Non-Logical Consequences

A Sermon Preached by

The Rev. Paul Debenport

June 20, 2010

Guilt and grief.  Real guilt and real grief from real evil.  That’s where we left off in last week’s sermon on the Jacob/Joseph narrative in Genesis 37—50.   Joseph—the Dream-bearer, the favorite son of Jacob and Rachel, had dreamed that his brothers would some day bow down to him in subservience.  His brothers reacted with extreme jealousy and hatred and they sold Joseph into slavery in Egypt.  Then they soaked his royal robe in goat’s blood and convinced their father, Jacob, that Joseph had been slain by a wild animal.

          This called by God, but convicted family was consumed by the guilt of the brothers as they lived with the inconsolable grief of their father, Jacob.  But as God’s salvation history, it goes much deeper.  The brothers had not just sought to kill the Dream-bearer, Joseph, but also to kill the dream of God, the Dream Maker.  God had covenanted to bless this family and, through Joseph, to bless all humankind.  But the dream-killers had prevailed.  The brothers intended evil, and had murdered God’s dream, God’s promise, God’s covenant.

          Or had they?  Evil had been done—no question about it.  And it had produced terrible consequences for all of them—for Joseph, the brothers, and Jacob, their father.  But had evil prevailed?  Was God’s will for life and health and salvation killed forever?

          As the story continues, the great mystery of God’s immutable providence unfolds.  Despite being a slave in Egypt, Joseph’s new master in Egypt finds him worthy of responsibility, but Joseph’s attractiveness attracts a false accusation which lands him in prison.  But even there God is with him.  Joseph helps the prisoners and eventually even Pharaoh.  Joseph saves Egypt from the great drought he predicted and becomes the all powerful prime minister of Egypt.  Talk about the “last becoming first!”

          But back in Canaan things were getting desperate for Jacob and his other sons.  After years of drought, they were dying with the vines.  So, as desperate people in hopeless situations always do, they migrated to prospering Egypt seeking food, survival, hope.

          Next comes a scene that every wronged, younger sibling dreams of, surely Joseph had dreamed of it night after dark night in prison.  Though they don’t recognize him, the brothers appear before all powerful Joseph to appeal for salvation.  Joseph’s temptation to vengeance —to justice, really—is palpable.  Now is his opportunity for the logical consequences of their murderously evil intentions and action.  So he toys with his groveling brothers, like a cat toying with a mouse before the kill.  But then God’s softens Joseph’s heart and changes his understanding of all this, such that God’s dream prevails.  God’s will will be done.  Hear the saving Word of God of God’s non-logical consequences from selected verses of Genesis 45: 1—15:

Then Joseph could no longer control himself before all those who stood by him, and he cried out, “Send everyone away from me.”  So no one stayed with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers.  ….  Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph.  Is my father still alive?’  But his brothers could not answer him, so dismayed were they at his presence.  … Joseph said, “I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt.  And now do not be distressed, or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life … to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors.  So it was not you who sent me here, but God; God has made me father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt.  Hurry and go up to my father and say to him, `Thus says your son Joseph, God has made me lord of all Egypt; come down to me, do not delay.   You shall settle in the land of Goshen, and you shall be near me, you and your children and your children’s children….  I will provide for you

there … so that you and your household …, will not come to poverty.’ … Hurry

and bring my father down her.”  Then… Joseph kissed all his brothers and

wept upon them; and after that his brothers talked with him.

The Word of the Lord.  Thanks be to God.

+     +     +

          Why Things Bite Back: Technology and the Revenge of Unintended Consequences.  That was the title of a book a few years ago describing what is now know as The Law of Unintended Consequences.  The book’s examples included that although power door locks made drivers feel safer, they have caused a huge increase in the number of us who lock ourselves out of our cars, and the like.  I’m sure now there would be statistics to show that although computers were supposed to result in “the paperless office” the real consequence has been the exact opposite.  The author called this “the strange consequences of nearly everything.”  

This definitely fits this story of Joseph and his family, where in the end, the consequences of the brothers’ extreme evil are far from what they intended, and far from the logical consequences both they and we might expect.  But this story highlights just how different God’s ways are from our ways.  This salvation drama is about the mysterious truth of the immutable, non-logical, but wonderful providence of God Almighty.  It reveals how God’s intentions will prevail, despite our sometimes evil intentions.

          At first, anyway, the negative consequences of the brothers’ evil intentions and actions do fall on them as well.  They are overcome with guilt, cold-sweats-in-the-night guilt, as every day for years they lived with their father’s inconsolable grief.  Their toxic “family secret” must also have created in them terrible anxiety that Jacob would discover their evil act.  The consequences of their sin almost destroyed their father and their mother, indeed, their whole family.  But deeper still, theirs was God’s covenant family, and they all but destroyed God’s plan for them and all humankind.  Always evil has negative consequences.

          But in the final events of this story, we are permitted to see much deeper as God’s non-logical consequences are disclosed.    First, here we are allowed to witness a gospel disclosure:  the dead one is alive!  The abandoned one has returned in power![1]  It’s easy for us to overlook this part, as we, the readers, know that Joseph is alive all along, but Jacob and his brothers surely didn’t.  The good news, for Jacob at least, is that now this family can live from a new reality of a live, powerful Joseph.  When Joseph revealed his true identity, of course the brothers reacted quite differently.  The text says they were “dismayed.”  Terrified, may be more like it.  They feared Joseph would act from their past sins against him, which is not unlike the reactions of Jesus’ disciples who had failed Jesus when they learned of his resurrection.

          In fact, this side of Jesus’ resurrection, we can see that the whole Joseph story is a paradigm for the resurrection faith of the New Testament.  Here, it is only by God’s power and intent that Joseph is alive.  It is only by God’s grace that Jacob’s deep sorrow turns to a deeper joy.  It is only by God’s loving, providential care that softens Joseph’s heart and changes his whole understanding of what has happened to him, that Joseph is able to break with the past, not react with the logical consequence of vengeance, and opens to the brothers a new future.  They are freed from their guilt and their anxious fear.  And the dream, God’s dream for this family of the covenant is again alive and well. 

As is even more clear in Jesus’ resurrection and forgiveness, the over-riding point here is that God wills life for God’s people.  God’s purposes are hidden and mysterious and God’s ways most often are subdued and mysterious, but they are decisive, sufficient, more than sufficient, abundant!

Yes, evil always has negative consequences, but the ultimate consequences, usually not intended by us, but intended by God, are for health, for goodness, for life—abundant and eternal.  God’s good word to us through this remarkable story is powerfully proclaimed by Joseph to his brothers in Genesis 50:

“Do not be afraid!  Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it

for good, in order to preserve a numerous people. So have no fear;

I myself will provide for you and your little ones.”

Thanks be to God for the great and gracious gift of God’s non-logical consequences,

where God responds to us not with anger or vengeance, but with saving love, where,

 in Christ, all guilt and all grief are overcome, and, always, the future is new.

Amen.