Scripture: Genesis 45:8 "So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt."

Preached in Bethel Free Presbyterian Church, September 2nd, 2018.


God's purpose in Joseph's life involved him going to jail and that for quite some time. Many have lived to bless the days of affliction and distress through which God caused them to go. They discovered, like Manasseh, (II Chronicles 33:12) that affliction often causes us to think upon our ways and to consider the Lord. So it was with the Prodigal son in Luke 15:14-17. The jails of Ulster have been places where the purpose of God has been wrought out in mercy in the lives of those who otherwise would never have been reached with the gospel. Joseph was able to say to his brothers, whose wickedness had been the cause of him being taken as a slave to Egypt in the first place, -- Genesis 50:20.

We can learn some very important gospel lessons from the experience of Joseph recorded in Genesis.

I. GOD'S PURPOSE WAS TO PLACE JOSEPH UPON THE THRONE.

"God . . . hath made me . . . . a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt", Genesis 45:8.

1. In this we have a picture of the purpose of God in the gospel. It is to take poor sinners and place them upon a throne. A far greater throne than that of Egypt. I Samuel 2:8.

Christ asks that His Father bring them to His throne that they may see and share in His glory, John 17:24. All of God's elect will see Him in all His majesty. All who are saved and washed in the blood of the Lamb are made unto our God "kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth", Revelation 5:10. We shall literally reign with Him when the Saviour returns to make the kingdoms of this world His.

2. But it is the privilege of the child of God to live now as a king where once he was a poor slave. Romans 6:14. As Joseph ruled where he once had been a poor miserable slave, so the Christian is enabled by God's grace to rule where once he was a slave to sin and uncleanness. See Joseph sitting upon the throne and imagine all those who had authority and dominion over him in past years now bowing before him in submission. See his brothers coming down and bowing before him, they who had cast him into a pit and sold him into slavery. So it is with the Christian. Upon receiving Christ, he becomes a new creature, "old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new", II Corinthians 5:17. He arises out of his prison cell of sin to "walk in newness of life", Romans 6:4.