From Prison to Prominence

Today on Redoing Your Mind with RC Sprawl, Joseph got in trouble because he said to his brothers when he was a boy and had had this dream that the time would come when he would be exalted over them.

And that, of course, didn't sit well with his brothers. And it resulted in Joseph's life being turned upside down. Sold into slavery, imprisoned and eventually placed in charge of a great empire, proving that Joseph's dream wasn't just a dream. But this is so much more than a rags to riches story. It's the bold proclamation that God is sovereign. He's in control of human events and he's faithful to his people.

We continue now with our study of the life of Joseph in our last session. We saw Hollard after two years.

The butler finally remembered Joseph when he realized that Pharaoh had been so profoundly distressed by this dream that he had.

And so after 13 years of trial and tribulation, Joseph is about to be vindicated. We pick up the story in chapter 41, beginning at verse 14. Then Fay Rose sent and called Joseph and they brought him quickly out of the dungeon.

Maybe that day they brought him quickly.

But it wasn't quick enough to satisfy Joseph. He'd been there about three years and he shaved, changed his clothing and came to Pharaoh. Interesting that that little detail is added there, that Joseph was given a new set of clothes because the clothes that he'd worn in prison were not fitting to appear before the pharaoh. And it was the custom of the Egyptian men at this period in history to be clean shaven. And Fero said to Joseph, I've had a dream and there is no one who can interpret it, but I've heard it said of you that you can understand a dream to interpret it. And so Joseph answered Pharaoh, saying. It is not in me. God will give Pharaoh an answer of peace.

The first thing that Joseph does here is expresses a statement of profound humility here. Pharaoh himself is talking to Joseph, who has been dragged out of prison. He's an exile. He's nothing in this land. And Pharaoh is at his wits end. And Pharaoh is saying, I've heard that you can interpret dreams and nobody can interpret mine. Please help me. I mean, want a time for justice to stand up there?

Let his chest swell out a little bit and say, don't worry about it. Another minute, Pharaoh. I'll interpret it for you. I can handle this.

As I said, it's not pay. It is not in me to interpret your dream. Only God can interpret your dream. And here is Joseph bearing witness to Fayre, the character of his God. And at the same time saying, I'll give you the answer, God will interpret this dream to give Pharaoh peace.

And so Pharaoh said to Joseph, Behold, in my dream I sit on the bank of the river.

Now, for the sake of time, I'm just going to skip over this part of the text, because all that we have here is the pharaoh's recounting of the dream, as we've already read it. And he speaks of the devouring of the fat cows by the skinny ones and the good grain by the bad grain. And then verse 25, we read this. Joseph said to Pharaoh, The dreams of Pharaoh are won. Now, that's something that obviously the other interpreters had missed.

Pharaoh, this really isn't two dreams. It's one dream. It's the same message given in two different forms. Joseph recognizing God's handiwork of confirming the truth by repetition.

And he says there's a unified message in both of these dreams. The dreams of Pharaoh are one. God has shown Pharaoh what he that is what God is about to do. The seven good cows are seven years and the seven good heads of grain are seven years. The dreams are one and the seven thin and ugly cows which came up after them or seven years, and the seven empty heads blighted by the East. When are seven years of famine? This is the thing which I have spoken to Pharaoh. God has shown Pharaoh what he is about to do. Indeed, seven years of great plenty will come throughout all the land of Egypt. But after them, seven years of famine will arise. And so all the planning will be forgotten in the land of Egypt and the famine will deplete the land so that the plenty will not be known in the land because of the famine.

Following it for it will be very severe and the dream was repeated to Pharaoh twice because the thing is established by God and God will shortly bring it to pass.

And so Joseph interprets the dream, the cows and the wheat are all about what is about to unfold in the nation of Egypt, seven years of plenty, followed by seven years of great distress and famine. Think about what famine can do to a nation. Think of Ethiopia, whose whole economy for the people of the land was found in cattle. They had no agriculture. They lived from their cattle and a cattle disease. A severe blight came and completely decimated the herds. And as a result, people in Ethiopia were dying by the millions in our own day. Bangladesh. Other places in this world where the famine comes and the crops are destroyed.

Now, in those days, they didn't have relief agencies from wealthy nations to transport goods and perishable food with airplanes and trucks and all of that.

So in that agricultural society, when a famine came not for one year, but seven years, it would be worse than the bubonic plague. Life itself would be threatened in the land.

Now, therefore, let Pharaoh select a discerning and wise man and set him over the land of Egypt. Let Pharaoh do this and let him appoint officers over the land to collect one fifth of the produce of the land of Egypt in the seven plentiful years and let them gather all the food of those good years that are coming and store up grain under the authority of Pharaoh and let them keep food in the cities. Then that food shall be as a reserve for the land for the seven years of famine which shall be in the land of Egypt.

Let the land may not perish during the farm.

So Joseph gives the word of God to the strongest politician on the globe and said it's time right now to introduce emergency measures of saving for the future.

And he said, what you need to do, Fayre, in each of the seven years of plenty, we have to impose a special tax, as it were. This is not the ordinary tax. This is a crisis tax of 20 percent.

20 percent of everything that is grown in this period is to be set aside in stores, cities as a reserve to have us able to meet the crisis of the famine when it comes. And you need to appoint somebody who is enable administrator. And I don't think we should jump to the conclusion that Joseph was suddenly suggesting himself here.

He's just simply this has to be done with no political machinations, no political chicanery, with the well-being, the real well-being of the people. In view. And reading about this text, I was amazed at the level of taxation in ancient lands. Not anywhere near the level of taxation in 20th century America or in the economies of the Western world, such as in Europe and Canada and elsewhere.

And yet here we are with a tax rate that far exceeds 20 percent in our country. And at the end of each year, we're deeper and deeper and deeper in debt. And as a nation, we are not saving. We are not protecting the future of our people. We are not setting up reserves for the future as God commands this ancient pagan king to do. Because the ruler is responsible to be a steward in the house of God, to be concern for the well-being of his people. By making provisions for the future. And you don't do that by spending more than you make. I don't know of any government on the face of the earth today that couldn't learn something very significant from this text. We are a world of wasteful consumers. Who exploit the goods and the resources of the land. And don't preserve things for the futures are silos are empty. As we spend and spend and spend, and the more we tax, the more we spend.

Now, this program here that Joseph is advocating in the name of God is similar to what some of you remember still from World War two, where there was rationing because there was a national emergency and people were saving lard and silk and paper and all of these supplies in order for there to be a future for the nation.

And the people understood that sacrifice was needed for survival. Because we were engaged in a world conflict and those kinds of severe situations call for sacrifices to be made in order to protect the future of the land and of the people. It's no different from what God is calling Fayre to do.

That food shall be as a reserve for the land for seven years of famine, which shall be in the land of Egypt, that the land may not perish during the famine, first 37 of Chapter 41. So the advice was good in the eyes of Pharaoh and in the eyes of all his servants.

I remember a man making a statement several years ago in the midst of a political debate. He made this claim. He said, I wish that we will have statesmen who will look to the next generation instead of politicians who look only to the next election. That's stuck in my mind. That's the difference between a politician and a statesman. The statesman is concerned about the future generations. The politician is only thinking short term. What do I have to do to get reelected? Instead, what do I have to do that will really benefit the nation? Statesmen are hard to find. But Fay Row, at least this pharaoh was a statesman and he was looking for the future of his people.

And so Pharaoh said to his servants, Can we find such a one?

Is this a man and whom is the spirit of God?

Verse 39, Pharaoh said to Joseph in his Much as God has shown you all this, there is no one as discerning and wise as you. You shall be over my house and all my people shall be ruled, according to your word. Only in regard to the throne will I be greater than you and Pharaoh said to Joseph C.. I have set you over all the land of Egypt.

When God vindicates its servant, he does it royally, really royally, far above and beyond. Anything Joseph could ask or think that's God. That's the promise that's made again and again in the New Testament, that if we are willing to endure suffering and humiliation for a season, that God has promised a future for his people beyond what I has been ever to see or hear, has ever heard or has even entered into the thoughts of man we can't imagine.

The wonderous things that God has in store for his people who will trust him in the times of languishing in prison.

Again, the irony of God's sovereign providence here, Joseph got in trouble because he said to his brothers when he was a boy and had had this dream that the time would come when he would be exalted over them.

Just a few scruffy Hebrew guys.

And he got in trouble with his parents when he said there will be a time when he would be over them. Two people. And now Farrow said, I am going to appoint you over everybody in my kingdom except me. Now, who does that include?

The butler who forgot him. Potter for who put him in prison.

And Port offers wife. Whose lies put him in prison in the first place? Can you imagine?

And the next issue of the Egyptian Gazette, part of first wife picks up the paper and sees this servant, this slave that she had slandered is now the prime minister.

I mean, she's saying the for it. You think be nice for us to go home, trip her vacation. I see them mad and for Syria or some place in a heartbeat to escape because how do they know how vengeful Joseph might be?

Then verse 42. Then Fero took his signet ring off his hand. And put it on Joseph Sand.

And he closed him in garments of fine linen and put a gold chain around his neck, and he had him ride in the second chariot, which he had, and they cried out before him, bough the knee. So he set him over all the land of Egypt.

All of these symbols of power are transferred to Joseph.

And it's not that Pharaoh said go out and make a ring just like mine. So that Joseph can have one, too. No Pharaoh takes off his own signet ring. That is the sign of his unique royal authority and says, Put it on, Joseph.

And he gives him the garments of fine linen, the garments of royalty in Egypt. Were there, the garments were white rather than purple and some of the other ancient kingdoms. Fine white linen.

And yet in his own private chariot.

And that'll be the second cherry. When we had the royal procession and Fay Row drives in the first chariot, the second chariot will be manned by Joseph second in command in the whole nation.

Now, that may seem extreme and extravagant, and you might think that is acting a little bit impetuously. But do you realize, first of all, Joseph has just saved the kingdom?

Favor would be king over nothing in 14 years without Joseph. He would have been unprepared for the devastating famine that would have destroyed his land.

Not only that, but he would still be trying to figure out this mysterious message that he had received.

Now, again, we have to read between the lines. Obviously, Faye Roe, who is inclined initially to think that Joseph might have an extraordinary degree of wisdom and might be useful in this place of power and authority, that he needed somebody. But obviously he was getting more information about Joseph and finds out that Joseph track record is one of unparalleled excellence and administration.

He's found this man I once told somebody, I said, I need somebody to work for me.

I have a job opening Ligonier and the pay is terrific. It's the pay is two hundred thousand dollars a year.

People say, well, what job do you have that offers two hundred thousand dollars a year? I said the job I'm offering for two hundred thousand dollars a year is a job where somebody can come to live in here and take care of all my problems. So I want to say, well, here's the problem, first problem I have is where to find it. Two hundred thousand dollars.

That's just a sort way of saying good help is hard to find, particularly when you get to the responsibility of that kind of management to manage an entire kingdom.

In times of. Crisis.

Now, it's also important to understand that they're the place where Joseph was put was not only the head of peacetime operations in the land, but he was also in charge of war.

He was the chief executive officer for domestic concerns, but he was also the commander in chief of the armies of Egypt. All of that responsibility given to a slave, taken from a dungeon.

That's gone. That's what God does when he raises up a will and brings the mighty down from their throne. That's the power that we see displayed in the life of Joseph.

It is helpful for us to remember who's in charge of nations and the people who lead them. And as believers, we can trust that God's timing is perfect, just as his ability to fulfill his plan is perfect. Thanks for joining us for Renewing Your Mind on this Saturday as we continue our C Sprawl series each week on the program. If you'd like to continue your study, we'd be happy to send you this full 20 part series. Contact us today with your donation of any amount. We've put together several other teaching series, including the parables of Jesus Knowing Scripture, Ecclesiastes, these Galatians and Knowing Christ. We've called it the Arcy Sprawl Teaching Collection, and you can request it with your gift of any amount when you go to Renewing Your Mind dot org, or when you call us at 800 four three five, 43, 43. The story of Joseph reminds us that too many times God uses the most unlikely people and circumstances to accomplish his purposes. Think about it for a moment. The pharaoh of Egypt had no intention of preserving the Israelites so that the messiah could come. But that's exactly what God did through him. And as we go through scripture and study accounts like this, it gives us hope, especially in challenging times like we're facing today. I hope your requests the RC Sprawled teaching collection to receive eight full teaching series, including The Life of Joseph. Our phone number again is 800 four, three, five, four, three, four, three. In our Web address is Renewing Your Mind, dot org. Our goal as a ministry is to help you grow in your faith. We hear from many of you that did Table Talk magazine has been a helpful resource. Each issue features challenging articles on a variety of topics biblical truth has presented clearly keeping a faithful eye to the historic Christian faith. If you've never subscribed to table talk before, let me invite you to request a free month trial subscription. Just go to try. Table talk dot com. Well, what more can we learn from Joseph story? Let's hear from Marcy again.

We could easily look at this event in the life of Joseph and in the history of Egypt and see at first glance the wisdom of the program that Joseph is recommending to Pharaoh for saving for future famine.

And it would be easy, as I've already mentioned, to look at stark contrast between that and the way we manage nations today. And it's easy to throw stones at our politicians and our governments, but it goes beyond that. This kind of stewardship is to begin in the home. With us. That the principle that we have in scripture is that each family is responsible to provide for the needs of that unit.

The Bible says that the father or the husband who fails to provide for his own household is worse than an infidel. Worse than an unbeliever. And the word provide means to look ahead.

To make provisions for the needs of his family. And you don't do that by spending more than you take in.

You don't do that without providing reserves for the rainy day or worse for the days when it never rains and nothing grows.

And so this principle applies not only to pharaoh earthly governments, but it provides to us.

Well, next Saturday, we will learn the details of Joseph's food savings plan. God's wisdom allowed Joseph to save the lives of countless people. It's a message titled Feast and Famine. So we hope to see you right back here for Renewing Your Mind next week.