The Gospel According to Joseph: Hope, Even in Death

This Sunday's sermon will be the final sermon in our series: The Gospel According to Joseph. As we said in the beginning and have reiterated many times throughout this series, there is too much in this story to cover it all in nine sermons (or even nine sermons plus nine devotionals). In every passage, there is some Christ-centered content that we just do not have time to cover. So, in this short devotional, we are going to talk briefly about the hope that the final chapters of Genesis give us, which we will not have time to cover in a sermon.

Both Ge. 49 and Ge. 50 end with death--the deaths of Israel and Joseph. Death may seem like a bad way to end such a great story, but when we look at the faith of these two men, we can see that in their deaths we're given hope--the hope of the gospel. Back in Ge. 47-48 (cf. The Gospel and Finishing Faithfully), we saw in Israel preparing for his death that his true hope was not in the physical land of the promise but in the God of the promise who was preparing a "better city, that is a heavenly one" for him and his descendants. In Ge. 50:24-25, we see Joseph express the same hope (a hope that we saw he had back in Ge. 41 as well, cf. The Gospel and Perspective) as he tells his brothers and descendants to take his bones with them to the promised land when they return. This is the hope that the author of Hebrews highlights in He. 11:13, "These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth." And, this is the hope that we have as well--a hope beyond the sin, pain, and death of this world.

We too will die as "strangers and exiles on the earth," for this world is not our home. Our home--our true inheritance as sons and daughters of God--is life without sin, sadness, or death in the new heavens and new earth with God Himself. John describes it for us briefly in Re. 21:1-4 (one of my favorite passages in all of Scripture):

¹ Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. ² And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. ³ And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. ⁴ He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” (Emphasis added)

That is our hope, brothers and sisters in Christ, and even in death it is an anchor that will not fail.

Death is not the way it's supposed to be. We were created for so much more, but sin has brought the pain of death into our lives, which is in fact is something that I have seen tragically and clearly in my own congregation recently. Yet, Christ has defeated death for us (cf. 1 Co. 15:55) and given us hope even in the midst of it. This is why Paul says in 1 Th. 4:13 that we do not grieve as those who have no hope. Now, that doesn't mean we don't grieve. We do, for death is not the way it's supposed to be and someone we love has had to endure it, and now we have to continue as "strangers and exiles" in this world without their comfort and companionship. Yet, we grieve as those who have the hope of the gospel, for we know that believers are redeemed in Christ (Ro. 3:24), live in Christ (Ga. 2:20), and even die in Christ (1 Th.4:13-14), and we know that we will see them again when we too go to our true home. We have the hope of knowing that even in death our Savior is with us and will bring us into a world so much better than our life as "strangers and exiles" here on earth--our true inheritance with Him in the new heavens and new earth for all eternity. We know that the death of a believer (even untimely, early ones) means they're finally home, receiving their true inheritance from Christ, which gives us hope. Death, as the Heidelberg Catechism says in the answer to question 42, puts an end to our disease of sin and begins our eternal life--our true inheritance. Christians have hope, even in death.

So, even though this great story ends in death, it's good ending. It's an ending that reminds us that this world isn't our home, that we have a glorious inheritance awaiting us in Christ, and that even in the midst of the pain of death in this life, the loved ones of believers can grieve with hope instead of grieving with fear and despondency. Rest in that hope that the story of Joseph, Jacob, and Judah gives to us here at the end.

By His Grace,

Taylor

The Gospel According to Joseph: The Gospel and Grace

My apologies for not publishing this on Sunday, my friends. The weekend was very busy for a number of reasons, and I simply forgot. Please forgive that memory lapse. Here it is, though, the sermon that complements last Friday's devotional: The Gospel and Grace. Israel's life has been a picture of God's amazing grace ever since he was born clinging to Esau's ankle, and here at the end of his life and near the end of this whole narrative, he becomes a bestower of grace through the blessings he gives to his sons and grandsons. The scope of this sermon only had room to look at two of those blessings--the blessing on Joseph's sons and the blessing on Judah--but in those two blessings we learn a lot about God's grace to us. So, if you want to hear about that, you can listen to the sermon here or read the transcript here.

Now, as we have also talked about in the other posts in this series, in each sermon, I try to highlight a question that we can ask of any Old Testament text to help us to see how Jesus may be on that page of Scripture. This week's sermon did not add a new question, but it does show another way that we can use a question we have talked about in previous sermons: How does this passage reflect upon or prepare us for the person or work of Christ—i.e. who He is to us (His person) and what He does for us (His work)? So, check out the sermon if you want to learn more.

I pray that this sermon will show you Jesus clearly and Him only and that it will be a blessing to your soul.

By His Grace,
Taylor

The Gospel According to Joseph: The Gospel and Finishing Faithfully

As we continue our way through the story of Joseph, Jacob, and Judah, we come to the part of the story where the Israel gets the majority of the attention. We have seen a lot about Joseph so far, some about Judah, and only a small amount about Israel, but in chapters 47-49, the story shifts is character focus mainly to Israel and the end of his life. In the sermon for today's post (from a selected reading in Ge. 47-48), we see Israel, who was stumbling greatly at the beginning of this narrative, finish his life faithfully and pass on his renewed faith in God to the succeeding generations. If you want to learn more, you can listen to the sermon here or read the transcript here.

Now, as we have talked about in the other posts in this series, we're not only studying the story but learning how to see Christ properly in these Old Testament (OT) narratives. To accomplish that, we've been talking about questions that we can ask of any OT text to help us to see how Jesus may be on that page of Scripture. For today's sermon, we added a new question: "How is the text calling us to respond to the grace of God and follow after Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit?" This is the part of preaching and teaching from OT stories where it's appropriate to see some instances as examples to be followed, but even these examples are still Christ-centered. If you want to learn more, you can listen to the sermon here or read the transcript here.

I pray that this sermon will show you Jesus clearly and Him only and that it will be a blessing to your soul.

By His Grace,
Taylor

The Gospel According to Joseph: The Gospel and God's Sovereignty

As Friday's devotion mentioned, this sermon post focuses particularly on God's sovereignty. Sovereignty (and the providence which results from sovereignty and God's love for us) can be sometimes be a tough theological truth to swallow, especially for "modern," Western Christians who have been raised in a culture of "self-determination" and individuality. Yet, it God's sovereignty is a very comforting, wonderful doctrine when it is viewed rightly, and the episode of this narrative found in Ge. 45-46 shows us several aspects of God's sovereignty. My prayer is that this sermon will help your view of God's sovereignty to be more biblical and comforting. You can listen to the sermon here or read the transcript here.

Now, as we have also talked about in the other posts in this series, in each sermon, I try to highlight a question that we can ask of any Old Testament text to help us to see how Jesus may be on that page of Scripture. This week's sermon did not add a new question, but it does show another way that we can use a question we have talked about in previous sermons: How does this passage reflect upon or prepare us for the person or work of Christ—i.e. who He is to us (His person) and what He does for us (His work)? So, check out the sermon if you want to learn more.

I pray that this sermon will show you Jesus clearly and Him only and that it will be a blessing to your soul.

By His Grace,
Taylor

The Gospel According to Joseph: The Gospel and Transformation

Continuing our way through the story of Joseph, Jacob, and Judah brings us to Ge. 43-44, which is one of the high points of this narrative, at least when it comes to the theme of gospel-change working in our lives. In the previous sermon, we saw Jacob and Joseph's brothers' consciences being pricked and awakened by God; yet we didn't actually see any transformation of their hearts. In Ge. 43-44, we see God use the tools of providence and guilt to transform Jacob and the brothers' hearts. It's a wonderful development in the plot of this story, and you can hear the sermon here or read the transcript here.

As we have stated in the past posts in this series, we are also learning the questions that we can ask of any OT text to help us to see how Jesus may be on the page of Scripture. In this passage, we do not learn a new question but reuse one we have already learned: What does this passage reveal about the redeeming nature of God? And, when we see an aspect of God's redeeming nature, we can see Jesus there, for He brings together all those aspects in His work of redemption. In this sermon, we also get introduced to another way of seeing Christ in these Old Testament stories: types. A "type" is a theological term for an OT person, place, or object that God ordained to serve as a predictive pattern for Christ and what He does for us, and we see Judah as a type of Christ at the end of ch. 44. If you want to learn how, you can hear the sermon here or read the transcript here.

I pray that this sermon will show you Jesus clearly and Him only and that it will be a blessing to your soul.

By His Grace,
Taylor