The Waiting Game, Week 3 Day 3, Genesis 41-42

The Waiting Game, Week 3 Day 3, Genesis 41-42

Most people don’t like reading Old Testament passages out loud.  They can be full of hard to pronounce words.  Words from a foreign language that require our lips and tongue to move ways to which we are not accustom.  I took a couple of years of Spanish back in high school.  I couldn’t roll my R’s to save my soul, or my Spanish grade.  And being one of those blessed with a healthy dose of dyslexia, I often have a hard enough time reading English let alone those foreign names in a foreign tongue.

But names are important.  We’ve seen that with Abram, Abraham and Sarai, Sarah.  Names meant something.  And names can tell us something about a person.

So Joseph who has become the second in command in Egypt needs to name his two sons.  His first born is name Manasseh “because God made me forget all my trouble and all my father’s household.”  He names his second son Ephraim, “because God has made me fruitful in the land of my suffering.”  The names of his children are like the Reader’s Digest version of Joseph’s life so far.  And what do they tell us about how Joseph sees his life.

A few things stand out to me.  First, he pretty much owns his suffering.  I find it interesting that he doesn’t blame God.  He doesn’t even blame others.  For Joseph it’s just “my trouble”, “my fathers’ household” and “my suffering.”  He doesn’t blame God, “How could you have done that to me?”  He doesn’t blame his brother’s.  His life is his life.  He owns his life and the things that have gone wrong.  Amazing since much of it wasn’t his fault and wasn’t justified.

And when it comes to the good, for that he gives complete and total credit to God.  “God made me forget” and “God has made me fruitful.”  Even when it was time to interpret Pharaoh’s dream Joseph says, “I cannot do it, but God will give Pharaoh the answer he desires.”

With all his struggles, with all his adversity, Joseph points of God as the interpreter of dreams, the one who makes us forget our struggles, the one who makes us fruitful.  And Joseph doesn’t take one bit of credit for himself. 

That’s especially interesting when you consider how his brothers complained that Joseph thought he was better than them, would rule over them, even though he was the youngest.  It turns out that Joseph’s ego isn’t really that big after all. Or maybe his ego was big but years as a slave, in prison, serving Pharaoh have tempered this ego.  He doesn’t blame.  He doesn’t get mad.  He doesn’t get upset.  His life just is.

We often spend a lot of time trying to figure out why things happen in our lives.  We can spend a lot of time trying to figure out if what’s happening is good or bad, our fault or something God is doing in our lives.  But Joseph just rolls with the punches, and some pretty big punches they are.  Murder plots, slavery, false accusations and prison terms.  This is the stuff of a Lifetime Channel movie, or maybe just another hero of the faith.  This is the life of a hero of faith who gives all the credit to God.

Don’t know that I’ve got much a conclusion for this one.  Except maybe to say that it’s a good thing Joseph is so good at forgetting his troubles and so good at crediting God.  Because pretty soon he’s going to be meeting the very brothers who sold him into slavery.  Their lives, and the future of Israel , depends on a man named Joseph who, if he cared about the hurts of the past, has a golden opportunity for revenge.

But it turns out the Joseph, the one who was wronged, is the one who is ready to forgive.  It the brother’s that say to each other, “Surely we are being punished because of our brother.” 

I’d often wondered why it seemed that Joseph was playing with his brothers?   Was he taunting his plotting brothers?  Why does he wait and not simply reveal himself to them at their first meeting?  It never occurred to me that Joseph’s dealing with his brothers might all be to help them reach the place where they could receive his forgiveness.  They needed the time to realize there sin.  They needed time to come to terms with the need for forgiveness.

Sometimes the people just aren’t ready to accept God.  Sometimes people just aren’t ready to receive forgiveness.  Receive forgiveness from God or from anyone else.

The sin of the brother’s is completely apparent.  But they discuss it in from of Joseph unaware the he understands everything that they are saying.  Unaware that he knows.  And how much is that like our own lives.  Thinking our sin is hidden from God even though there is nothing we can hide from Him. 

And Joseph, just like God, let’s them work it out until ultimately they we be ready to receive forgiveness.  Joseph isn’t playing with them.  God isn’t playing with them.  They are preparing them for the greatest gift of all, the forgiveness of the one that they have sinned against.

God, I’m really dense sometimes.  I think I can do in secret that which offends You.  You stand there, ready to forgive and I thing of a million reasons why I can’t accept it, why I’m not worthy.  And that whole time You’re standing there, listening to everything that goes on in my heart and head, seeing everything that I do, and still completely ready to forgive.  I’ve wasted a lot of time.  But maybe not, because that time has prepared me for You, for Your Love, for Your Forgiveness.  Thanks for waiting God.  Perhaps Your most underappreciated virtue is Your patience.  Thanks for waiting for me.  Thanks for waiting for us all.  Amen

Leonard