The Law: Servant of Peace
Read Genesis 50:15-21
There are numerous ways that Joseph represents Jesus Christ. For instance, by one man’s sacrificial service, the world was saved, the innocent was rejected by the guilty, and an evil act accomplished redemption. This story provides another parallel intended to teach us the nature of God’s grace in Jesus Christ as well as how it should be imitated to others.
Peace that drives out fear
After Jacob’s death, his brothers fear that the peace they have experienced with Joseph will expire with their father. Though Joseph has never based his kindnesses on honoring a living father, they surmise that they must garner the resources to save their lives from Joseph’s vengeance.
Twice Joseph exhorts his brothers to fear not. Earlier he had told them the same when they realized who he was. They were so afraid that they were speechless, so he spoke for them and commanded them to be at peace and not be angry with themselves. In every place where God tells people not to be afraid, he accompanies the command with the reason – “I am with you.” Joseph tells his brothers that God is with them and that Joseph was specially sent to them to save them (45:5). In our text, he reminds them that God has already demonstrated his mercy to them, which should comfort them even if Joseph should become vengeful—because God is greater.
Here, Joseph represents Jesus Christ who assures us that he represents the heavenly Father who declares that we are at peace because Jesus settled our accounts. Like Joseph, Jesus was sent by God’s initiative not only to save our lives, but to provide daily for our needs and to bring us comfort in all of our trials.
Peace that defeats evil
The ultimate proof Joseph provided for why he could be trusted to show grace rather than get revenge was his own perspective of God’s sovereignty over his suffering. Just as he urged them to believe that God would sovereignly care for them even if Joseph turned on them, now he discloses more clearly than ever how he can risk showing grace to his persecutors. He knows that whatever evil they intended, God will infallibly fulfill his promise to bring a Savior who will conquer all powers of evil. To do so, God sovereignly coopts even evil to accomplish his purposes.
Grace is not something God extends begrudgingly; it is distilled from the core of his character, from his heart.
The ultimate proof of that point is the cross of Christ. Peter preached to Jesus’ murderers: “This man was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross” (Ac. 2:23). This brief verse states that while God holds man responsible for his evil deeds, God nevertheless orchestrates even those acts of evil to accomplish his purposes, which were determined from all eternity. Later Peter would draw on this theology in order to continue proclaiming the gospel with boldness despite the death threats of Herod (Ac. 4:24-30; cf. He. 1:9).
Peace from God's heart
Finally, Joseph’s tears anticipate the kind of Savior God will bring into the world. Our Savior wept with anger and remorse at the tomb of Lazarus because sin had brought death into his Father’s good world. Our Savior wept with anger and remorse over Jerusalem because she had killed the prophets and rejected the Christ.
When Joseph wept, it was because he felt anger and remorse at the same time over his brothers’ unbelief and their failure to grasp with gratitude the selfless and sacrificial grace he had extended to them. Grace is not something God extends begrudgingly; it is distilled from the core of his character, from his heart. Dispensing grace is who God is. When we default to manipulation and merit, it grieves him. Those reactions are contrary to the way he deals with us. For us even to entertain them, or to have even the fleeting thought that it is what he responds to, breaks his heart. It is the horror that a good father feels when a child tries to buy his favor.
From the very first book of the Bible, God has been proclaiming peace to us in Jesus Christ.