“We have come from Canaan to buy food,” they answered. Although Joseph recognized his brothers, they did not recognize him. He remembered the dreams he had dreamed about them and said, “You are spies; you have come to find out where our country is weak.”
“No, sir,” they answered. “We have come as your slaves, to buy food. We are all brothers. We are not spies, sir, we are honest men.”
Joseph said to them, “No! You have come to find out where our country is weak.”
They said, “We were twelve brothers in all, sir, sons of the same man in the land of Canaan. One brother is dead, and the youngest is now with our father.”
“It is just as I said,” Joseph answered. “You are spies. This is how you will be tested: I swear by the name of the king that you will never leave unless your youngest brother comes here. One of you must go and get him. The rest of you will be kept under guard until the truth of what you say can be tested. Otherwise, as sure as the king lives, you are spies.” With that, he put them in prison for three days.
Forgiveness is…..hard.
It is strictly a unilateral decision. And it’s not a feeling. It’s a verb…..a conscious choice that we either do or we don’t. And those deep wounds…well, they are hard to forgive because they take forever to heal. They break open constantly and everywhere you turn, if it’s not actively bleeding, it’s being rubbed raw by a memory or a trigger. You can’t seem to win or get ahead.
This passage above from Genesis is about Joseph. Coat of many colors, Joseph. Let me catch you up if you are new Bible study. His story is great, but long, and there is SO much content here, that will be other blogs for sure. He had 11 brothers. He and his youngest brother had the same mother, whom their father favored and, therefore, he favored them. So the other 9 brothers resented Joseph. He had prophetic dreams and his father gave him the famous gift of the colorful coat. Long story short- try to keep up, read faster lol!… one day the brothers took off the cloak, threw Joseph in a pit to leave him for dead but then decided to sell him into slavery. They took the coat, covered it in blood and told their father he was attacked and killed. Meanwhile, Joseph is sold as a slave in Egypt, eventually ends up as a servant to a man named Potipher, whose wife thinks he’s hot and tries to seduce him. When Joseph says no, she takes his coat and accuses him of rape and he’s thrown in prison. He is in prison for 2 years, when the Pharaoh gets word that this slave in prison can interpret dreams. He then interprets a dream for Pharaoh and is released. Later, he ends up serving as 2nd in command to Pharaoh. Because of one of his earlier dreams that a famine was coming, Egypt had enough food stored to not only feed their own, but to sell to neighboring lands. So here come Joseph’s brothers to buy grain…. They don’t recognize him, it’s been 22 years, and Joseph is fully immersed in Egyptian culture.
What do you think is going through Joseph’s mind? The author of the text doesn’t ever say, although we know he is overcome with emotion several times during the story because he leaves the room to weep twice. A lot of interpretation of this passage makes Joseph out to be the patron saint of forgiveness and good intentions, but I am unsure of that. I have zero doubt of the content of his character based on the description of his life, but maybe the writers of these expositions haven’t ever been betrayed and deeply hurt to see it the way I do? Maybe the way you do? He recognizes them and does NOT immediately reveal himself and offer grain to ease their suffering. He accuses them of being spies which is punishable by death. The only reason he didn’t send them straight to the gallows was because he wanted information about his younger brother Benjamin and his father, neither of whom were with them. He quickly devises a plan where he might be reunited with the 2 people he loves and misses by using the other brothers. But he puts them in prison for 3 days first. Probably so he can cool off. And think. Maybe a little revenge, some ‘I told you so, you are getting what you deserve….’ I REALLY wish there was commentary on Joseph’s thoughts during these 3 days. Mine would go something like this….
They don’t deserve to live, because they tried to kill me…….. But God says vengeance is His and He can do it better than I can.
They deserve to rot in there, like I rotted as a slave, and rotted in prison because of them……. But God has blessed me in ways I cannot explain in other parts of my life and I can’t return hate for hate.
They deserve to feel what it is like to be betrayed by someone who is supposed to love you……But God has loved me and I am to love others.
The yin and yang of the thoughts that run through my mind at any given moment, especially when I am sitting in the deepest points of sorrow, are no different than yours. And are certainly no different than Joseph’s were. We are human. God made us, so He knows.
During those 3 days, Joseph had decisions to make. Would he forgive? I am sure he thought he had already forgiven them over the course of 22 years, especially when things were good, but now he was face to face with it. Are you in those 3 days? I am. Trying so hard to forgive. I want to, I really do. Ultimately, Joseph does forgive, releases them, and derives a plan to reunite them all. It’s a great story of redemption that I will write about someday. Just not today.
Forgiveness is HARD. It’s legit hard work.
Joby, the pastor from Eleven22, has preached the best sermon I’ve ever heard on forgiveness. I’ll leave the link below. He says we don’t forgive because we don’t trust God to be the judge. Also, we believe that if we forgive, they get away with it. That is 100% true. He says not forgiving is like “trying to kill rats by you taking the rat poison, it never ever works!” He encourages us to create a Debt Ledger where we acknowledge who hurt us, exactly what was taken from us, and what feelings are associated with it. Then DO SOMETHING with it. Burn it, bury it, something. So that every time the enemy reminds us of those things, we can say “no, they don’t owe me that anymore.” I heard that sermon in October and today, I am writing to you from a hotel room in Portugal, with one of my best friends, who also has some things to forgive. And we have some plans for that debt ledger while we are here. We did the hard work. I came to realize that I was already doing “hard” by living with unforgiveness. And I don’t want to eat the rat poison anymore.
Forgiveness is HARD. It’s legit hard work. And it takes time.
I also realized that forgiveness can’t wait for healing. I think I have been waiting for the bleeding to stop to be ready to forgive. Like, ‘when I feel all better, then I can forgive. Until then you don’t deserve it.’ But maybe that’s backward. Maybe healing is in forgiveness? Or a part of it? In Mark 2, Jesus forgives the man of his sins before he tells him to get up and walk. And I am ready to get up and walk! Are you? If so, listen to the linked message and make your debt ledger. And lets leave the poison for the rats…