"By faith Joseph, when he died, made mention of the departing of the children of Israel; and gave commandment concerning his bones,” Hebrews 11:22. 

Joseph’s story is of great importance. We may tell that if only by the portion of Scripture devoted to his story. The history of Abraham covers from the end of Genesis chapter 11 to chapter 25. The record of Joseph’s life starts with his birth in Genesis 30 and ends with his death in the last verse of Genesis, chapter 50, verse 26.

Nearly half of the book of Genesis is taken up with the remarkable story of Joseph. 

Here in our text, he speaks to us all again.

I. LET US LEARN THAT DEATH IS NOT THE END

“And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence,” Genesis 50:25.

Joseph knew that Egypt was not the lasting home of his people. Christians can say: “This world is not my home!”

II. JOSEPH BELIEVED THAT GOD WOULD VISIT HIS PEOPLE

In like manner, Christians can expect God to visit them. 

1. First of all at their death. Our passing does not come by chance! No, “It is appointed unto men once to die,” Hebs 9:27. Job said: “Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months are with thee, thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot pass,” Job 14:5. The Lord will personally attend and arrange the death of His people. “Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints,” Psalm 116:15.

2. Then again, God will visit us on the great day of resurrection. “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first,” 1 Thessalonians 4:16.

This is what the people of God must keep before their hearts as did Joseph.

III. THOUGH JOSEPH DIED IN EGYPT HE DID NOT WISH TO REMAIN THERE!

His request was honoured. “And Moses took the bones of Joseph with him: for he had straitly sworn the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you; and ye shall carry up my bones away hence with you,” Exodus 13:19. “And the bones of Joseph, which the children of Israel brought up out of Egypt, buried they in Shechem, in a parcel of ground which Jacob bought of the sons of Hamor the father of Shechem for an hundred pieces of silver: and it became the inheritance of the children of Joseph,” Joshua 24:32.

Boys and girls, the regard that was had for Joseph’s bones underlines the fact that we do not cease to be when we die. Heed Job’s words. 

“For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me,” Job 19:25-27. Job would rise again in his ‘new’ body despite the rendering of his being to dust in the grave. See Daniel 12:2. “And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.”

The bones of Joseph will live again, as will the bodies of all God’s redeemed. “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound  and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed,” 1 Cors 15:52.