My Brother's Keeper

Reading:   Genesis 43-45

First - I must apologize - I started a new salaried position and have been very busy so the blog is a bit backed up; but, have no doubt, I have kept up with the reading and a flood of catchup blogs shall hit the web soon!

Brief synopsis:   Joseph is removed from jail and interprets Pharaoh's dream.  The dream predicts seven years of bountiful harvest followed by seven years of famine.  Joseph suggests that excess from the seven bountiful years be stored for the predicted famine years.  Pharaoh is so impressed by Joseph that he makes him overseer of the storage in the good years and provisional general during the famine years.  During the second year of famine, Israel sends ten of his sons to purchase corn from the Pharaoh so that they might survive.  The men do as Israel asks and make the long journey to Egypt.  in Egypt, they are met with Pharaoh's provisional overseer, their brother Joseph, but none of the men discover his true identity.  Joseph is overwrought by the presence of his brothers and tears up (secretly) when they speak of Benjamin (Joseph's younger brother), who did not make the journey.  Joseph demands that they return to their father and bring back Benjamin so that he might know him better man  - he takes Simeon hostage as added incentive.  Despite much hullabaloo from Israel, Benjamin is finally allowed to visit the Pharaoh's provisional general (Joseph) and the men return to Egypt.  Joseph cannot contain his joy at seeing all his brothers together and eventually breaks down and explains that he is, in fact, the very same brother that they had sold for twenty silver pieces.

GENESIS 45:5, 7-8

5    Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither: for God did send me before you to preserve life. 

 7    And God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. 

8    So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt. 

I found a great conference talk from 1990 about the verses I wanted to share today and I think it will fit perfectly with my thoughts...

Thomas S. Monson (President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints)
1990 April General Conference, Priesthood Session 

 ...One such example [of a Brother's keeper] is found in the life of Joseph and his brothers. We will recall that Joseph was especially loved by his father, Jacob, which occasioned bitterness and jealousy on the part of his brothers. There followed the plot to slay him, which eventually placed Joseph in a pit without food and without water to sustain life. Upon the arrival of a passing caravan of merchants, Joseph's brothers determined to sell him rather than to leave him to die. Twenty pieces of silver extricated Joseph from the pit and placed him eventually in the house of Potiphar in the land of Egypt. There Joseph prospered, for "the Lord was with Joseph." (Gen. 39:2.)

 After the years of plenty, there followed the years of famine. In the midst of this latter period, when the brothers of Joseph came to Egypt to buy corn, they were blessed by this favored man in Egypt-even their own brother. Joseph could have dealt harshly with his brethren for the callous and cruel treatment he had earlier received from them. However, he was kind and gracious to his brethren and won their favor and support with these words and actions:

 "Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither: for God did send me before you to preserve life. ...

 "And God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance.

 "So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God. ...

 "Moreover [Joseph] kissed all his brethren, and wept upon them: and after that his brethren talked
with him." (Gen. 45:5, 7-8, 15.)

 They had found their brother. Joseph in very deed was his brothers' keeper. 

Awesome...so despite the fact that his brethren totally sold him...Joseph truly believed it was only so that he might preserve them later in life - that it was God who sent him away, not them.  Wow!!

~Kipling