It Is Enough

A father who thought his son was dead. Next on Renewing Your Mind, the Reunion that Saved a Nation. Joseph was sold into slavery as a teenager by his brothers and spent much of his young adult life as a prisoner. But God's plan of redemption was still at work. When famine forced Joseph's family to look for food in Egypt, Joseph had compassion on his brothers.

And today Dr. R.C. Sproul shows us how this joyful family reunion points ahead to the coming Messiah. Finally, we have seen Joseph reveal his true identity to his brothers. And when he does that, he sends them back home saying, hurry home, get our father and our children, and come back down here. And he gives them all these provisions for their journeys, and he bestows enormous wealth upon his one total blood brother, Benjamin, and sends them packing. And when they come home and talk to Jacob and tell him that Joseph is still alive, we remember that the Scripture said that Jacob's heart stood still.

And so we pick it up today in chapter 45 of Genesis, beginning at verse 27. Jacob was reluctant to believe the report of his sons. But, we are told, when they told him all the words which Joseph had said to them, and when he saw the carts which Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of Jacob their father revived. Then Israel said, now remember, here we have this change in the text from the reference to Jacob to the reference to Israel. You remember they refer to the same person because God had given Jacob the name Israel when he had wrestled with God.

And so we read, then Israel said, it is enough. Joseph, my son, is still alive. I will go and see him before I die. What biblical character immediately comes to mind when you hear that narrative?

I mean, it just jumps into my head. This is the pre-incarnation of the venerable Simeon in the New Testament, who had waited for so many years for the fulfillment of the promise the Holy Spirit had made to him that he would not die until he saw the Lord's Messiah. And you recall when Joseph and Mary brought the infant Jesus into the temple, Simeon saw him and picked him up and sang the Nook de Midas, now let us thou, thy servant, depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen the salvation of Israel. That's what Jacob is saying in his elder years. It is enough. How often we choke before ever saying those words, it is enough, in a positive sense. We are quick to utter them in the midst of affliction, in the midst of trouble. The least bit of trouble, we're quick to say, that's enough.

I don't want any more. But in terms of our relentless pursuit for happiness, for joy, for contentment, when do we ever say it's enough? When do we ever reach that place in the journey of life where we are truly content and truly satisfied? Here is Jacob in his older years, and you know those of us who are getting old, we have a tendency to adjust our goals, and we don't have a whole lot of aspirations left because we don't have a lot of time left to reach them. But still we have hopes that something is going to come into our lives that will fully satisfy all the longings of our heart.

But rarely do we say, it's enough. Jacob said, it's enough. That's the greatest news I could ever receive. My son who was dead is alive. Not the same story as the prodigal son in the New Testament, but it's the same response when the prodigal son came home, not that Joseph was the prodigal son in any way, but when the prodigal father saw his son coming back, nothing could possibly exceed the joy of that moment. And that's why he had this big celebration that the brother was jealous about and he said, don't you see, my son was dead and now is alive.

He's gone and he's now returned. Jacob is saying, it's enough. Let me go and see him once and then I can die. I can die in peace.

I can die a happy man. Well, in chapter 46 we read these words, so Israel took his journey with all that he had and came to Beersheba, which is south of Canaan, between Canaan and Egypt, and he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac. And God spoke to Israel in the visions of the night, and he said, Jacob, Jacob. Now let me just pause here for a moment.

There's something a little bit startling here in this text. Jacob is thrilled beyond words when he said, now I can die in peace. Let me hurry down just once to behold my son alive. And so he leaves. He departs, but he gets as far as Beersheba, and then he offers a sacrifice to God. But in terms of this communication that takes place between God and Jacob, there's something that's slightly beneath the surface here.

We have to read between the lines a little bit. It seems to suggest that Jacob is beginning to get nervous as he approaches the border. After all, he's been the victim of lies from his sons before. Now he's not so sure that he wants to go over that border and go all the way down to Egypt and face possible peril. And so he offers a sacrifice to God, and he prays. And again, God, who as far as we know has been fairly silent in the life of Jacob lo these many years, you recall that at Bethel, God had revealed Himself years and years earlier to Jacob in his midnight dream. You remember that occasion where in the dream Jacob saw the angels of God ascending and descending on a ladder that bridged the gap between heaven and earth. And we recall that when he awakened, he trembled in awe and said, surely God was in this place, and I knew it not. And God had revealed Himself to Jacob and said to Jacob that He would be with him everywhere he went.

But Jacob was not a paper saint. Jacob was a human being, and there had to be tons of moments in his life where his sense was a sense of the absence of God, not the presence of God, where the fears of the flesh took hold of him. We remember just earlier, not very long before this, he had said, Jacob is no more. Simeon is no more, and everything is against me.

And he had come that close to falling into the absolute pit of despair. So now God appears again at night in a dream as He had done with Abraham and as He had done earlier with Jacob, and He speaks to him in this dream. Now some of you will recognize something unusual, strange, and significant about this address that God gives to Jacob.

Notice that God does not say to him, Jacob, but He says, Jacob, Jacob. I've given a message on several occasions that I call the double knocks of Scripture. I just do a quick overview of the whole Bible about the 15 or so occasions in sacred Scripture where somebody is addressed by the double mention of their name, wherein their name is repeated.

I've referred to that earlier in our teaching series here on Renewing Your Mind. We remember at Mount Moriah when Abraham had the knife poised to plunge into the heart of his own son Isaac, that when at that last second God stayed His hand, He cried to him saying, Abraham, Abraham, lay not thy hand upon thy son. We remember when God called the young Samuel when he was under the care and tutelage of Eli in the midnight vision, He called to him saying, Samuel, Samuel.

And Samuel said, Speak, Lord, for thy servant hears. Or David, when he received the news of the death of his son, he cried out in agony, Absalom, my son, my son. Or the occasion when Elijah was carried off into heaven in full vision of his disciple Elisha, and as Elisha saw the chariot coming down to take away his master Elijah, he cried out, My father, my father, the chariots of fire. In the New Testament, Jesus speaking tenderly to Martha, Martha, Martha, remember that, or in His lament over Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who stone the prophets and so on, how often I would gather you to my bosom as a hen gathers her chicks, but you would not. He speaks to Peter when Peter boldly presumes that he will never betray Jesus.

Jesus looks at him and says, Simon, Simon, Satan would have you and sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you. Or Saul on the road to Tarsus sees the bright light at midday and hears the voice in the Hebrew tongue calling to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? And perhaps the most poignant use of all is from the cross when Christ cries, Eloi, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? There's only a handful of times in all of Scripture where we have the repetition of the personal form of address. It is a Hebrew device that signifies deep personal intimacy. It's what Jesus warns about in the Sermon on the Mount when He says, on the last day, many will come saying what? Lord, Lord.

Pretending not only to know Him, but to be close personal friends, to be on an intimate basis with Him when He says, depart from me, I never knew you. But this is an emphatic form of personal address, and so in the midst of Jacob's uncertainty, in the midst of his fear, God speaks to him with the double knock, Jacob, Jacob. And Jacob said, here I am. And so he said, I am God. Now, what preceded this was a similar form of exclamation when the brother of the brothers said to them, I am Joseph. Well, one greater than Joseph is speaking here.

The voice says, I am God, the God of your father. Do not fear to go down to Egypt, for I will make of you a great nation there. I will go down with you to Egypt, and I will also surely bring you up again, and Joseph will put his hand on your eyes.

I will go down there. He could have said, I've already been there because I've been with Joseph these many years. But again, God renews His covenant promise. He renews His pledge that He had given years earlier to Jacob to be with him in his sojourn. Then Jacob arose from Beersheba, and the sons of Israel carried their father Jacob, their little ones and their wives, and the carts which Pharaoh had sent to carry him. So they took their livestock and their goods which they had acquired in the land of Canaan and went to Egypt, Jacob and all his descendants with him, his sons and sons' sons, his daughters, his sons' daughters, and all his descendants he brought with him to Egypt.

Then what follows in the rest of chapter 46 is a lengthy list of all of the people that went with him. And for brevity's sake, maybe this story is way too late to make this a short story, but we're going to skip over that to verse 26 of chapter 46 where we read this, "'All the persons who went with Jacob to Egypt, who came from his body, besides Jacob's sons' wives, were sixty-six persons in all. And the sons of Joseph who were born to him in Egypt were two persons. And all the persons of the house of Jacob who went to Egypt were seventy. And he sent Judah before him to Joseph to point out before him the way to Goshen, and they came to the land of Goshen. And so Joseph made ready his chariot and went up to Goshen to meet his father Israel. And he presented himself to him and fell on his neck and wept on his neck a good while.'"

Isn't that an interesting description? It wasn't just an emotional hug, a kiss on the cheek, and a warm embrace. He fell on his neck and wept, and he just hung on. What do you say after all those years? I've told this story before, but one of my most vivid memories from my childhood happened in 1945, I'll never forget it, when my uncle took my mother and my sister and me to the Pennsylvania Railroad Station in downtown Pittsburgh, this great big domed amphitheater type building. And as a little child, I walked into this huge place where there were hundreds and hundreds, perhaps thousands of people.

My recollection from my youth was that there was no room to move. It was just wall-to-wall people, and they were almost all wearing uniforms, the white of the sailors, the brown khaki of the army, and the dress blues of the Marines, and so on. Everywhere were servicemen. And we went through the outer place of the station and went back to where the trains came in, and there were several different docks where trains came from all over the place, and on every one of these docks there were just crowds and crowds of people. And a train had just come in, and I was standing on this platform, and I saw this huge crowd of people coming.

And about fifty yards down the platform, I saw a man in a uniform with a duffel bag over his shoulder that I only recognized from a photograph on my mother's dresser. Every single night, my mother used her typewriter to type air letters to my father, and when she was finished, she would let me crawl up in her lap, and she would point to the X key and the O key, and I would punch out the X's and the O's as an addition to these letters. And I saw my father fifty yards away, and I started running through this crowd of people, and he saw me coming.

I'll never forget it. He knelt down on one knee, put his duffel bag to the side, and opened his arms, and I flew the last twenty feet into his arms and hugged his neck and would not let go. That's what Joseph does to Jacob. He falls on his father's neck, and he can't let go, and he can't stop crying. And Israel said to Joseph, now let me die, for I have seen your face because you are still alive. After all the years in prison, all the time in exile, after all the loneliness in Joseph's life, his greatest dream was fulfilled. After a similar period of mourning and grief and perhaps bitterness in the soul of Jacob, his deepest dream was fulfilled. The father saw his son, and the son saw his father, and it was enough. It was enough for Joseph, and it was enough for Jacob. What a poignant moment for Jacob and Joseph, and what a great reminder for each of us to be satisfied with what the Lord gives us. Dr. Sproul will have more on that in just a moment, and I hope you'll stay with us.

We've been airing R.C. 's series, The Life of Joseph, here on the Saturday edition of Renewing Your Mind over the past several weeks. It's much more than an exciting story. There is rich theology in these final chapters of Genesis. That's the joy of studying Scripture, isn't it? We have the opportunity to learn God's character and His holiness, and we'd like to help you continue your study.

This Life of Joseph series is part of a bundle we call the R.C. Sproul Teaching Collection. When you request it, you'll receive eight full teaching series, including the parables of Jesus, Knowing Scripture, Ecclesiastes, Galatians, and Knowing Christ. Call us with your gift of any amount, and we'll send you these resources.

Our phone number is 800-435-4343, but you can also make your request and give your gift online at renewingyourmind.org. Here at Ligonier Ministries, our goal is to help you know what you believe and why you believe it. We do that by focusing on biblical studies, theology, worldview and culture, Christian living, and church history. One of the resources we offer in that letter category is Five Minutes in Church History.

It's a podcast by Dr. Stephen Nichols, and here's a sample. The 19th century, the 1800s, was a great century of modern missions. It was the century of William Carey and missionary expansion. Well, the 20th century witnessed even greater missionary activity.

And during the 20th century, this missionary activity was carried on even during and despite of world wars. That's from the episode on the 1910 Edinburgh Missionary Conference. And when you subscribe to Dr. Nichols' podcast, you'll hear about theologians and movements from 2,000 years of church history. Again, it's called Five Minutes in Church History, and just look for it wherever you listen to your podcast. While we learn much about contentment from Joseph and Jacob today, let's listen to a final thought from R.C. before we go. Have you ever asked yourself the question, what would it take to make you happy?

What's enough to do it? When will you be satisfied? I often tell the story how when I was a child I couldn't wait to be 16. I said, when I'm 16, then I'll be happy because I'll be able to drive a car. And I got my driver's license, but I postponed my day of happiness. I said, I'll be happy when I get out of high school.

Get that behind me. And then I'll be happy when I'm 21, and then I'll be happy when I'm married, and then I'll be happy when I get my first job, and then I'll be happy when we have children, and then I'll be happy when I get a new house, then I'll be happy, then I'll be happy, then I'll be happy. And these milestones come and go in our lives, and yet we're still not satisfied. There is no greater satisfaction in this world apart from the satisfaction that comes from the sweetness of our relationship to Christ than the satisfaction that comes from the love that we experienced from our children and the love that they experience from us. Far more valuable than any material possession or any singular achievement in this world is the deepest level of love that exists with people, and that's what we've just experienced. That's Dr. R.C. Sproul, and I'm Lee Webb inviting you to join us again next Saturday as we continue learning about God's faithfulness to His people, here on Renewing Your Mind.