Joseph Recognized by His Brothers (1788) by Jean-Charles Tardieu; image from Wikimedia Commons.
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An old friend of mine has been telling me about her granddaughter, who is only ten years old and loves to play sport.
She fell off of a trampoline last year and shattered her ankle. The surgery was difficult, and her bones didn’t heal properly. Fearing that her leg might not develop properly, her medical providers re-operated and re-broke and re-splinted the bone. They are still not sure whether the bone is properly healing, so she faces the possibility of yet another re-break and re-splint.
My friend grieves for her little granddaughter’s suffering. She wouldn’t hesitate to take her place, to suffer in her place if only she could.
We understand why the orthopedic specialists do this. They must bring short-term distress and suffering for her long-term benefit—so that in years to come she might run and play sports again with her friends.
We see Joseph doing just this to his brothers in Genesis chapters 42 to 44. He wounds them and brings them to their knees, so that he can heal and lift them up to full health. It is a picture of what Jesus does time and again with his beloved.
Desperation brings us to the Savior.
“When Jacob learned that there was grain in Egypt, he said to his sons, ‘Why do you look at one another?’” (Gen. 42:1).
The predicted seven-year famine threatened to destroy the region, including the covenant family—the sons of Jacob from whom God would raise up a blessed people to be a blessing to the nations. We see their pasturelands desiccating, herds emaciating, silos diminishing, wells turning first to mud, then to dust. Anxious Jacob sends his anxious sons to Egypt. “Behold, I have heard that there is grain for sale in Egypt. Go down and buy grain for us there, that we may live and not die” (Gen. 42:2).
This is how the journey to Christian faith often begins.
A financial crisis, a terrible accident, or a deadly sickness cripples us. A broken marriage or family crisis brings us to our knees. A great life disappointment slays us. Or we commit a great sin: something that shatters our idea of who we think we are. Sometimes all of these at once.
You look around for help, but the deluge has swept away every earthly support and hope. You are forced to look beyond: “I have heard that there is grain in Egypt.” “I have heard of the one they call Jesus.”
God had revealed to Jacob’s family his special plan for Joseph: that one day they would bow before him to receive his sustenance. The dreams made them jealous; they dismissed them as hubris. When the opportunity came, they plotted to murder Joseph, tossed him into a pit, and then sold him into foreign slavery.
Now in their hour of distress God forced them back to the one they tried to destroy, the only one who could help them.
President Eisenhower said that “there are no atheists in the foxholes…. In times of test and trial, we instinctively turn to God for new courage and peace of mind.” There is nothing wrong with this. This is no less sensible than dialing 911 in an emergency, or firing a distress flare from the life raft.
The Savior may harshly test us.
His brothers were prostrate before Joseph, pleading for his help. Yet, Joseph did not immediately throw his arms around his brothers with shouts of comfort and joy.
He recognized them but 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.” “You are spies,” he replied, “You have come to see the nakedness of the land” (“nakedness of the land” meaning “where our land is unprotected”; Gen. 42:7–9).
So Joseph initiated a long and difficult trial for his brothers. Why?
When last he saw his brothers, Joseph was in distress and pleading for his life (42:21). They cruelly ignored his pleas and sold him as a slave, never to see his home or family again.
Joseph needed to know: Had they changed? Were they still petty and jealous egoists with hearts full of malice and murder, or had they learned to love? Were they living in an opium cloud of self-righteousness, or had they confessed their crimes to God and sought his mercy and forgiveness?
“You are spies!” Spies were impaled. How would they react? Would they cut a deal and betray one another to find freedom?
Joseph threw them in a dungeon for three days, as they had once thrown him into the cistern. He forced them to acknowledge their guilt. Later, he hid their silver, their payment for Egyptian supplies, back in their baggage. Would they be honest? Then he put Benjamin’s life in the balance. Would they let Benjamin die, or free him by taking his place?
Jesus works hard on us because he loves us.
When a person comes to Christ, the Savior tests their heart and motives. Have they confessed their sin? Are they truly sorry for their sin, or are they sorrier for its consequences? Do they want to be freed and transformed from rebellion, or just freed from immediate pain?
Jesus pressed the distressed Peter—who had denied him three times—to re-profess his love three times over. Jesus left Saul blind for three days before descaling his eyes. He worked on David for three-hundred days after his murder and adultery, until his “bones wasted away” (Ps. 32:3), “for day and night your hand was heavy on me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer” (Ps. 32:4). Jesus works hard on us.
Joel Beeke condemns “the false invitation of decisionism” where people say a prayer “but remain enemies of God” (Reformed Systematic Theology, 2024). Martin Luther learned to fear God in the thunderstorm in 1505, but he was not converted until after a further ten years of trials and study. At the age of 23, John Newton cried out to the Lord from a violent ocean storm, but it was only after many more years of pain and wretched sinning that he came to full repentance and faith.
It is, however, only after becoming Christians that the Lord really begins his terrific—I use this adjective intentionally—work of affliction.
We must not harden our hearts against the startling ferocity of the Lord’s merciful discipline.
Every day he breaks and tears down strongholds of rebellion, willfulness, egoism, self-reliance, and hope and comfort in earthly people and things—anything and everything that hinders us from trusting and loving him in our totality.
Eliphaz knew this, and knew also the temptation to resent the Lord’s sanctifying discipline:
“Behold, blessed is the one whom God reproves;
therefore despise not the discipline of the Almighty.
For he wounds, but he binds up;
he shatters, but his hands heal. (Job 5:17–18)
Isaiah encourages us to look beyond the pain, to see that heaven will shine even brighter after such earthly trials:
Moreover, the light of the moon will be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun will be sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day when the Lord binds up the brokenness of his people, and heals the wounds inflicted by his blow. (Isa. 30:26)
James urges the same:
Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him. (James 1:12)
Hosea pleads that we do not harden our hearts against the startling ferocity of the Lord’s merciful discipline:
“Come, let us return to the Lord;
for he has torn us, that he may heal us;
he has struck us down, and he will bind us up.” (Hos. 6:1)
The Lord’s harsh discipline gives us the deep comfort of knowing that we are God’s beloved children:
My son, do not despise the Lord's discipline
or be weary of his reproof,
for the Lord reproves him whom he loves,
as a father the son in whom he delights. (Prov. 3:11–12)
Hebrews draws from these verses the lesson that an absence of discipline should alarm us to the possibility that we are not in fact God’s children:
It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. (Heb. 12:7–8)
We must store up rich silos of faith for the coming years of trial.
Our dear old friend Max, who has learned to be a Christian through long years of “dangers, toils, and snares,” recently urged us in our evening service to prepare for such suffering, through the knowledge of how God works in his children through trials. Max is right! If we don’t understand these things beforehand, it may be too late when the suffering comes. Joseph laid up a store of sustenance for the lean years, and we must store up rich silos of faith for the coming years of trial.
Joseph tested his brothers with tears in his eyes. He tested out of love, not vengeance. Nor did he stand above their suffering. He knew suffering, knew how to help them, and shared in it. Likewise,
We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. (Heb. 4:15)
Our Lord’s love for us is relentless; he will sanctify us at all costs: He will tear us to pieces, but he will heal us; he will injure us, but he will bind up our wounds.
In trials be patient and praise him for his wisdom and love.
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