The Unseen Pit

May 28th AM, 2017 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Welcome to Sharper Sword, the publication ministry of Lighthouse Baptist Church in Lemon Grove, California. Lighthouse believes that individuals can reach their potential for the Lord as they grow in Christ. We want to hear our Lord say, Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Let's join Pastor Doug Fisher as he preaches another important biblical message from the Word of God.

SPEAKER_00 0:32

God will give us something that's timely, and it's not for us. It's for someone we're gonna meet. It's for someone we're gonna run into. It's for someone that we haven't even met yet that's gonna ask us a question. We're gonna go, oh yeah, I know the answer to that from the Bible. And God has a way of doing that once in a while. So may I say as you sit and listen and study with me a little bit today, uh, don't just think of yourself like this is for me. Think of it like I wonder who I'm gonna run into that I need this, that I can be a messenger from God unto them. So in Genesis chapter number 37, uh, notice if you would verse number 18, please. Verse number 18, thanks for looking. It says this, verse 18 of Genesis 37. When they saw him afar off, they are the sons of Jacob. The one they saw afar off was Joseph. Joseph is a son of Jacob also, and Joseph, you could see him afar off because he wore this special coat of many colors. And you could see him coming. And notice what it says in verse number 18: even before he came near unto them, they, what's the next word? Say it? Conspire. That tells you something about their attitude. The brothers conspired. Here's what the word conspired means: a secret plan with someone to do something that is harmful or illegal to someone else. So it's not a negative, it's not a positive term, it's a negative term. Conspiracy or conspire is to do some harm, to do something bad towards someone. And so they begin to conspire. And they were thinking bad things about Joseph, and they decided to conspire how they might kill him. Why? Well, one of the reasons in verse 19, they said one to another, Behold, this dreamer cometh. In verse number 11, you'll see that they were envious of the dreamer. What do you mean? Joseph had gotten from the Lord two dreams. They were dreams that were visions of something in the future for Joseph and his family. But when Joseph explained the dreams to his family, at least his brothers envied him and didn't like what he said. May I say to you that once in a while God reveals something to someone, and when someone else doesn't understand it, they can get all human about it. What do you mean, all human about it? They can kind of get lifted up like, well, how do you know that? What do you know about that? Who are you? You're just like me. May I say, in this case, God chose to tell Joseph something about the future. And he in turn shared it with his family, and the brothers didn't like it. But I want you to see this. They decided to put him in a pit, but they were gonna kill him. They were gonna slay him. They were gonna say, if you would, now this evil beast has come and slayed him. Verse number 20, you'll read that. And so what they do is in verse number 24, and here's the text for today's message, verse 24. And they took him and cast him into a pit. And the pit was empty, there was no water in it. So here they took Joseph and they they found this hole, this pit, and they put Joseph in that hole in that pit. Evidently it was deep enough that he couldn't climb out. And they had him in there reserved for what they would do to him next. Now, at that time, they didn't quite know what they were going to do. They had talked about killing him. They had talked about making it look like some evil beast out there, a lion or something, which were in the country, had devoured him. I want you to know something. When they cast him into a pit, they went into a deeper pit themselves. When they put Joseph in that physical pit, there was a pit those brothers went into that they wish they would have never entered into. It was going to become a deep emotional crevice, a deep, a deep cavern that would take years for them and great soul searching for them to finally come up out of. They put Joseph in that physical pit, but I want to say to you that because they conspired and did it to harm him without a cause, they put themselves in a pit. Now, statement, I want you to look back with me, stay right with me, and notice if you would, there's one that comes along, part of the brothers. Verse number 20. Verse number 20. Come now, he said, they said, uh, and let us slay him, let's kill him, and cast him into some pit. We will say some evil beast had devoured him. And we shall see what will become of his dreams. You you hear the competitive jealousy and envy. And Reuben heard it. Reuben was the eldest of all of them. He was the uh he was the firstborn of Leah. Leah, God, when when Jacob and Leah married, God saw that Leah was hated, is what the Bible says. And God gave Leah the ability to bear a son, and she bore Reuben. And Reuben was Jacob's firstborn, the oldest, the responsible one, if you would, by age. And when Reuben heard it, when Reuben heard that, he said that he he and he delivered him out of their hands and said, Let us not kill him. And Reuben said, verse 22, watch, let's not shed any blood, but we'll cast him into this pit and lay no hand upon him. Notice what it says, verse 22, read it carefully, that he might rid him out of their hands. Reuben was trying to deliver, if you would, Joseph from what they had talked about doing in a mischievous way. Reuben was the oldest. And may I say, Reuben knew he would give an account. Because that's the way the culture was in those days. The oldest would be responsible out there, and he knew it. Well, the Bible says they they took that coat off of him in verse number 23, threw him in that pit, and then they sat down to eat. And when they were eating, verse number 25, uh, here comes this company of Ishmaelites. And the Ishmaelites were uh were the different kind of people, and and they would, if you would, uh uh be involved in human trafficking. What do you mean? They would sell people off. And they would, they, they would, if you would, uh, capture people and then sell them off. And they had all these uh camels and the spice tree and the balm, but no doubt, if you would, they knew and they knew who the Midianites were. And Judah, number verse 26, said, What's going to profit us if we slay our brother? Conceal his bread. Hey, let's, verse 27, let's sell him to the Ishmaelites. Let's just sell him out of here. Brethren, please listen. It wasn't like he had a phone that you could find out where he was. There was no email, there was no texting. Once they sold him off, he they just thought he'll be gone. Nobody will know what happened to him. The Midianites, they're they're not even part of our culture. What do we care? We'll just sell him off and we'll tell everybody that an evil beast hath devoured him. And we'll conspire that way against him. So watch what happens if you would stay with me. And these Midianites passed by in verse number 28, and they lifted up Joseph. They took Joseph out of the pit and sold him to the Ishmaelites for 20 pieces of silver. It's a type of Christ. Would you agree? I know that uh Jesus uh Judas got 30 pieces, a type of Christ, money for him. And they brought Joseph into Egypt. Please listen. When they sold Joseph for those 20 pieces, the pit got deeper. What do you mean? The pit for the sons of Jacob got deeper. As they did more wrong, it got deeper. As they did more wrong to an innocent human, it got deeper. In fact, if you read carefully what happens next, you're doing well this morning. They uh they took that uh Reuben returns. Now Judah had tried in verse number 26 and 27. Judah said, you know, let's let's not kill him, let's let's profit from him, so we'll sell him. And Reuben, when Reuben comes back in verse number 29, the oldest, the eldest, he said, he went to the pit and he said, Where did he go? He's not here. Remember, Reuben was going to try to deliver him. And then it says this, verse 31, and they took Joseph's coat. Remember that coat they took off of him? They killed a little goat, a kid. And they took that blood from that kid and they dipped the coat in the blood of that goat. Uh, brethren, they didn't have forensic science in those days. So they took that that coat that that was obviously a special coat that his dad had made for him, and they they put blood all over it, the blood of a goat. And then they sent it back, and may I say the pit got deeper. Now they're trying to cover something and and throw somebody off with information that's misinformation, that's disinformation. And may I remind you, God's watching all of this. And when God watches, sometimes you don't. Well, why didn't God act? I want to tell you something about our Lord, and you know this. He's very patient. Well, why didn't God do that to that person? We got a patient, long-suffering, merciful God. And may I say to you that when they killed that little goat and put the blood on that son's coat of many colors, they sent it back to their father, verse number 33. And when his father saw it, he knew the coat. It was a special coat. He had had that coat made. And when he saw it, he said, It's my son's coat. An evil beast had devoured him. And by the way, that wasn't uncommon for an evil beast to devour someone. Joseph, he says, no doubt is read in pieces. So they lead dad to think that Joseph has died from an evil beast, and he, and dad, verse number 34, uh, is grieved for his son. And they tried to comfort him in verse number 35. He wouldn't be comforted. Why? Because he blamed himself. Why? Because dad was the one who sent Joseph to check on his brothers, and so dad is blaming himself for his son's death, and the pit got deeper. What do you mean? Now somebody else's grief is based on lies and deception. And the pit got deeper. Why do you keep saying the the pit got deeper? I don't I don't see them being in a pit. Brethren, mentally, they're now in prison. We know that because of in a few scriptures we'll lead. In fact, look at Genesis 42. Stay right with me. Genesis chapter number 42. If you're still with me, say amen. Genesis 42, if you're not and the person next to you is sleeping, give that person a little bump. Amen. In the Lord. Genesis 42. That was the best joke I have. Verse 1. Genesis 42, verse 1. Now, now we're 20 years later. What do you mean? When we get to Genesis 42, we're now 20 years later. I won't go all the scriptures because of time, but we're two decades later now, 20 years later. And uh there was a famine in the land. And it affected, if you would, uh it affected Jacob, it affected all his sons, and so uh Jacob, who's also is going to be named Israel, sent his sons, hearing that there was uh there was uh provisions in Egypt. There was grain you could go buy in Egypt, there was food you could go buy in Egypt. He sent his sons to Egypt to buy food. What they didn't know was the controller of all this was Joseph. Because Joseph had survived, and Joseph was alive, and Joseph was right where God wanted him to be. Well, Jacob sends all those sons who had thrown Joseph in a pit and made it seem like he had died. Look at verse 6, verse 6 of Genesis 42. And Joseph was the governor over the land, and he it was that sold to all the people of the land, and Joseph's brethren came, bowed themselves down, they bowed themselves to the earth to the ground. And Joseph saw his brethren, and he knew them, but made himself strange unto them. Let's stop there for a moment. Twenty years later, here's the governor who's Joseph, but please listen. Now he's he looks, if you would, like an Egyptian. He's the governor of the land. He speaks not just Hebrew, but he speaks the Egyptian language. And so they don't know it's him. They have no idea it's Joseph, but he knows them. And notice what happens. It says he made himself strange unto them, spoke roughly to them, and said, Whence come ye? And they said, From the land of Canaan to buy food. Now remind yourself, they don't know it's Joseph. He's speaking through an interpreter. He understands Hebrew. He understands they're talking to each other. He's speaking through an interpreter to the brothers, and they don't know it's him. Aren't you glad God records this kind of stuff? And Joseph knew not, knew his brother. Verse 8, but they knew him not. And Joseph remembered the dreams. And then he says, Ye are spies. Now I want you to know something. Uh Joseph does not have a vendetta towards them. I'll show you, I'll show you in a moment. He does not have a vendetta. He said, You're spies. You come in to spy out the lamb. He's using this, and in fact, in verse number 17, look there real quick, verse 17. He put them all together into ward three days. What does that mean? He put them in a controlled situation and put them under guard for three days, saying to them that they were spies, and the pit got deeper. What do you mean? It's 20 years later. It's 20 years after they had thrown Joseph in a pit, after they had lied about him, after they had made it to the father, like Joseph was dead, after they caused their father all kinds of grief, after God knew all this, it's 20 years later, and here they are in ward. They are captured, if you would, for three days. And then they're brought out to be examined a little bit. And notice verse number 21. This is really important to the thought. They're speaking in Hebrew. They're in front of Joseph. Joseph understands Hebrew. They don't know it's Joseph. And they said one to another, We are verily guilty concerning our brother. In that, we saw the anguish of his soul. When he besought us, and we would not hear. Brethren, they're in the pit. It's a deep chasm mentally. Don't tell me they haven't been thinking about it. And here they are in front of the one that they threw in the pit. And they're talking in front of him, and he they don't know, he understands. And he said, You know what we did to our brother. We know, we heard the anguish of his soul. We heard him cry out to us. We heard him say, Why are you doing this to us? In Psalms 105, it says that the Midianites put fetters, leg irons on him. They watched him walk away in leg irons in a chain gang to be sold. And he wasn't quiet about it. He was crying out, saying, What have I done? What are you doing? Hey, brethren, in those days, you go off in one of those, you may never come back. And they said, We heard the anguish of his soul when he cried out to us. And Joseph listened to all that. Twenty years later. And the Bible says, verse 23, and they knew not that Joseph understood them. For he spake unto them by an interpreter. And he turned himself about from them and wept. Don't tell me Joseph didn't have emotions. I want to say to you again right here, please listen. Joseph's not got a vendetta against them. We'll see that in a moment. Joseph's uh hearing what they're saying, if you would. And the Bible says, and he turned and went away from them and wept. Notice what he does, he takes Simeon from them. And in a series of events now, he uh he keeps one of them there and he sends the rest back. And he wants to see his father, and he especially wants to see his younger brother, Benjamin. You see, his mom's name, Joseph's mother's name was Rachel, and she had two sons. One was named Joseph. And the other one, when she gave birth to the last boy, his name was Benjamin, and then she died right at his birth. So Joseph knows that he's got a younger brother, but he hasn't seen him in 20 years. And don't tell me Joseph doesn't long for his family. Long for his dad. I want to make this statement. Joseph's no longer in the pit. But his brothers still are. Let me stop here for a moment. You ever have someone do something to you and you just think, why doesn't God do something? Did you ever have somebody do something to you and say, you say in your heart, why doesn't God do something? How do you know he's not? He just might not show us. Isn't God involved? Why doesn't he do something? He might be involved, but he not may not show you. Because God still works on this whole situation. You may run into somebody and say, you know, I just don't understand. Somebody did me wrong, and I thought God was fair and just and he didn't do anything about it. You might be able to tell that person, it's not your jurisdiction. To his own master, he stands and falls. We are not in the place of God. Joseph's gonna say that later. I am not in the place of God. We are not in the place of God. Isn't it good that we don't influence God to do what we're thinking? Let me say that again. Isn't it good that God doesn't listen to our thought life and say, well, do that? Because we think, God, what are you doing? Why don't you do this to them? If God did all that to people, what about us? What about when we do something, someone thinks that about us? Man, God would be destroying a lot of Christians. Come on, are you still with me or not? I mean, God, I don't understand why I'm thinking this. Why don't you do this? And God says, if I did that, I'd have to do what they're thinking about you. And I'd wipe out the whole church. I'd wipe out Christianity. So God's very gracious and merciful. Now notice if you would stay with me. Notice chapter number 45. We're almost there. Chapter number 45. Thank you. In chapter number 45, it starts this way. They now have gone back for a few more years. Now they come back and they're run out of food again. The famine is going to be seven years long. And now they're out of food again. They're in about the second or third year, and when they come back, in Genesis chapter 45, Joseph, they're in front of Joseph, and he said he couldn't refrain himself. He could not refrain himself. He cried. And he says, cause every man to go out from me. He sent everybody that was in his court, if you would, out. All the servants, all the ones that were there helping him, and there stood no man with him. While Joseph made himself known unto his brethren. So he reveals to them who he is. Wouldn't you like to see that video replay? All we have is a Bible, but praise the Lord, the Holy Ghost puts it in our mind's eye. The Bible says, and Joseph said to his brethren in verse number three, I'm Joseph. I come on. Stunned? Disbelief? Brethren, may I comment to you? When he started talking them in Hebrew, they were shocked. When he stopped talking in Egyptian and he started talking in Hebrew, I'll guarantee you they were stunned. Traumatized. And he said, I'm Joseph. Doth my father yet live? That tells us what he's been thinking about. His first statement, his first question is, Is dad still alive? Is my father still alive? Joseph's done the math. He knows how old his dad is now. And he says, Is my dad, is our father still alive? And his brethren could not answer him. It's not because they didn't know. They were shocked. They were stunned. And they were all troubled at his presence because they'd been in the pit for a while. What pit? Mental. Emotional. They couldn't answer him. They were troubled. And Joseph said unto his brethren, Come near to me, I pray you. And they came near and he said, I am Joseph, your brethren. And then he says, This, whom ye sold into Egypt. Well, that pretty well confirmed it. Because only those guys knew that they had done that. So when he says, I am Joseph, you sold me. But he wasn't saying that with a fist. He wasn't saying that like angry at it. He said, Whom you sold. It just confirmed who he was. But those are the only guys that knew about it. And then the Bible says this. Now therefore, watch. Be not grieved, verse 5, nor angry with yourselves, nor angry with yourselves. Don't blame yourselves. Don't blame yourselves, please, that you sold me hither. For God did send me before you to preserve life. He said this, please listen, don't be angry with yourselves. Don't don't blame yourselves. Brother, their motive was envy. Their motive was jealousy. And he says, Don't be angry with yourselves. It's okay. He had already seen them a couple years before. And now it's down the line a little bit. He said, Whatever you do, don't be angry with yourself. There's no vendetta. He said, I know what God's done. I remember the dreams. It's okay. God's got a plan. You all just don't know what it is, but don't be angry with yourselves. Brethren, isn't it interesting that envy sent him on this journey? Sorry, somebody in here, may I say this to you? Once in a while something happens to us that's unfair. And that sends us into God's will. What do you mean? Sometimes something is done to us, something that is unfair. And it sends us into God's will of experience and understanding. You still with me? You say, no, no, no, this can't. This, no, in the situation I have, it can't be. Sometimes things happen to us that are not right, and it sends us off into a journey of understanding that we could have never had without that. And so the Bible says very carefully, don't be angry with yourself. God sent me up before you to preserve verse 7 of posterity. It was not verse 8, so it was not you that sent me. It was God. And it goes on and and and you say, What do you think the brothers are thinking? Please listen. What do you think they're saying? Nothing. They're just standing there with whatever look on their face. They were quiet. Why? They're still in the pit. He's trying to help them. But they're still in the pit. What pit is it? It's a crevice of doing wrong to somebody unnecessarily. And then trying to cover it up and making it worse. And then hiding it away. In fact, you could even say they had a double life going on. What do you mean a double life? They were one way about Joseph with their dad, but they knew the truth that it was a false accusation that a beast had killed him. And dad's still grieving. And blaming himself for sending Joseph. Well, let's quickly go to the end. Look, if you would at uh chapter number 50. Chapter number 50. And we're done. Chapter 50. But don't miss this, please. Because dad's going to die. And Jacob dies, and they take him for the burial in chapter 50. And notice verse 15, and we finish the message. And when Joseph's brethren, the one who put Joseph in the pit, saw that their father was dead, they said, Joseph will peradventure hate us. If Joseph's a type of Christ, he's not going to hate. Would you agree with that? Joseph, peradventure, will hate us. Will certainly requite us. He'll pay us back. He'll requite us. All the evil that we did unto him. They're thinking, see, they're still in the pit. Joseph, now that dad's gone, he's going to pay us back. He's going to pay us back with evil. Verse 16. So the brothers they sent a messenger unto Joseph, saying, Thy father did command before he died, saying, So shall ye say unto Joseph, forgive, I pray thee now the trespass of thy brethren. Brethren, statement. Joseph's already forgiven them. It's already done. It's been done a long time ago. Joseph, when he left the pit, he's no longer in that emotional pit, although I gotta tell you, when he was in prison, he brought it up once. Statement. He says, Pray, please forgive your brothers and their sin that they did unto thee, the evil. And now we pray thee, forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of thy fathers. And Joseph went and they spake unto him. And his brethren also went and fell down before his face. And they said, Behold, we be thy servants. By the way, verse number 18 is the fulfillment of Genesis chapter 37, 5. Remember, he was out in the field and he had this dream that his brothers were out there and their sheaves would bow down to him. And it happened 40 years later. 40 years later. How do you know it was 40 years? Go back to Genesis chapter 47 and look at verse 28. You still good with me, or did I lose you? Is your stomach growling? Chapter 47, look at verse number 28. And Jacob lived in the land of Egypt 17 years. And the whole age of Jacob was 147 years old. It says that Jacob lived in the land of Egypt 17 years. Please listen. When Joseph left, he was 17 years old. At 30 years of age, the same age that Jesus started his public ministry, at 30 years of age, Joseph was made second command. There were seven years of famine. It was two and a half years later that the brothers came and another half year. And so that ended up to be 10 years total. And he was down there 17 years. I won't go into all the details, but if you add up 17 minus 30, and then if you would, the 10 years, and then the 17 years, it turns into a perfect 40 years. What do you mean? It's 40 years later. And if you know anything about the Bible, 40 is a significant number. It's 40 years later. That they finally say, forgive us. We've done you wrong. 40 years in a mental pit. You say you're making it up. Read it. Brother, I don't even want to be in a pit one year. It's better not to let the sun go down upon wrath. It's better not to do it at all in the first place. But we're all guilty of something. Come on, let's not look at each other and say, I got my halo on. How about you? We've all done something dumb. Said something we shouldn't have said, did something we shouldn't have done. Maybe not this gross, maybe not this extreme. But Joseph said a few years before, don't be angry with yourself. Let it go. But they had not yet repented to him. They needed to make that right. They were afraid when dad died, Joseph's going to retaliate on us. He's going to requite. Joseph had already forgiven him. He was already preserving a posterity, getting ready to take care of them and their children. He wasn't going to let what they did to him stop him from doing the will of God. I want to say it one more time. Joseph was not going to let what they did to him stop him from doing the will of God to benefit not only them, but all their children. There was four in Joseph's family. A wife and two sons. When Jacob came up out of Egypt, he came out with 66. If you do the math, there were 70 total. Joseph and his wife and two sons, and 66 started out living over in Goshen. It's not worth staying in the pit. It's not worth going in the pit. And if someone has put you in a pit and you're down in there, ask God to bring you back out. Yeah, but I got sold to the Midianites. It'll be alright. Yeah, but I went there and then I got accused of this. It'll be alright. But yeah, but then I went to the prison and you know, I was in prison for a while, and I it'll be alright. Because if we do right before the Lord, sooner or later it will be alright. All things still work together for what? Good to those that are called and those that love God. Somehow God's got a plan. You say, Well, I just haven't seen it yet. Brethren, if you don't see it down here in heaven, you'll be glad you went through it all. Because he'll wipe away all that pain, one of those songs said. The statement is simply this Joseph got thrown into a visible pit, but in doing that, they put themselves in a pit. And then they told their father, he died, and an evil beast slain him, and his dad blamed himself and blamed himself and blamed himself, and they let that go, and they got into a deeper pit. And it lasted for not just 20 years when they saw Joseph. But by the time their dad had died, and they had lived in, he had lived in the land there for 17 years, and at his age, if you add it all up, it was 40 years later before they came to Joseph and said, We're sorry. So all the time that they were living those 17 years and being taken care of, nobody ever went over and said, I'm sorry. You say, Why should I say I'm sorry? It's not about you and the person, it's about you and God. Think about Eliphaz, build out, and Zophra with Job. Somebody had to say they were sorry. Huh? Brethren, the words I'm sorry, they're difficult for some people. And sometimes they're difficult for us. But I'm sorry says to God, I know I did it. I'm telling him I did it. And God says, it's about time. Now let me take care of something for you. When we get saved, we have to say to the Lord, in some way, shape, or form, I'm sorry. When we get saved, in some way, shape, or form, we have to say in our hearts, I'm sorry for sinning and breaking and being disobedience and breaking your rule. There has to be godly sorrow. It's called repentance. That's a great start to salvation.

SPEAKER_01 39:00

Thank you for listening to this message by Pastor Doug Fisher of Lighthouse Baptist Church in Lemon Grove, California. To learn more about Lighthouse Baptist Church, visit our website at www.lighthousebaptist.com or call 619 461 5561.