20-20 Hindsight and a Mummy – Gen 45, Isa 56, Ps 67

Checkout these links for Joseph resources, including how to make your very own mummy!

Together Apart – Joseph and his Brothers – Part 1 (Gen 37) All-age 10-page PDF
Together Apart – Joseph and his Brothers – Part 2 (Gen 45) All-age 10-page PDF
God of Second Chances (with a bit of Science!)
Forgiveness craft

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Reflection

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. As are rose-tinted spectacles and a conveniently selective memory.

We all know Joseph’s story. We’ve seen the show: riches to rags to riches in a couple of hours. So it’s easy to forget that more than twenty years pass between the opening lines and the finale. And most of the time Joseph is a slave. The show may end with an all-singing, all-dancing ‘Any Dream Will Do’, but the half-time curtains come down on a gloomy figure, alone on stage, singing ‘Close Every Door to Me’.

Q: There are many examples in the Bible of people being in dead-end situations: Moses being a shepherd, Paul in prison, Gideon hiding in the winepress. Which others can you think of, and what happened next? How does that help us to think about our situations?

Having revealed his identity to his bewildered brothers, Joseph confidently explains that “you sold me … but God sent me”. This is a great example of seeing the bigger picture in the events of one’s life, but I don’t imagine it looked like that at the time!

I wonder when Joseph worked it out, and how many years he spent chuntering to himself about the unfairness of it all, and how he’d like to see his brothers get their comeuppance. Eventually, perhaps when the raw pain of injustice and resentment had mellowed, Joseph could think through the past with an ear to God’s voice, and see things from an additional perspective.

The events that placed him here were still real, and still (humanly speaking) due to the vagaries of the Midianite slave market, the Egyptian judicial system, unusual weather systems and delicate political fortunes. But in God’s hands, they gain purpose and meaning, just as the petals of a flower are still (chemically speaking) cellulose and anthocyanins, but in the hands of lover, a red rose gains purpose and meaning.

Although we will not understand everything fully this side of glory (Paul puts as ‘seeing in a mirror dimly’), attempting to stand back a little from troubling situations, especially when they threaten to overwhelm, can help us keep a healthy perspective and see beyond the immediate.

Q: What practical steps could you take to help you ‘think through the past with an ear to God’s voice’? What looks confusing at the moment, that you would like to gain God’s perspective on? When do you think that might happen?

Joseph put his theology into practice. It’s all very well saying I believe something, but if there is no doing as a result, it’s only lip-service. If Joseph really believed that this was God at work, then he had to forgive his murderous brothers.

He had tested them to see if they would as easily sell Benjamin into slavery as they had him, and they passed. Were they truly reformed, or just trying to give a good impression? Joseph didn’t enquire. And he never brought it up again (although it weighed on the brother’s minds for many years, see ch 50).

Q: What conscious decisions do you make because you are a Christian? Who might you need to forgive or accept forgiveness from?

(Reflection from Together Apart, above)

Liturgy for Proper 15

Confession and Absolution

Isaiah 56:1, 6-8, Psalm 67

Thus says the LORD: Maintain justice, and do what is right,
for soon my salvation will come, and my deliverance be revealed.
Good Lord, we confess that we have not lived with your justice in mind.
We have sought revenge against those who hurt us,
we have harboured bitterness in our hearts
and bred up anger.
Forgive us, good Lord.
Forgive us and help us.

Thus says the LORD: Maintain justice, and do what is right,
for soon my salvation will come, and my deliverance be revealed.
Good Lord, thank you that your salvation comes quickly.
May your deliverance be revealed in us,
may we live as your forgiven people
and bring your life to others.
Guide us, good Lord.
Guide us and help us.