Msg #24033 Joseph, A Superb Type of Christ
What The Bible Says
Good Samaritan’s Penny Pulpit by Pastor Ed Rice
Joseph is a type of Christ, indeed a superb portrait of Christ in the full depth of typology. When some ignominious Bible teacher says Joseph portrays Christ because Joseph forgave his brothers, I cringe and rant at their shallowness. When they say he was a spoiled brat with family relationship issues, another rant.
In the Bible there is a lot in a name, and even the name Joseph means “another son is coming” (Gen.30:24). There are five Josephs in the Old Testament, all significant, nine in the New (Joseph the eleventh son of Jacob, of course Joseph espoused to Mary, Joseph one of his sons, a half brother of Jesus, a Joseph of Arimathea, one surnamed Barnabas, one surnamed Justus, and three others in the lineage of Christ.) Each one, with that meaning in their name, is significant.
In Genesis 37 Joseph was a young man who was shown that his brothers would one day bow before him: consider that Jesus knew “every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God” (Rom.4:11). Joseph was wrongly judged, badly misused, stripped of his garment, and thrown into a pit, consider Jesus was “wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities, … And he bearing his cross went forth into a place called Golgotha, … now his coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout. … Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be” (Isa.53:5, Jhn.19:17-24). Joseph was pulled from the pit and sold into Egypt: consider Jesus, “Vainly they watch His bed, Jesus, my Savior! Vainly they seal the dead Jesus my Lord! Up from the grave He arose With a mighty triumph o’er His foes. He arose a Victor from the dark domain And He lives forever with His saints to reign” (Robert Lowry).
Egypt is a portrayal of the world and Joseph was transported there even as the resurrected Lord left the dispensation of the Jews and went to be Saviour to the world. But our Genesis story of Joseph is interrupted here by Genesis chapter 38; C.I. Schofield labels it “parentheses:the shame of Judah.” There, the things Judah did splash across a page of our Bible as a shocking display of how God’s stiffnecked people operate without him while Joseph languished in Egypt.
And all the while Joseph was struggling there in Egypt, there is a portrayal of the Christian saints, in Christ, struggling in this world. Tested by bondage, but keeping integrity; tested by sexual temptations, but keeping purity; tested by prison, but rising above it; able to discern the times; able to endure hardness as a good soldier; able to stand before kings; rising successful above all challenges; having a world impact; and even able to touch Israel.
Continuing on, the touching story of Joseph revealing himself to his brothers is a portrayal of Jesus’s testings and trials bringing Israel to a place where “every eye shall see him and they also which pierced him.. shall wail because of him” (Rev.1:7). In Egypt Joseph becomes saviour to the world, a saviour to all that come to him for bread. In Egypt Joseph then became saviour to Israel; the brothers who rejected him came and bowed before him calling him Lord. For Jesus the Saviour of the world, Romans 11:26-27 states it this way: “And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob: For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.”. That’s what makes Joseph a type of Christ.
A 575 word essay for week #33, Aug 18, 2024
Penny Pulpits including the Joseph Rant www.GSBCPastorRice.wordpress.com
Msg in audio at www.GSBaptistChurch.com/audio/gs240818.mp3
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