What a reversal of fortune!
They had to clean Joseph up to send him before Pharaoh and in the end he
is riding just behind Pharaoh and the people are shouting, “Bend the
knee!” Joseph not only interpreted the
dream, he also came up with the plan for dealing with the famine. Pharaoh was so certain that this is all
correct that he immediately elevated Joseph to the number two job in the
kingdom, only with respect to the throne was Pharaoh greater. Remember that when Joseph was speaking to
Potiphar’s wife he said that only with respect to her was Potiphar greater in
his own house. The giving of the signet
ring is significant in that it allows Joseph to set Pharaoh’s seal to whatever
he, Joseph, does. The level of trust for
one plucked from the pit is amazing. I
wonder if Joseph thought back to his own dreams from so long ago when he saw
all this and heard the particular chant of the crowd. Interesting isn’t it that everyone else’s
dreams come true immediately and his had to wait many years and through incredible
difficulty?
Jesus says that he does only what He sees the Father doing
and the Father shows the Son all that He is doing. In Amos 3 we are told that the Lord does
nothing without first revealing it to the prophets. Jesus is more than a prophet because the
Father not only reveals what He is doing through the Son, He reveals it also
through the Son as instrumentation. In
eastern iconography Jesus is always pointing to the Father, giving glory to
Him. Here, Jesus says that the Father
has given judgment to the Son that whoever does not honor the Son does not
honor the Father. Where in that is there room for more than one way to the
Father? If the Father is only honored by
honoring the Son, it isn’t possible to honor the Father through some other
means. What we make of Jesus determines
our fate.
In Jesus we are like Joseph.
We were baptized into the death of Christ in order that we might be
risen with Him to be sons and daughters of the living God. When we are raised, we are essentially in the
position of Joseph with respect to Pharaoh, we are metaphorically clothed in
fine linen and given the signet ring as children of God. (That does not imply that our words are
binding on God.) We are no longer under
law but under grace but sin still matters as it keeps us enslaved. Joseph received grace. He received God’s grace in the ability to
interpret Pharaoh’s dream. He received
grace from Pharaoh in commuting his sentence and also in raising him up. We have received this same grace from God
through the death of Jesus. Let us
celebrate the new life we have been given by bowing the knee to the One who has
given us grace.
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