Dreams & Schemes

Good morning. Good to see all of you today. Those of you who are here, or are streaming in online, or maybe you’re watching later on demand. My name is Tim. I get the privilege of being the lead pastor here. And if this is your first time, or maybe you’ve been come in the last couple of weeks, or maybe you’ve joined us since Christmas. we’re glad that you are checking us out. And if I haven’t had a chance to meet you, I will be available right after the service through those doors with Pastor Ben. And we’d love to shake your hand and just learn a little bit more about you and what led you here today. we’re a church that loves to open the Bible and to read the Word of God and to let God speak deep into our hearts and into our lives. And, if you have no context to Shepherd’s gate, this is just the way that we feel that, that we are being called to present God’s Word. And so, some of us, me included, had the privilege of growing up in a church. And maybe you went to Sunday school. And so what happens when you read a book of the Old Testament, which we’re going through?

Genesis, when you actually stop and intentionally read the passages, you find out there’s a whole lot more than what we even remember from our childhood. Is that true? Can we say that to be true? and so what we’re doing is we’re encouraging all of you to be on this with us. we’re on part five, so we’re going to be going through Genesis 37 to 50. We started last week, so we’re in week two. And part of this was challenging you to be present in worship every single week. Which it should be a lot easier now than it ever has been. You knew I had to talk about the elephant in the room. In fact, I was planning to wear all black today and morning, and my wife said, you can’t do that. You need to put this vest on with your outfit. And so that’s why. And even my 14 year old son is we stayed up way too late. That’s the Latin. I’ve never stayed up that much. that late on a on a I’m like an old man on Saturday night. I go to bed by 9:00 and there was no way that I couldn’t. And he just kept staring at the television and he just said, dad, I don’t understand, dad, I don’t understand. I don’t understand, and let’s just be honest, to some of us, that’s what we’re feeling this morning.

The heaviness of what just happened. But aren’t you glad you’re in church where we get to learn about God and worship God? And thanks be to God. He’s a victory in all of the areas of our lives. And so we got some exciting things planned for you today, not only to be in worship every week, but also to engage in the text and the other value that’s really important to us here at Shepherd’s Gate is that we actually invest in our families, in the way that we do. That is simply by, using the resources that we’ve created for you. It’s as easy as downloading our app. The reading plans on there. You can read the text before you even come here on Sunday morning. There’s dig deeper questions for your own personal devotional life, or if you want to do it with your spouse if you’re married.

Or there’s family questions because our kids that are in our kids program are learning the same thing we’re learning. They’re just learning it at an age appropriate level. oftentimes people are checking out churches at the beginning of the year, which is great. Some of you, you’re in that season where you’re trying to figure out, is this the place that maybe God is leading you to call home and really, no matter where you’re at, there’s kind of three phases that people go through. In a church world. The first one is this you’re a seeker, so you’re going to come, you’re going to sit, you’re going to listen. You’re going to figure out if, you know, maybe this is a church that God would be leading you to be part of. And then you leave and you go home and you pray and you process, what’s been going on in your life?

Oftentimes, though, and unfortunately, sometimes people go to a church for a long time and they sit and they soak. They soak in all the information. But then what happens over time, if all you do is become a consumer and all you do is kind of look at it from the standpoint of, I come to church for what I can get out of it. What almost always happens is you shower because what will eventually take place is this you’ll begin to nitpick things. Well, they didn’t sing the songs that I wanted, and Tim didn’t preach the way that I wanted, or we didn’t do this. This way, or we didn’t do this that way. And I can tell you this because I’ve been doing this a long time, that when complaints come in and sometimes legitimate complaints come in or people have concerns, oftentimes they’re from the people that are in the sit soaking sour phase more than they are in the people that are committed.

They’re committed follower of Jesus. They’re engaged. They’re they’re taking us up on the challenge they’re reading through. They’re staying in God’s Word during the week. They stay. Which is so cool here at our culture, at our church, is that even when the preacher preaches longer than he’s supposed to. You guys still stick around because you recognize that that’s a value of ours. We want you to be in community. We want you to build those friendships with one another. And then that leads into finding out what is your part of the puzzle. What is your piece in all of this that you would use the gifts that God has given you to serve this church and to serve one another. And what that does is it releases a spirit of generosity within you. It releases something in you. And so just, you know, that’s our, our plan for all of you. So whether you’re in the seeker of the bitter phase, our fate, our job is to hopefully get you into being a committed follower of Jesus. Does that make sense?

All right, so here’s where we’ve been. we just started last week. Let me just give you a quick recap of Jacob. he’s got two wives and two concubines, so he’s got four baby mamas, and he’s got 13 children. Okay. his daughter was violated. we looked at this, back last year in November. And when you know, this dad with one daughter didn’t respond, didn’t do anything.

And so we kind of just looked at that is, you know, why did he not defend her honor? And so that was a difficult, week that we had to get through. And then we, looked again. And we were reminded again last week that his favorite wife of these four women that he has in his life is Rachel, even though she’s now passed away, she passed away giving birth to his last child, Benjamin. And he also just happens to have this favorite child called Joseph. And so last week we saw Joseph is who’s going to kind of emerge as our central character throughout Genesis chapter five. he’s such, such a favorite child that he even goes and he buys them this coat of many colors. This is what we remember about Sunday School. And so he buys them this coat and he puts it on them so that everybody knows he’s the favorite. So here’s Joseph’s, recap. Really, really quickly. He’s the one that actually goes and tells his dad the truth about the family business. So their family business at the time is they have a lot of livestock. And he goes and he assesses the situation.

He comes back and he tells his dad the bad report. That’s not that he did anything wrong. He’s just telling his dad the truth. he also starts having these dreams. He’s 17 years old, he’s a teenager, and God starts downloading dreams into his life. And so he shares them with his brother, and he shares them with his dad. And none of them are happy about these dreams. And again, he recognizes that he is his dad’s favorite kid. And so we left off last week with this, with his brothers being jealous because who wants to have a dad in their life that favors one kid over the other? So much so that everybody knows that he makes it completely obvious. And yet his father is now starting to keep these things in his mind. His father starting to process these dreams that Joseph is telling him about. So here we go. Verse 12 says this. Joseph’s brothers had gone to graze their father’s flocks near them. Now Shechem is the place where their sister was violated. And it is interesting that two of the brothers, when they found out that that had happened, dad did nothing.

The two brothers not only went and killed the guy that violated their sister, they went and killed all the men in the town. So it’s kind of weird that they’re going back to the same place where they’ve had this crazy encounter not that long ago. And it says here, Israel said to Joseph, and don’t forget, Israel and Jacob are interchangeable because God changed Jacob’s name to Israel. So sometimes it looks it’s in there is Israel, sometimes it’s Jacob. It says, Israel says to Joseph, as you know, your brothers are grazing their flocks near Shechem. Come, I’m going to send you to them. And of course, being a good son, that he says, very well, I’ll go. So Jacob says to Joseph, go and see if all is well with your brothers with the flocks, and bring word back to me. See where this is going. I didn’t work out well the first time. Dad. Why are you setting him up? To have to go and be the one that’s going to give the report the second time? Or is he the only one that you trust to give you an honest report? So he sends them off from the valley of Hebron.

When Joseph arrived at check them, a man found him wandering around the fields and asked, what are you looking for? Joseph replied, I’m looking for my brothers. Can you tell me where they are grazing their flocks? They have moved on from here, the man answered, and I heard them say, let’s go to Dawson, which is about a day away from this place. So Joseph went after his brothers, and that’s where he found them. But then they saw him in a distance, and before he reached them, they plotted to kill him. That seem a little extreme. Those of you with siblings. Doesn’t it seem like phase one should be to rough them up a little bit, or even verbally assault them? I mean, murder is kind of a kind of time of taking it to the extreme. When you say they go on, here comes that dreamer. Come now, let’s kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. So we’re going to kill him, and then we’re going to lie about it. Then we’ll see what comes of his dreams. They’re not happy about these dreams that he’s had.

They’re not happy about anything that has transpired up to this point. There’s a lot of bitterness and anger and rage in their hearts. And I was thinking about this because this has really escalated kind of quickly, don’t you think? I mean, here we are, Joseph, just on the scene in the text, and all of a sudden there is this amount of animosity and anger and rage, and it made me wonder if I’ve ever hated someone so much that I wanted to kill them. And I asked our staff this week and some of them said, no, I don’t think I’ve ever been that angry. And I was the one with my hand up because I’ve said I have several times in my life, have been so enraged and angry that I have thought about killing somebody. And I’m wondering if anybody else falls into that category and would be willing to be honest about that this morning. Here’s the thing. We don’t realize how simple we really are, the depravity that lives inside of us. So the sinful, fallen nature to want to take others out that hurt us or that rob us or that steal from us, and again, remember their hatred toward him is all due to favoritism. Their father is showing Joseph has done absolutely nothing wrong up to this point.

They hate and despise him because their dad is a terrible father. Now think about that in your own life. Some of you that have anger triggers, I’ll tell you mine. I don’t know why, but I am obsessed with the inside of my car being clean. In fact, sometimes when my kids are in my car, my anxiety goes up because they always seem to have cups and wrappers and food that comes out of all these places. And then they leave my car and I turn around and my car looks like a school cafeteria. And all of a sudden, these anger, these feelings of anger start welling up within me. Does anybody know what I’m talking about? Does anybody else have that? I’ll tell you. My wife’s. I didn’t get your permission. I’m sorry, but my wife’s trigger is the kitchen. She does not like it when we go in there. When my when I go in there, the boys go in there and we mess up her kitchen like, that’s the thing for her. Is that true? Sorry, babe, that I just outed you in that.

But yet, how do we manage that? What are we supposed to do about that? It was, a few weeks ago that my wife called me and said, I got some bad news to share with you. one of, Henry’s classmates, our oldest son’s classmate’s grandmother, passed away, and I was like, wow, that’s that’s awful. That’s sad. You know, let’s have, you know, Henry, write a card and see if we can take him to the viewing because it’s his friend from school. That would be great. And, she said, well, I have something else I need to tell you. she said, I kind of signed you up to do the funeral. I was like, wait, what? How do you sign me up to do the funeral? She said, well, they were asking if you would do it, and I was kind of caught up in the moment. And they’re grieving. And since this, it’s so easy for you. You can do it. I just thought that you. And I’m like, dear Lord, do you know my schedule? You only things I have on my schedule. Look at all the things that we have to do here at the church. This is my son’s friend’s grandma. And we got in a massive fight. Huge fight. Sometimes it’s the little things, right? Like, even even when someone wants to do something good or do something good in and through you, man, it can really cause havoc in a marriage, can it?

Here’s the crazy part. This week Tuesdays is when I study for my message and put the final touches on. I’m studying from my message and I got a text message from this family and the text message said this. Hey Tim, we know that your church is going through a building campaign. we wanted to know if you would be okay if we could make a donation to your building campaign. And I said, absolutely not. We do not take donations from people outside of Shepherd’s Gate. They’re never going to come here. They’re not they don’t. They live too far away for this to be their home church. And yet somehow, in all of that, God orchestrating those events and I had to go tell my wife and my wife said, as she should, are you going to apologize to me now? Yeah, but sometimes it goes a little deeper than that, doesn’t it? Some of us, we’re going into the New year and we still haven’t dealt with our anger. We were good at pushing it down. We’re good at ignoring it. We’re dismissive. If anyone tries to bring it up or pointed out or or want to pull us out of that.

And maybe as we start the new year, maybe that’s something that God is prompting some of us to hand over to him. I’ll be honest, there’s been times in my life where anger has overwhelmed me, where I have lost sleep, I literally have not been able to sleep. And what happens when you lose sleep? Do you think you become a nicer person or a meaner person? That I had you meaner, thank you, a meaner person. I had to then go and seek professional help. I had to go to a counselor who then had to unpack these things in my life, and the anger and rage that I had toward another human being on this planet, and that God used that person to help bring healing and wholeness to me. And here’s the thing. Do you think our culture is getting more toxic or less toxic? You think we’re getting more angry or less angry? And if that’s the case, then how in the world, as followers of Jesus, do we monitor this in our lives? How do we do these self checks to make sure that we are humble enough to admit our own faults and failures, and to not think that we control this and we can control how we treat or talk to other people, but instead hand it over to God so it doesn’t escalate past doing something that we really, truly will regret.

Jesus had this to say. Jesus said, you know that the Bible says you shouldn’t murder. It’s one of the Ten Commandments. But if you have anger in your heart against a brother or sister, you also will be subject to judgment. It’s a heart condition. John, one of the disciples, would have been there and would have heard this teaching. In fact, later on he wrote this everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. You hate your brother, you have murder in your heart or you have hatred in your heart. You’re a murderer and no one that that you know that no murder has eternal life abiding in them. And what’s so interesting is you even unpack our scripture this morning is that up to this point, all the brothers seem to be in cahoots. All the brothers seem to be an agreement on how they should treat Joseph. But then there’s this really cool turn in one of their lives. His name’s Reuben. When Reuben heard this, he tried to rescue him from their hands. Let’s not take his life, he said. Don’t shed any blood. Throw him into this cistern here in the wilderness.

But don’t lay a hand on him. And then it tells us that Reuben is saying this to try to rescue him from them, to take him back to his father. Hey, I realize this is a very tense situation, and if I can at least get the rest of my brothers to move to this point, then maybe after this point I can get them to then disappear and I can take him back, get him back to to our father.

And I know if I get him back to our father, he’ll do everything that he can to protect him. Now, remember, we’ve been looking at this chart. I mean, a lot of kids here, there’s 13 kids that play one daughter in all of these kids and all of their dynamics in what they have gone through. But when Joseph came to his brother, they stripped him of his robe, that ornate robe he was wearing. They took him and threw him into the cistern, and the system was empty. There was no water in it. Why is that important? That’s right. Because if there was water in it, they would have killed him right there. That would have been the end of his life. That would have been the end of the story for him. And what’s so fascinating to me is that you can literally be caught up in sin. You can literally be caught in a moment where you have such anger and animosity, and now you have physically done something to harm another person. They have put him in this hole, and yet they’re still able to go on with their day, and they sit down to eat their meal, and they look up and they see a caravan of Ishmaelites coming from Gilead.

Their camels were loaded with spices, balm and myrrh, and they were on their way to take them down to Egypt. Another brother finally speaks up Judah this time, which is the line of Jesus. If you didn’t know, Judah said to his brothers, what will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? I have a better idea.

Let’s sell them. How many of you with Judah on this one more humane way of treating them. But sell them to the Ishmaelites and not lay a hand on him? And after all, after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and blood. We all share the same dad. And what happens? All the brothers that are there at the time agree. And so when the minion merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph out of the cistern and sold him for 20 shackles of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took them to Egypt, went wild. Yeah. You remember this part? If you grew up in church and Sunday school seems way more intense when we’re reading it here this morning than what I remember growing up with.

I mean, this is a this is a toxic, terrible, awful situation. What is going through Joseph’s mind? What was that last look from each one of the brothers as they caught eyes, as they’re watching this all unfold. And it’s interesting that one of them wasn’t even part of this whole thing, because when Reuben returned and saw that Joseph was not there, he tore his clothes and he went back to his brothers and said, the boy isn’t there. Where can I turn now? They didn’t tell him what it actually happened, but this is what they did. They knew that they had to cover their tracks. So they took his robe and they slaughtered it. Go. And they dipped the robe in the blood. They took the his robe back to their father and said, we have found this.

Examine it to see whether it is your son’s robe. And of course, Jacob, recognizing it, said, it is my son’s robe. Some ferocious animal has devoured him. Joseph has surely been torn to pieces. Started with jealousy. Started with having to grow up in a household with a dad that showed favoritism. And little by little, inch by inch. Sin by sin. Week by week, month by month, year by year allowed them to get to this point in their life not only to sell him, but now that they have to lie to their father and to continue to keep that lie going. Can you imagine for a moment, even if you were mad at your dad, even if you thought he was the worst dad for loving one of your other siblings more than you? Watching that man mourn, watching him bawl his eyes out, knowing you’re lying to him? Why anybody stand up and say, wait, wait, dad, dad, dad, hold on, hold on.

Why? He’s not dead. But we sold him. Hey, dad, he’s not dead. But we’re going to go and try to figure out if we can get him back. No. Instead, what they saw was their dad tear his clothes just as Reuben did. He put on sackcloth and he mourned for his son many days. And he has his sons and his daughters came to comfort, and he refused to be comforted. No, he said, I will continue to mourn until I join my son in the grave. And so his father wept for him. So even in his darkest moment, even as they’re in some way trying to make some type of connection to him and enjoying him even as they’re lying, join him in mourning. What does he do? He pushes them away, and even in death, he elevates Joseph and he makes his existence all about Joseph. Remember that because as I was reading this passage, as I was contemplating what it is that that’s unfolding in this text, this is what I came up with. If you want to know how to be a terrible father, or you want to know how to be a terrible human being, this is how you do it. You’re ready to be unfaithful in your marriage.

Flirt with somebody that’s not your spouse. Bring other people or other resources or internet sites or things that you know that you shouldn’t have in your life. Bring those in and slowly but surely over time, allow sin to creep in and to get a foothold in your life. Don’t defend your family. When something bad happens, just dismiss it and act like it’s no big deal. And just think that somebody else has to take care of the problem. It’s always a great idea to pick a favorite child and make sure everyone knows about it. I mean, if there’s anything we can learn from that, it’s a great way to be a terrible dad. Or listen to this one, because I think this is a societal problem that we have, by the way.

And I think this for all, for many of us in here, including me, might be the one that’s the most convicting is live to worship your children instead of God. I say it again, live to worship your children instead of God. Prove me wrong. Tell me that this isn’t what’s happening in our society. Everything around us, the way that that activities are set, inform the the the the, education system, like everything is built and designed for us to take out the next kid or the next family to make sure that we do whatever we can to elevate ourselves and to elevate our kids over everyone else. Until you read a text like this and go look at how this has left this family, this family is being decimated. And it all started with the feelings that they had in their heart. And those feelings led to how now they are responding and acting out in anger and rage. How do you flip this? How do you go from being a terrible dad or a terrible human being and interpret this in your own context, in your own life, whatever you may be?

Maybe you’re here, you’re single, maybe you’re a college student. Whatever the case may be, think about how you can be a terrific human being. Think about if you’re not married, the person that you want to be married to. This is how you be a terrific person. You love your wife as Christ loved the church. Does that sound familiar to anybody? That you lay down your life for them and as you do that, that ultimately leads into serving them. And of course, protecting them. But you’re not protecting them from a kid on the team that’s better than them. You’re not protecting them from a kid in the classroom that gets better grades than that. You’re protecting them from the world and all the things that the world tries to drag into their lives. Amen. Of course, that would lead into treating everyone equally.

Think of that for a moment. Do we treat everyone equally? Part of our vision statement is that we value everyone we meet. Do we really actually live that out? And then finally this morning, church. Do we worship God above all else? If you were to give your kids, if you have kids in the home, a piece of paper and a pen or pencil and you said, hey, I want you to write out all the ways in which you see mom and Dad worshiping God throughout the week.

What would they list out on that piece of paper? Would they say, oh man, when we’re sitting down at the dinner table and we all have food in our mouths, you tell us to spit it out because we’re going to stop and we’re going to pray and thank God for the food that you’ve provided. Is it all because you make sure that church is a priority in our family? Oh, it’s because whenever there’s a situation or a hardship, or maybe there’s a test coming up or you’re in a conflict with another kid at school that your parent comes to you and says, you know what? Let’s bring this before the Lord. Let’s hold hands together. Let’s pray together. Let’s make sure that that you understand who God is and the role that he plays in your life. See, it’s so easy to go the other way. It’s so easy to fall into the traps that this society that we live in sets for us. And yet God calls us back to this.

Go back to Joseph while all this is going on. Well, this family unit, this dad is just bawling his eyes out, good, bad or indifferent, thinking his son is dead. Meanwhile, the Midianites sold Joseph in Egypt. They got him to Egypt. He’s already a slave. He’s already a far away, away from his family. And what’s the very next thing that happens for this guy? He gets sold again. Can I ask you something? Did God abandon him? Is God still with him? Does God know everything that’s going on in his life? And yet somehow God allowed him to go through this incredible hardship that we’re seeing here, this path that God has for him, that God didn’t make it easy for him. And he just had to be faithful and trust that somehow, in some way, God was going to work all things out for him in his life. Can’t even imagine the mental and emotional turmoil that Joseph is going through. Here’s what’s incredible for you and for me today is that your Heavenly Father and my Heavenly Father? He loves the church. He loves us. He never stops obsessing about us. He is always pursuing us, even in our anger, even in our rage, even in our constant focus on ourselves and trying to to better ourselves above others.

He still loves us and he already sent Jesus to die on the cross for us. Do you know that he serves and protects us? Scripture tells us that Jesus sits at the right hand of God the Father, and he’s not sitting there bored out of his mind. He’s not trying to figure out what to do. You know what he does all day, every day. He intercedes for you. He prays for you. He prays for your kids. He protects you from the devil in his schemes. He asks in petitions God the Father to to give you blessings, to be with you, to remind you that no matter what you face in this world, no matter how difficult things get, he will never leave you or abandon you. This is a God that treats everyone equally, doesn’t he? He doesn’t show favoritism. He’s not a respecter of persons. And he’s given us this incredible gift through the Holy Spirit. Who, by the way, the Holy Spirit is a comfort. So when we’re going through dark moments, or maybe we’re in a dysfunctional family and things aren’t going the way that we think they should go, and the pressures of life are against us.

Or maybe you’re on the receiving end of somebody else’s anger. Or maybe you have a father, or a grandfather, or an uncle, or some male figure, or a female figure in your life. That is a constant, constant negative force. No, the Holy Spirit is with you. Know that he will give you words of comfort and that he can fill you with peace. And that for all of our lives, we’re at every stage and phase we may be in whatever age we are. The Holy Spirit is here to guide us into truth and to guide us in all areas of our lives. Amen. So again, it’s the beginning of the year. Great opportunity to lay some things down at the foot of the cross. And as we look at this text this morning, as we allow it to convict our hearts and our lives, what is it for us? What is it for you? What is the Holy Spirit right now, in this moment, speaking to you and saying, guess what? You were a jerk in 2024. You were angry in 2020 and 2024. You were self-absorbed in 2024.

And guess what? No more that God wants to come in and he wants to break that spirit. And by the way, just, you know, all of those characteristics, all of those attitudes, if you dig down deep, it’s just insecurity, the meanest, the ornery, the angriest people on the planet. They’re like that because there’s some deep, dark issue inside of them that they haven’t dealt with. And I’ll tell you this, the only one that can get to that level is God. And that’s why we come to service. Do you know? That’s why we sing songs that as you sing, as you’re as you, as you proclaim the Word of God, that you, that you and thrown him with your praises, that you’re saying, God, it’s not about me. It’s about you. God, I need your help. God, I need you to help fix this situation. God, I can’t do this on my own. I need you. That’s worship. Why do we pray? Why? When we pray, we bow our heads. We take that posture of humility. Right? Your God, I’m not. I can’t go through this life without you.

I can’t be a good husband or a good wife. Without you, I can’t be a good college student. God, without you, I can’t be a good son or daughter without you and your mercy and your grace, living and moving and breathing inside of me. Help me God. Give me the courage and strength to admit my shortcomings. And once again, fill me with your Holy Spirit. That I can walk out these doors forgiven, but also renewed and strengthened in you. Amen. Will you bow your heads and close your eyes with me this morning? Heavenly father, I thank you for my friends that are here today. Those that are watching us online. God, we know your Holy Spirit’s at work in this room. God, thank you that your word is it’s true. You give us these glimpses of people that lived on planet Earth that struggled just as we struggled with that God. Somehow, in reading their accounts and understanding their stories, that somehow God, you would use that to convict us and to get us back on the path that you have for us, living life and living it to the full.

And so with our heads bow and our eyes closed, I pray for any of my friends that are here or listening to this right now. In anger is the issue. Jealousy is the issue. Rage is the issue that right now, in this moment, God, that they are handing that over to you, that they’re laying that at your feet. And as they’re doing that, as they’re whispering that to you, Almighty God, that in that moment we know that you are faithful and just, you will forgive them. You will cleanse them from all unrighteousness. And in this moment that you will give them your peace, and you’ll give them the assurance that you have never left them, nor will you forsake them, and you will help them in everything that they face in this life.

So gracious Heavenly Father, thank you that you that you even hear our prayers and that you answer them according to your will, because that’s your power, not ours. It’s your power that’s at work within us, and that you work all things out for the good of those that love you, that are called according to your purpose. So thank you, Heavenly Father, that you have called us your children and that you never stop working in our lives. We love you, we thank you, we pray all these things in your most holy and precious name. Amen.