The Story of Joseph and His Brethren/Part 2/Chapter 7
CHAPTER VII.
I AM unwilling to crowd too many different ideas into your minds, which might have the effect of rendering that confused which would otherwise be clear. I think, however, that I may venture very slightly to advert to another spiritual lesson which this beautiful history offers. It is different from the one we have just considered, but in harmony with it. It relates immediately to ourselves, and teaches something relating to our own spiritual life, as we are in our natural or evil state, and to the saving work which the Lord effects in those who are willing to become His children. Whatever in the Divine Word relates to the Lord and His experience, relates also to us and our experience, provided we become His true disciples.
Endeavour now to transfer the scene of this history to your own minds, and then try to think of the persons mentioned in it as representing principles, or things that belong to your minds. Think of Leah and Rachel as representing two different but kindred affections; Leah representing a natural affection, and Rachel a spiritual affection. Then, if you can see that Leah represents a natural affection, you may be able further to see that her sons represent thoughts that proceed from that natural affection; and if you can see that Rachel represents a spiritual affection, you may be able to see that Rachel's sons represent spiritual thoughts that come forth from that spiritual affection. To see the general spiritual meaning of the history of Joseph, you only need to have some clear idea of the two kinds of thoughts that Joseph and Benjamin represent on the one hand, and that the ten brethren represent on the other. If you are in any degree religious, you must have these two kinds of thoughts present in your minds—thoughts about God and heaven, and thoughts about yourselves and the world, or thoughts about spiritual things and thoughts about natural things. If you have observed your own thoughts, you will also know that your natural or worldly thoughts sometimes hate and oppose your spiritual or heavenly thoughts. For instance, when your spiritual thoughts tell you that you ought to be kind and forgiving to others, your natural thoughts will suggest to you that others do not deserve your kindness and forgiveness, and that you ought to be severe and revengeful. Also, when your spiritual thoughts tell you that you ought always to obey the demands of duty, your natural thoughts will tell you that it is better to follow the calls of inclination. There is, indeed, in every mind that has any religion a conflict between the natural and the spiritual thoughts; for as the Scriptures say—"The flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh." Now this conflict was represented by the brethren of Joseph hating and persecuting him. But as Joseph did not hate his brethren, but endured his trials and sufferings meekly, so the spiritual thoughts never hate, but endure temptations meekly, hoping the best, thinking the best, and doing the best
But, besides this, spiritual thoughts love the natural thoughts, as the Christian loves his enemies, and desires nothing more than to do them good and be reconciled to them, or rather to reconcile them to itself. For the natural thoughts only require to put away their enmity to the spiritual, and submit themselves to their authority, to become good and useful, and make their possessor happy. Now, how is the reconciliation of these and their union with the spiritual to be effected? They have in the first place to be starved into submission. This is meant by the famine. But you may ask what is meant by the natural thoughts being starved into submission? By this I mean you must deprive your natural desires of their selfish indulgences, and this is expressed by the word Self-denial. When they prompt you to do anything, or when they crave anything, that your better thoughts tell you it is not right to do or good to grant, you must withhold from them what you know is sure to be hurtful to them. This famine will cause them to come and submit themselves to your spiritual thoughts, and their submission will become the means of bringing them into a better state. But there is one full and final means of union between the natural thoughts and the spiritual, which this history teaches us. You know Joseph did not make himself known to his brethren, nor did the reconciliation between them take place, till the brothers brought Benjamin down with them to Egypt. Now, Benjamin represents a uniting medium, a principle that unites the natural to the spiritual thoughts, or the natural mind to the spiritual mind. And what, think you, may that medium be? That medium is truth in act, and this Benjamin represents. In other words, Benjamin represents obedience to the divine commandments. And what is obedience to the divine commandments? It is to shun evil because God has told us that we are not to do it, and to do good because God has told us that we are to do it. The brethren had great difficulty in getting Benjamin down to Egypt, so we find it a hard and difficult thing to bring ourselves to a state of actual and active obedience to the commandments of God; but as soon as we accomplish this all-important object, the happy result surely and quickly follows.
What, then, do we learn from this beautiful and instructive history under this last view? We learn that, after we have entered on the life of religion, there are two different kinds of affections within us, some that come from heaven and others that come from the world. We learn, further, that these two kinds of affections and thoughts draw the mind in opposite directions, one prompting and telling us to place our hearts on heavenly things, the other prompting and telling us to place our hearts on earthly things. The Lord in His providence permits us to undergo trials and sufferings, anxieties and privations, in order to exalt the spiritual and humble the natural, as Joseph was exalted and his brethren were humbled. And the Lord's purpose in this is to bring the spiritual and natural into a state of agreement, in which they act harmoniously together. This is finally and fully effected by obedience to the truth, by resolutely and constantly doing what we know to be our duty to God and to man. This is sure to bring peace to our minds, peace with God and peace with each other. When God created man, He made all his spiritual and natural affections and thoughts in sweet agreement with each other. What was it that set them at variance? It was disobedience to the divine command. You remember what discord, and labour, and trouble, and anguish the Creator told Adam and Eve they had brought upon themselves by having disobeyed His command? The discord and trouble have continued to this day; and all outward discord and trouble arise from discord and trouble in our own minds. If this unhappy state of discord, and strife, and trouble came by disobedience, how can it be removed but by obedience? God originally wrote His holy law upon the heart, and when that law was effaced from the heart. He wrote it with His own fingers upon tables of stone. This is the law of the ten commandments which we have in the Bible, and which every child is taught to remember and to understand. Since the time the law was given from Mount Sinai, the Lord has come into the world, and we know Him as the Lord Jesus Christ. He came too for the very purpose of living a life of obedience to His own divine law. And now we have His holy and blessed example; and, besides this, we have His grace to influence our hearts, and we have His divine teaching to direct our lives, line upon line, and precept upon precept, saying to us—"Ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you; he that hath my commandments, and doeth them, he it is that loveth me; if a man love me, he will keep my words; he that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings; if ye love me, keep my commandments." When the Lord had delivered these sayings to His disciples, then He said—"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give unto you."
How are we to obtain the peace of Jesus? By obedience to His commandments. Obedience is the peace-maker. Obedience, or perseverance in well-doing, overcomes all difficulties, settles all controversies, adjusts all differences, and unites in one things that sin has separated from each other. It is quite true that we require to have love and faith as well as obedience. But love and faith work out their purposes by obedience, and can complete no work without it. To speak of the subject as symbolized in the present history; there must be a Benjamin as well as a Joseph; and although Joseph is the moving and directing cause, Benjamin is the acting medium. Obedience is the younger brother of love and faith. And we should remember the words of Joseph to his brethren—"Ye shall not see my face except your younger brother be with you." (Gen. xliii. 3.)