Author: Gary

The most important prophecy is the prophecy to Jacob’s son Judah. It is one of the first times we read about a messianic prophecy in the Bible. “The scepter will not depart from Judah or the staff from between his feet until he whose right it is comes.” Meaning that many kings and rulers will come from Judah until ultimately, Jesus the Messiah, comes to take the scepter. Jesus coming to save his people from sin has been God’s plan since the beginning. No one knows when God will ultimately destroy sin forever, but for now we have been saved from it and have been given the opportunity to live in the days after Jesus came, died, and rose again. We have no excuse at all now because Jesus has come and defeated death, hell, and the grave. All we have to do is put our faith and trust in him and we can accept the free salvation and mercy given to us by God through Jesus. Love y’all! Have a great day!

We see here where Jacob blesses Joseph’s two sons Ephraim and Manasseh. He officially proclaims that from Joseph will come two tribes instead of just one. Also Jacob chooses to give the right hand blessing, which is the greater of the two, to the younger son Ephraim. This becomes a common pattern God has shown giving the birthright to the youngest son. Just like with Abel over Cain, Isaac over Ishmael, and Jacob over Esau. Showing that God’s main concern is the heart and not human traditions. He cares more about the condition of the heart when it comes to offering his blessing. Just because a son was born first doesn’t mean he will automatically receive God’s blessing the way people thought. This also happens with Adam and Jesus. Jesus is described in the New Testament as the second Adam. The condition of Adam’s heart was not received by God and the blessing went to Jesus, the savior of the world who was accepted by God the Father. When Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist, the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus like a dove, the heavens opened up, and a voice from God the Father says “this is my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased.”(Matthew 3:16-17) Henceforth, the “right hand”blessing of the whole world rests on Jesus Christ’s shoulders and why our salvation comes from and through him as he sits on the “right hand” of the Father. Love y’all! Have a great day!

If we slow down at pay attention you can clearly see the parallels between Jesus and Joseph. Joseph was Jacob’s son that was loved more than the other sons. Jesus is God’s only begotten son. Joseph was hated and rejected by his own people and they plotted to kill him. Jesus was hated and rejected by his own people and they plotted to kill him. Joseph was sold for 20 pieces of silver. Jesus was sold for 30 pieces of silver. Joseph was thrown into prison for falsely being accused of trying to sleep with Potiphar’s wife. Jesus was falsely accused and thrown into prison and crucified. Joseph went from prison to sitting at the right hand of pharaoh. Jesus was crucified and now sits at the right hand of God. Joseph saved Egypt and his family from famine. Jesus saved humanity from sin and death. Joseph forgave his brothers for selling him into slavery because God used it for his good. Jesus on the cross says “Father forgive them because they do not know what they are doing.”
Joseph reunited and saved the people of Israel. Jesus reconciles believers to God. The character of God has not changed. He is saving people today just like he was back then. God has saved us through the sacrifice of his one and only son Jesus Christ. He has given us a way out of sin and death. All we have to do is know this and rest in this fact. Jesus has come to save us. He has come to bear the weight of sin and shame on his shoulders. He loves us and wants us to love him back the way he so richly deserves! Love y’all! Have a great day!

This chapter is a complete celebration and revelation of God’s promise all the way back to Abraham. God told Abraham that he would make a great nation from his family as many as the stars and the dust of the earth. It’s easy for us to read this story and downplay how impossible this must have seemed to Jacob. I could only imagine how real God was to Jacob when he saw his son Joseph, that he thought was dead, at the right hand of Pharaoh. This should show us that God always keeps his promises. We have a bad habit of getting down when we don’t see God moving the way we think he should move. We tend to think he has forgotten about us. It is easy to have our own vision of how we think God should move in our lives or how he should bless us. The truth is that God can see exponentially more than we could ever imagine seeing. If it seems like God isn’t moving don’t lose hope and don’t lose faith. Just when we think God has forgotten about us that is when he shows up. God will never leave us or forsake us. Remember this always. Especially in the face of evil and suffering. God can always use it for his good if we allow him too. The free will that God has blessed us with can be our greatest gift or our greatest downfall. God is not going to make us choose him. He gives us the choice. We can either submit to him or submit to the world. There is no in between. Always remember how much he loves us. Love y’all! Have a great day!

The thing in this chapter that is the hardest to comprehend is how Joseph forgave his brothers that had sold him into slavery. Two things are true. The first is that the brothers lied to and deceived their father and sold Jacob into slavery. The second is that God used their sinful ways for his will. Joseph was able to forgive them because of his relationship with God. He saw that God can use every evil for his good. Joseph didn’t focus on what his brothers did to him, he focused on how he was used by God through his suffering to become who God wanted him to be. All of us have a past. Some people’s past can be a lot worse than others. If you get through all that life has thrown at you and you find God through it, then it makes it all worth it. To receive God’s grace and mercy is everyone’s destiny from the day that they were born. If suffering and struggles lead you to everlasting life walking with God then all of the suffering was worth it and you become thankful that God let you go through it all. The way you make your suffering worth it is to let it become your testimony to how God delivered you from your circumstances. Joseph didn’t hold a grudge because he realized that all of his suffering that led him to the point where he was at made it all worth it. God is ready to deliver us from any and all suffering in this world through faith in his son Jesus Christ. All we have to do is accept the free gift that God has given us through his son. Love y’all! Have a great day!

We see here in this chapter that Joseph is still testing his brothers. We also see Judah’s changed heart on display from the time he and his brothers sold Joseph into slavery. Judah was willing to take his younger brother Benjamin’s place because he gave his father Jacob his word that he would bring him back. We start to see from Judah the parallels between him and Jesus. We see his changed heart and his growth and maturity on display. The parallels we see is Jacob=God, Judah=Jesus, and Benjamin=God’s People. Benjamin carries the burden of Joseph’s cup=sin. The burden of the cup and the punishment rests on Benjamin. Judah is willing to sacrifice himself so that Benjamin can be with his father. Judah promised his father Jacob that he would return Benjamin back to him and he was willing to die for that. Jesus has done the same thing for us. Sin and the wages of sin rest with our very existence. These consequences of sin have taken us away from our father and Jesus was willing to take those wages of sin from us. Jesus, our lord and savior, gladly took that burden from us when he sacrificed himself on the cross so that we may be with our father. Jesus was the only person and only way we could go back to having a relationship with God the father. All we have to do is live our lives believing and living in that fact. It is our hope, our strength, and our salvation. Love y’all! Have a great day!

In this chapter we see how Joseph has characteristics that only come from God. He shows love, mercy, and compassion for the members of his family who abandoned him. Joseph shows even though his brothers were envious of him and tried to push him away forever he still loves them. Joseph shows by testing his brothers that he wants to help them as long as they have been humbled and changed. Joseph holds the same qualities as Christ in this story because he has a strong relationship with God. He has matured and moved along in his sanctification process through his life and his characteristics resemble the God he serves. We are the brothers in this story and Joseph resembles Jesus. Even though our natural instinct is to pursue our own dreams and desires and push God away, he continues to love us. He has endless mercy and grace for us even though we don’t deserve it. We are broken, flawed, and prideful yet Jesus died for us anyway. All he requires from us is to realize that fact and put our faith in him and what he did for us. Just like Joseph’s brothers, we have to humble ourselves and want the life God has for us instead of what our flesh wants. Every big or small decision is a decision between what we want and what God wants. Spiritual maturity comes from knowing the difference. It comes from willingly letting God lead us through the Holy Spirit. It is the hardest thing you will do in your whole life because it isn’t natural. The more you choose God over yourself and worldly things, the easier it gets. It gets easier because when you start to base all of your decisions on where the Holy Spirit is leading you the more you see your true purpose and that purpose is to draw closer to him. Throughout the whole Bible we see that God always makes a way for his people to come to him. No matter what sin consumes and affects us he has more mercy and grace than sin in our lives. Don’t ever think you are too far gone or that God doesn’t love you because of the sin in your life. God’s grace and mercy is far greater than any sin we could ever commit. Love y’all! Have a great day!

There is so much going on here. In this chapter both of Joseph’s dreams come true. Don’t forget that Joseph told his family that he dreamed that all of his family including his father would bow before his authority. This set into motion the defense mechanisms from his brothers, which led to Joseph being sold into slavery in the first place. This also shows that God knows everything before it happens and how he uses suffering and man’s sinful nature for his own will. There was nothing that Joseph’s brothers could do to stop the will of God. The brothers feared that if Joseph stayed they wouldn’t stand a chance of receiving their father’s birthright so they got rid of him. God uses their deception and deceitfulness for his own good. What we see here is a lesson that no matter how hard you try to control God’s will, what he has set into motion will always prevail. God has set into motion that he will defeat sin once and for all and he will claim his people for his own. The only thing we have the free will to control is to accept this or not. When Jesus comes back one day the only thing that will matter is if we belong to him or not. What will not matter is if you think you were a good person or a bad person. You can’t earn or throw yourself out of God’s hands. Once you belong to him you always do and if you never accept him for who he is then he says he never knew you. We tend to overcrowd our minds with things that really don’t matter in the grand scheme of things. We all have a purpose, and that is to be with God the way he intended it from the beginning. Our sin separated us from him and he sent his beloved son to die to pay the debt for our sins. All we have to do is to truly accept that fact and give our lives to him. We should love him because he first loved us and his love is greater than any love we have ever known or comprehend. Love y’all! Have a great day!

In this chapter we see that God’s spirit was with Joseph and Joseph had a reverence for God in his good and his bad situations. God chose to bless Joseph’s consistency. When Pharaoh summoned Joseph from prison to interpret his dreams, Joseph could have easily taken all the credit and glory for the spiritual gift that God had given him, but he freely chose to give it to God. We need to understand that God has given us a free will for a reason. He desires us to choose him no matter what situation we are in. There is no room for selfish ego and pride when it comes to gaining a relationship with God. When we accept the free gift that God has given us through Jesus, we also choose to give him the reigns in our lives. We freely do this because we understand that nothing is truly good unless it comes from God. There is nothing we can provide for ourselves that is good. Joseph understood this in prison and he understood this as right hand to Pharaoh. We should take this as a lesson to stay consistent. Whether we are thriving or suffering we should keep the same energy of giving all praise and glory to God. Never get to high or to low to acknowledge that everything we have comes from him. He is the source of all of our gifts, possessions, and abilities. God loves us more than our minds could ever comprehend. Love y’all! Have a great day!