Pentecost 9, 2011 Immanuel Chapel, Genesis 45:1-15
There was a time when we went to a movie theater that after we bought a ticket we could just walk into the theater. Sometimes we came in near the end of the movie, and saw the ending before we saw the beginning. Today, we come in near the end of the movie featuring Joseph and his brothers.
The sons of Jacob stand before the man whom Pharaoh had named, “the god who speaks and lives.” Pharaoh had given Zaphenath-paneah all authority to administrate the affairs of the empire. The sons of Jacob came, hat in hand, from Israel at a time of famine, looking for food. They are beggars for their lives and that of whole clan of Jacob.
We came this morning before God who speaks and lives. We who cannot feed ourselves except that God give us our daily bread, and how often we eat it without a thought or word of thanks. Why should God give us that which we need to support this body and life? Did we not also come confessing our wayward ways that we have sinned in thought, word and deed against God? We have not loved neighbors as ourselves. There is much good that we have failed to do. There are things done that haunt the edges of our minds, or ought to.
On the edges of minds of Jacob’s sons was the reason they believed they had fallen into such a beggarly state. Fifteen years ago they had sold their brother Joseph, their father’s favorite son, the one who wore the colored garment, the one who tattled on them, the one who told them his dreams that one day he would rule over them, the one who drove them fury and hatred, into slavery. The last they had seen of him was in the possession Ishmaelites, headed south for the North African slave market. He was almost certainly dead by now, certainly lost. What they had done could not be undone. Now God was giving them what they deserved.
We said as much about ourselves this morning, “We justly deserve your present and eternal punishment.” Such was our plight as we stood before the almighty God, beggars for a stay of the execution of our deserved present and eternal punishment.
Back in the chambers of, “the god who speaks and lives,” he cleared the room of all his staff and advisors and interpreters. Now it was only the all-powerful servant of Pharaoh, and the sons of Jacob, bent and bowed by age and impending starvation.
The Egyptian did not speak to them in Egyptian. He spoke in plain, simple Hebrew, “I am Joseph! Is my father still alive?” Suddenly the world of the sons of Jacob was shattered. The one who was dead was alive. The one whom they had abandoned had returned with power and might. Their very life was at stake. Their brother held their lives in the palm of his hand. In that moment, they were astonished and terrified. Numbed minds could think of no way out of a situation in which there was no way out. Their chests ached and there was a knot of fear in their stomachs. Flight or fight was not options. They could do neither.
Listen to how the Gospeler Mark describes the reaction of the new Israel to the news that the One who was dead was alive. The One whom they had abandoned was back with power and authority. Very early in the morning the women went to the tomb. “They saw a young man sitting on the right side…and they were alarmed, and he said to them, ‘Do not be alarmed, you seek Jesus of Nazareth…He is risen.’ And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had seized them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”
Part of our problem is that we take for granted that the forgiveness of our sins will be pronounced following our confession, whether we meant it or not.
Part of our problem is that the prospect of standing before Jesus and being told that he is God, whom we have crucified and now is raised, no longer astonishes nor causes us to tremble. Remember what Jesus said to the foreign woman, in the gospel reading who came crying to him for help? Jesus told her, that he was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel. We aren’t among the lost sheep of Israel. We are foreigners to God’s kingdom. We are Gentiles. When Jesus says, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs,” he is speaking to you and me.
When the sons of Jacob stood before Joseph, in that moment between Joseph identifying himself and his next words, the future of Israel, and the future of the world, including us hung in the balance. Would he call out, “Guards, take these and throw them into prison?” Joseph said, “Come near to me, please…do not be distressed or angry with yourselves.” With those words, the good news of salvation broke the tension in the room. They could breathe again. The knot in the stomach eased. Muscles relaxed. They, who faced death, now were given life.
The author of Hebrews wrote, “Let us with confidence draw near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” The One whom we know as Jesus is also “the God who speaks and lives.”
The word God speaks to us is a gracious word. His word removes the threat of God’s judgment. You see, there was another Joseph who lived much later. He too had a dream, not a dream in which he ruled over his brothers, but a dream in which an angel of the Lord told him that the child his betrothed was carrying was conceived of the Holy Spirit. The son she would bear would be named Jesus. He would save his people from their sins. In his death on the cross, in his abandonment in the tomb, in his resurrection to new life, we who could neither flee from God nor win a fight with God, are given the new life of Jesus resurrection, and the peace. Today he says to us again, “Come near to me please. Come near, eat and drink of me, my body and my blood, for the forgiveness of all your sins, for the strengthening of your faith and for your eternal salvation.”