Sermon Nuggets Mon Nov 26 Injustice
Verses- Gen 40
Handling Injustice
If you ever have trouble with table
conversation, start talking about dreams. Every one has dreams. I don’t mean
goals and vision and hopes, but dreams while you are sleeping. Sometimes they
are funny, or scary, or go back to childhood, or sometimes people even solve
problems in their dreams. I have a recurring nightmare that it’s time to preach
and I can’t find my Bible and sermon notes.
Many people try to interpret
dreams. Some seek some prophetic meaning like in the Bible stories. There have
been other examples of God speaking to people in their dreams like Abimelek
warned not to take Sarah to bed or God’s judgment would fall on him and his
country. He spoke to Jacob a couple of times in a dream, like the ladder to
heaven with angels ascending and descending on it. God told Jacob in another
dream how to mate the goats and sheep to increase his flocks.
Of course, I am so glad that we
live at a time we don’t have to wonder what God is telling us in dreams or
interpretations. We have the Bible and the Holy Spirit who speaks to us. I
definitely gave up thinking God speaks to me in dreams. I had a dream once of a
famine coming and severe draught and it was the rainiest spring we ever had. I
dreamed one girl I knew in College who worked with the drug culture to witness
to them at MSU was in danger and I awoke and prayed for her and when I saw her
I asked her what happened. Nothing she said she was at home sleeping and hadn’t
had any problems like that for some times. I also dreamed about giving someone
some money. I did so and was told it was not needed and some time afterward
there was no particular need for it, but thanks anyway. So I’ve closed the door
on thinking God speaks to me in my dreams. I’d much prefer the Bible and the
times with the Holy Spirit lays something on my heart.
The story today has to do with two
prisoners who told Joseph their dreams and God gave Joseph the gift of
interpretation. They both had a bad day. They made the Pharaoh mad and ended up
in a dungeon with Joseph.
I saw on the email some examples of having a bad day. Have
you ever felt like it was a really bad day? You know it’s a bad day when you
turn on the morning news and they’re displaying emergency routes out of your
city. You know it’s a bad day when the bird singing outside your bedroom window
is a buzzard. You know it’s a bad day when your horn goes off accidentally and
gets stuck when you’re following a group of Hells Angels on the expressway.
Well Joseph had many bad days and
even bad years. He experienced many injustices. But the way he acts and witnesses of the Lord
serve as tremendous example to me in a study on how to handle injustices.
We will
look this week on ways you can handle them.
Pastor Dale
Sermon Nuggets Tues Nov 27 Bitter
Genesis 40:1-9 Some time later, the cupbearer and the
baker of the king of Egypt offended their master, the king of Egypt. 2 Pharaoh
was angry with his two officials, the chief cupbearer and the chief
baker, 3 and put them in custody in the house of
the captain of the guard, in the same prison where Joseph was
confined. 4 The captain of the guard assigned
them to Joseph, and he attended them.
After they had been in custody for some time, 5 each
of the two men—the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt, who were being
held in prison—had a dream the same night, and each dream had a meaning of
its own.
6 When Joseph came to them the next
morning, he saw that they were dejected. 7 So he
asked Pharaoh’s officials who were in custody with him in his master’s
house, “Why are your faces so sad today?”
8 “We both had dreams,” they
answered, “but there is no one to interpret them.”
Then Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to
God? Tell me your dreams.”
Injustice can make you Bitter
Joseph had every reason to be bitter. There were people who
abused him. There may be people in your life who abuse you. That’s certainly a
major cause of bitterness.
How do you think Joseph felt when he obeyed his father went
to his brothers and the jealousy and hatred were so strong they wanted to kill
him? They bound him and threw him into a pit and sold him to some Ishmaelites
when they came traveling by.
Abuse was done directly to Joseph
out of a spiteful heart by Potiphar’s wife who was embarrassed and angry that
he would not go to bed with her. Her vengeful spirit was had him arrested and
put in stocks and in a dungeon. .
People abuse others when they
intentional try to hurt someone or do evil to them Abuse is always unjust
treatment. I know there are various
degrees and circumstances of abuse I took a class at MSU on child abuse as a
social problem in our society. I was made aware of some of the worse examples
of inhumanity on the most vulnerable of people, children. The class was on
social problems but we had an invited professor of social services for the
state of Minnesota and he used this class as a soap box to make public aware of
the magnitude of physical emotional, verbal and sexual abuse of kids.
I grew up in a Christian home were
such treatment was never thought of. O yeah, I thought I was abused when I had
gotten a spanking with a belt by my parents for misbehavior, but never burned,
cut, hung upside down, had bone broken or had head put into a toilet or
scalding water poured over my body.
Some of you know what abuse is
like? Some of you know what it is like to live in a home where someone gets
drunk and angry and begins to beat everyone. Some of you have been sexually
abused and have felt ashamed, guilty and dirty. Some as children still carry
secrets that you think it has some way been your fault and it wasn’t. People
make choices to abuse other people just like Josephs brothers and Potiphers
wife. They had the intent to destroy and hurt Joseph.
Now that is not all there is to injustice. Some may never be abused but you can say they’ve been misused. I think this is when people take advantage of you. These are people who generally are manipulators. They claim to be a friend or helper but use information to turn on you or get your money or a sale or gossip about you or spread lies about you. There are bosses that misuse employees, using them beyond what their job calls for. We see examples when someone will claim to repair a car and change parts that don’t need changing, or do work on house repair and persuade people they need certain treatment that just isn’t so.
But as far as this passage goes there is an illustration of how people use other people. In this story the two prisoners, the butler and the baker used Joseph’s gift. Joseph had the ability to interpret dreams, remember a couple of weeks ago when he told his family some dreams. Joseph had this gift and these two men used it for their benefit.
Unfortunately people often use other
people. They will use your gifts, talents, good looks and ideas and then get
rid of you. Have you ever felt used, like someone told you a lie in order to
use you? Even after helping the butler Joseph was forgotten and left in prison
for a long time.
One can
become bitter. People might feel justified to be bitter. Some people think they
have a right to never forgive another and will hold angry and hateful spirit
for years. Such people never get over it because they do not want to get over
it.
Pastor Dale
Sermon Nuggets Weds Nov 28 Barren
Gen 40 9 So the chief
cupbearer told Joseph his dream. He said to him, “In my dream I saw a vine
in front of me, 10 and on the vine were three
branches. As soon as it budded, it blossomed, and its clusters ripened
into grapes. 11 Pharaoh’s cup was in my hand, and I
took the grapes, squeezed them into Pharaoh’s cup and put the cup in his hand.”
12 “This is what it means,” Joseph
said to him. “The three branches are three days. 13 Within
three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore you to your
position, and you will put Pharaoh’s cup in his hand, just as you used to do
when you were his cupbearer. 14 But when all goes
well with you, remember me and show me kindness; mention me to
Pharaoh and get me out of this prison. 15 For
I was forcibly carried off from the land of the Hebrews, and even here I
have done nothing to deserve being put in a dungeon.”
Injustice can make you Barren
Many people treat life as if there is nothing that can be
done to change their circumstances and so they withdraw into depression,
discouragement and a numb and barren existence. I see this in the faces of many
prisoners in Rush City. Instead of making something different of their
situation, they have blank faces.
To be sure I do not know each story. Many, in order to
survive, do not want to get involved with anyone lest they be hurt more. Some
realize the rule of the Armed Forces. Don’t volunteer for anything.
I think I see this in some people who may not have
experienced injustice, but disappointment or changes in life. The writer of
Ecclesiastes might sum it up by saying “Vanity of Vanity, all is vanity.” There
is nothing to enjoy, or do but exist. It can be a depressing book. There are
people filled with barrenness for they have given up on hope. They have stopped
living.
I know people who have lost loved ones whose grief lasts so
long and hard they close up themselves to do anything. They no longer get
involved in the outside world. They do not go to activities. Their loneliness
makes them a prison hidden from other people. They do not feed their body,
mind, soul, or spirit. They stop growing; they stop living.
I have a book written by a hospital chaplain entitled, “Make
this illness count.” He tries to help patients face facts that life has changed
for them, but there is something to learn from each and every experience. Don’t
waste your illness in bitterness or in barrenness. (he uses different words).
We have choices to make even though those choices are different than before. We
can give up or get up.
Instead of sulking in the cell Joseph used his gifts,
skills, and spiritual life to make a difference in prison. His life had some
choices to interact with prisoners and with guards. And most importantly he
continued in his prayers and faith. God was with him even in the prison. He was
given the gift of interpreting dreams and used that gift even when the butler
forgot about him. He had administrative and leadership skills that he used so
rose to the place of helping those around him. Knowing the butler would be out
in three days also gave him hope so he asked to be remembered to the Pharaoh.
He wouldn’t have that opportunity if he just minded his own business and
refused to get involved with others.
As I face retirement I realize there are many who give up,
sit at home, and do nothing. They soon wilt in their depression. But I have
choices to make to get involved in growing in my faith and doing service
according to my gifts and God’s opportunities. On lady who impressed me while a
youth pastor was blind, old, bed ridden. I called on her every so often only to
be encouraged as she showed interest in my ministry and prayed for me every
day. Her life didn’t change much from day to day, but her mind was active and
her spirit full as she could be encouraged in the ministry of youth through
prayer and keeping up on their activities from her bed. She made an influence
on my life and opened up a new friendship that wouldn’t have happened if she
was closed up instead of opened up to a young pastor.
Beware of barrenness when life seems unjust. There are other
things before you what wouldn’t be there if you just emotionally and
spiritually drop out. Make your situation count for something as Joseph did.
Pastor Dale
Sermon Nuggets Thurs Nov 29 – Better
Gen 40: 16 When the chief
baker saw that Joseph had given a favorable interpretation, he said
to Joseph, “I too had a dream: On my head were three baskets of
bread. 17 In the top basket were all kinds of baked
goods for Pharaoh, but the birds were eating them out of the basket on my
head.”
18 “This is what it means,” Joseph
said. “The three baskets are three days. 19 Within
three days Pharaoh will lift off your headand hang you on a tree. And
the birds will eat away your flesh.”
20 Now the third day was
Pharaoh’s birthday, and he gave a feast for all his officials. He
lifted up the heads of the chief cupbearer and the chief baker in the
presence of his officials: 21 He restored the chief
cupbearer to his position, so that he once again put the cup into
Pharaoh’s hand, 22 but he hanged the chief
baker, just as Joseph had said to them in his interpretation.
Injustice can make you Better
Joseph had
another choice to handle his injustices. So do we. They can make you better.
Joseph could have sulked and had a pity party and wallowed in bitterness or
barrenness, but he made his circumstances better by using his gifts and abilities
in leadership and was a model prisoner. He was willing to help others. He
noticed these two men who were thrown into prison because they made the Pharaoh
very angry. He listened to the cup bearer’s dream and told him he will be
reinstated in 3 days and he was. But when it comes to the baker things are not
all that good. He will be hanged and birds will eat his flesh.
Why is such
a gruesome prediction necessary anyway? If you know what was going to happen to
the baker and he was in prison don’t you think it would be better to not tell him?
Joseph’s task as an interpreter was not to create God’s message, nor did he dare to change it. He spoke as God directed. The message of the baker’s dream was one from God, and it was true. I think of that when there are parts of the gospel that I would just as soon not tell. But the gospel is not our message to men; it is God’s
This prediction of his death also
allowed him to prepare for eternity. Would it have been less cruel for Joseph
to have lied to the baker about his future? If he had lied, then there would
have been no incentive for him to consider his ways and turn in faith to the
God from whom this warning had come. Far better to be warned of the “wrath to
come” and to prepare for it than to be deceived and face it unprepared. The
part of the Gospel is that you too will be like the Baker or the Butler. We are
condemned due to our sins. One group will be forgiven and the other group will
be destroyed forever. Right now if you have not allowed Jesus to die for your
sins by confessing repenting and asking Christ to come into your life then you
are bound for hell. God’s word says ‘God sent his son not into the world to
condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved”, Jn 3:17, but
the following verse reads, “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but
whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed
in the name of God's one and only Son.”
The baker did not have a choice in
the matter. We too do not have a choice -you will die and so will I. Where will
you spend eternity? God’s word is not cruel, but offers for you an alternative
to know that you will go to heaven. Will you say yes to Christ?
How else
might injustices make you better? Pastor Rick McKinnis noted that most people
think to be happy or to be successful in this world you need to have good
circumstances, and good relationships; Circumstances might be defined as car,
boat, house, job, money and so forth. Good relationships means having some good
friends, wife or husband to share life experiences with, and a normal to good
relationships with kids, grandkids, parents and so forth. If things do not work
out that way and dreams are not fulfilled then it is adversity. Adversity is
when circumstances and relationships do not work out the way dreamed or wanted
them to be.
Some people will try to make it
better by going out and shopping or buying new things, or playing music, or
changing their circumstances to be something else. Some might party to forget
or drink or do drugs so they will feel better. Some might read a novel, or go
to a movie or work harder to keep busy. Sometimes that works. It is way of
taking circumstances and replacing them with different circumstances hoping the
other circumstances will change.
Trying to face it as a better person is accepting what
cannot change and change what can be changed. I can’t do anything about. If I
crash the car there is nothing I can do about it but either get it fixed or
sell it or leave it they way it is for awhile. So I’ll change the situation by
rather than feeling bitter about the accident, I’ll take steps that need to be
taken to find different transportation, borrow a car, get a loan to buy
another, or walk. It’s a better solution than to do nothing and let the
circumstances get you down.
Some might
use injustices to do a personal inventory. It generally doesn’t help to make
excuses for others mistakes. It helps to re-evaluation yourself and the
situation as objectively as possible and learn from it and maybe make some
important changes in one’s life. We might be tempted to blame others for the
trouble we're experiencing.
Most certainly that could have been the way Joseph might
have coped with his situation. He didn’t do anything wrong it was all his
brothers fault, Mrs. Potiphar’s fault, Potiphar’s fault, and the Cupbearers
fault that he is where he is.
Some will look at their situation and be somewhat correct
when they conclude that The co-workers who don't do their jobs right ... the
parents who failed to provide us with the love and support we needed ... the
doctor who didn't diagnose the problem soon enough ... the crooks in Washington
who take all our money and give us corruption and scandal in return ... the
weatherman who told us it would be sunny for our picnic. If you look hard
enough, you can always find someone partly responsible for the mess you face.
But someone who wants to make things better instead of bitter say, I can’t do
anything about what others have done, I can only do what I have decisions and
ability to do. I can’t change my husband, but I can change me. I can’t change
my kids, but I can change me. I can’t change my situation but I can change me
within the situation. That is a positive and better step to take.
Pastor Dale
Sermon Nuggets Fri Nov 30 Blessed
Gen 40: 23 The chief cupbearer, however, did
not remember Joseph; he forgot him.
Injustice can make
you be Blessed.
First, we should notice that the two dreams, when taken
together, tended to strengthen the testimony of Joseph that God was with him
and enabled him to interpret dreams. Joseph did not, as is often done, give
nebulous and vague predictions. He gave two very specific prophecies to two
persons, yet they were exactly opposite in their outcome. If both came true, it
would be much harder to attribute Joseph’s accuracy to good luck. It was a
means of giving glory to God.
Had Joseph
believed that if he only had the faith he could have been instantly delivered
from his troubles, his faith would have been devastated by the fact that his
troubles did not go away. If freedom from pain and problems is solely dependent
upon my faith, then when pain and problems come my way, there must be something
wrong with my faith. Joseph would then have been questioning his own
relationship with God, perhaps even the existence of God, at the very time when
he should have been ministering to others and giving testimony to his faith. If
our faith does not endure the storms of life, what good is it?
Now part of our problem even with
making things better is a matter of perspective. We too often do not see the
picture for what it really is. This might be illustrated by something I got in
an email this week. I can’t vouch for the exact validity of the statistics, but
I think it makes a valid point never-the-less.
“If we could shrink the earth's
population to a village of precisely 100 people, with all the existing human
relations remaining the same, it would look something like the following. “There would be: 57 Asians; 21 Europeans; 14
from the Western Hemisphere, both north and south; 8 Africans; 48 would be male; 52 would be
female; 30 would be white; 70 would be nonwhite; 30 would be Christian; 70
would be non-Christian. 89 would be heterosexual; 11 would be homosexual 6
would possess 59% of the entire world's wealth and all 6 would be from the
U.S. 80 would live in substandard
housing; 70 would suffer from malnutrition.
1 would be near death; 1 would be near birth 1 (yes, only 1)
would have a college education; 1 would own a computer When one considers our
world from such a compressed perspective, the need for both acceptance,
understanding, and education becomes glaringly apparent.
The following is also something to
ponder . . . If you woke up this morning with more health than illness, you are
more blessed than the million who will not survive this week. If you have never
experienced the danger of battle, the loneliness of imprisonment, the agony of
torture or death, you are more blessed than three billion, yes 3 billion people
in the world. If you have food in the refrigerator, clothes on your back, a
roof overhead, and a place to sleep, you
are richer than 75% of this world.
If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and spare
change in a dish someplace, you are among the top 8% of the world's wealthiest
people.
If you can
read this, you are more blessed than over two billion people in the world who
cannot read at all.”
Does that
help put some things in perspective?
But we come to the look at things
as they are for Joseph. I could think of all those who are less fortunate than
him. He could have been beaten instead of been made in charge in leadership
position with the prisoners. He could have been in bad favor with the guard
than in good favor with the guard. He could have not had any communication with
the others instead of esteemed by the others.
Pastor Rick McKinnis preached sermon on Adversity and he
asks a very important questions. "could the equation of success we're
following be wrong?" In other words, does that blueprint we saw earlier
really work? My contention is that if it doesn't help you deal with adversity,
then something's wrong. You have to be able to handle circumstances and
relationships that don't turn out as you'd hoped in order to find success in
any venture.
Adversity tests the foundation upon
which your life is built. In the first model, the foundation was the pursuit of
good circumstances - job, health, money, home. (Please understand that I'm not
saying that there's anything wrong with these desires. It's the way God wired
us up.) But those things are fickle. They're unreliable, sometimes
unattainable.
God is the
opposite of all of those qualities. Faithful, reliable, available. And a life
that has the pursuit of Him at the foundation is much better equipped to
withstand the adversities of life. That's exactly what Jesus meant when he told
the parable of the wise man and the foolish man. One had circumstances that
were self serving. The other had a foundation for his life that was built on
the Lord or the Rock. One did not stand when circumstances were difficult the
other did. One crashed the other stood even though both went through the
storms. Jesus was speaking of something more than house building he was talking
about life building.
Joseph
story is also more about life building for even in prison in the worse of
circumstances there was a different formula for handing injustices. It was the
route of blessedness by the only true source of all blessing. It was in the
relationship and foundation of his relationship with God that allowed him to
make it., success is not ultimately about getting your circumstances right or
relationships right, as important as those things are. It's about God. It's
about pursuing him, first. And that's why Joseph, in spite of all the adversity
that had come his way, eventually received the success that God had promised
him
Joseph didn't overcome the tremendous
adversity in his life by denying his disappointment; he didn't blame others;
and he didn't try harder. He overcame adversity and became a success because he
built his life according to an equation that made the pursuit of God the most
important element of it.
He was ready for the tests when they
came. And I guess that's the most important lesson we need to learn in order to
pass the test of adversity.
Realize
that you don't respond to it, you prepare for it. Ask yourself,
"on which equation is my life based?" What am I pursuing? Finally, ask yourself, "what changes do
I need to make in order to pursue Christ first?"
Pastor Dale
