Acts 7:9-16

JOSEPH TYPICAL OF CHRIST

9-16. The symbolism of Joseph is entirely in the royal line of Jesus. In his deep disgrace and humiliation, slavery and imprisonment, he emblematizes Christ in His first advent; while crowned with gold, mounted on a golden chariot, ruling over all the land, he typifies Christ in His second advent Jacob loved Joseph more than his ten older brothers, because he was the son of his beloved Rachel, for whom he toiled fourteen years. Then she lived but a little while. I saw her tomb on the road from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, where she died, leaving a broken-hearted husband to transfer his love to her two little boys. Hence the ardent love of Jacob for Joseph, manifested in the royal robe of many colors, such as kings wore. Though Jacob knew it not, he was even then verifying the regal character of Joseph, the brilliant type of King Jesus, by dressing him in a kingly robe. When Joseph dreamed those wonderful, prophetic dreams, he was only twelve years old, too young to have any idea about their meaning. Yet they so vividly impressed his infantile mind that he could not forbear telling them. So he told his harvest dream: All binding sheaves in the field, and the bundles stood up, and those of the other ten all fell down before his. When a beardless boy I used to preach to the toiling slaves, delighted to hear them shout and sing their homespun Ethiopian songs. Here I remember one about this Scripture:

1. “Joseph had a vision; Joseph had a vision;

The sun and moon and eleven stars fell down obeisance to him.

Chorus: Shine, shine like a star, Shine, shine around the throne of God.

2. “His brothers' wrath was kindled; His brothers' wrath was kindled;

They sold him to the Ishmaelites and had him carried to Egypt.

Chorus: Shine, shine, etc.

3. “They brought him unto Pharaoh; They brought him unto Pharaoh;

And there they laid the corner-stone on which to build Salvation

Chorus: Shine, shine,” etc.

When the little fellow told his dream about the sun, moon and eleven stars falling down before him, his father chided him:

“Why, my son, are you so vain as to think you will be king over your father, mother and brothers?”

When his angry brothers sell him to the Ishmaelites for ten dollars, the price of a young slave, typical of Jesus sold for fifteen dollars, the price of a grown slave, he was only twelve years old, too little to know anything about the wonderful meaning of his dreams. How vividly Joseph, in the purity of his youth, triumphing over all the temptations in the house of Potiphar, and even submitting to the lying persecution which consigned him to a loathsome dungeon seven weary years, emblematizes our Jesus in the purity of His youth. Finally the chief butler and baker are cast into the same dismal, dark, imperial prison. They both dream dreams. The former dreams that he saw three luxuriant vines bearing luscious grapes, which he expresses, bearing the wine to Pharaoh's table. He tells Joseph, who interprets:

“The three vines are three days, at the expiration of which Pharaoh will take you out of this prison and restore you to your butlership again.”

The interpretation is so good the chief baker is encouraged to try him on his dream.

“I dreamed that I had three baskets on my head, containing all kinds of sweet cakes used on the royal table. But the fowls of the air lighted down and ate the bread out of the baskets on my head.”

Joseph responds:

“The three baskets are three days, after which Pharaoh will send and take you out of this prison, hang you on a tree, and the fowls of the air will eat your flesh off your bones.”

Sure enough, in three days the chief baker is taken out and hung and the chief butler restored to his butlership. While the latter is going out Joseph says:

“When it goes well with you, remember me.”

In his royal splendor he forgets all about the humble request of the poor Hebrew boy. Pharaoh dreams that he sees seven of the finest cattle he ever beheld come up out of the Nile and graze in a meadow; then seven of the poorest stunted dwarfs. But the latter devoured the former, exhibiting no change. Again in his dream he saw seven stalks of the finest corn lie ever beheld growing on the banks of the Nile. Then seven of the most worthless, withered and blasted by the east wind. But the latter devoured the former and showed no change. He calls in all the magicians and astrologers and wise men of Egypt. They are utterly dumfounded. Then says the chief butler:

“Now I confess my sin. There is a Hebrew boy in that dungeon who beats all creation to interpret dreams and evolve dark sayings.”

Pharaoh orders: “Bring him straight.” In one short hour Joseph stands before the king, hears his wonderful dreams and proceeds to interpret:

“O king, the dream is double, because it is sure to come to pass. The seven fat cattle and fine ears of corn are seven years of plenty, such as have never been known in the land of Egypt. The seven lean kine and the seven blasted ears of corn are seven years of famine, which shall consume all the substance of the first seven years of plenty, depopulating the nations with general starvation. Now, O king, look out some man of wisdom who shall take this matter into his hands, build storehouses and lay up a supply of corn during the seven years of plenty for the seven years of famine which shall come upon all the earth, so that no life will survive unless this matter shall receive diligent attention.” “Why,”

says the Pharaoh,

“who in all the world is so wise as yourself, the man to whom God has given wisdom beyond that of any other man in all the earth?”

Forthwith, Joseph is washed, dressed in the royal robes, a great chain of gold put around his neck, a crown of gold on his head, mounted on a golden chariot, fifty royal couriers run before him, shouting to all they meet, “Bow the knee, the king cometh.” What a wonderful emblem of regeneration in which the sinner is elevated from the doom of hell to the palace of heaven. Here Joseph, in one short hour, passes from the filthy dungeon to the proudest throne beneath the skies. Sure enough, the land teems with plenty; such crops were never before seen in the valley of the Nile. Joseph has granaries built in all the land to store the surplus corn.

Everything full and running over. The seven years of plenty have come and gone. The seven years of famine set in. Dearth prevails, nothing is raised. The people all come to Joseph for bread. He has plenty. What a glorious emblem of Christ, dispensing the bread of life! There is famine in the land of Canaan. Jacob hears there is corn in Egypt. Sends his ten sons. Joseph meets them. It has been twenty years since they sold him to the Ishmaelites. He is so covered with the royal robes and the beard on his face, as to preclude all possible recognition; meanwhile he recognizes his older brothers, several of whom were grown when they sold him. He feigns incognito. Speaking to them through an interpreter, though he understood the Hebrew which they spoke, he asks about their family and country. They say, We are all the sons of one old man living in the land of Canaan; we also have a little brother at home and one dead (having lied so much about Joseph, they think it is true). The Latin history I read when a boy says they were unutterably surprised at the gushing tears flowing from the eyes of the king as they spoke of their father and little brother. He accused them of coming to spot out the land, detained Simeon, and exacted from them a promise to bring Benjamin, certifying they never shall see his face unless they bring Benjamin. They all find their money in their sack's mouth, on the road home. Jesus gives us the bread of life like Joseph, his type, without money and without price. The old man is awfully shocked when he hears that the king of Egypt arrested and detained Simeon.

“Thus I am deprived of my children. Joseph is dead, and now Simeon is gone.”

When they tell that Benjamin must go if they get any more bread, he positively refuses. Time rolls on! The bread is out and famine stares them all in the face. Oh, how reluctantly the old man consents for Benjamin to go! but concludes he would better lose Simeon and Benjamin along with Joseph, already dead, than for them all to starve to death in a pile. So they all go again. On arrival they meet Simeon, looking better than they ever saw him. They wonder again why the king of Egypt cries so when he sees their little brother. The king entertains them with a rich feast. To their unutterable surprise he sits them down in the order of their ages. He puts on Benjamin's plate five times the usual amount. God grant to you, reader, a Benjamin mess while you read this book. After dinner Joseph puts all of the Egyptians out of the room and now speaks in the Hebrew language, which they thought lie did not know, as he spake to them through an interpreter:

“I am Joseph, whom you sold to the Ishmaelites twenty-two years ago.”

They are all stunned, appalled and panic-stricken. They all fall down before him and beg his pardon.

“Oh,” says he, “no need of that. God sent me before you to Provide bread and keep you all from starving to death.”

He goes around, embraces and kisses each one of them. They almost swoon away under the shock. Old Pharaoh in his palace hears the loud crying, sends for Joseph, who confesses his brethren have come. Pharaoh nobly says:

“The best of the land is at your option; send wagons and bring them all down. Regard not their stuff, for I will supply them.”

When they return with Simeon and Benjamin and tell Jacob that Joseph is still alive and ruler over the land of Egypt, he faints and can't believe it. Finally when he sees the wagon his spirit revives and he ventures to believe it. Convalescing finally from the shock, he says:

“Then my Joseph is yet alive;

I will go down and see him before I die.”

Jacob lived seventeen years after the migration into Egypt. The old Pharaoh who had made Joseph his prime minister, committing to him the burdens and responsibilities of the kingdom, soon passed away, leaving the sole incumbent of the throne to reign over Egypt sixty-one years, precisely the period of Queen Victoria at the present date. The striking conservatism of Pharaoh and Egypt to Joseph and Israel vividly symbolizes the glorious millennial reign of our Lord, when all the kings of the earth shall submit obsequiously and co-operate conservatively in the mighty theocracy. Though Joseph died one hundred and fifty years before the departure of the children of Israel out of Egypt, pursuant to his predictions of the coming exodus and return to Canaan, they embalmed his body in a stone coffin, kept it through all those years, and finally, as history says, carried it on a wagon drawn by twelve oxen, heading the procession out of Egypt, through the Red Sea, forty years in the wilderness, then through the rifted waters of Jordan's swelling flood into the Promised Land, where they buried him in the sepulcher which Abraham bought from the sons of Emmor in Sychem, the remains of Jacob having been carried up by Joseph in person and buried with Abraham and Isaac in the sepulcher of Machpelah.