At 42:1 we begin the next section of this history, the next act in the drama, if you will. This section extends through chapter 45. The attention shifts from empire to family. As Joseph has risen to power over the empire of Egypt now he rises to rule over his family as, remember, had been foretold in the two dreams he was given years before.

The attention of the narrative now shifts back to Jacob and Canaan, where twenty years have passed. Joseph, we read in 41:51, named his first son Ephraim because, he said, "God has made me forget all my trouble and all my father’s household." Well, Joseph may have largely forgotten his family back home – at least so far as sorrowing over the loss of it was concerned – but we discover that Jacob has been grieving for his lost son all these years (42:36-38).

The story unfolds in three journeys to Egypt. The first by Jacob’s ten sons (minus Benjamin) who, in Egypt do obeisance to Joseph but do not recognize him, from which journey Simeon does not return to Canaan, but is kept as a hostage; the second with all ten remaining sons, including Benjamin, who, after certain adventures, are reunited with and reconciled to Joseph; and the third, when the entire family, including Jacob himself, go to live in Egypt under Joseph’s protection (that in chapter 45).

I need to make some extensive comment on the reading, so we will understand what is about to unfold and why events take the course that they do. I’m sure most Christians, reading this text, have wondered why Joseph did what he did: why he disguised himself for so long, why he placed the money back in his brothers’ sacks, demanded Benjamin’s presence, and so on. I’m much more sure, in my own mind, why he did so than I ever was before. The narrative art of Genesis continues to amaze and thrill me as each new section of the history falls under our view.

v. 1 A typical father’s remark!

v. 3 Note that Jacob’s sons are referred to as Joseph’s brothers.

v. 4 Right at the headwaters of this account we are reminded of the family dynamics. Benjamin is now the apple of his father’s eye as Joseph had been before, he being the only surviving issue of Jacob’s marriage to Rachel. The sons of Leah still, after all these years matter much less to Jacob and he does not hesitate to let them know it.

v. 6 Remember, in the dreams that Joseph had been given years before, Joseph’s brothers bowed down to him.

v. 9 That is, they would be in the employ of the Hittites or Assyrians, one of Egypt’s natural enemies, looking to find a weak point in the defenses.

v. 11 Joseph, of course, was also a son of that same father. The irony is that they hope to rebut suspicion of dishonorable conduct by asserting their brotherhood, but they are doing so to the very brother whom they betrayed in the most dishonorable way possible.

v. 12 The constant repetition of the charge is a technique of interrogation still very much in use today. There really is nothing new under the sun!

v. 19 They had stated that they were honest men; now that honesty will be tested.

v. 22 This may indicate that Reuben had never been told that his brother had not been killed, but had been sold into slavery. If you check back to 37:30 you will see that Reuben arrived after the deed had been done. Or, this may mean only that Reuben equated kidnapping with murder.

v. 24 There is a longstanding debate as to why Joseph chose Simeon as his hostage. The two greatest medieval Jewish commentators differed in their explanation. Rashi appealed to the violent streak in Simeon and Levi that was revealed in their murder of the Shechemites in chapter 34. He thought that Joseph kept Simeon in order to separate him from Levi and keep them from concocting some violent and foolish plot. Ibn Ezra, on the other hand, stayed with the immediate context and argued that, overhearing Reuben, Joseph learned for the first time that Reuben, the eldest brother, was not in on the plot to kidnap him. For all these years he had held Reuben responsible as the eldest. Now he knows that Reuben had actually opposed the plan of the other brothers. Simeon is kept then as the next oldest brother and so most accountable. Some modern commentators have proposed another explanation, which I think is less persuasive because less obvious. They hold that because Joseph wanted Benjamin, Rachel’s second son, he should hold Simeon, Leah’s second son, as hostage.

v. 33 The brothers put Simeon’s detention in Egypt in the best possible light. They make it sound as if Simeon is the Egyptian Ruler’s guest, not his prisoner. They know how Jacob will react to this bad news. They also omit the fact that they were imprisoned for three days. They are trying to make the situation sound less ominous. Naturally they don’t mention that the Egyptian promised to execute them if they didn’t return with Benjamin.

v. 35 The simplest way to read this is to assume that only one man had so far opened his sack and found his money returned. It was only upon their return home that each one of them found his money in his sack. After all, they all brought home many more than one sack of grain. It may not have been obvious which sack would have contained the money.

v. 37 Did Jacob think that the brothers had sold Simeon into slavery and were only pretending to be dismayed at the sight of the money. That would be dramatic irony, if true! In any case, how could they possibly deny it outright – all the more now that their consciences had been awakened? It was, after all, half true. They had deprived him of Joseph. This leads Reuben to his reckless outburst.

v. 38 But Reuben’s bold promise only raises Jacob’s suspicions further. And he speaks of Benjamin and Joseph in such a way as to deny virtually any relationship between Benjamin and the sons of Leah, his half-brothers. He couldn’t have made it clearer that he cared more for Benjamin than for all the rest of them put together. Simeon was Leah’s son. He wouldn’t risk Benjamin for him!

We have seen Joseph in the immediately preceding account of his rise to ruler of Egypt as both a godly, wise, and faithful man, and as a master administrator. What follows, I am now convinced, is all a further demonstration of those same gifts and graces. What Joseph does, he does on purpose and for the highest possible motives.

Let me demonstrate this to you.

1. In ways too difficult to explain, in several verses in this narrative, there are word plays that hark back to the betrayal of Joseph by his brothers and to Joseph’s subsequent misfortunes. For example, in v. 17, the word for "custody" is the same word used for Joseph’s imprisonment in 40:3,4,7. In v. 7, the verb the NIV translates as "recognized" is the same verb used in 37:32 when Joseph’s brothers ask Jacob to "identify" or "recognize" the bloody cloak as belonging to Joseph. And so on. The narrator, with his typical skill, is setting all that happens against the backdrop of that ancient betrayal. What is now to occur has everything to do with what happened long ago.
2. The comment in v. 9 that Joseph remembered the dreams he had had about his brothers bowing down to him further indicates that Joseph recognizes the Lord’s hand in his brothers’ appearance and that he intends by his actions to serve the Lord’s interests in the whole affair. One commentator remarks, "A comment like this [in v. 9] on a participant’s state of mind is rare in the Bible and is correspondingly significant." [Wenham, 406] But, of course, the dreams had not yet been completely fulfilled. Remember, Joseph’s first dream had all his brothers bowing down to him, but all his brothers were not yet here, Benjamin was missing. His second dream had all eleven brothers and his father bowing down to him, but Jacob was not yet present. So, there is more to come, that is clear to Joseph. Now, how to make the most of what God had shown him would come to pass? That is what he did with the dreams given to Pharaoh; now he does the same with his own dreams.
3. You will have noticed as we read the account in vv. 15-20 that Joseph changes the demand he makes of his brothers. He began by demanding that all of the brothers remain in Egypt but one, but finally required only one to remain while all the rest returned home. While there may be other reasons for this, it does seem clear that Joseph wants them to do the right thing and to be reconciled with his family and father and does not want to put undue burdens on them – either on the hungry part of the family still at home in Canaan, so he sends the food back to them; or on the men who must decide whether to risk a return journey. Surely it is doubtful that Jacob and Benjamin would ever have come to Egypt if nine of the brothers were already prisoners there. Joseph’s demonstration of goodwill is an indication of what he wants and hopes will happen.
4. Then, in v. 24, his tears indicate already at this early stage the depth of his feeling for them and his love for his family.

So, what is Joseph doing? Joseph here is once more the master administrator. What we see him doing is giving his brothers tasks by which to heal them and to reconcile them first to one another and then to him. We can see Joseph’s genius in the plan as it unfolds. Joseph had to have providence working with him to achieve this end. But, when the providence appeared, in the presence of his brothers, in Egypt to buy food, and when they failed to recognize him, Joseph knew what to do with the opportunity, just as he had known in his wisdom what to do with the knowledge that there would be seven years of plenty in Egypt followed by seven years of famine. Now worldwide famine created the backdrop against which the family drama of spiritual restoration and reconciliation can unfold. Joseph exploited the opportunity that God provided. Because of his spiritual insight he was able to be the instrument of the renewal of his brothers and, remember, that is the great story here, for it will not be Joseph, worthy man that was, but Judah, who will receive the climactic blessing at the end of the book, Judah who is told that the Messiah and the King of Kings will come from him.

So what did Joseph do? Well, he began by putting his brothers on the defensive with aggressive questioning and cross-examination. As his brothers reveal more and more to him, he seizes the opportunities they provide to test them. They claim to be honest men, he contrives to test that claim.

Benjamin is the key. If the sons of Leah can feel brotherly toward Benjamin, if they can act as true brothers to Benjamin, if they can show a proper concern for Benjamin, Jacob’s favorite – perhaps a fact obvious enough to Joseph from the fact that though his brothers tell him that Benjamin is still alive, he did not come with the others to Egypt – then spiritual healing will have come to these men.

Throughout this entire plan as it unfolds through this and the next two chapters, Joseph treats Benjamin as his surrogate. He will give Benjamin preferential treatment precisely to see how his brothers will react. His testing of them is the means to lead them to a right state of mind and heart.

And, then, he puts the money back in their sacks of grain. What is this but another test of their integrity? Will they come back and face the music? Will they be honest when honesty seems dangerous? Will they fear God and keep his commandments? And how will they handle the matter in conversation with their father back home? It is so obvious that Joseph is placing these men precisely in that situation where they must come to terms with the men they have been and the evil they have done. What will be the result of that? You noticed, perhaps, that Joseph’s plan as outlined in 18-20, is not simply a punishment that fits their ancient crime, but that, in detaining one brother and making them return to their father without him, he is making them relive their actions of twenty years before.

This is so obvious that the brothers themselves immediately pick up on the parallel. Indeed, so immediately, that they comment on it while Joseph is still close enough to overhear them. "Surely we are being punished because of Joseph…"

And, then, finally, proof that Joseph, by this elaborate strategy, was seeking the spiritual renewal of his brothers and reconciliation of his family, that is exactly what we see beginning to unfold here in chapter 42. It is not complete in this chapter, but the signs of what is to come are already visible.

1. You have, first, in v. 21, for the first time, the brothers acknowledging their sin long ago against their brother. What is more, we see them there connecting their sin against God and its consequences. God is dealing with them. Not Joseph; God. And they now know it. And in that spirit, they do not seek to mitigate or extenuate. They admit that what they did was unforgivable. Indeed, we learn here for the first time, in the brothers’ own report of their crime that Joseph had cried out for mercy at the time and they had turned a deaf ear to their brother’s cries. For the first time, these men put sin and death together and point the finger at themselves.
2. You have the same again in v. 28. When one of them finds the money back in his sack, they all, not just he, but all together cry out, "What is this that God has done to us?" Not only are they now reckoning with the justice and the hand of God, but they are doing so together. No recriminations against the brother who found his money returned – No, "What have you done to us now?" – but what has God done to us?

There are the key elements of all true spiritual restoration and life: the genuine, sincere acknowledgement of our sin and wrong, reckoning with God and his judgments, and taking responsibility for what we have done and what we must do. The USA will never have this healing until we own up, as a society, to these twin facts of God and sin, really own up to them. The very things we at present will not own up to come wind, come weather.

We have been months tracing the course of the sins that have brought us to this point in the history of the sons of Israel. Some of you may remember the famous fiasco some years ago when the World Health Organization tried to help the residents of Borneo exterminate houseflies, which were widely suspected of carrying disease. The insides of the houses were sprayed with DDT, an action that triggered an unforeseen and deadly chain of events. As the flies died, the lizards (their natural predator) feasted on them and sickened from the DDT they ingested. Their sickened condition made them easy prey for house cats who, in turn, sickened and died from ingesting the DDT in the lizards they ate. The loss of the cats gave free run to the rats. When the rats began to eat house food and threaten the population with bubonic plague, panicked officials resorted to parachute large numbers of imported cats into the area to mend the break in the food chain. [Plantinga, Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be, 118-199]

Well this was something like that but more evil. Not an error in judgment but a crime against God and man. It started with Laban’s deceiving Jacob and giving Leah, whom he did not love or want, to him as his wife and so commencing that sequence of events that was to consume the family with jealousy and hatred. Joseph’s betrayal and kidnapping and enslavement was but the bitter fruit of that longstanding jealousy and competition in Jacob’s household which Jacob never did anything to remove. It was a very tangled web that Joseph must unweave.

Now, what Joseph will do, with these very elaborate strategies, is to unravel that jealousy and that history of selfishness and hatred and restore the family to covenantal integrity.

They don’t know what is going on. But Joseph is wise enough to know that too much needs to happen in their hearts for him to imagine that disclosing himself immediately to his brothers would bring the spiritual light and warmth that his brothers so needed.

And how true to life. God is at work through Joseph and is about to bring to pass the most wonderful and remarkable changes in these men, but they do not know it. Jacob is but months away from the happiest and most satisfying moment of his life, a moment that will make up, more than make up, for the misery of the past twenty years, when he says, "Everything is against me!" And the brothers themselves think that all that has happened to them in Egypt and on the way back is God’s punishment. They are waiting for and expecting the other shoe to drop. At least now they know they will deserve it when it comes. No wonder they were frightened in v. 35!

But those days in Canaan were like a person who comes into a room where an important football game is being shown, but the sound is turned off. You watch as four successive plays go badly for the home team. Three losses and a blocked punt. Doesn’t look good. But, then, you turn up the sound and learn that it is the fourth quarter, your team is up 55-0, and the fourth string is on the field. How little we see and understand of God’s ways with us, or of how much must first occur before God can give us what we long to have from his hand.

But, let there be, even the beginning of the acknowledgement of sin and guilt before God, let one begin to reckon with God himself and his judgments, and no one can imagine what happy, true, and satisfying things lie just around the corner!

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