Genesis 49:29-50:26 — God Will Re-Write The Story

Main Idea: Choose to see your life through the lens of God bringing good out of evil.

• Gen. 49:29-50:14 — Jacob dies, and is buried in Canaan in the family grave plot Abraham bought next to the trees and altar in Mamre.

• Gen. 50:15-21 — Joseph’s brothers fear that he’ll take revenge on them once Jacob dies, but he reaffirms his forgiveness and belief in God’s sovereignty to direct their evil actions towards good ends.

• Gen. 50:22-26 — Joseph dies, and commands Israel to bury his bones in Canaan when God calls them out of Egypt.

God is re-writing humanity’s story

• Humanity chose to reject God’s initial good design.

• Humans choose every day to rebel against God’s character.

• Jesus chose to reconcile us to God through His suffering & death.

• One day He’ll return to make all things right in the resurrection.

God is re-writing YOUR story

• Your choices (good or evil) can be used by God for good.

• Others’ choices that affect you can be used by God for good.

• You can view your life through the lens of broken human choices, or through the lens of God’s plans for human good & His glory.

SERMON TRANSCRIPT (AUTO-TRANSCRIBED BY APPLE PODCASTS)

Got to tell you guys, for a thousand different reasons, today is meaningful and impactful, not least of which is about three, yeah, about three years ago from September, so this month we're heading into.

I've been talking with our pulpit search committee here at Tabernacle and about, I think it was beginning of September, maybe mid, yeah, somewhere around in there, that it looked like, okay, they might be asking me and my family to come out here to

Tabernacle. And as I thought about coming out here, we were in Washington State, Central Washington State. And so I was like, okay, I'm going to move all across the country and be a senior pastor, be a lead pastor for the very first time.

And I was like, man, what would I love to be able to have as kind of the start of my ministry at that church, that no matter who comes in year five or year 10 or year 25, if the Lord tarries, what would I love for to be the basis of what our church

has learned as I got there? And I said, okay, Philippians, because it's nice and short, I think we did like 11 or 12 sermons through there. Okay, boom, Philippians, we got it down. You know, there's only four chapters that are there.

So I said, okay, I want to do Philippians. And then I want to go through the Gospel of John, because I don't want us to have like three years before we get to Jesus. So let's jump into the Gospel of John.

I want to do Genesis. That way we know what's the start of everything. What is the foundation of the Christian faith as God has laid out in scripture?

And I said, I want to do Daniel, because when I was going to be coming, that was going to be 2024. It was going to be an election year. And so I knew, all right, Americans go crazy during election year.

Let's see what the Bible has to say about how we should live and operate and believe and how we should interact with the world powers that are all around us. And we completed John several months ago. We completed Daniel last July.

We did the Apocalypse in July sermon series, kind of a twist on Christmas in July. And now we are finishing up Genesis. And so this was everything that the Lord had impressed on my heart three years ago.

These are the things that I want you to preach on. And so even as I approach this final message of Genesis, I am just filled with thankfulness to the Lord for. What He's done in this place and with these people.

And remember, I'm running on very little sleep, and so that's why there's all this like, but as I look around the room, and I see person after person that I started off with three years ago, and person after person that has come since I started

coming here three years ago, and I hope we have all joined in on this wonderful adventure together to say we are here to uplift Jesus, to help one another, to grow on our faith, and to show the love of God to everyone around us. There is no greater

mission. There is no greater thing that we could devote our lives to. So, enough blubbering, at least for now. We are going to be in Genesis chapter 49 and verse 29 through chapter 50 and verse number 26.

Title of the message today is God Will Rewrite the Story. God Will Rewrite the Story.

4:02

Sermon Introduction

I don't know how many of you are book readers. If you are like, man, I love either reading a book or maybe you are like an audiobook person and you like listening to books. If you fit into either one of those categories, could you raise your hand?

Do you either like love reading books or love listening to audiobooks? Okay, good amount of people. We have people that that is just not their thing.

Wonderful. You are not a lesser person for that. But those of you that have read books and enjoy reading books, have you ever had a book that you read through that at the end of it you went, that was awful.

Like that was the worst ending ever. I did not enjoy that. I can't recall right off hand if I have a particular book in mind that has done that.

I can think of at least like two or three TV shows that I've watched that like, you know, they ran out of money or something, or they were getting canceled at the very, you know, that season. And so it wasn't in the plan.

They didn't do any buildup to that point. And you're just going, wait a second, this just totally undercut all of the pathos, the emotions that you were feeling about these characters and this storyline. Man, this was just not a well-written story.

As we come to the stories of our lives, very often, we can look back and go, I wish that my story had been written a little differently.

I wish that I hadn't had those failures that I look back on now decades later, a year later, six months later, and go, oh, I shouldn't have done that, shouldn't have said that, shouldn't have treated them that way.

For some people, it's, I wish that someone else hadn't written themselves into my story. Circumstances of abuse, circumstances of unkindness, and being taken advantage of, unjust things that have happened over the last three years.

I've gotten to know and pray with and pray for each of you. I know that each of us have these situations where we go, I wish the story had been written differently.

What I love in this passage of scripture is that God says, I am rewriting the story even as you and I and other people, we think we're writing the story, but God has some edits along the way.

So what I want to encourage us today is to choose to see your life through the lens of God bringing good out of evil. Choose to see your life through the lens of God bringing good out of evil. Would you pray with me?

We'll dive into the passage and see what the Lord has for us. Dear Jesus, thank you for today. Lord, thank you for every person that is here, either in person or online.

I pray that you would bless them for the time that they are devoting to hearing from you and Lord, to learning about your kingdom and the way that your kingdom operates.

God, we pray that you would be with our hearts, help us to hear what you have for us from your word. Lord, I pray that you would only have me to say the things that you want me to.

And Lord, we pray that if someone here does not yet know Jesus as their Savior and their Lord, even as they hear about God's ability to rewrite a story, Lord, that they would say yes to God's desire to rewrite their story.

We love you, Lord, and we pray all of this in the name of Jesus. Amen.

7:14

Jacobʼs Death

Let's dive into the passage beginning in verse number 29. I encourage you, if you have a copy of God's word, follow along in that, or the verses are there on the screen for us as well.

It says, Then he, this is Jacob, commanded them, this is his like children and descendants, I am about to be gathered to my people. This is a way to think of death. Jacob says, I'm going to where Abraham and Isaac and Rachel and Leah have all been.

I'm going to be gathered to my people. Small side note, I'm not saying that any of you are old or ancient, but what a joy that in the day that Jesus calls us home, whether young or old, that we are going to be gathered to our people.

I love there was a quote from Matthew Henry that I read this week that says, if God's people are our people, then when we are gathered to our people, it will be to the people of God that we have returned.

And so I look forward to that day when I get to see my grandma, my grandpa again, my many, many people in my life. I hope that that is your heart as well. This is bury me with my ancestors in the cave in the field of Ephron, the Hephaite.

The cave is in the field of Machpelah near Mamre in the land of Canaan. This is the field Abraham purchased from Ephron the Hephaite as burial property.

Here scripture is reminding the Israelites, you actually do own this piece of property that is here. Israel was not just usurpers, they owned particular land as a result of Abraham purchasing it at this time.

And Mamre, I doubt any of you remember like last January through March's series on the life of Abraham. Mamre was this place where it had an oak grove that was there and lots of trees. Think Genesis, trees, someone that walks with God.

So you should be thinking kind of Garden of Eden type place. And as Abraham would go back to Mamre throughout the various times in his life, he would actually end up building an altar there. And so it was a place where God was worshiped.

It was a place that reminded the children of Israel of the fact that God had called Abraham out of Ur of the Chaldeans and had placed him into this new land, starting a new family. If you will, it's kind of a new Adam.

It's a new start to what God is doing that would ultimately lead to the person of Jesus Christ being born from that particular family. So here he says, this is where I want to be buried. He says Abraham and his wife, Sarah, are buried there.

Isaac and his wife, Rebecca, are buried there. And I buried Leah there. If you recall, Rachel died on the way down to a different part in the land of Canaan.

And so she was actually buried near Bethlehem. And so it was a place of very special importance to the children of Israel, which is why then is David is born there. And then many centuries later, Jesus is born in Bethlehem.

It's a place of unique importance for the children of Israel. He says, the field and the cave in it were purchased from the Hethites. If you're ever reading through the Bible and you're going, why is it just like, keep repeating?

Okay, we get it. He purchased it from the Hethites. It's a memorization help for you.

If it says it 79 times, you're probably going to remember what it says by the 78th or 79th time that it brings it out.

It says, When Jacob had finished giving charges to his sons, he drew his feet into the bed, took his last breath, and was gathered to his people. I was reading one commentary earlier this week, and they talked about Jacob.

He had an earnestness that he didn't have a fear of death as it was arriving. But as he recognized he was going to be reunited with his loved ones, he joyfully went, okay, well, I'm going to get into bed.

I'm not standing up, I'm not fighting against death, but he welcomes it. Happy is death for the believer in Jesus, that it is not our final farewell. It is the door that brings us face to face with our Savior Jesus Christ.

And may we look forward to that day ourselves. Says, then Joseph, leaning over his father's face, wept and kissed him. He commanded his servants who were physicians to embalm his father.

So they embalmed Israel. You can think, in Egypt, what are the Egyptians known for? It is the...

Can someone shout it out? Because my tired brain... Yes, mummification.

Thank you. It's like my brain is like... Nope, there's nothing left in the tank, guys.

Says, they took 40 days to complete this, for embalming takes that long, and the Egyptians mourned for him 70 days. And if you know anything about the Bible story, 40 days is often a time of trial. You can think of Jesus' 40 days in the wilderness.

You can think of the children of Israel's 40 years in the wilderness. And then with the 70 days comes up over and over again in scripture.

When the days of mourning were over, Joseph said to Pharaoh's household, If I found favor with you, please tell Pharaoh that my father made me take an oath, saying, I am about to die.

You must bury me there in the tomb that I made for myself in the land of Canaan. Now let me go and bury my father, then I will return. But you didn't know that in the Bible, they had to submit for vacation days and stuff like that, too.

Bet you didn't know that. So Pharaoh said, go and bury your father in keeping with your oath.

Then Joseph went to bury his father, and all Pharaoh's servants, the elders of his household and the elders of the land of Egypt, went with him, along with all Joseph's family, his brothers and his father's family.

Only their dependents, their flocks and their herds were left in the land of Goshen. So here Pharaoh doesn't just say, All right, all of you Israelites, you can go and you can bury Jacob.

He actually sends an entourage with them, having a nobility to Jacob in his death. Want to encourage you? As a pastor, I get to do quite a few funerals.

And one of the things that is so meaningful to me every time that I'm there as the minister officiating is I am driving right behind the casket, and then there's all of the different cars behind me.

And it's so interesting as all of us, you know, we have our hazards on, and everyone can see as this procession is going, that this is a noble and important thing.

And so I want to encourage us, may we have a respect and honor, a reverence for those that have passed. Don't just look at death flippantly, though it's certainly, it's not the end, it's not something that we grieve over like those that have no hope.

But as we see what death means for us, may there be a holy respect for that moment where we are called from this mortal coil to put on immortality with the Lord forever. Horses and chariots went up with him. It was a very impressive procession.

When they reached the threshing floor of Atad, which is across the Jordan, they lamented and wept loudly, and Joseph mourned seven days for his father.

When the Canaanite inhabitants of the land saw the mourning at the threshing floor of Atad, they said, This is a solemn mourning on the part of the Egyptians. Therefore, the place is called Abel Mishraim. It is across the Jordan.

And so here there is grief. Back in these times, you would hire people to cry at funerals. That way, you know, your loved ones wouldn't go out without anyone shedding a tear.

Nowadays, like, if you're not crying at a loved one's funeral, it's okay. There will probably come a moment when all of the tears come flooding through. But during that time, you had these people that you hired for this particular task.

So Jacob's sons did for him what he had commanded them. They carried him to the land of Canaan, buried him in the cave at Machpelah, in the field near Mamre, which Abraham had purchased his burial property from Ephron the Hephite.

So that's again, it says it a thousand times so that you remember it and so that it sticks in your memory.

15:21

Josephʼs Forgiveness

It says, after Joseph buried his father, he returned to Egypt with all his brothers and all who had gone with him to bury his father.

When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said to one another, if Joseph is holding a grudge against us, he'll certainly repay us for all the suffering that we caused him.

Now, if you guys remember the start of the Joseph story, yeah, I could see it. If your brothers kidnapped you, threw you in a pit, talked about killing you, said, no, let's not kill him, let's just sell him into slavery in a faraway country.

They did that.

You went as a slave into another country, were falsely accused, got thrown into prison, were left there for years and years and years, and then suddenly you came to power in the land of Egypt, and now you have the chance to get even with those

brothers. I think most of us would be very tempted to get even. So they say, he'll certainly repay us for all the suffering that we caused him. So they sent this message to Joseph.

Before he died, your father gave a command. Is it just Joseph's father? No, it's all of their fathers.

But it's as your father gave a command. Say this to Joseph, please forgive your brother's transgression and their sin, the suffering that they caused you. Therefore, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father.

Okay, number one, we actually don't read that Jacob said this to them, so they could be making all of this up to say, Dad said, you can't hurt us.

I see here as well, there's kind of a weaponization of, listen, we're the servants of the God of your father. Like, we're God's servants, so you have to forgive us. But Joseph doesn't have the response that you or I might have had to this.

It says Joseph wept when their message came to him. And here's his response. His brothers also came to him, bowed down before him and said, we are your slaves.

But Joseph said to them, don't be afraid. Am I in the place of God? Ultimate justice, the living out of right consequences for our behavior belongs to God alone.

No act of vigilantism, no action of personal violence, fist fighting, getting even with another person, is allowed in the kingdom of God.

And to every person that views themself as the personal actor for God, to be able to exact vengeance on another human, you will one day answer to your creator. Joseph says, don't be afraid. I'm not God.

I'm not your ultimate judge. He says, you planned evil against me. God planned it for good.

In your life and in mine, we have planned evil. We have planned ways in which we were not going to act like God. We mistreated someone.

We lashed out in anger. We said, it doesn't matter what God says, I'm going to do this thing. I'm going to jump into this relationship.

I am going to take this action, even though it's financially pretty sketchy and maybe illegal. Every single one of us have planned to do evil, which is anything contrary to the thoughts, words, and character of God.

But it says, mankind plans evil, and God plans it for good. You can think all through the Genesis Scroll here. Joseph is talking particularly about this situation with his brothers.

But Satan and Adam and Eve chose evil. They chose rebellion against God, and God brought redemption and glorification to mankind. That our end state as the people of God is actually going to be better than Adam and Eve had it.

We'll have clothes. We've got the white robes that the Lord himself gives us. We have the glorified bodies like Jesus Christ himself had as he resurrected from the dead.

You can think about the fact that God himself will dwell with us, and all wrongs will be made right. There will be no more chances for us to mess everything up as there was with Adam and Eve. Satan and Adam and Eve planned evil.

God planned good. Cain chose evil and killed his brother. But God chose the good of protecting Cain and bringing up another son, Seth, who Jesus Christ would be descended from.

Humanity chose evil before the flood and at the Tower of Babel. But God chose the good of salvation and justice and a new start for mankind with new promises. Abraham chose evil in abusing Hagar.

God chose to protect Hagar and Ishmael and their family, so that then the descendants of Ishmael would bring Joseph safely to Egypt. Jacob chose evil in his interaction with Tamar.

God chose, or sorry, Jacob chose evil in marrying multiple women and having children with four different women. God chose to use those extra wives to bring extra kids who would save the family. Judah chose evil in his interaction with Tamar.

God chose to use that son to bring the Messiah into the world. We mess up. God doesn't go, my beautiful plan.

God goes, I am the one who can take what the enemy meant for evil, and I can turn it for good. He says, therefore, don't be afraid. I will take care of you and your children.

If I was feeling like super benevolent, I'd be like, I will take care of your children. You guys sold me into slavery. I ain't taking care of you guys.

You guys can take care of yourselves. But he says, I will take care of you and the generations after you. What is your response to people that have wronged you?

Do you have a response of, I'm going to choose love and kindness, or I'm going to choose bitterness and an intentional recrucifying of this person for their wrongs for all of time?

Joseph, looking at a situation through the lens of God making good out of humanity's evil, Joseph says, I'm not God, I'm not your ultimate judge, I'm going to deal kindly and generously with you.

That will look different from person to person if someone sells you into slavery today. Not necessarily advocating that you have to support them and their children throughout upcoming generations, but this is what occurred in the life of Joseph.

22:48

Josephʼs Final Request

Says Joseph and his father's family remained in Egypt. Joseph lived 110 years. He saw Ephraim's son to the third generation, and the sons of Manasseh's son, Makir, were recognized by Joseph.

Joseph said to his brothers, I'm about to die, but God will certainly come to your aid and bring you up from this land to the land. He swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Here, there's this prophecy.

Joseph says, we're not staying down in Egypt forever. We're going back to the promised land. And he says, he made the sons of Israel take an oath.

When God comes to your aid, you are to carry my bones up from here. I want to be buried in that land of promise. Now, we all recognize God can bring someone up and resurrect them in Egypt just as well as he can from Canaan.

But here, there was this idea of, I want to be with God's people, even in my death. So as Joseph died at the age of 110, they embalmed him and placed him in a coffin in Egypt.

So, what you guys need to know today is at your death, you need to be mummified and buried in a coffin in Egypt.

23:56

God Rewrites Humanity

No, that is not what we have. But I want us to see as we close today that we need to see our life through the lens of God bringing good out from evil. First today, I want us to see that God is rewriting humanity's story.

Humanity chose to reject God's initial good design. We all know the story of Adam and Eve, that God says, here is this wonderful world that I have given you. One thing that you are not allowed to do, one thing that will bring you death.

And we said, God, you're great and all, you've given us all this stuff. But we don't actually think you know good from bad, because this looks really good. So I'm going to say that this bad thing is good.

And here we are today with all of the issues that we have in our world. Over and over again, saying, God doesn't know how to interact with people. God doesn't know how people should be treated.

God doesn't know how I should operate with my money. God doesn't know how I should interact with government. We say, I know what is best, God doesn't.

We see that humans choose every day to rebel against God's character. I want you to realize, this isn't just like some other person. This isn't just like the political party that you don't like.

This isn't the person sitting next to you. It's not just your spouse. It's not just your kids.

Every single one of us every day rebel against God's character. Then in our thoughts, we don't think about people and we don't think about God the way that God does.

In our words, we don't use the tone or vocabulary that God would in how we treat other people with our words. In our actions, we don't treat other people with the kindness and dignity that God has treated us. That's a really bleak look.

So what's the hope that Jesus chose to reconcile us to God through his suffering and death? What I love is Jesus is the perfect picture of this, that he's sold out by his brother. He's sold out by Judas, just as Joseph was sold by Judah.

Jesus is sold out by Judas. Jesus is put on a mock trial. He has his beard ripped out.

He's smacked. He's given over to the Romans. He's beaten and crucified.

Now, humanity planned evil against him. God planned it for good.

If even the suffering and death of Jesus can be meaningful and important, as God placed all of the sins of humanity on Jesus, so that as Jesus suffered, he suffered for sin, and he was able to give us his perfect righteousness if we call on him for

salvation. And as he rose, he rose triumphant, just as Joseph, if you will, rising from the jail that he was in up to the highest spot next to Pharaoh, you have Christ raised to the throne of his father.

Can I ask you today, have you ever asked Jesus to be your savior from sin and the Lord over your life? One day, Jesus will return to make all things right in the resurrection.

This was the hope that Jacob and Joseph had, that what God had started in life with his people, that even death itself would not stop that life, that God would restart what had been broken. This is why they wanted to be in that land of Canaan.

And now as we look forward to the resurrection today as God's people, can I ask you, what are you doing today that you can look back on with gratitude on the day of your resurrection?

On the day that you stand before your king and your God, will you be able to look at your actions today and go, Lord, thank you that I showed kindness to that person. Thank you that I went the extra mile in this or in that.

Or will many of us have to say, Oh, Lord, I'm so sorry that I said that. I thought that I did that. I didn't do this thing that you instructed me to do.

What are you doing today that you could look back on with gratitude on the day of your resurrection?

28:27

God Rewrites Your Story

And then lastly, God is rewriting your story. First, your choices, good or evil, can be used by God for good.

We see this all throughout the scroll of Genesis, that people can make bad decision after bad decision, but God is not limited by your fallenness or mine. He can turn it for good. Now, God can also use our good choices for good.

Praise the Lord for that. You can think of the little lad who brings his loaves and his fishes to Jesus. Man, that's generosity, and God can bring good out of that.

God can also bring good out of a brother being sold into slavery. So realize that your choices can be used by God for good. But will you make choices this week that join God's mission for good or fight against it?

We can either work with God and say, yes, we want to do good in the world, or God can be moving around to say, okay, I understand that the Romans and the Sanhedrin did this. I'm going to turn it for good.

It would be much better for all of us if we were working and operating on team God for the good of others. Then I love this, others choices that affect you can be used by God for good.

That person that has insulted you, that sibling that you're just on the rocks with, that horrible situation that you don't really talk about and only a few people in your life know about. God can use other people's choices for good in your life.

That you can experience closeness to God, that you can be an encouragement to other people.

It might be that the choices that someone else made against you might place you in a location or in a job or in a family that you would never have interacted with otherwise.

Can I encourage you today, just because other people have hurt you or harmed you, doesn't mean that that's the story that you need to walk through in your head. That's not the story that you have to tell others.

Instead, you can have a story like Joseph tells to say, don't be afraid. I'm not God. You planned it for evil.

He doesn't say what they did was good. He says you planned it for evil, but God planned it for good. How can you use the results of others' choices to bring good to those around you?

I love in 2 Corinthians, chapter 1, the apostle Paul says, blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of mercies and the God of all comfort.

He comforts us in all our affliction so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction through the comfort we ourselves receive from God. Someone goes through a miscarriage.

They are able to minister to those who have also walked through a miscarriage. You have lost a child or a spouse. You are able to help those who have walked through the loss of a child or a spouse.

Will you choose to use the evil that you have encountered in your life through the power of the Holy Spirit to be used for good, to tell yourself the kind of story that Joseph was telling himself?

You can view your life through the lens of broken human choices, or through the lens of God's plans for human good and His glory.

As you think about your life, as you think about your week, as you think about the next seven to fourteen days of your life, you get to choose what kind of story that you are believing or writing in your head.

You can either believe in God's goodness, that He is rewriting the story of the broken choices that you and I make and that others make.

Or we can say, no, everything is bleak, all I can see is suffering, or we can see God at work in the middle of suffering. Do you view your life and your future with the optimism that God's goodness deserves?

As we think about the scroll of Genesis, it started off with God's good design. Everything made and God saw that it was very good. We said, God, you don't know what's good.

We know what's good. We're going to go our own way.

And though we walked away from Him, from the very beginning, God said, I'm going to send the rescuer, this descendant, the seed of the woman, who will crush the head of the serpent, that evil will be forever conquered.

And we know that person, Jesus Christ, the descendant of Fares and Judah and Jacob and Isaac and Abraham and Shem and Noah and Seth and Adam. As we see Genesis, we see the story of Jesus starting off.

And the wonderful part of the story is no matter how broken their stories are and their families were and the evils done against them, God was still in control and bringing about the right conclusion. God will do the same for you and for me.

Will you believe today that God is rewriting your story to bring good out of evil?