Theme: Wrestling with God - The Stories of Jacob ^Jacob ... · PDF file^Jacob and the Technicolor Dreamcoat _ Sermon preached by Jeff Huber – based on a sermon series by Adam Hamilton

(Sermon preached by Jeff Huber – October 12-13, 2013 – page 1)

Theme: Wrestling with God - The Stories of Jacob “Jacob and the Technicolor Dreamcoat”

Sermon preached by Jeff Huber – based on a sermon series by Adam Hamilton

October 12-13, 2013 at First United Methodist Church, Durango

Genesis 37:1-4

VIDEO Jacob and Joseph Sermon Starter

SLIDE Jacob and the Technicolor Dreamcoat

I want to invite you to open up your Bibles that are in your pews as we continue the story of Jacob today. If you will turn to Chapter 37 you will find these words.

SLIDE 1 So Jacob settled again in the land of Canaan, where his father had lived as a foreigner. 2 This is the account of Jacob and his family. When Joseph was seventeen years old, he often tended his father’s flocks. He worked for his half-brothers, the sons of his father’s wives Bilhah and Zilpah. But Joseph reported to his father some of the bad things his brothers were doing.

What we've learned so far about Jacob is that he ended up with two wives, Rachel and Leah. When Leah stopped having children and Rachel didn't seem to be able to have children, these women gave their maidservants Bilhah and Zilpah to Jacob to be surrogate mothers. The children that were born to the maidservants during this time in history were not seen as being on an equal plane with the children born to Jacob's legal wives Rachel and Leah.

Joseph is the son of Rachel and is the only son that Rachel had biologically for many years. Joseph also was Jacob's favorite son and was born when Jacob and Rachel were quite a bit older. Being born to Rachel, Jacob’s favorite wife, endeared Joseph to his father. Joseph came back from being in the fields with their flocks and he gave a bad report to his father about his half-brothers. This did not endear Joseph to his brothers. We don't know what the bad report was, if it had to do with them being lazy or just not effective watching the sheep. Whatever it was that he shared, Jacob, as the father, got onto his boys and the brothers were pretty ticked off at Joseph for ratting them out. We then continue to read this in verse three and following.

SLIDE 3 Jacob loved Joseph more than any of his other children because


Joseph had been born to him in his old age. So one day Jacob had a special gift made for Joseph—a beautiful robe. 4 But his brothers hated Joseph because their father loved him more than the rest of them. They couldn’t say a kind word to him.

In this story we find a clear picture of a family that is dealing with jealousy and anger, where the youngest one has been a tattletale and gets the other ones in trouble. These stories are ones that we are used to, aren't we? This is what often can happen in our own families. This is why these kind of stories were shared around the campfire at night because they taught children and parents and grandparents about what it meant to be human and how God can take even the messy moments of our lives and bring about something beautiful.

Please take out of your bulletin your Meditation Moments and your Message Notes. If you are watching at home or online, you can take out a piece of paper and a pen to write with and download this resource off our website later. I invite those of you who are here today to write down anything you would like to remember from today's message in those blank lines just below the Scripture passage listed for today.

You also have an opportunity to read the Bible on your own every day to read the rest of the story. Today we are going to cover 14 chapters of the book of Genesis in one 30 minute sermon. We could take six weeks and cover this same material, which means there is much that I am not covering today, and I hope you will go back and read the rest of the story using the Meditation Moments. I think you will find yourself blessed if you take time to do that and think more deeply about this story.

While we often have jealousy and we deal with parents playing favorites in families in today's world, things got pretty bad for Joseph in the next part of the story. Joseph had dreams and God gave him dreams in which he could see the future. Let's listen to what happens when he begins to share those dreams with his brothers.


Verses of Scripture we find this in Genesis 37:5-8.

SLIDE 5 One night Joseph had a dream, and when he told his brothers about it, they hated him more than ever. 6 “Listen to this dream,” he said. 7 “We were out in the field, tying up bundles of grain. Suddenly my bundle stood up, and your bundles all gathered around and bowed low before mine!” 8 His brothers responded, “So you think you will be our king, do you? Do you actually think you will reign over us?” And they hated him all the more because of his dreams and the way he talked about them.

Joseph might've had these nice dreams but he certainly didn't have any wisdom. Wisdom knows when to keep your mouth shut. There are some things you might know will be true in the future, but you keep your mouth shut because you know it won't help things to say it out loud. Joseph didn't have this wisdom because at age 17 he knew everything! I will never forget when I was 17 years old sitting with my best friend Dan from my youth group, who told me that I would be a better friend if I would stop talking and learn to listen a little bit. I was grateful for his wisdom and the truth is Joseph needed someone like that in his life.

The hatred and animosity towards Joseph from his brothers builds up as he tattletales on them, Joseph has dreams he should've kept himself, and his father loved him more than his brothers. Joseph's father then sends him out to the fields to check on his brothers and let's see what happens in verse 18 and following.

SLIDE 18 When Joseph’s brothers saw him coming, they recognized him in the distance. As he approached, they made plans to kill him. 19 “Here comes the dreamer!” they said. 20 “Come on, let’s kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns. We can tell our father, ‘A wild animal has eaten him.’ Then we’ll see what becomes of his dreams!”

Do you get the feeling that Joseph's brothers really didn't like him? I have a sister who celebrated her birthday this last week on October 9. She is six years younger than I am and we get along great now, but when we were younger she would constantly get me into trouble. She would pretend like I was about to do something, or I had done something, and all she had to do was scream in a certain tone of voice and my mother would come looking for me.

When I was 12 years old and she was six, my father got remarried in Hawaii. My dad's mother, Grandma Huber, came with us and took care of me and my sister while my father and stepmother went off on a honeymoon to a different


part of the island after the wedding. My father had bought us each a new swimming mask and snorkel to use on that trip. My mask was black and my snorkel was blue, while my sister’s mask was blue and her snorkel was black. My set was a bit nicer than hers because I was older and it was a bit bigger since I was six years older. My sister, however, convinced my grandmother that the blue mask should go with the blue snorkel and the black mask should go with the black snorkel. She ended up with my snorkel and I was furious and the two of us started fighting. Grandma came in to find us arguing in the hotel room and she began to scream at the both of us. As she did so her teeth came flying out of her mouth! I had no idea at that point she had false teeth and so I screamed at my sister, "Look, you're making grandma fall apart!"

The truth is that I liked my sister very much back then because of the way that she would use the fact that she was younger and she was the only girl in our family. While I didn't like my sister very much at times, I certainly never thought about killing her or selling her off into slavery, although if I'd read this story as a young child I might've thought about it!

These boys however are going to kill their brother. What does that tell you about what is going on inside of their hearts? What does that tell you about their character? Rueben, who is the oldest and the biological son of Leah, eventually comes to the aid of Joseph and suggests they don't kill him, but simply throw them him in one of the dry cisterns. That way Joseph might starve to death, but at least they wouldn’t be guilty of physically killing him themselves. Rueben is thinking that he will come back in a few days and pull him out of the cistern and hopefully Joseph will have learned his lesson. They throw Joseph into the hole in the ground and Reuben goes off to take care of the flocks.

Meanwhile, a group of Ishmaelite slave traders came by on their way to Egypt. Judah gets the idea to pull Joseph out of the hole in the ground and sell him to the Ishmaelite slave traders and then they could at least get some money for Joseph and he won’t be dead. Joseph would then go to Egypt and his brothers wouldn't have to see him again because he would be a slave. They pocketed two silver coins apiece as they pulled him out of the cistern and sold him to the Ishmaelite slave traders. We discover later in the story that Joseph is pleading with them the entire time, "Please don't do this." But the brothers were happy to send Joseph away Egypt as a slave.

The brothers then had to figure out how to tell dad what happened to Joseph, his favorite son. If you look down at verse 31 you will find out what they


do next.

SLIDE 31 Then the brothers killed a young goat and dipped Joseph’s robe in its blood. 32 They sent the beautiful robe to their father with this message: “Look at what we found. Doesn’t this robe belong to your son?” 33 Their father recognized it immediately. “Yes,” he said, “it is my son’s robe. A wild animal must have eaten him. Joseph has clearly been torn to pieces!” 34 Then Jacob tore his clothes and dressed himself in burlap. He mourned deeply for his son for a long time. 35 His family all tried to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. “I will go to my grave* mourning for my son,” he would say, and then he would weep.

What kind of sons tell their father a boldface lie, sell their brother into slavery, watch as their father is grieving and then pretend to comfort him when they actually know his son is still alive in Egypt? We are meant to see a parallel in Jacob's story as we remember that Jacob told a boldface lie to his father in order to steal the blessing from Esau. In some sense we see the brothers doing what their father did, but they have gone way beyond what Jacob did to his father Isaac. They have hurt and wounded their father mortally.

That is not all they did wrong and if you read the Scriptures this week, you will find a story where their sister, Dinah, is assaulted. The brothers decide not to seek justice but vengeance against those who perpetrated this crime against their sister. They murdered every man in the village. They looted the village and then took the wives and children and all the property as their own. They made the name of Israel a stench among the Canaanites people. We find again and again these boys at this stage in their life doing things that are atrocious.

SLIDE Sometimes children hurt their parents

Part of what you are meant to do in this story is read it and say, "Gosh, my kids aren't that bad!" You are meant to see the fact that even the patriarch of Israel had sons who didn't turn out quite exactly as he anticipated. Part of life is that sometimes children hurt their parents. Part of life is that our children don't always go in the direction we had planned or hoped for. You can do all the right things. You can read all the right parenting books. You can make sure your kids have all the right experiences. You can try to love them as much as you possibly can. You can teach from the faith and pray with them. You can make sure they are in Sunday school and church every single week. You can do all these things and


they still may not turn out exactly as you had planned or dreamed or hoped.

They may even choose to go in a direction that you didn't anticipate. There are moments where it simply hurts to be a parent. The truth is, even if you don't have kids, every one of us has at some point hurt our own parents doing something they didn't want us to do, or saying something that was hurtful. Part of life is that we hurt each other and we disappoint each other because we are human and we are meant to see that in this story.

If we are going through a time where our kids are struggling, we are meant to read this story and recognize that Jacob's kids did awful things and they still became the 12 leaders of the tribes of Israel. Somehow in the end, God used even their wandering away and choosing to do hurtful things to bring about his kingdom.

Last January I visited a church led by a pastor who is one of the most gifted pastors I have met. He has written books and his church teaches other churches how to be vital and effective in today's world. We had some one-on-one time together and I shared with him about how our son has struggled over the past year, something that we have shared with many of you. He then shared about his son who had been dealing drugs and was in jail. He is heading down a path that could very well end in his death. I know how much he and his wife love their sons and they are wrestling with this question, "What did we do wrong? How did this happen? Why did this take place? We didn't care about how much money they made or what kind of career they had. We just wanted them to know the love of God and we did everything we could to help them experience that and feel that in their lives. We just wanted them to live out that love towards other people. Why didn’t that happen? Will it happen someday?"

The last year I have spoken with a dozen families in the church and in this community where I ask, "How are your kids? How is your family?" Tears begin to well up in their eyes and they say the same thing, "I don't know where we went wrong? We tried to give our kids experiences that we never had. We try to love them in ways that we never experienced when we were children. How did it happen this way?"

Sometimes in the same family you will have one child that is heading in a great direction and you have another child who was pulling away from parents and turning against God, often choosing all kinds of destructive behavior. They're going in a direction that no one would've anticipated and there is pain and hurt and heartache.


It’s easy to be smug when our children are small and think that we are doing all the right things and our kids are doing great. But the truth is, you just don't know how they're going to turn out. To make matters worse, you know people who didn't read any of the parenting books and don't seem to be loving parents towards their children and didn't do anything they were supposed to do as parents in terms of our cultural expectations, and their kids turn out great! What happened there? How did their kids end up doing so well?

Jacob's story reminds us that we are not alone in that experience when our children struggle. We also recognize that Jacob's children turned out okay and God continued to work in their lives. The Scriptures promise this.

SLIDE Train up a child in the way they should go and when they are OLD they will not depart from it.

Who knows what old is, but it doesn't say that when they are 16 they won't depart from it, or when they are 22, or even 40. For most of us that's what happens. We go through a period of time and we may push God away. We may push our parents away, but still they continue to pray for us and to love us. Sometimes they give us tough love and somewhere along the way we find our way back home.

Just out of curiosity, how many of you in this room, from the age of say 15 until 30 or so, did something that if your parents knew they would have been horrified. Come on and be honest! Now look at you, you're sitting in church! All we can do as parents is continue to trust and do our best as we continue to love our children. We do our best to show our children the right way and somehow most of those children find their way back home. One of the reasons I am confident in that is because I know many of your stories and many of you in this church have not been in church since you were in high school. God now has ahold of your life and you came back home. Lots of us are prodigals and that is what happened to Jacob's sons.

SLIDE Joseph's story

Let's turn now to Joseph's story after he is sold off to the slave traders. They take him down to Egypt and he is sold to a man named Potiphar, who is an official in Pharaoh's house. Joseph had been a prince in his own family, being given the finest things including an amazing coat of many colors. He had the best of what his father could give him and now he finds himself a slave. He has to be wondering, "How did this happen? How did I end up here? Where is God in the midst of this chaos? God, you gave me these dreams and now I end up as a slave


in Egypt…what are you thinking?" Wouldn't you have been thinking these things if you are down in Egypt as a slave and had been sold there by your brothers? This is not how Joseph planed for his life to go.

What we do know is that Joseph determined to do the next right thing, even as a slave in Egypt. He was going to follow God and try to do God's will and live as a person of integrity even in this disappointing circumstance.

Potiphar, who has purchased Joseph as a slave, finds himself blessed by Joseph because he has such integrity. His household is blessed because of Joseph and he trusts him. Listen to what we read in Genesis 39:6 and following.

SLIDE 6 So Potiphar gave Joseph complete administrative responsibility over everything he owned. With Joseph there, he didn’t worry about a thing—except what kind of food to eat! Joseph was a very handsome and well-built young man, 7 and Potiphar’s wife soon began to look at him lustfully. “Come and sleep with me,” she demanded. 8 But Joseph refused.

But she doesn't take no for an answer. Every day in the house, when the master leaves, it's the same thing. She pushes Joseph and tries to lead him astray. Joseph does the right thing over and over again. He says every day to her, "I cannot do that. I cannot cheat on my master or lead you to cheat on your husband. I will not participate in this."

One day she gets aggressive and she grabs Joseph by the robe and says, "You were going to sleep with me today." He turned to run and the cloak is ripped off of his shoulders. She holds onto the cloak and he runs outside the house, and this time she is angry. She has been spurned one too many times.

When Potiphar arrives home that day, she brings out the robe that is been torn and says, "I want you to know what Joseph, your favorite servant, did to me today. He tried to assault me. I want you to know this and I want to know what you're going to do about this treacherous and traitorous servant."

Potiphar became furious and he takes Joseph and has him thrown into Pharaoh's dungeon. Joseph has now gone from being a prince in Canaan, to being a slave in Egypt, to being a trusted servant in a house with lots of privileges, to now being in the dungeon and a prisoner. What do you think he is thinking now? What would you be thinking if you did the right thing and you got thrown in prison for it? I imagine he's thinking, "God, where are you really? I have tried to


do what you said for me to do. I have tried to live for you and look where it has landed me! I am now in the dungeon, so maybe it would be better if I was not following you."

I have had people tell me this before as their pastor, because it feels that way sometimes. People sometimes tell me, "I became a Christian and began to follow Jesus Christ and my life got worse and not better. It got harder and not easier." I have talked with people who have been fired from their jobs because they made a decision with integrity that was in line with their faith in a company that wanted to do something that was immoral or unethical. Their decision to follow Christ got them fired from their job.

The truth is that sometimes this happens. The gospel doesn't promise that if you do the right thing, you will always be rewarded. In fact, quite the opposite is promised. Jesus told his disciples, "If you follow me, they will arrest you. They will persecute you and sometimes they're going to kill you." The promise was not that everything would go well if you follow him, at least not immediately or in all circumstances. The promise is that God would be with you and the worst thing in your life will never be the last thing in your life.

This is true for Joseph. After some time of self-pity, which was understandable, Joseph decides that he is still going to follow God. He recognized that he has two choices, "I can live in the dungeon and have no hope and not believe God, or I can choose to follow him even here and trust that God will be with me even in the circumstances." Joseph determined once more to put one foot in front of the other and do the next best and right thing. Let's see how that works out in Genesis 39:21 and following.

SLIDE 21 But the Lord was with Joseph in the prison and showed him his faithful love. And the Lord made Joseph a favorite with the prison warden. 22 Before long, the warden put Joseph in charge of all the other prisoners and over everything that happened in the prison. 23 The warden had no more worries, because Joseph took care of everything. The Lord was with him and caused everything he did to succeed.

Are you beginning to see a trend for Joseph? He becomes a slave and he decides to do what is right and his master put him in charge of everything. Though his master's wife lied, he ended up in prison and when he goes to prison the same thing happens. He lives with integrity and does the next right thing and he is then put in charge of all the prisoners.


SLIDE The Lord was with Joseph

Notice the most important part of this passage, however, where it says on two different occasions that the Lord was with Joseph and showed him his faithful love. Joseph was in prison for 10 years. We face unemployment for six months and it feels like an eternity. He was in prison for 10 years and a slave for three years before that, and God was with him.

We find this truth throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament where God says, "WHEN you pass through the floodwaters, I will be with you. WHEN you go through the fire, I will be with you." We are never told that God will keep us from having to deal with floods or fires or struggles. God says that he knows we will go through these things and what he promises is, "I will be with you." This is why we read the Psalms, "Yeah, though I walk through the Valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me."

It's assumed that you will go through the Valley of the shadow of death because you are human and that is the journey that we all take. Life is hard sometimes. Life will not always be fair sometimes. The answer is not to turn away from God because if you do, you still are left with the pain and hurt and the fear, but you have no hope. The answer is that God walks with us through the hell that we sometimes experience.

SLIDE Emmanuel = “God with us”

Jesus was called Emmanuel which means, "God with us." Jesus said to his disciples that even though they will go through tough times and be arrested and persecuted and maybe even killed, "I will be with you always, even to the end of the age. I will leave the comforter, the Holy Spirit, to be your guide."

This is the promise of Scripture and it is what we find in the story of Joseph, but the Lord is with him even in prison. That leads us to the next part of Joseph’s story.

SLIDE Joseph release

While Joseph was in prison, Pharaoh sent his butler to the same dungeon. One day the butler has a dream in prison and it is perplexing and confusing. He has heard that Joseph, who is over all the prisoners, once had dreams that meant something and so he goes to Joseph and says, "Can you help me understand this dream?"

He explains his dream to Joseph and Joseph sensed God giving him an interpretation to that dream. He tells the butler what he thinks God is saying to


him through the dream, "That in three days you will be lifted out of this dungeon by Pharaoh who will restore you as his butler. This is good news for you." Then we find Joseph saying this to the man in Genesis 40:14.

SLIDE 14 And please remember me and do me a favor when things go well for you. Mention me to Pharaoh, so he might let me out of this place. 15 For I was kidnapped from my homeland, the land of the Hebrews, and now I’m here in prison, but I did nothing to deserve it.”

This is Joseph’s one shot at getting out of prison or he might wait and stay there for the rest of his life. He has a word with the butler who then will be in front of the Pharaoh, and he asks the Butler to put in a good word for him because he has done nothing wrong. But then look at what happens in verse 23.

SLIDE 23 Pharaoh’s chief cup-bearer, however, forgot all about Joseph, never giving him another thought.

Sometimes we feel like we have been forgotten by others or forgotten by God. Two years go by and Joseph has been forgotten, but an interesting thing happens one day. Pharaoh has a dream which is really disturbing. He knows that the dream means something really big and the next night he has a similar dream. He is perplexed and he called together all of his advisers, the wise men and the magicians in Egypt. He tells them the dream and asks them what it means because he knows it's important, but nobody can tell them what it means.

SLIDE Pharaoh's dream

Suddenly, the butler remembers. "Hey, wait a minute. I just remembered something I was supposed to tell you two years ago. There was a fellow in prison named Joseph and he knows how to interpret dreams."

The Pharaoh then sends for Joseph. Pharaoh told Joseph his dreams and you can read about them in your Scripture readings this week in the Meditation Moments. Joseph then tells Pharaoh, "This is what I think God is trying to say to you. For the next seven years our economy is going to be expanding and we will have years of plenty. Things are going to be great and it will be unlike anything you have ever seen before. The stock market will soar and housing values will go way up and the national debt will disappear. But during that next seven years, you need to set aside 20% of everything that is earned because after that will come seven very lean years. It will be the worst recession you have ever seen, similar to the Great Depression. You need to be prepared for the famine that is to come."


Joseph lays out a plan to save the people of Egypt, and this is what Pharaoh says to Joseph in chapter 41:39 and following.

SLIDE 39 Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Since God has revealed the meaning of the dreams to you, clearly no one else is as intelligent or wise as you are. 40 You will be in charge of my court, and all my people will take orders from you. Only I, sitting on my throne, will have a rank higher than yours.”

Do you remember how unwise Joseph was before he was a slave and was sent to prison? Tough things have a way of making us wise and giving us wisdom and this experience has actually helped Joseph. He became a different person as a result of his slavery and imprisonment. Because of that wisdom Pharaoh put Joseph in charge of the entire land of Egypt. For 13 years he had been a slave and then stuck in Pharaoh's dungeon, but now at the age of 30, this Hebrew has become the Prime Minister of Egypt.

I love stories with happy endings, don't you? This is a remarkable story and one of the things we're supposed to recognize is how this journey takes place. How could Joseph have become the Prime Minister of Egypt if his brothers had not sold him into slavery in Egypt? How would he have ever become a confidant of Pharaoh had Potiphar’s wife not attempted to seduce him and then lied about him and then have him sent to prison for 10 years? All of those 13 years Joseph couldn't see what was happening. All he could see what the hell he was walking through but he was determined, like Jacob his father, who wrestled with God and persevered, to wrestle with God himself and persevere as he held onto his faith despite his current circumstances.

SLIDE The Reunion

The seven years of blessings and great economic stability happen just as Joseph foretold it in the dream. He manages to take 20% of everything from the Egyptians and put it into storage. The famine begins at the end of that seven years and the people are hungry but there is enough to eat because of what Joseph is done. Two years into the famine it spreads to the land of Canaan and suddenly we meet Jacob and his son again.

Jacob is now an old man living in the land of Canaan and they are in the midst of a famine. He turns to 10 of his sons, the ones who had sold Joseph into slavery, and says to them, "You have to go to Egypt. You have to get food so we can eat or we will all start to death."


The 10 sons make their way down to Egypt and they stand before the Prime Minister. They don't recognize him because the last time they saw him he was 17 and now he is 30. He is also dressed a bit differently than he was back then. They stand before him and they beg him for food for their family and their people so they can survive back in the land of Canaan. Israel and his sons and family are going to die without food from Egypt. The one man who has the opportunity to give them life just happens to be Joseph, their brother.

I encourage you to read through the rest of the story because I have to skip through most of it at this point, but when you get to the end of the story we find that Joseph reveals himself to his brothers. He says to them, "It's me, your brother Joseph."

They are horrified and terrified because they are certain that Joseph is going to kill them, but Joseph shows them grace and mercy. Then he says this in one of the most powerful passages of Scripture we find in the entire Bible in Genesis 50:20.

SLIDE 20 You intended to harm me, but God intended it all for good. He brought me to this position so I could save the lives of many people.

It's profound that Jacob and Joseph both live long enough to look back over their lives and see the difficulties in pain and suffering, and see how God used those things for his saving purposes. At this very moment, for such a time as this, Joseph was Prime Minister Egypt to save his people so that his people might have a future with hope. We are here today in part because of that story.

I want to recognize that every person of faith, everyone who believes in God, struggles with this question: Why do bad things happen to good people?

We wrestle with making sense of a good and loving God in light of our life experiences that are sometimes hard and difficult. We believe that God blesses us and walks with us, but why don't I have a job? Why did my wife leave? Why did my child get this disease? We have lots of questions and there are times when we are tempted to turn away from God because those things haven't worked out the way we anticipated or hoped or dreamed.

SLIDE The Doctrine of Providence

The question is: How does God interact in our world? How is God involved in our world? This is called the doctrine of providence, because it deals with the question of how God provides for our world.

Some people have an idea about God that goes something like this. Every


one of our lives is a novel that God has written. Everything that happens is already written, and what you are doing is just living into that story that God already wrote for you. I have many good friends who believe this and have a deep faith in Christ, and maybe some of you see it this way. What they would say is that everything that happens, happens for a reason because it is part of the story that God wrote before you were born. Every twist, every turn, and every bad thing that happens in your life is authored by God in some way. All we can do is trust that God has a good purpose for this that I can't see and it will all turn out okay.

I might believe the last part of that way of understanding how God provides for our world, but it's the first part that I struggle with as a pastor who has been with people through terrible circumstances. Please, don't tell me that God put it on the heart of people to rape other people. Please, don't tell me that God wrote the story for children who are abused or killed for no apparent reason. If God wrote the story in advance then this person who did this horrible thing only did it because that is what God wanted to have happen.

I don't believe that's how God works. I don't believe God wishes for a child to have cancer. I don't believe God wishes for someone to be killed in a car accident. I don't believe that God wishes for someone to fly airplanes into a building. Do you really think God wants that to happen? Do you think that's the story that God wrote?

There is another way of looking at this which says that the story is not written yet. God may know what is going to happen in your life but he didn't write the story and he invites you and I to join him in writing our own life story. We cooperate with God and we pray that God will use us and lead us. In our lives we are trying to cooperate with God and live in a way that God intends, but even then other people have the freedom to be able to mess up those plans. People have the freedom to do something which is hurtful to you. The economy has a chance to go haywire because we made a whole bunch of bad decisions and we are people who are messy, and innocent people are affected by those things.

Part of what happens next in the story is how we respond to those moments when things don't go as planned. For Christians, who believe the doctrine of providence in this way, we don't say that God causes the evil to happen in our lives or that God wrote it in the story before our lives began. Instead, we recognize that God redeems the evil in our lives. God takes the suffering that happens in our world and in our lives and he is able to force it to serve his purposes.


When we begin to see life this way we recognize that we live in a world where there is freedom and people are free to reject God and do things that God doesn't dream for them to do. The entire biblical story appears to me to point to the fact that God has a will for humankind and human beings are constantly pushing against God's will and saying, "No, I don't want to do that. I want to do my own thing, thank you very much!"

Then God comes along and tries to fix those things and bring about something beautiful out of the ashes after we have messed it up. If we are like Jacob and Joseph, part of what we trust is that even when I'm in the dungeon—when I ended up in here even though I was trying to do the right thing, but somebody else did something evil, not that God made them do the evil thing—that God will be with me in the prison. God can use even this to accomplish his purposes.

So we say things like this, "God, my heart is breaking right now. But use even this to shake me and make me the man you want me to be. Somehow bring something good from this, oh God."

In the end, God can bring beauty from the ashes, which is why Paul writes these words in Romans 8:28 that many of you have memorized.

SLIDE 28 And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.

Joseph's brothers received mercy and grace from a brother they had cast out and sold into slavery. They saw that even through their evil God was working in bringing about his purposes. They sent for their father Jacob, and Jacob and his entire family came to live in the land of Egypt. Jacob lived for 17 more years and had a chance to see his son Joseph as the Prime Minister of Egypt. He lives long enough to look back over his life and recognize that in those moments where he was terrified, God sustained him. In the time when he thought all hell was breaking loose in his life and he felt crushed, he could see that God was at work. He could see how all of those moments fit together to accomplish God's purposes.

In that moment Jacob gave God thanks. Jacob wrestled with God and he never let go, and this story is meant to invite us to do the same. So when you get to the end of your life, you can look back and say, "Look what God did here in this place. Look what God did here, and here. Thanks be to God for what he has done in me."


May that be our prayer today—would you bow with me as we end this series looking at the life of Jacob?

SLIDE Prayer

While your heads are bowed and your eyes are closed, I simply invite you to talk to God. You might say something like this, "God, I place my life in your hands. I pray that you would take even the painful things and use them for good. I pray that you would use me for your purposes, and help me to hold on tight to you and never let go…

Lord, we pray for our children, for those who are wandering from you and have turned their back on you. We pray for them, oh God, that you wouldn't let them go. In their baptisms, you claimed them. Hold onto them Lord. Draw them back to you and their families.

We pray, God, that you would help us in those moments when we feel like we are in Pharaoh’s dungeon or that we are Potiphar’s slaves. Help us in those moments to trust you and never let go—to do the next right thing even when it's hard—and to know that somehow you will make all of these circumstances in our lives come together in the end for your glory and for our good. We give our lives to you, in your holy name. Amen.


“Jacob and the Technicolor Dreamcoat”

Theme: Wrestling with God

Scripture: Genesis 37:1-4

Things I’d like to remember from today’s sermon:

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Meditation Moments for Monday, October 14 - Read Genesis 37:1-11 - Jacob favored Joseph, Rachel’s first son. The “dreamcoat” (we can’t be sure what it looked like) showed Joseph’s favored status. Family therapists now know that being a “chosen child” like Joseph often skews emotional growth and relationships. Joseph’s strutting misuse of his ability to receive and interpret dreams finally upset even Jacob.

• Jacob should have known the danger of parental bias from his own parents – but he didn’t. Have you ever been “the favorite” in some setting? Have you had to relate to someone else who’s “the favorite”? What wounds from those experiences undercut your life and the lives of those around you, limiting your joy and effectiveness?

• It’s so easy (and such fun!) to feel superior to others as Joseph did. Choose one thing you will do this week to show respect to someone you are tempted to feel superior to. End this time in prayer, asking God to help you have genuine humility as you interact with others.

Tuesday, October 15 – Read Genesis 37:12-36 – Jacob seemed clueless when he sent Joseph to see his brothers. They acted on their outrage at being lorded over by their brother and undervalued by their father. First,


they wanted to kill Joseph. Reuben and Judah talked them out of that, and they sold him to traders. They tricked Jacob (sound familiar?). He believed his favorite son was dead and mourned the loss bitterly.

• Genesis doesn’t tell us what Jacob’s sons and daughters said as they tried to comfort him – but it didn’t help much. Do you know how to comfort a grieving friend or family member? Are you able to honor the process of grieving rather than saying “Get over it”? If not, you might pray for God to give you a calm presence and understanding heart as you interact with others who are grieving.

• Reuben and Judah had enough moral courage to stand up to their brothers and say, “No, don’t kill Joseph. We don’t want blood on our hands.” On the other hand, they weren’t able to say, “Dad, Joseph isn’t dead – we sold him to traders headed for Egypt.” How morally courageous are you? In what areas do you want to become braver?

Wednesday, October 16 – Read Genesis 42:1-38 – Years later, Jacob sent his sons (all but Benjamin, Rachel’s youngest biological son) to Egypt for food. Over time, Joseph had thrived in Egypt (the story is in Genesis 39-41). He ran the famine relief plan. His brothers didn’t know him and bowed to him. (Remember his dreams?) He gave them a tough time at first (Genesis doesn’t say why), and insisted on seeing Benjamin.

• Some read this story and believe Joseph was having a little mischievous revenge, toying with his brothers. Others think he was testing them to see if they had grown in character over the years. In what ways do you see the brothers showing more kindness and maturity than they showed when Joseph was younger?

• Imagine yourself in Joseph’s position. In all of Egypt only Pharaoh held more power than he did. What could Joseph have done when he saw his brothers coming before him? On a spectrum from “most vengeful” to “most generous,” where would you put his response? How would you have responded in his place?

Thursday, October 17 – Read Genesis 43:1-16, 45:1-18 – Desperate, Jacob sent Benjamin to Egypt. Joseph put the brothers through more trials (chapter 44). Finally, overwhelmed by emotion, he revealed who he was. He


made peace with the brothers who sold him as a slave and nearly killed him. He told them God had worked for good even in their evil actions. He asked them to bring his father to Egypt.

• “Do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you,” Joseph told his brothers. Think of a time when someone did evil to you. Are your allowing God to redeem this evil—turning it into a blessing instead of a curse? How can Joseph’s story strengthen your faith?

• When Joseph revealed who he was, Genesis says his brothers were terrified (which makes sense!). What do you imagine the impact of Joseph’s forgiving generosity was on them? In what ways does Joseph give us a vivid image of the way God treats each of us when we seek God’s grace?

Friday, October 18 – Read Genesis 45:25 - 46:7, 48:1-11 – Amazed, Jacob learned that his much-loved, much-mourned son not only lived, but held great power in Egypt. His “spirit revived,” and he went to Joseph. At the end, he blessed Joseph’s children, blessed all his sons (chapter 49), and spoke yet again about losing Rachel.

Jacob’s story, like ours, is one of human messiness mixed with the grace of Jacob’s God.

• Compare Jacob’s rapport with God in Genesis 46:1-4 with his relating to God in 28:10-17. Then God had to speak in a dream before Jacob recognized God was there. Here Jacob calmly worships before God speaks. Where are you in walking with God and sensing God’s presence? How can you grow into the “old friends” faith Jacob had?

• One last irony: Jacob got as nearly-blind as his father Isaac had been (48:10). However, the boys he kissed and embraced really were Joseph’s sons. There was no struggle or trickery when he met his grandsons. What do you learn about God’s patient work in human lives as you think back over Jacob’s long spiritual journey?

Saturday, October 19 – Personal Application: Jacob’s story is epic, yet very honest and human. Spend time in prayer, and then honestly put down the story of your life so far. What are the main moments you see that have brought you to where you are today? What role has God played in it all?


Who has been “Esau” or “Laban” in your life? Have you been more like the young Jacob, or the older one? Most important, where are you and God going next?

Family Activity: Even though Joseph was not dead, his father Jacob was tricked into believing that he was. Jacob was sad and could not be comforted. Has anyone died who was special in your lives? What brought you comfort? Think of people in your neighborhood, church or school who may be sad right now. What can your family do to bring comfort to them? Often a handmade card with a simple phrase such as “We are praying for you,” or “We love you and so does God” will bring comfort. You might also consider preparing a meal for the family, sending flowers or listening to them. Pray that God will help your family bring comfort to others in times of need.

Prayer: God, you were there at Jacob’s birth, at his death, and every moment in between. You cared for Jacob deeply because he was your son. Scripture tells me that I am also your child. When Jacob went through hard times, you held him close. God, please carry me through life’s ups and downs, too. Help me to be your child, and to know I can always turn to you because you are always there. Amen.

Documents

Theme: Wrestling with God - The Stories of Jacob ^Jacob ... · PDF file^Jacob and the Technicolor Dreamcoat _ Sermon preached by Jeff Huber – based on a sermon series by Adam Hamilton