Title: The Dreaming Joseph! / Genesis 37
Content Title: Dreaming Joseph!
Bible: Genesis 37
Date: 1998. 6. 14 (Sunday) Sunday afternoon at Mission Church
Review: Summary of Genesis 36 / The ancestor of the Edomites was Esau!
/ Not 'This is what Esau is about', but in general. Even if they are called the descendants of the promise, it shows that they are not very interested in the physical lineage. However, it suggests that the story will unfold around an important event to accomplish the spiritual will of God.
1. Jacob dwelt in the land of Canaan. / This was the residence of his father Isaac. It means that Jacob succeeded Isaac and inherited the covenant.
2. The reason for the story of Joseph / Despite the fact that Jacob has several sons, the story unfolds centered on the story of his younger son Joseph because the son who inherits Jacob's blessing will be Joseph. The rest of the sons will play an auxiliary role for this.
From the point of view of blood and blood, Joseph is the youngest son and the second wife's child, so he does not have any outstanding inheritance rights.
However, in the Bible, all future stories are developed with Joseph as the center. From this point of view, all of God's work does not follow lineage, but is done according to God's spiritual providence.
1. Reporting the faults of the brothers to their father / It seems that while shepherding the sheep with the brothers, he deceived the father about the evil things the brothers were doing. As always, the tell-taker is hated and ostracized by his brothers. They wouldn't like Joseph for telling his father what they were doing wrong.
2. Wearing colored clothes / This is an expression of love. In particular, colored clothes are very precious as they are worn only by princes and sons of nobles. When it was time to run out of these clothes, Jacob put them on again and put them on over and over again.
Jacob expressed his love for Joseph because he was the first child he had in his old age. This is usually the case. The love for the eldest son is the greatest, but the love for the youngest son after the end of his energy is even more terrible. However, in the background of Jacob's love, he is the son of his most beloved wife, Rachel, who is already gone. His love for his wife extended to his children.
3. The brothers hate and complain. / His father Jacob's love for Joseph was radically different from other brothers (just looking at the case of colored clothes), and in the end, the relative sense of damage caused by his father's favoritism could not be radiated to his father, but to Joseph, who could do whatever he wanted. poured out In particular, when Joseph had a dream and told it to his brothers, his hatred doubled.
Here, the literal translation of the saying that the unsa complained can be said to be "He didn't even say shalom!" In other words, it means that they did not even say hello and expressed their hatred explicitly.
1. Dream of 12 Sheaves / While tying grain in the field, I had a dream in which Joseph's sheaf stood up and the brothers' sheaf stood around and bowed down. In a way, Joseph has a dream like this and tells his brothers to listen to it. In some ways, he is ignorant and in a way, he is pure. I am heartbroken because of my father's favoritism, but hearing about Joseph's dream is not easy to plant. In the end, Joseph himself caused the hatred of his brothers to become even more intense.
2. The dream of the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars / Despite his brother's hatred, now Joseph's dream develops further. It used to be the sheaves of the earth, but now the background of that dream ascends to heaven. He had a dream in which the Sun, Moon, and Holy Spirits from heaven bowed down to him.
3. The brothers are jealous and the father has his heart in mind Because this is actually what Jacob wants.
4. Fulfillment of the dream / This was fulfilled as Joseph's brothers fell down and bowed down to ask for food before Joseph, who became prime minister of Egypt (42:6; 43:26; 44:14).
God sometimes shows us what He wants to do in dreams or visions. But it's very rare that it happens once or twice in a lifetime.
The same is true of Joseph. Meanwhile, God's providence to govern and guide all things throughout Joseph's life was centered around three dreams...
1) The first is two dreams in the text (verses 7 and 9). / This was a dream about himself,
2) And the second is the dream the two rulers had when they were imprisoned in Egypt (40:1-23). / This opened the way for you to get out of prison by interpreting other people's dreams.
3) The third and last are two dreams that Pharaoh had. (41:1-32). / Through this dream, Joseph became the prime minister of Egypt and the dream he had as a 17-year-old boy in his first father's house came true.
Not all of these depend on dreams, but they depend on God who is in control of them and come true through life in holiness according to God's will, not magically and fatefully.
Ex) He was sold at the age of 17 and he must remember the fidelity of the faith he kept in the midst of a lot of suffering until he turned 30.
By any chance, if we try to dream, we are on the wrong path of faith. These providential dreams are given by God, not because we ask for them.
Also, it should be borne in mind that the given dream is fulfilled through right faith and life, and that the dream itself has no mysterious power or is fatefully fulfilled. It is just that God sometimes gives dreams to give strength and encouragement to fulfill His providence.
What is important is the life of faith, not the dream itself. The brothers wanted to see what the dream would become, and Joseph faithfully kept his faith before God. That belief is a dream come true.