Having begun what has no end
Genesis 50 · Vern Peterman · Apr 5, 2009
Genesis, No. 60
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926129407659

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

A blessed morning to you. Before I do, I'll just briefly mention I was talking with Bruce just before the service began, just letting him know I'd be making another trip to Uganda here towards the last half of next month, and I'll share some more details about that coming up here. I'm sure just as interesting, but also be very focused trip. So anyway, I'll talk about that more as the time gets closer. Here we are in Genesis chapter 50.

We call it the end of the beginning. Okay? Not the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning. It's been a book of beginnings as we started, believe it or not, the end of 2007. Okay? We started with the words, in the beginning, in the beginning God created. And so now, as we proceed through the book, we saw that it addressed the beginning of the world, the beginning of life, and of all mankind. And this was the way we graphically represented it with the creation days and on the seventh day God rested.

And really a dynamic introduction. As we get here into chapter 50 though, we kind of get some perspective. Genesis is told about the beginning of the Gentiles, that is all the non-Jewish ethnic groups. And we see that described and detailed to some degree. as well as the Jews. That's what's been the focus here particularly since the twelfth chapter where we introduced this fellow Abraham and have proceeded now as of this last chapter to talk about the future of the twelve tribes. And we even see some of that continuing here as we look at this last chapter of Genesis. It's indeed the end of the beginning. It's been a book of beginnings and now we're coming to the close of that. The rest of it is the unwinding and the unwrapping and the unfolding of what was begun here in the beginning.

So here's Genesis, the big picture, okay? We want you to have on your brain and have memorized, as we said earlier, the book of Genesis. We want you to have Genesis on the brain, okay? We want you to memorize the book, and the way that we said to do that, to memorize the entire book of Genesis, was this. So I'll ask you for the last time to say it with me, okay? Creation, Fall, Flood, Nations, and the next four, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph. And that's how this book wraps up.

And now you've got it memorized, right? Okay. And if it helps you, by the way, to remember, you know, like Courtney flings Fig Newtons, if that helps, then that's great. Okay? If it helps you to think of, you know, Alan is just joking, then that's fine too. Okay. Now, this is the summary, and that's what this slide is about. It's a summary of the chapter.

It's a death mourned, a forgiveness confirmed, and another death. Genesis 50 begins with the response of Joseph and many others to the death of Jacob, now at 147 years old. We previously laid out this little chart here, which shows here's Abraham, who lived to 175. Isaac, his son, living to 180, and now Jacob, 147. And that kind of summarizes the life and death of these three patriarchs. Now, the next part, the middle of the chapter, is after Jacob dies, Joseph's brothers fear that Joseph will take revenge. They're very stressed about it. And if you have a technical background at all, you'll understand that this is stress. Okay, I blew over most of you.

Okay, Joseph confirms his forgiveness. Oh, that's great. I see you back there smiling. Okay, so somebody got it. Alright, Joseph confirms his forgiveness of his brothers, declaring his perspective on what has taken place. He has already said it before, as we'll see, but he declares again, look, you guys don't need to worry, and here's why. Here's how I see it. And because of that, you don't have to worry. And then finally, Joseph himself dies and is placed in a coffin in Egypt. That's the summary of this final chapter here.

Let's walk our way through it, beginning with those first, say, eleven verses. Jacob was said to be gathered to his people. We mentioned that last week. Kurt read it for us here this morning. And so as Jacob was gathered to his people, it makes reference to, he didn't just fade away, he didn't just bury his bones and he's done. But it makes reference to a life after this one. It makes reference to this isn't all. And boy, this is really important.

We'll talk about this some more. But really an important perspective. You know, because the world just doesn't get it. The world doesn't get it. It's like all you do here is what counts. God's Word says no, that isn't all there is. As a matter of fact, this is just the beginning. This is decision time for how the rest of eternity is going to turn out. Okay?

Joseph says goodbye to his father with tears and kisses. Think about Joseph here. A kind of a unique position. He spent the first 17 years of his life having close contact with his father. His father, probably with some error involved, looked upon him as the favored son. But the first 17 years of his life, he spent with his father and then he spent two decades and a little bit more apart from his father, most of that time not having any idea what his father thought, what his father knew, or whether he'd ever see him again. And now he has spent the last 17 years of his life, almost like a perfect bookend, the last 17 years of his life in close proximity to his father.

Isn't that interesting? What a very interesting kind of life it is for Joseph now. And finally, this is the last goodbye. Joseph's father has given blessings to the son. And now it's over. And Jacob is gathered to his people. Joseph orders his father embalmed by the physicians.

I put the physicians in quotes and the reason is I don't think you want these guys to work on you. These guys are not healing up anything. They're not treating any diseases. All they're doing is dealing with the body. We've got some pictures of the way they would work. Unlike today, they would use some kind of intravenous embalming fluid there. It would be sort of a bath in embalming fluid. Then they would have drying compounds to dry out the body.

And this whole process would go on for weeks. But these guys are not the sort of physicians you want working on you if you have anything that needs to be cured, believe me. The Egyptians mourned Jacob's death for 70 days. Now that's a long time to cry. The way they did it, 70 days would be the kind of mourning that you would have for a nobleman and they would actually have hired mourners. People that were supposed to keep on this wailing and crying for this whole period of time. All the while the Egyptian priests are doing what they do to prepare the body and to get things ready.

Jacob was given kind of Egyptian dignitary kind of honors. although he had come from the outside because he was Joseph's father. Jacob's family and a great many of the Egyptians as well travel the area east of the land of Canaan. They find a threshing floor there and again mourn Jacob's death for seven days and then they enter into the land of Canaan for the final burial.

Now Jacob, before he had died, made Joseph promise. He said, you must bury my body in Canaan. This is the land that God promised him. It's also the land that God had promised Isaac and the land that God had promised to Abraham. And specifically, not just somewhere there, but in the cave, you know the one, The one where Abraham and Sarah and Isaac are all buried.

That one. Here is the old city of Hebron. Here is the structure. where that burial place is. Here's what it looks like on the inside, and it's locked up. There's some Arabic there on the faceplate, but because the Arabs have control of it right now. By the way, the Arabs claim descent from Abraham, so that's why they would have an interest in it. The last time anybody went into it was back some four decades ago when a 12-year-old girl, she was small enough, actually was lowered down inside there and got to go inside and see the tombs. So very interesting.

Apparently is genuinely the place. Who was buried there? This is not something on your handout, but Sarah and Abraham. Sarah was the first one buried there by Abraham. And then Isaac and Rebekah. Leah, as Jacob makes known, just in the prior chapter. And then, as we see here, Jacob himself. So those at least are the ones who are buried there. Rachel is not. She was buried elsewhere near Bethlehem. There may have been others, but at least these are the ones that are identified there in that same place in Genesis.

So here's Jacob where he'd made Joseph promise, you will take me, take my body to the promised land. Jacob's body is buried there just as Joseph had promised to his father, Jacob. And so there it is in the city of Hebron. Because of God's promise to him and God's relationship to him, Canaan was Jacob's heart's home. You get that? Canaan was Jacob's heart's home.

That's important. It's important, why? Because it's important for us to think about where is our heart's home? Now, a number of you may have a place that you think of it, boy, that's really home to me. And maybe it's where you live now. And maybe it's some place where you used to live. You think of, boy, that's really home to me on planet Earth. But I think one of the things that the New Testament is abundantly clear on, and that is we ought to have a heart's home into a place we haven't physically been to yet.

Heaven is where my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is now, where I'm seated with Him. It's a good thing that I be occupied with Him there. Heaven is where I have a citizenship. Heaven is where I have a citizenship. How did I get a citizenship? because of Christ. That's where I have a citizenship. That's my heart's home. That's where I belong. I'm visiting here, but that's where I belong.

Heaven is where I am to set my mind. So the first two are statements of fact that I believe. is an action on my part to set my mind. It isn't just taking my gray matter and putting it there or somehow getting thrust up there on a rocket. This is something that we do as an action to set our minds in that place, that place where we have our citizenship, that place that is to be our hearts' home, that place where Christ is now seated, that place where we can be occupied with Him. That place where we can live from. Heaven is where I'm to set my mind. And finally, heaven is the place from which I eagerly anticipate my Savior to come to take me to be with Him.

That's why we started off with this picture and the quote up at the very front there. Our heart's home is something that's, well, it matters a lot. It matters a great deal. And that's as I look at this passage here in Genesis. Here, Jacob, the father of the whole tribe and tribes of Jews, says, that's my heart's home. Put my body there.

The verse that I think I've taken a partial quote from, looking for the blessed hope. You see, we can hope for various things, can't we? Yeah? We can hope for this or hope for that, and maybe you have some hopes like that. You know, you hope this politically, or hope that politically, or you hope this doesn't happen, or this other thing does happen, and that's okay. But the blessed hope, the singular hope, is the hope that has me looking for Him. the hope that says, you know, I may have all kinds of hopes here on planet earth, but it would be wonderful if the Lord came, and I hope it's today.

Which body, which place? The Egyptians took great care, and especially those who are wealthy and higher socioeconomic status, to prepare this present body. If you've ever seen anything about Egyptology, what they would do is they would prepare this present body to be resurrected. I think they did it wrong, but nonetheless, that's what they thought they were doing.

To live eternally here on Earth. And so they would prepare the body, and they would prepare a place for this resurrected present body to live here on planet Earth. And that's why you would see them going through all these procedures that they go through. And that's why you see the tombs and paintings, because it was all a nice place for the pharaoh and all the other noblemen to be forever, to live in those painted hallways, to live in those tombs.

That's what they thought that they were doing. They would take out several internal organs. They would even take the brain out and put those in jars as part of their preparation. Why? I have no idea. What did they think they were doing? What are you going to do without a brain? But anyway, that's what they thought they were doing.

They went to prepare a place. Remember how Christ says, I go to prepare a place for you? These Egyptian priests went to prepare a place on this present earth for the Pharaoh and those of the noble class. They worked very hard. They had everybody working hard, doing these paintings inside, forming all these things, even those great pyramids that you see pictures of. By the way, the Jews didn't build those. Those were already built by the time they got there.

Those were places for the Pharaoh and those in his court and the noblemen. Those were places for them to supposedly spend forever their afterlife. But God has taken great care for each one of us to prepare each of us spiritually and ultimately to have a new and kind body like Christ's resurrected body. Prepare a place, not here, there. Prepare a place with Him.

And here's an interesting thing in Matthew 8.11, Christ said, I say to you that many will come from east and west and recline at the table with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven.

So Jacob's not done. And matter of fact, I'll just say this confidently, you will see him. if you're a believer here today. If you have done so much as to believe that Christ died for your sins and was buried and rose again, you will get to see this guy. He'll be there. Here is the way we've simplified it for the sake of your handout, but that time is coming and may be very close.

Jesus in answering the Sadducees, and they were Sadducees because they believed there was no resurrection. He said, but regarding the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God? I am, which is by the way quoting from where Moses was talking to the Lord through the burning bush, I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. is spiritually alive. And we will see him. Now, next comes the middle of the chapter in what for the brothers is an uh-oh moment.

Like when Esau swore that when his father Isaac died, he would kill Jacob. Jacob's brothers are thinking, okay, well, here's a family tradition. When Jacob dies, is Joseph going to have us done in? After all, what we did to him in selling him like a slave was nasty, with probably more than one S. It was a nasty thing for them to do. And they're thinking, uh-oh, now that our father is dead and Joseph has all the power to pull this off, all he has to do is give the order and we are toast.

So they're worried about this. They're worried that Joseph is going to take revenge on them. This has been a fear that you can imagine has been stewing in their minds for 17 years. Can you imagine that? Them going along thinking, when dad dies, so do we. When dad goes, we're toast.

Imagine them worrying about that, worrying for the sake of themselves, for the sake of their families, maybe even their grandkids. Worrying and stewing and fretting and wringing of hands, the whole thing. Joseph had already told them, hey, don't worry about it. But still they're worried. They're really worried.

Look at what Joseph had already told them back in chapter 45 when he talked to his brothers. And this is when he first reveals to them in verse 4, I am your brother Joseph. Of course, that's blowing their circuits about this point in time. Verse 5 he tells them, Now do not be grieved or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. Is Joseph still resentful? Does he have a perspective that now I'm really going to sting my brothers because I can? No, you don't see that. Let's look ahead in verse 7.

God sent me before you to preserve for you, you, okay, they're not getting that, right? For you, a remnant in the earth and to keep you alive by a great deliverance. They've forgotten all this. Now, therefore, it was not you who sent me here, but God. You thought you were selling me to the slave traders. It was God sending me here.

Why? To preserve for you a remnant to keep you alive. Even after those words of assurance, they are worrying for 17 years. Wow! What Joseph wants to get across to these guys is, guys, I really do mean it. I really do forgive you. So they send notice to Joseph. They come with a message. Our Father said to forgive us. Now notice, even in their wording, they admit that what they did was wrong. And they have before. But they say it again. They admit that what they did was wrong. No debating or denying that. Joseph's response was to weep. Guys, you don't get it! All this time you've been worrying needlessly.

Didn't you believe me when I told you that God sent me here? You thought you were selling me. I see it as God sending me. You thought you were doing me wrong. God saw it as doing right. You think that I'm going to do in your whole life, God sent me here so that you'll live.

So Joseph weeps. He says, you guys don't get it. He came back with a very insightful question. It's this, am I in the place of God? Joseph is recognizing in this question that revenge is an attempt at taking God's place in carrying out justice. This is a very important insight, one that we ought to pay attention to. God's answer to resentment, anger, and rage, and this fits in with the diagram that you've got on your first page there, God's answer is that God is absolutely and totally just. He will deal with every injustice of all time in one of three places. First of all, every sin was born on the cross. Every. Every sin was born on the cross. Secondly, sometimes Sometimes justice gets carried out here on earth. That is usually what causes us to have resentment, anger, and rage is the sometimes and not always. You ever notice that?

It's the, that didn't quite happen the way I wanted it to. That guy didn't get the punishment he deserved. That guy got off on a technicality. That guy really did it, but they weren't able to nail down enough evidence. What that person did to me was really, really wrong, but it wasn't illegal. So he's not going to pay. Those kinds of things fail to recognize that the Lord is ultimately the one who carries out justice, isn't He?

And for the things that for some of us might be a cause for just smoldering resentment, grudge. For another of us might be a, I'm hitting the top of the thermometer right now. I'm ready to blow up. Or I am going to work out some revenge. Ultimately, God will also deal with everything in eternity. Even those things that I do that are not right as a believer will be judged, won't they? We will stand before the Lord. Now, the Lord's not looking to punish me when I walk through heaven's gates, and neither for you. But there will be justice, won't there? There will be justice. For us who believe, the Lord is looking for maximum reward. But there are some things that are not rewardable.

There's also another distinction to be made, and it comes out in these last chapters of Genesis. Forgiving and trusting are not the same. We are called to forgive at every turn, not carry a grudge. not to have a heart that seeks revenge, not to have smoldering and burning anger, knowing, as Paul put it, God in Christ has also forgiven each one of us. Romans 12, 19, never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, vengeance is mine, I will repay.

Did somebody not get the justice that they deserve? Did somebody get away from punishment? No, they didn't. God's a God of absolute justice. It will all be dealt with, ultimately. All of it. There is nothing to get angry about. There is nothing to have rage about. There is nothing to have resentment and grudges about. God will deal with it all.

In many cases, He already has. While we must forgive readily, it has to be verified that the person who has offended can be trusted. Sometimes that may be a long time. There may even be instances where that can never happen. What do I mean by that? Here's Genesis 42 through 44.

Joseph worked diligently to find out if his brothers could be trusted. Oh, he was eager to forgive them. You notice his response, I'm Joseph, forget about forgiveness, that's not even a question. Forgiveness, microseconds. But he spent several chapters trying to find out, can these guys be trusted? Have they changed? Our Lord Though when he was on the cross, he said, Father, forgive them. They know not what they do. He also had it recorded in his word. There are places he didn't trust them. So trust and forgiveness are two different things, an important distinction to make.

Joseph brings it together. God meant it for good. The key to Joseph's perspective here He finally came to understand God was the one who sent him to Egypt, who worked everything out for the good of saving, that is physically, Joseph's family, the extended family. God was the one who sent me here so that all of you could be kept alive.

And a similar truth applies to us. It's not an identical truth, but similar. God works all things, that is, all circumstances, so that the good of our conformity to the image of Christ is carried out in those circumstances. Now, here again is an important area of distinction. What do I mean by that? It doesn't mean that everything is basically good.

Bad things will happen. People will do bad things. But God will still work all those things together for good. Bad things have happened. It wasn't good. Can God work things together for good to conform believers to Christ? Yes. Bad things will happen. Things you look at and say, this is not good. But God will still carry out His promise. We can count on it, absolutely, that each believer will ultimately be conformed to the image of Christ. No matter how bad the circumstances get. Hopefully you don't have that happen.

And then finally the chapter goes on to, now it's Joseph's turn. The Egyptians of the working class, including all those agricultural laborers who worked under Joseph, could expect to live into their forties. And that was about it. Fifty years old for the average working class Egyptian was kind of towards the upper limit. Joseph, however, by God's blessing and by higher standard of living, lives to be 110 years old before he dies.

Not as old as his father, but nonetheless much older than most of the Egyptians. As an Egyptian nobleman, he would have his body embalmed and placed in a coffin, somewhat similar to how his father had been treated. Joseph's body too would be taken to the promised land, but this is interesting, not until centuries later.

It's recorded in Exodus 4.19 that Moses took the bones of Joseph with him when he led the Exodus. That was right before the recording of the parting of the Red Sea. Here he is taking the bones of Joseph with him. Isn't that interesting? Yeah, we'll carry this out, Joseph. It'll just be a few hundred years, right?

It's recorded in Joshua 24.32 that they took his bones to Shechem. And they were left there in the promised land. So Genesis begins here, what has no end. Genesis is the book of beginnings because God made promises. Realize if God hadn't made any promises that he could just truncate things there at the end of Genesis and we'd all be done. There wouldn't be a need for the rest of the books.

But God made promises. He made promises to Abraham about a land, this land of Israel. He told Abraham, the land that I will show you. He said to Isaac and to Jacob, yeah, this one that you're in right now. About a seed or descendants, ultimately Christ. And about blessing, which includes several things, but also ultimately Christ as well. Those promises were repeated to Isaac and to Jacob. I thought it was interesting going through this to find out that God didn't just make the promises to Abraham and then say, you tell your sons about it and your grandsons. God made the promises again directly to Isaac and to Jacob.

So it was personal. Here's something else it does. It has to do with relationship with the Lord, doesn't it? Relationship with the Lord. So when Jacob says, take me back, take my body back to the promised land, it had to do with his relationship with the Lord. Not just this is a tradition I got from my grandfather.

It's because God made those most gracious promises that this world is still here. That the Bible goes beyond the book of Genesis. And there are things yet to be fulfilled on the earth. The Bible contains about 10,000 prophecies. About 5,000 of those have been fulfilled. About 5,000 are yet to be fulfilled. Isn't that interesting? That's a lot of prophecies. And you know what it says? There's a lot yet to happen. But we can count on them as faithfully as the Lord has fulfilled the first 5,000. Can't we? We can trust Him for those things.

This family of Jacob will even show up again in the last chapters of Revelation. It had a great and high wall, this is the New Jerusalem, with twelve gates and at the gates were twelve angels and names were written on them which are the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel. Recognize even to the end. See, when God makes promises, He keeps them for good.

In fact, let's put it this way. He keeps them forever. Isn't that great? Isn't that wonderful? When the Lord makes promises, He keeps them on into eternity. Isn't that a tremendous thing? That we can count on Him and depend upon Him. And just like with Jacob, it's all about relationship. It's about our fellowship with Him. That's why these things matter, and that's why His promises matter. Not so we can keep a list of the rules and keep a list of the promises to hold God to it, but because the Lord desires relationship and fellowship with us. Let's pray.

Lord, as we've stepped our way through this certainly lengthy book, but also a very full book, we thank You that Your character has been revealed page after page, chapter after chapter, that your intent has been revealed. And the things that you have promised, we can count upon. And who you are can also be counted upon. We thank you for your love, your grace, your mercy shown and shared. And we thank you for your marvelous glory and give you praise. In Jesus' name, Amen.