Life has a way of often coming full circle.  We get reconnected with long lost friends.  We go back to towns we grew up in.  I am about to do a wedding for the granddaughter of a woman who I got to marry to her high school sweetheart 50 years after they first met.  Joseph has this experience as he is reunited to his brothers after much time has gone on.  I encourage you to read Genesis 42 to get the whole story but we are going to pick it up today in Genesis 43 as Joseph’s brothers prepare to go back to Egypt a second time and bring Benjamin with them this time.

Now the famine was still severe in the land. 2 So when they had eaten all the grain they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, “Go back and buy us a little more food.” 3 But Judah said to him, “The man warned us solemnly, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’ 4 If you will send our brother along with us, we will go down and buy food for you. 5 But if you will not send him, we will not go down, because the man said to us, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’” 6 Israel asked, “Why did you bring this trouble on me by telling the man you had another brother?” 7 They replied, “The man questioned us closely about ourselves and our family. ‘Is your father still living?’ he asked us. ‘Do you have another brother?’ We simply answered his questions. How were we to know he would say, ‘Bring your brother down here’?”8 Then Judah said to Israel his father, “Send the boy along with me and we will go at once, so that we and you and our children may live and not die. 9 I myself will guarantee his safety; you can hold me personally responsible for him. If I do not bring him back to you and set him here before you, I will bear the blame before you all my life. 10 As it is, if we had not delayed, we could have gone and returned twice.” 11 Then their father Israel said to them, “If it must be, then do this: Put some of the best products of the land in your bags and take them down to the man as a gift—a little balm and a little honey, some spices and myrrh, some pistachio nuts and almonds. 12 Take double the amount of silver with you, for you must return the silver that was put back into the mouths of your sacks. Perhaps it was a mistake. 13 Take your brother also and go back to the man at once. 14 And may God Almighty grant you mercy before the man so that he will let your other brother and Benjamin come back with you. As for me, if I am bereaved, I am bereaved.”

Jacob (Israel) does not want Benjamin to go.  The brothers are unwilling to go without him as that was Joseph’s demand.  They still have no idea he is their brother.  Simeon is waiting in jail all the while.  I don’t know if Joseph has a clear plan in his mind as to what he wants to do yet.  He is overjoyed to see his brothers but there has to be some lingering hurt.  Perhaps that is why he is making them jump through all of these hoops before revealing himself and forgiving them.  Maybe there is someone in your life who you have a lingering hurt from.  There is no better time then today to offer them forgiveness.  Today (Thursday of Holy Week) we celebrate when Jesus instituted the last supper.  He laid down his life to offer to us the ultimate forgiveness.  His example, as well as the example of Joseph, should encourage us to forgive others as well.

In His Grip,
Pastor Dave