How easy is it to forgive? I mean truly
honestly forgive and accept forgiveness. We are all faced with little things
every day, things that hurt us or make us angry, but little things usually, and how do we usually respond to those moments? We get angry and bitter and we usually end up holding on to those emotions for a very
long time. I wonder if it is easier to forgive when the wrong done is even greater. For how Joseph so openly accepts and loves his brothers here is so monumental.
If
you can remember from last week, Adrian shared
with us the beginning of Joseph’s story. Where Joseph was a little full
of himself and his dreams were beginning to make those around him uncomfortable, his dreams that one day his brothers and
his father would bow down to him, did not make him very popular. But regardless
of his ego, what happened to him next seems cruel. His brothers threw him in
a pit and were going to leave him there, and then these lovely brothers, decided that they could do better than that. They sold him in to slavery, they actually received money for their brother. Do you really think Joseph’s ego was that bad, that his brothers needed to be
that cruel, not only did they tell their father he was dead, but they actually accepted money knowing their brother was going
to be put in to slavery.
If
our story ended there and that was the end of the bad that befell Joseph it would be enough, but our story does not end there,
for Joseph it just keeps getting worse, but at each step of the journey, God is with him, preparing him for the amazing things
he is about to do. From the pit we know through scripture that Joseph ends up
in the house of Potiphar. A very important man in the community, who Joseph finds
trust from. Joseph’s life could be made very miserable during his time
of slavery to Potiphar, but he is accepted and put in charge of the household. He
is basically running the show, and then Joseph finds himself in a terrible predicament.
Following in the footsteps of his father, grandfather, and great grandfather, an issue with a woman comes to light. But in this situation, Joseph is blameless.
Potiphar’s wife makes the advance towards Joseph and when she is refused, she tells her husband that Joseph tried
to take advantage of her.
I
mean, come on, can’t Joseph catch even the smallest break. He had been
sold in to slavery by his brothers, and thankfully ended up in the household of a man who would trust him, and then he comes
face to face with a great temptation and he does the right thing, and what happens to him?
He gets thrown in jail. But again Joseph overcomes this struggle. He isn’t put in debtors jail or even a slightly bad jail, he is basically in
a low security jail that we could compare to where a high end business man might end up if he was caught embezzling. A good sign that Potiphar didn’t necessarily believe his wife, but really had
no choice but to get rid of Joseph, but he didn’t put him in a terrible jail.
And
in this jail, Joseph’s gift of dream interpretation is very important, for in jail with him are Pharaoh’s bread
maker and his food taster. And they have gotten themselves into a little trouble
and have had these dreams and in the end Joseph interprets them, and within days the interpretations come true and Joseph
is forgotten about. Until Pharaoh has a dream that no one is able to interpret. And all of a sudden this great gift of Joseph’s is remembered, and they get
him out of prison to interpret this dream, a dream in which it is told that Egypt will have 7 years of wonderful harvests,
and then the following 7 years will bring a terrible famine.
With
this news Pharaoh looks for advise and the only one who seems to have any idea is…you’re gonna be shocked by this…Joseph. In an instant Joseph tells Pharaoh exactly what needs to be done, and Pharaoh with
this deer in the headlights kind of response puts Joseph in charge of organizing famine response for the entire country and
becomes second in line to Pharaoh. He is the go to guy and really has all the
power because when the famine starts, who has control over food distribution? Joseph. Who has access to animals and land and water?
Joseph. Who says who gets food?
Joseph. So a man who was sold in to slavery is now responsibly for feeding
an entire nation. Wow, the journey really is sometimes half the fun.
So
how do we come to our scripture today? Well, the famine was far reaching, it
wasn’t just Egypt, but the land of Jacob and his sons was also in the midst of a great famine. And word got to them that there was food to be had in Egypt,
so the brothers are sent out by Jacob to get food and so they do. They go to
Egypt and find themselves before Joseph, only they do not recognize their brother. And after several encounters, and trips back to Jacob and Benjamin being held until
their return and all sorts of interactions, Joseph can’t stand it for a second longer.
Now
the bad side of me always thinks to myself, how would I respond, my brothers sold me in to slavery, my life was worthless
to them, I ended up in jail all because of them and look now my dream is even coming true because they bowed before me, granted
they didn’t know I was Joseph when they bowed down, but still my dream was right.
Ok that might be one way to respond, but Joseph, so overcome with joy, sends everyone out of the room except the brothers,
and then he just weeps, and says it’s me. It’s Joseph, your little
brother, remember the one who you sold in to slavery. And the brothers don’t
understand at all what is happening, and then they are told to come closer, and they recognize each other, and then Benjamin
and Joseph embrace and they weep and everything. Everything from the past is
wiped away from Joseph’s memory, there is not a second of hard feelings, there is just love and joy that his brothers
are here before him.
You
could argue that his initial response of sending them back and forth to Jacob was a bit of revenge, but nothing really comes
from it except that Jacob and his entire family find food and shelter, and end of living lives in more comfort than they ever
dreamed of. Not only is Joseph happy to see his family, but Pharaoh is as well,
he tells Joseph to give them animals and land. The family of Jacob is welcomed
with open arms in to Egypt, a land that is not their home. They
are met with joy and peace and love. The reconciliation displayed here, the forgiveness
that is so openly offered is so beautiful. And I can’t help but turn to
the major event happening in the world at this moment.
I
speak of course of the Olympics, I am obsessed. For so many reasons, there is
so much about the Olympics I can’t help but love. But what makes me think
of the Olympics while talking about reconciliation is a moment I witnessed early in the games, a moment that was mentioned
briefly during coverage but not focused on, it wasn’t a moment when a medal was won or a record set. It wasn’t one of the countless races swum by Phelps or of a gymnasts fall. It was a moment during a beach volleyball game. Two teams
met, two teams that probably had never met before, and they embraced. Now you
are probably thinking many athletes at the Olympics embrace why was this so special.
Well, because one of the teams was from the country of Georgia and the other team was from Russia. In the midst of the fighting and the turmoil in their countries, these
two teams met on the Olympic stage, and knowing probably better than anyone else, they met each other with an embrace. An embrace that tore down the walls that divide us, an embrace that showed that no
matter what is going on, we are all in this together. An embrace that said I
know you must be suffering and I am sorry. It was one of those moments that you
can’t script, they just happen out of the purity of our connection as children of God.
I
can’t tell you who won the game, and I don’t think I want to know. All
I know is that moment said so much. The Olympics show us so much. The world cheered when a man from Togo won the first medal
ever for his country, it was a bronze medal but it might as well have been gold. The
world cheered when the athletes from Iraq entered the arena during the opening ceremony.
The Olympics are this beautiful opportunity for us to remember that we aren’t in this world alone, that what
happens in one place affects us all, because we are all connected, we are all God’s children. I encourage you to watch some of the highlights of these games, hopefully you will find a moment that touches
your heart in a way you can’t imagine.
And
as I think of how Joseph welcomed his family and how he reached out to them, it is so beautiful. That no matter what is going on around us, we have the capacity to love like God has loved us, we have
a chance to welcome those who have hurt us and those we don’t know, we have the capacity to treat each person we encounter
as a sibling we have missed more than anything. But how often do we? How often do we let our joy over ride our hurt and our fear? We
live our lives with walls up in between us, we live our lives sometimes in ways that we forget there are other people around
us, but the truth is, there are people. There are people who need to feel the
embrace whether from a friend or a stranger they will both feel like family.
We
each have the ability to welcome others in to our lives, to share our lives with them and to truly care for them. We just need to take the first step sometimes, we just need to break down and weep and throw our arms around
someone in need. We need to break down the walls that divide us and welcome each
other as different as we may be.
I’m
going to ask you to do something a little different today. I am going to ask
you to open your hymnals to hymn number 280 and I’m going to ask you to stand with me, and together sing the first verse
of Amazing Grace and then I would like to ask you to do something you may have never have done before. I want you to pick one of the stanzas at the bottom of the page, whether Navaho or Cherokee or Creek, and
I want you to sing that, don’t worry if you don’t get all the syllables in the right place or if you can’t
get the words out. I just want us to take this moment and to raise our voices
together reaching past our own and into just a glimpse of another. So I ask you
to stand and join me in verse one in English and then a stanza of your choice from the bottom let our voices be lifted up
to God in the spirit of reconciliation and joy.
