Peter thought that he was doing a good thing but instead he would have thwarted
what God had planned for Joseph (at least for the time being). Its important to be lead by the Spirit and
sometimes circumstances may seem like an injustice, but it is actually all part
of God’s intricate plan.
o
When we ask why
do bad things happen to good people, remember this:
a.
Romans 8:28 - And
we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them
who are the called according to [his] purpose.
b.
This means that
there is a higher plan than our current circumstance no matter how miserable it
may be, its all part of a bigger picture.
n.
Genesis
37:31 - And they took
Joseph's coat, and killed a kid of the goats, and dipped the coat in the blood;
·
Jacob had been
deceived by his sons as he had deceived his father, both involved the killing
of a kid.
o
Genesis
27:16 - And she put the skins
of the kids of the goats upon his hands, and upon the smooth of his neck:
·
Note here that
the sons of Jacob, killed a kid and presented the blood to their father (though
it was a lie it was a type of alibi for their sins, or a covering)
·
Christ was the
Lamb of God whose blood is presented to God takes away the sin of the world
o
John 1:29
- The next day John seeth
Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the
sin of the world.
o.
Genesis
37:32 - And they sent the
coat of [many] colours, and they brought [it] to their father; and said, This
have we found: know now whether it [be] thy son's coat or no.
·
When men commit
one sin they often commit others in order to conceal it.
·
Job 31:33
- If I covered my
transgressions as Adam, by hiding mine iniquity in my bosom:
·
Lets look at this
through the eyes of Jacob:
o
Jacob loved
Joseph the most (rightly or wrongly that doesn’t matter)
o
Jacob was
concerned for his other sons so he sent Joseph, alone, to find them and check
on their status
o
Jacob must have
felt a tremendous burden of regret, such as…I could have sent servants with
Joseph to protect him, I could have just sent the servants, Why did I give him
that coat that probably attracted the beast, etc…
p.
Genesis
37:33 - And he knew it, and
said, [It is] my son's coat; an evil beast hath devoured him; Joseph is without
doubt rent in pieces.
·
An interesting
item of note, the brothers did not say “an evil beast hath devoured him”, Jacob
made this assumption and the brothers just let him believe it. They did not lie to their father Jacob with
their words, but rather deceived him through their deeds and allowed him to
draw his own erroneous conclusions from the false evidence they presented.
·
Essentially,
Jacob deceived himself. His actions and
special treatment of Joseph shouldered a large part of the blame yet he never
recognized it. God saved Israel
o
1 John 1:8
- If we say that we have no
sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
o
Jacob had just as
much sin as the brothers, and Jacob will benefit just as much as his other sons
when they are rescued from death and brought into a prosperous land.
o
Benjamin is the
only one who is innocent.
q.
Genesis
37:34 - And Jacob rent his
clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days.
·
Matthew
27:51 - And, behold, the veil
of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did
quake, and the rocks rent;
·
Just as Joseph’s
father Jacob rent his clothes at he death of his son, so also did God the
Father rent the veil at the death of His Son Jesus.
r.
Genesis
37:35 - And all his sons and
all his daughters rose up to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted; and
he said, For I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning. Thus his
father wept for him.
·
His sons rose up
to comfort him, but not reveal the truth to him. Jacob could have been comforted by the truth
that his son yet lived, yet his sons denied him of that hope by allowing him to
believe a lie.
·
We learn here
that Jacob could have indeed had more than one daughter, but this could also be
in reference to daughers-in-law as well as grand-daughters.
s.
Genesis
37:36 - And the Midianites
sold him into Egypt
·
Potiphar – פוטיפר
Powtiyphar, "belonging to the sun"
