Surely We Are Being Punished

Genesis 42:1-38

When Jacob learned that there was grain in Egypt, he said to his sons, “Why do you just keep looking at each other?” He continued, “I have heard that there is grain in Egypt. Go down there and buy some for us, so that we may live and not die.”

Then ten of Joseph’s brothers went down to buy grain from Egypt. But Jacob did not send Benjamin, Joseph’s brother, with the others, because he was afraid that harm might come to him. So Israel’s sons were among those who went to buy grain, for the famine was in the land of Canaan also. – Genesis 42:1-5

It seems as though Jacob was fearful that something bad would happen to Benjamin if he went with his brothers. Benjamin was the youngest brother. Hopefully, by now, Jacob learned to not show favoritism to one son over the others. He might not have trusted his other sons.
 

God’s presence often shows up the clearest in the darkest times. Their family and many people in that region were experiencing a dark time. Famine was sweeping through the land. At that time they had no clue what God was planning. They had no idea that the good and all-knowing God of Abraham and Isaac was going to show up. God was weaving a great plan of deliverance through their dark and seemingly insignificant lives.

The passage says that they just kept looking at each other. In the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the translators use a word that would describe the brothers as idle or remiss. They seemed to be indecisive or not motivated. Whatever the reason, there’s some kind of hesitation inside of them.

Now Joseph was the governor of the land, the one who sold grain to all its people. So when Joseph’s brothers arrived, they bowed down to him with their faces to the ground. As soon as Joseph saw his brothers, he recognized them, but he pretended to be a stranger and spoke harshly to them. “Where do you come from?” he asked. “From the land of Canaan,” they replied, “to buy food.” Although Joseph recognized his brothers, they did not recognize him. Then he remembered his dreams about them and said to them, “You are spies! You have come to see where our land is unprotected.” – Genesis 42:6-9

 
When Joseph’s brothers arrived, they bowed down to him with their faces to the ground. At this particular moment, the dream Joseph had as a young man had been fulfilled. When Joseph was younger he shared a dream he had:

“We were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright, while your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it.” – Genesis 37:7

 
And:

Then he had another dream, and he told it to his brothers. “Listen,” he said, “I had another dream, and this time the sun and moon and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” – Genesis 37:9

 
Joseph’s brothers had no clue that the dreams had been fulfilled. If we’re not careful, we can miss the fulfillment of God’s dreams and promises as well. We can be like Joseph’s brothers in a way. We can be so caught up in our dire situations that we totally overlook what God is doing. Who are you meeting with, connected with, each week reminding each other what God is doing? When I meet with our discipleship groups, we talk about our past week. We’ll share what God has been doing in us and through us. Each of us needs a few others that can remind us about what God is doing among us. Sure, Joseph’s brothers had one another, but in the end, their brotherhood didn’t help them become more aware of what God was doing. They were completely blind. In a way, it reminds me of the Pharisees. They were a brotherhood. But their brotherhood didn’t bring any of them closer to God. And they totally missed what God was doing right in front of their eyes. The Savior of the world had come, but it went right past them. As we’ve talked about in this series on Joseph, he was a picture of Jesus. The Pharisees didn’t recognize who Jesus was, just like Joseph’s brothers didn’t recognize him. And the brother who may have been dead would later come to life right before their very eyes.

“No, my lord,” they answered. “Your servants have come to buy food. We are all the sons of one man. Your servants are honest men, not spies.” -- Genesis 42:10-11

 
They call themselves “honest”. That’s furthest from the truth. This is what a world does that is devoid of God. If there is no God to protect us, then we need to lie in order to protect ourselves. Desperate times demand desperate lies. They did not entrust themselves to God. They may have acknowledged God, but they didn’t trust Him. One of the things that I find encouraging in this story is seeing God’s mercy. God still helped them. Even though they sold their brother to slavery, God still helped them. Even though they lied to their father about Joseph, God still helped them. Even though they lied about being “honest”, God still helped them. Jesus said,

“He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” – Matthew 5:45

 
God hasn’t changed. He still does the same for us even though we’ve sinned as well. In spite of the brothers’ sins, God still had a plan to save the nation of Israel with a “great deliverance.”

“No!” he said to them. “You have come to see where our land is unprotected.”

But they replied, “Your servants were twelve brothers, the sons of one man, who lives in the land of Canaan. The youngest is now with our father, and one is no more.”

Joseph said to them, “It is just as I told you: You are spies! And this is how you will be tested: As surely as Pharaoh lives, you will not leave this place unless your youngest brother comes here. Send one of your number to get your brother; the rest of you will be kept in prison, so that your words may be tested to see if you are telling the truth. If you are not, then as surely as Pharaoh lives, you are spies!” And he put them all in custody for three days.

On the third day, Joseph said to them, “Do this and you will live, for I fear God: If you are honest men, let one of your brothers stay here in prison, while the rest of you go and take grain back for your starving households. But you must bring your youngest brother to me, so that your words may be verified and that you may not die.” This they proceeded to do.

They said to one another, “Surely we are being punished because of our brother. We saw how distressed he was when he pleaded with us for his life, but we would not listen; that’s why this distress has come upon us.”

Reuben replied, “Didn’t I tell you not to sin against the boy? But you wouldn’t listen! Now we must give an accounting for his blood.” They did not realize that Joseph could understand them, since he was using an interpreter. – Genesis 42:12-23

 
Recently, I was talking with a friend who does ministry with students at Clemson. He told me some of the struggles he was having by not accomplishing his ministry goals. He was wondering if his struggle was caused by his sin. He was wondering if he had done something wrong against the Lord that caused the Lord to frustrate his plans. While it is good to take a sober look into the mirror, we have to be careful coming to conclusions like that. We don’t understand the reasons why many things happen to us. There are things going on behind the scenes that we can’t see.

One of the big themes of the book of Job is this very idea. Job’s friends kept telling him that he must have done something wrong in order to deserve this judgment from God. But exactly the opposite was true! It was because God thought highly of him that Job went through those difficult things. If we’ve done something obviously sinful, then we need to repent. But, if there’s no clear connection, then we need to be cautious in making connections.

Joseph’s brothers were assuming that they knew what was going on behind the scenes. They assumed that God was punishing them. We’re not sure if God was punishing them or not. One thing we do know…He was setting up a great deliverance. When making judgments about what God is or isn’t doing we must look to what God has already said. From that foundation we might be able to interpret circumstances a bit better. Listen to what Joseph said to his brothers in chapter 45 of Genesis:

“But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance.” – Genesis 45:7

 
And later Joseph said,

“You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” – Genesis 50:20

 
God was writing a greater story of deliverance, the “saving of many lives.”

But we shouldn’t let ourselves off the hook too quickly. There is plenty of Scripture that talks about God dealing with us according to our sin. James says,

God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. – James 4:6

 
In Hebrews 12:6 the author says,

The Lord disciplines those He loves, and He punishes everyone He accepts as a son. – Hebrews 12:16

 
We have to remember that God can take something bad that He didn’t approve, and turn it into good. That’s what He did in Joseph’s situation. Maybe that’s what He did in the situation with Joseph’s brothers. Even if God didn’t give Joseph the idea and approval to treat his brothers harshly, He could still use that situation to discipline them. Paul said,

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose. – Romans 8:28

 
In the context of chapter 8, we see that God’s ultimate desire for us is to become more like Christ. If we’re trying to determine God’s involvement in a situation we could ask two questions. The first would be, “Would God give this type of idea and approve of it?” The second question would be, “Can God use this situation to help me become more like Christ?” While God might not give or approve of every idea, He uses every situation to help us become more like Christ.

Sometimes, God allows us to be in situations where our backs are against a wall. It seems like there is no way out, then God shows up. We have to remember that God doesn’t want things to come between us and Him:

Do not worship any other god, for the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God. – Exodus 34:14

 
He wants us to know Him as the Savior, our Savior. But we cannot know Him that way if we don’t think we need saving, or if everything works the way we think it should work. Jacob’s family was up against the wall. They didn’t just need to be delivered, they needed to experience the God of deliverance.

Listen to Paul’s dire situation, and the reason that they were in that situation:

We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and He will deliver us. On Him we have set our hope that He will continue to deliver us… -- 2 Corinthians 1:8–10

 
Listen to King David’s description of God. He isn’t talking about God like he’s talking about an inanimate object or a lofty ideal. He’s talking about God like he would talk about someone who is real and someone who interacted with him on a personal basis:

David sang to the LORD the words of this song when the LORD delivered him from the hand of all his enemies and from the hand of Saul. He said: “The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer…” -- 2 Samuel 22:1–2 (Bold added)

 
What can sin do to the mind? It can make us think things about God that aren’t true. Knowingly, or unknowingly we malign the character and nature of God. For example, we might begin to think that He doesn’t care about us. We might give in to the temptation to believe that He is not the deliverer. In Romans 1, Paul talked about the process and effect of sin:

Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, He gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. – Romans 1:28-29

 
People who had some kind of experience with God, like Joseph’s brothers, probably didn’t think it was worthwhile to “retain the knowledge of God.” They probably didn’t understand, or want to believe, that He was kind, merciful and generous. They had some erroneous view of God…like He was bent on punishing them for every wrong turn. They must have rejected God in some manner or degree. I say that because you can see the fruit of their lives. They hated Joseph to the point of plotting to murder him. The apostle John said,

Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him. – 1 John 3:15

 
Joseph’s brothers were envious of Joseph, they plotted his murder, they caused strife, they deceived their father and they had malice in their hearts when they sold him into slavery. Because of peoples’ rejection of the pursuit of a right understanding of God, their thinking can become worse. Their mind will become “depraved.” Joseph’s brothers didn’t arrive at a wrong understanding of God by accident. It was a process they started many years earlier.

But there’s a ray of hope in what the brothers said, even through all of their wickedness. There was a lot of wickedness in the people whose stories were told in Genesis. But there is only one time that anyone confessed their sin. That one time is in this passage. They acknowledged that they had done a wicked thing by selling their brother into slavery. God was using this situation to bring them to the point of admitting their sin. Maybe they had found some kind of repentance. Would they have admitted their sin if not faced this situation? Who knows? There was some kind of admittance of wrongdoing. It’s impossible to have reconciliation if either party doesn’t admit to wrongdoing.

He turned away from them and began to weep, but then turned back and spoke to them again. He had Simeon taken from them and bound before their eyes.

Joseph gave orders to fill their bags with grain, to put each man’s silver back in his sack, and to give them provisions for their journey. After this was done for them, they loaded their grain on their donkeys and left.

At the place where they stopped for the night one of them opened his sack to get feed for his donkey, and he saw his silver in the mouth of his sack. “My silver has been returned,” he said to his brothers. “Here it is in my sack.”

Their hearts sank and they turned to each other trembling and said, “What is this that God has done to us?”

When they came to their father Jacob in the land of Canaan, they told him all that had happened to them. They said, “The man who is lord over the land spoke harshly to us and treated us as though we were spying on the land. But we said to him, ‘We are honest men; we are not spies. We were twelve brothers, sons of one father. One is no more, and the youngest is now with our father in Canaan. – Genesis 42:24-32

 
It’s difficult to break the pattern of deception. It’s difficult to break out of a family’s pattern of deceit. It’s also difficult to break out of a personal habit of deceit. In Genesis 20, Abraham deceived Abimelech into thinking that Sarah was his sister, not his wife. In Genesis 25, Jacob deceived his brother Esau by trading a bowl of soup for Esau’s birthright. Then, in Genesis 27, Jacob deceived his father Isaac by stealing Esau’s blessing. Rebekah was in on this as well because she helped Jacob deceive his father, Isaac. In Genesis 29, Laban deceived Jacob when he gave Leah to him in marriage instead of his other daughter, Rachel (whom Jacob loved). In Genesis 37, Joseph’s brothers deceived their father, Jacob, by saying that Joseph was killed by a wild animal as opposed to the truth that they sold him into slavery. In our chapter today, Joseph’s brothers lied about being honest, of all things. Also, it seems to me that Joseph deceived his brothers as well. He pretended not to know them. He acted like he didn’t understand the Hebrew language, thus needing an interpreter. Joseph seemed to be deceptive by speaking harshly to his brothers when he had no reason to do so. He deceived them by telling them to go back and prove that they were honest men, then he ratcheted up the situation by giving them their money back, making them look even more dishonest. All of these acts of deception I listed were probably driven by fear and greed, and probably other things as well.

We have to remember that Joseph was not perfect. He was a sinner just like his brothers. He lived a far more righteous life than his brothers, but he was not without sin. Our tendency is to elevate Joseph above his brothers, and we should, to an extent. I’m not sure why Joseph deceived them. I have a hard time believing that it was God’s will though. Maybe he was too overwhelmed with emotion in order to deal with the situation. He didn’t know what to do, so he just did something. We do that sometimes too. We look back on a situation and say, “Why in the world did I do that?” You may not have been angry. You may have just been in a state of emotional overload. Maybe Joseph had some sort of fear. He had been thrown into prison for something he didn’t do. If I were him, I would have walked very carefully. Maybe he still had a
little bit of resentment in his heart towards his brothers. As we keep reading past our chapter, it appears to me that he had forgiven them. But you know how it is, you forgive someone but those feelings come back. He could have thought about what it would be like if he saw his brothers again. We’ve all done it. We’ve played out the situation in our heads over and over again. We might dream of the opportunity to get our revenge. I can’t imagine that there was absolutely no battle in Joseph’s head at all.

I’ve found that one way to solidify my words of forgiveness is to do something about it. Forgiveness wants you to talk with the person, but unforgiveness wants you to avoid them. Forgiveness will lead you to give, but unforgiveness will lead you to withhold. Forgiveness will drive you to speak kindly of the person, but unforgiveness will drive you to slander. Forgiveness is not a passive prayer that we say to God. It is something that starts with prayer to God but needs to end up with some sort of positive action. Not every situation of forgiveness is the same. For some special circumstances it might be better not to have any interaction with the person who has offended you. I don’t believe that we get a clear answer from Scripture as to why Joseph did what he did. As we’ll read later on, he showed the acts of someone who had forgiven his offenders. The story in Genesis 42 was a crossroads moment for Joseph’s brothers to believe the best about God. It is also a story of a crossroads moment for Joseph to give the best from God.

“Then the man who is lord over the land said to us, ‘This is how I will know whether you are honest men: Leave one of your brothers here with me, and take food for your starving households and go. But bring your youngest brother to me so I will know that you are not spies but honest men. Then I will give your brother back to you, and you can trade in the land.’ ”

As they were emptying their sacks, there in each man’s sack was his pouch of silver! When they and their father saw the money pouches, they were frightened. Their father Jacob said to them, “You have deprived me of my children. Joseph is no more and Simeon is no more, and now you want to take Benjamin. Everything is against me!”

Then Reuben said to his father, “You may put both of my sons to death if I do not bring him back to you. Entrust him to my care, and I will bring him back.”

But Jacob said, “My son will not go down there with you; his brother is dead and he is the only one left. If harm comes to him on the journey you are taking, you will bring my gray head down to the grave in sorrow. – Genesis 42:33-38

 
What Jacob had feared was now facing him. He might lose Benjamin. When you personally go through a tough time it can be a difficult journey. But when your child is going through, or might go through, a difficult time, it can be debilitating. This is what Jacob was experiencing. But God is doing something. He was weaving a greater story into Jacob’s story. He is weaving a greater story into our story as well. I know it can be hard to believe this. I feel anxiety or fear when I look at some of my circumstances. But my God is the same God who provided a ram for the sacrifice in place of Isaac. In Genesis 22:14, He called the name of the place where God provided the lamb, “Jehovah jireh”. This means “The Lord will provide.” This knowledge of God should have been passed down from Abraham to Isaac to Jacob, then to Jacob’s children. They were on the verge of a great deliverance. If they had forgotten what God was really like, they were about to experience it, and not just hear about it. Some of you are on the verge of something great. You’ve hit a wall in your life. You’ve had to come face-to-face with someone that has brought back bad memories. But God is weaving a greater story of deliverance through your pain and confusion. You might be on the verge of not just knowing who God is but experiencing who He is.