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As I pulled the zoom back, it hit me that God already knew that some 450 plus years down the line He’d be bringing His people out of Egypt in the biggest set of miracles He’d ever chosen to display. But first they’d need to leave the Promised Land to get there, and Joseph would need to be there ahead of them, already in place in the government to shepherd them to the fertile land of Goshen.
With that end in sight, the tragic events of this chapter can be seen for what they might really be – attempts by Satan to undermine the will of God and God’s ability to take what others meant for evil and turn it inside out, using it to further His purposes!
Yes, Israel unequally loved Joseph. But Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah weren’t having to tend the flocks. Their names were missing from that list. At 17, Joseph was quite self-absorbed, marveling to his brothers about the dreams of them bowing down to him, but what 17 year old isn’t absorbed with himself at some point?
My commentary even mentioned the goat that was killed so that his blood could make Jacob/Israel believe that Joseph had been eaten by wild animals. It reminds us of another goat, killed years earlier by Jacob – its meat and hairy skin used by Jacob to trick his father Isaac into blessing him. Only the second time the trick’s on Jacob.
Father, the details of the story could easily have changed, turned on a coincidence. Yet You are so sovereign that those details could do nothing to defeat Your ultimate goals. I’m so glad that I worship a God who never has to worry about events spinning out of His control – Who can take what others mean for evil and use them for His own purposes!
Your Brother In Christ,
Gary Ford
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