Genesis
Foundation Book of the Bible
The Beginning of the End
Stratégie d'enseignement
The focus of this lesson is to review the beginning of the story of Joseph. Of special note in this lesson is how Joseph came to his position in Egypt and the role it played in God’s eternal plan to bring Jesus to complete His work of redemption.
Résultats de l'apprentissage des étudiants
- Know: Understand how God uses the affairs of men to continue His promise of redemption.
- Feel: Develop an awareness of the role Genesis plays in God’s overall plan for man.
- Do: Use the information gained from Genesis to strengthen our faith.
Corps de la leçon
Questions à discuter
Vous trouverez ci-dessous des suggestions de questions à utiliser pendant la partie de la leçon consacrée à la discussion guidée. Vous trouverez également des suggestions de réponses aux questions pour aider les élèves à saisir les différents concepts. Ces réponses sont fournies pour faciliter la discussion et ne sont pas considérées comme des réponses "justes ou fausses".
As the chapter begins, we see the end of the narrative of Jacob's life and the appearance of a new writer. The evidence is the telling of the dreams of Joseph. It seems logical that Joseph would be the one telling of the dreams and other details of the events that followed in his life.
There may be many reasons why this is significant but of major note is the turning of a page in the narrative of God's faithfulness to His covenant. It will now shift to Joseph as a key player in the fulfillment of the covenant. Note also that Jacob is living in the land of his father as a sojourner. Sojourner means traveler indicating that it is a transient life.
Joseph dreams two dreams indicating that his family will one day serve him. The brothers become jealous and angry and sell him into slavery. This resulted in the chain of events that eventually led the Israelites receiving the Law of Moses and later on, the arrival of Jesus.
Joseph's physical slavery and removal from his father is symbolic of our slavery to sin and how this results in the separation from our heavenly Father. Joseph did not choose separation, it was forced upon him by the actions of others. In our slavery, we may not always choose to sin, but throughout history the results of sin are none-the-less forced upon us. As a result, like Joseph we are separated from God. Joseph was physically removed as far as possible from his father. In the same way, our slavery to sin completely removes us from our Father. The blood of an innocent animal was shed in the transaction for Joseph. The innocent blood of Jesus was shed but not to separate us from the Father, but to reunite us.
Jacob experienced deep grief with seemingly no hope of ever seeing Joseph again.
It is likely that he felt, as would any father, that he would rather have been taken than his son. In like fashion, our separation from God causes Him grief. He did in fact offer a part of Himself to die in our place through His Son, Jesus. This illustrates how deep the love of God is for us.
God grants us wonderful gifts that we must use for His glory as He intends for us.
God granted Joseph insights into His will for him. Joseph misinterpreted God's intent. As a result, he suffered the consequences. We see this today when we use our gifts from God, both physical and spiritual, for our own purposes and not God's.
No matter the gifts or our use of them, we need to continually refine our ability for ministry by study, prayer and practice. We should seek every opportunity to exercise our gifts to God's glory.
As we live according to God's will, Satan will interfere in order to shift our focus away from faithfulness. He will use our weaknesses and attempt to turn our strengths into weakness. We must be on guard for this and take an uncompromising stand for what is right. Joseph was a good example of this. As we review the life of Joseph we see that his faith in God and desire to live faithfully did not waiver.