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Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Jesus, Savior, pilot me. You're on the first. Jesus, Savior, pilot me. Over life's tempest you see. Unknown ways before me roll. Hiding rock in treacherous shoal. Short and compass come from thee. Jesus, Savior, pilot me. As a mother's silver child. Valk and slush the ocean wild. Boisterous waves obey thy will. Windmills to them be still. Wondrous sovereign of the sea. Jesus, Savior, pilot me. When at last I near the shore. And the fearful breakders roar. Fix me and the peaceful rest. Then while leaning on thy breast. May I hear thee say to me. Fear not I will pilot thee. Let's start with a word of prayer. Thank you, Heavenly Father, for giving us this opportunity to come together. Sing praises under your name. And to hear the word of God being preached. I pray that you would just bless all aspects of our service. And may you be with those that are not able to come this evening. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Let's go to 133, Safe Wherever I Go. Song 133. And your hymnal is a really short one, so we'll sing it twice. All right? Song 133, Safe Wherever I Go. You're on the first. Safe wherever I go. Peace the world cannot know. Sins all forgiven and heaven my home. I'm safe wherever I go. Safe wherever I go. Peace the world cannot know. Sins all forgiven and heaven my home. I'm safe wherever I go. Thank you so much for being here. If you need a bulletin, you can still lift your hand nice and high. One of ushers will come by and get you a bulletin. On the front we have our Bible memory passage. John chapter 1 verse 7. On the inside we have our service and soul-ending times as well as our church stats. If there's any soul-ending to report, I'll go ahead and get that now. Is there anything to report from Monday by chance? One for Monday. What about Tuesday? Anything on Tuesday? What about tonight? Anything from tonight? One from tonight? All right. Keep up the great work on soul-winning. And then also on the right we have the list of our expecting ladies. Continue to pray for all of them. We also have our prayer list. And we've got a lot of people here mentioned. Continue to pray for the Negara family. Pray for their health. Pray for Ms. Lucy's mother's tumors. Pray for brother Cameron Hall's leg. Our couple of friends, Pastor Kevin Sepulveda and brother Matthew Stuckey from Verity Baptist Vanilla continue to pray for them. Stephanie Weathers is also asking for additional prayer for her pregnancy. Brother Jeremy Gore has a surgery coming up very soon, January 11th. Brother Doggo is asking for prayer for him and his family. Brother Jeff Goodwin was praying for his brother-in-law's salvation and I guess some legal issues he's going through. Also, brother Richard Capito was praying for some health issues, back pain. And his father had recently been in a bicycle accident and I guess it sustained some serious injuries and so is asking for prayer for that as well. The Holden family was praying for health. Also, the Oz family, their baby Anna, they had taken her to urgent care but I guess she's doing a little bit better. Is that right? Okay. But still prayed for her health and recovery. Brother Jimmy Stewart. And really, you could probably just put below that like every other family in our church. Unfortunately, almost everybody seems to have gotten wiped out recently with sickness and so definitely stay diligent out there. I know my wife even is very sick right now but just continue to pray for all of our church family that's not here as well. I'm going to say a quick word of prayer for our church and then we'll keep moving on with our announcements. Thank you, Heavenly Father, for Steadfast Baptist Church. Thank you so much for us having the ability to go out and preach the gospel and get people saved. I pray that you would just also help our friends that are in different parts of the world, that they would also have the same liberty and freedoms, that they could serve you at the fullest capacity, that you'd open doors for them. I pray that you would bless all the ladies in our church that is expecting that you would be with their pregnancy, that you'd be with their baby, help them with development, help them with their pregnancy and their delivery, upcoming delivery, that you give them strength. I pray that you would also just bless all the rest of our church family with all their various health concerns, that you would help people recover from their sicknesses, that you would help people to have strength, be encouraged in difficult times. I pray those that have lingering health issues that you could just give them strength, wisdom, and favor, that you would just help to encourage them and if possible, just give them strength, if possible, just give them grace, just give them full restoration of their health and their body. I pray that you would just also be with those that have been in accidents and injuries, that you could just use these events just for people to lean and depend upon you more. We just thank you for all that you give us. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. On the back, we have an exciting announcement about the ordination of Brother Tanner Furr on January 16th. At the end of the month, we have a baby shower for the Galasos. I have a few details down below. We have the congratulations to Shane and Laura Warner on the birth of their son Noah Ezekiel. He was born December 31st at 3.27 p.m. weighing 8 pounds, 3 ounces and measuring 22.5 inches long. And so that's really exciting for them and still gets that tax check. So, you know, even though you only took care of them for like, you know, 6 hours for the year, you still get it. So it's like, you know, whatever, 9 hours or something, 8 hours. Either way, it all works out, right? It's kind of like that parable that I explained, you know, how the people in the 11th hour, they still get the same payment or whatever. It's like you have the baby, the last minute and you still get that full tax rebate benefit. So, there you go. Biblical principle. All right. The baby shower, January 29th. It's going to be in honor of Tina Glasso and her baby boy. It's from 1230 to 2.30, going to be here at the church if you would like to bring a dish. Please do. Also, she's registered on Amazon and is nursing's only preferred. So thank you for all those that participate in that. That's pretty much all I had. Four announcements at this time. Let's go ahead and go to our third song, 169. Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing, tune my heart to sing my grace, streams of mercy never ceasing, call for songs of loudest praise, teach me some melodious sonnet, sung by flaming tongues above, praise the mount I'm fixed upon it, mount of thy redeeming love, here I raise my Ebenezer, hither by thy help I'm come, and I know by thy good pleasure, safely I'll arrive at home, Jesus sought me when a stranger, wandering from the fold of God, heed to rescue me from danger, interposed his precious blood, all to grace I'll grade a debtor, daily I'm constrained to be, left thy goodness like a fetter, by my wandering heart to thee, prone to wonder, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love, here's my heart, oh, take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above. Turn in your Bibles, if you would, to Genesis 41, Brother Ben's going to read for us. And we'll pass the operating plate at this time. Genesis chapter number 41, we'll read the entire chapter. My bad. Genesis chapter 41, the Bible reads, and it came to pass at the end of two full years that Pharaoh dreamed, and behold, he stood by the river, and behold, there came up out of the river seven well-favored kind and flat-fleshed, and they fed in a meadow, and behold, seven other kind came up after them out of the river, ill-favored and lean-fleshed, and stood by the other kind upon the brink of the river, and the ill-favored and lean-fleshed kind did eat up the seven well-favored and fat kind, so Pharaoh awoke, and he slept and dreamed the second time, and behold, seven ears of corn came up upon one stock, rank and good, and behold, seven thin ears blasted with the east wind sprung up after them, and the seven thin ears devoured the seven rank and full ears, and Pharaoh awoke, and behold, it was a dream, and it came to pass in the morning that his spirit was troubled, and he sent and called for all the magicians of Egypt and all the wise men thereof, and Pharaoh told them his dream, and there was none that could interpret them unto Pharaoh. Then spake the chief butler unto Pharaoh, saying, I do remember my faults this day. Pharaoh was wroth with his servants, and put me inward in the captain of the guard's house, both me and the chief baker, and we dreamed a dream in one night, I and he. We dreamed each man according to the interpretation of his dream, and there was there with us a young man in Hebrew, servant to the captain of the guard, and we told him, and he interpreted to us our dreams, to each man according to his dream he did interpret, and it came to pass as he interpreted to us, so it was me he restored unto mine office, and him he hanged. Then Pharaoh sent and called Joseph, and they brought him hastily out of the dungeon, and he shaved himself, and changed his raiment, and came in unto Pharaoh, and Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I have dreamed a dream, and there is none that can interpret it, and I have heard say of thee that thou canst understand a dream to interpret it. And Joseph answered Pharaoh, saying, It is not in me, God shall give Pharaoh an answer of peace. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, In my dream, behold, I stood upon the bank of the river, and behold, there came up out of the river seven kind, flat-feshed and well-favored, and they fed in a meadow, and behold, seven other kind came up after them, poor and very ill-favored and lean-fleshed, such as I never saw in all the land of Egypt for badness, and the lean and the ill-favored kind did eat up the first seven fat kind, and when they had eaten them up, it could not be known that they had eaten them, but they were still ill-favored, as at the beginning, so I awoke, and I saw in my dream, and behold, seven ears came up in one stalk, full and good, and behold, seven ears withered thin and blasted with the east wind sprung up after them, and the thin ears devoured the seven good ears, and I told this unto the magicians, but there was none that could declare it to me. And Joseph said unto Pharaoh, The dream of Pharaoh is one, God hath showed Pharaoh what he is about to do. The seven good kind are seven years, and the seven good ears are seven years, the dream is one, and the seven thin and ill-favored kind that came up after them are seven years, and the seven empty ears blasted with the east wind shall be seven years of famine. This is the thing which I have spoken unto Pharaoh, what God is about to do he showeth unto Pharaoh. Behold, there come seven years of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt, and there shall arise after them seven years of famine, and all the plenty shall be forgotten in the land of Egypt, and the famine shall consume the land, and the plenty shall not be known in the land by reason of that famine following, for it shall be very grievous. And for that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice. It is because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass. Now therefore let Pharaoh look out a man discreet and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt. Let Pharaoh do this, and let him appoint officers over the land, and take up the fifth part of the land of Egypt in the seven plenteous years. And let them gather all the food of those good years that come, and lay up corn under the hand of Pharaoh, and let them keep food in the cities. And that food shall be first stored to the land against the seven years of famine, which shall be in the land of Egypt, that the land perish not through the famine. And the thing was good in the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of all his servants. And Pharaoh said unto his servants, Can we find such a one as this is, a man in whom the Spirit of God is? And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, Forasmuch as God hath shewed thee all this, there is none so discreet and wise as thou art. Thou shalt be over my house, and according unto thy word shall all my people be ruled. Only in the throne will I be greater than thou. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, See, I have set thee over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh took off his ring from his hand, and put it upon Joseph's hand, and arrayed him in vestors of fine linen, and put a gold chain about his neck, and he made him to ride in the second chariot which he had. And they cried before him, Bow the knee! And he made him ruler over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnath-panea, and he gave him to wife Asenath, the daughter of Potipharah, priest of An. And Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt. And Joseph was thirty years old when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh, and went throughout all the land of Egypt. And in the seven plencheous years the earth brought forth by handfuls, and he gathered up all the food of the seven years which were in the land of Egypt, and laid up the food in the cities. The food of the field, which was round about every city, laid he up in the same. And Joseph gathered corn as the sand of the sea, very much until he left numbering, for it was without number. And unto Joseph were born two sons before the years of famine came, which Asenath, the daughter of Potipharah, priest of An, bare unto him. And Joseph called the name of the firstborn Manasseh, for God, said he, hath made me forget all my toil, and all my father's house. And the name of the second called he Ephraim, for God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction. And the seven years of plencheousness that was in the land of Egypt were ended. And the seven years of dearth began to come, according as Joseph had said. And the dearth was in all lands, but in all the land of Egypt there was bread. And when all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread. And Pharaoh said unto all the Egyptians, Go unto Joseph, what he saith to you, do. And the famine was over all the face of the earth. And Joseph opened all the storehouses, and sold unto the Egyptians. And the famine waxed sore in the land of Egypt. And all countries came into Egypt to Joseph, for to buy corn, because that the famine was so sore in all lands. Let's bow our heads for a word of prayer. Father, we thank you for Genesis chapter 41, and for our church and our pastor. I pray that you fill him now with your spirit and just help him, Lord, to preach for us tonight. Give him clarity of mind so that he can expound this chapter to us, Lord, and give us ears to hear so that we can learn more about your word tonight. And we pray that you keep our church safe, and that you bless us and bless all aspects of this service. In Jesus' name I pray, amen. Amen. So we're in Genesis chapter 41, and the previous chapter, if you just look at the last verse there, 23, it says, Yet did not the chief butler remember Joseph, but forgot him. So in the previous chapter, Joseph interpreted the dream for the chief butler and the chief baker. The butler was restored exactly like Joseph had interpreted. The baker was hanged exactly like Joseph interpreted. And Joseph had asked the butler to remember him when he went back to Pharaoh, but he forgot. Now it says in verse one of chapter 41, and it came to pass at the end of two full years. So Joseph all hoped that that guy was going to remember him. He's probably gone at this point in the sense that it's been two years. He probably thinks like, oh, I guess that ship has sailed, right? Two full years after having that guy restored, he probably is thinking that there's going to have to be another way for him to be restored, right? It says that Pharaoh dreamed, and behold, he stood by the river. And behold, there came up out of the river seven well-favored kind in fat flesh, and they fed in a meadow. And behold, seven other kind came up after them out of the river, ill-favored and lean flesh, and stood by the other kind upon the brink of the river. The ill-favored and lean flesh kind did eat up the seven well-favored fat kind, so Pharaoh awoke. And he slept and dreamed the second time, and behold, seven ears of corn came up upon one stock, rank and good, and behold, seven thin ears, and blasted with east wind, sprung up after them. And the seven thin ears devoured the seven rank and full ears. Pharaoh awoke, and behold, it was a dream. It came to pass in the morning that his spirit was troubled, and he sent and called for all the magicians of Egypt and all the wise men thereof. Pharaoh told them his dream. There was none that could interpret them unto Pharaoh. So we have here in the first portion of chapter 41, talks about king, essentially, the Pharaoh, the ruler of Egypt, is given a dream. And the dream is so unique that he actually wakes up, you know, and it's kind of interesting that the dream's so vivid or it either troubles him or it's so interesting to him, he kind of woke up. But then he goes back to sleep and he has another dream, but he doesn't understand either of them. And both of these dreams, I guess, they're probably unique in the sense that we all have dreams and everything like that, but most of the time, if you don't, like, write down or say something about your dream immediately after you wake up, typically you forget about it. At least I do. I remember lots of times waking up and having a certain feeling, you know, maybe it was either happy or sad or whatever, based on the dream that I was having. And it seemed like my dream was very real. And then just moments later, I start trying to remember why I had that feeling or what I was dreaming about it. I can't remember anymore. It's like dreams seem to be pretty fleeting, right? But for whatever reason, this dream is not fleeting whatsoever. This is a very vivid, it seems like a very purposeful dream. And you know, so it strikes Pharaoh as being really important. Something is trying to be communicated to him, he believes, through this dream. So he asks all the wise men, he asks all of his magicians, you know, what is this dream? Like why am I having this dream? And you know, it's kind of interesting that Pharaoh, you know, he doesn't have to be convinced that dreams have significance or that somehow he's being communicated with because he believes that there's an actual literal interpretation to this dream. So that means either one of two things. Either A, you know, I guess the Egyptians just believe in dreams as some kind of communication with the gods. Or B, it's just so unique of a dream, like, you know, it's such a unique experience that it separates itself from every other dream that he's like, there must be a real specific reason why I had this dream. Why is it? You know, what is God trying to tell me? What are the gods trying to tell me or something like that. Now, when it says that none could interpret them, interpret them unto Pharaoh, I believe it's possible that this is even a little bit of time is taking place, right? Perhaps they're coming up with their own little things like, you know, in seven hours this is going to happen and then seven hours pass and it doesn't happen, right? You know, whatever they're saying, whatever bogus ideas they have or whatever they're coming up with, they can't figure it out or maybe they're not even attempting to figure it out. I don't know. It's a little bit different than Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar ups the ante because he says, not only do you have to interpret my dream, you have to tell me what my dream was. They're just like freaking out. They're just like, because they know they're fake, you know, and they're like, we can't even like fake what the interpretation is, we don't even know what the dream was, you know, whereas in this case, at least he kind of tells them the dream, right? But even with having the dream, they can't figure it out. Now, what I liken this unto is the Word of God because if you think about it, it is the Word of God, first of all, right? I mean, we're reading here in the Bible his dream specifically and the thing is, no matter how smart someone is, no matter how much wisdom they have or no matter they've studied other things or no matter how much wisdom false religions may have, they cannot understand the Bible. Now, keep your finger here and go to 1 Corinthians chapter 2 for a moment. Let's go to 1 Corinthians chapter 2. And that's what's unique about the Word of God is that while the Word of God is identified as wisdom, there's a difference between Bible wisdom and the wisdom of this world, which is really unique. And to me, it's also a confirmation of the Bible, you know, being the wisdom of God. Because how could you write a book that has all the answers and has all this wisdom, yet nobody can crack the code unless they're saved? No one can figure it out unless they have, you know, it's not like we could just put some of these really smart atheists in a room and say like, hey, will you give us the interpretation of these parables or will you tell us how to interpret these sections of the Bible and they're just like, well, we plugged it in our computer and it came out and here's what it is and here's all the answers. They could never figure it out. Why is that? Why is it that the smartest people can't figure out the Bible and yet people that aren't that smart but are just spirit-filled, they could tell you all day long what the Bible says? Because there's a spiritual wisdom that excels that which is carnal, okay? Now look at 1 Corinthians chapter number 2. Look at what it says in verse number 9. But as it is written, eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered in the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit, for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God. Now that's an important section to understanding this context of verse 2. It's kind of saying like it's impossible to know what a man thinks or kind of the experiences of man or the wisdom of man unless you're a man, right? Like a dog, he can't really appreciate what it's like to be a human. You know, and obviously some people say like my dog's my companion and when I feel sad he comes around, he licks my hand or whatever. You know what? A dog doesn't really know what you're going through. You know, the dog can't truly empathize, the dog doesn't understand the true emotions and the feelings and the wisdom of a human, okay? They can't truly appreciate, you know, certain things that mankind do, beauty, aesthetics, you know, dogs will just knock things over and just ruin things and, you know, they don't have the same sophistication, wisdom and knowledge as a man, he's just a beast, right? Well, we have to take that same analogy and as foolish as it would be for us to think that a dog could program a computer or a dog could build a car or a dog could do these type of things, it would be the same for a man to be able to understand the things of God. They can't, it's a complete category change when we go from a man to God. So, the only way to understand the things of God is through the Spirit of God and fortunately for us when you get saved, you have the Spirit of God dwelling inside of you, so now you have the capability to actually understand the things of God. But without the Spirit of God, the things of God cannot be understood, especially when we talk about the deep things of God, you know. And so we're thinking about like dreams, interpretations, parables, proverbs, dark things, you know, they cannot be understood. It makes me think of something that Jesus said in the book of Matthew, let's go to one more place, but keep your finger in 1 Corinthians 2 because I want to come back to this, okay? Let's go to Matthew, though, chapter number 16, I believe is where I want to go. Yeah, chapter 16, let's read the very first part of this and this will help you understand the carnal aspect versus the spiritual aspect. Matthew 16 verse 1, the Pharisees also with the Sadducees, aim and tempting desired him that he would show them a sign from heaven. He answered and said unto them, when it is evening, ye say, it will be fair weather, for the sky is red, and in the morning, it will be foul weather today, for the sky is red and lowering. Oh, ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky, but ye cannot discern the signs of the times. A wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign, and there shall no sign be given unto it but the sign of the prophet Jonas, and he left them in the part of it. This is what's interesting, according to science even, you know, when you have certain weather patterns like this where the sky is red, you know, according to Jesus and science, okay, both at the same time, whenever the sky is red, in the morning, it's a sign of, like, scary things, right? Isn't that what he's saying? He's saying, and in the morning, it will be foul weather today, for the sky is red and lowering, right? But if it's in the evening, in the verse 2, he said, it will be fair weather, okay? So even though the sky is red, depending on the timing of that is going to determine what the weather is going to be like and the pattern. And he says about the Pharisees is they can understand this carnal truth. This is a carnal truth. They could read this in the Bible or they could figure this out and they could realize, okay, it's going to be fair weather today. But even though the sky might be painted red, in a sense, spiritually, or in the Bible, they can't understand it if it's a spiritual truth because they just don't have the Spirit of God. Now go back to 1 Corinthians, chapter number 2 and look at verse number 12. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God, that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God, which things also we speak not of the words which man's wisdom teaches, but what the Holy Ghost teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. The natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. So again, according to the Bible, the natural man does not receive the things of God, okay? It has to be given to him through the Spirit of God. That's the only vehicle by which he can get that. And so, you know, it'd be kind of like expecting to get electricity without plugging it into the wall. You know, you're not going to get electricity unless you plug that power cord into the wall. You know, you can sit there and smash it in the drywall all day long, but, you know, that's how smart it would be, is just shoving it in the drywall and be like, let's flip the switch and see if it works. And it's like, oh, it didn't work? Okay. And this is what the unsaved are trying to do with the Bible, is they're just shoving their power cord into the drywall, hoping that it's going to turn their generator on, but it's never going to come on. And if you look at chapter 3, we're still here, if you look at verse 18, let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool that he may be wise. The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God, for it is written, he taketh the wise in their own craftiness, and again, the Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise that they are vain. Therefore, let no man glory in men, for all things are yours. So Paul in 1 Corinthians is constantly smashing the idea of the power of God resting in the wisdom of men. It doesn't rest in the wisdom of men, it rests in the power of God. And also Joseph makes it abundantly clear when he interprets these dreams throughout this passage that it's not, he's saying, it's not me, it's not that I'm so great, it's not that I'm so wonderful, it's not that I'm smarter than anybody else. That God is the one that's going to give the interpretation, God's the one that has the answers here. Because arguably you have the smartest people that are not saved standing before Pharaoh, they can't figure it out. Now you would say, okay well what about the smartest person of the children of God? Still he can't figure it out unless the Spirit of God gives it to him. So if we go back to our story here in Genesis chapter number 41, again a really important concept is that the unsaved are not going to give you the interpretation. Here's a good idea, let's apply this to our lives today. Whenever I want to understand the passage of the Bible, don't go and get a commentary from some unsaved heretic and wonder what that passage says. He's not going to tell you. Now sometimes they'll get things right just simply because they're repeating what an actual saved person said before them. Or it's a carnal truth. Of course they can tell you that the sky being red in the morning is going to have foul weather. Unsaved people can say that. Jesus said, you Pharisees know that. You guys get that right every single time. But you can't figure out that Jesus is standing right in front of you. You can't figure out that I'm the son of God. You can't figure out that it's just faith in me that gets you into heaven. And so if you read these unsaved commentaries, like a Matthew Henry or some of these other things like that, what you'll find is that a lot of times when it comes to the carnal truths, I mean these guys knock it out of the park. They'll tell you all the different reasons why the carnal truth is true and whatever. But then when you try to get to a spiritual aspect or the parables or the pictures or understanding good doctrine, they always just screw it all up. And it's kind of crazy how you think about that. So I only usually use a commentary if I just want to figure out what they understand about the carnal aspect or a false doctrine. But I'm never looking at them as an idea of like, let's confirm the right doctrine here. Let's go look at these old commentaries or these old preachers or whatever. You should anticipate or expect that it would always be wrong, false doctrine, they don't understand the passage. It'd be kind of like Nicodemus trying to, in Nicodemus' commentary, oh, I have to enter in my mother's womb a second time, you know? It's like, no, no, no, no. That's not what the Bible's meaning there, right? Let's keep reading here, verse 9. It says, Then spake the chief butler unto Pharaoh, saying, I do remember my faults this day. So he's now remembering, okay? Verse 10, Pharaoh was wroth with his servants, and he put me in ward in the captain of the guard's house, both me and the chief baker. We dreamed a dream in one night, and I and he, we dreamed each man according to the interpretation of his dream. And there was there with us a young man in Hebrew, servant of the captain of the guard, and we told him, and he interpreted to us our dreams. Each man according to his dream he did interpret, came to pass as he interpreted to us, so it was. Me he restored unto mine office, him he hanged. Then Pharaoh sinned and called Joseph, they brought him hastily out of the dungeon, and he shaved himself and changed his raiment and came in unto Pharaoh. So the chief butler finally remembers, and obviously it probably makes sense why he remembers now, because it really triggers, it's really vivid in his mind, like, oh, there is a guy that can interpret dreams, there was this guy that restored me, okay? So even though from Joseph's perspective, you would think he got, he was forgotten forever, right? God still is going to use that experience to restore him. It was just not in the timing probably that Joseph wanted. I guarantee that Joseph wasn't hoping, you know, two years, he's probably hoping two days, you know, or two minutes or something like that, right? But nevertheless, it's still going to end up restoring him, and it's going to give him this deliverance. Now, a couple things to note about this passage. I like that in verse 12 it says, and there was there with us a young man. Now, that would mean that Joseph, according to this timeline, would be 28 years old, because later in this chapter it tells us he was 30 when he stood before Pharaoh, and it had been two years, okay, two full years, that means he was 28. So if you're 28, according to the Bible, you're a young man, all right, or a young lady. I'm just there to encourage you to realize, you know, he's a lad at 17, he's a young man at 28, you know, I guess middle age is like 50 or something, okay, I don't know, I'm just throwing that out there, right? That was just kind of interesting. Another thing that's just kind of interesting and has nothing to do with this passage, but I just wanted to bring it up, is some of the pronoun usage in this passage, I find kind of interesting. Now, keep your finger and go to Daniel chapter 9 for a second, I want to show you a verse here that sometimes people confuse, and it will bring up a stupid idea. Now, in Daniel chapter 9, it has nothing to do with the sermon this evening, except I just want to compare these pronoun usages, because I think I find it interesting. But in Daniel chapter number 9, we kind of have Daniel's praying and he's seeking forgiveness for basically his whole people, his whole nation, so that they can return back to the promised land, he realizes they're supposed to be in captivity for 70 years, then an angel shows up and he's like, let me tell you about a different 70 years, and then this is kind of referred to as Daniel's 70 weeks or whatever, and you kind of have this prophecy, and it's not a lot of verses, just a few verses real quick, kind of talks about seven weeks, and then 62, which would be 69 in total, leaving a week, right? And we kind of understand this as being that first seven is kind of like the picture of the temple being rebuilt. You know, even the Jews say 40 in six years was this temple and building, so we can approximate from the time of the commandment to the end of the completion of that building was probably about 49 years, pretty close to, and that's really that first seven weeks, then there's probably a gap, there's another 62 weeks, then Jesus comes, and then there's contention on that last week, okay, when did that last week happen? Now, verse 27, it says, and he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week. Some people ask the question, what is the he there referring to in verse 27? Now let's just read verse 26, it says, and after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself, and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary, and the end thereof shall be with the flood, and at the end of the war desolations are determined. So it says in verse 27, and he, so the question would be, well, who's the he? Now, some people would say, grammatically, it could only be the Messiah, and that, first of all, I know of no such grammatical rule, okay, nor does the Bible ever follow such a grammatical rule, in fact, pronouns are often used to any proper noun found anywhere in preceding verses, okay? If you even think about it, the book of Proverbs is just pretty much all just pronouns with no idea where they're coming from, it's just he is just like anybody, right? So to say that there's such a grammar rule, show me the grammar rule first, number one, okay? Number two, we always speak in such a manner, we may constantly, in fact, it always frustrates me when I'm talking with people, and I'm gonna sound a little sexist in this comment, okay, but I'm just saying, sometimes I've noticed that it feels like women will use a lot of pronouns, okay, and especially my co-workers, and so I would often ask them to clarify their pronoun usage, because they would use like four different people's names, and they would say them, he, it, or whatever, I'm just like, who are you talking about, like, I have no idea, okay? So you'd be like, two guys walked in a bar, and he went over and got a glass, you'd be like, which one? Because you wouldn't know, you wouldn't know, because you have to then either have the story or have to have clarification, okay? In this, you have to just figure it out from the context of the story, but it's very clearly the prince when you study the doctrine, because it says in verse 27, he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week, and in the midst of the week, he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation of peace, and for the overspreading of abominations, he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation and that determinant should be poured upon desolate. Now here's the thing, this particular phrasing about the abominations and making it desolate is mentioned like four times in the book of Daniel, and every other time it's talking about the Antichrist, okay? So it would make no sense to then say, well, three times it's talking about the Antichrist, the fourth time it's just randomly Jesus too, okay? Plus, you know, when you make it Jesus, it starts making everything else kind of fall apart in this particular verse, of like, what does it mean in the midst of the week, and how did that work? And so you have people trying to say, like, have a preterist view, and say that everything that was mentioned here has already been fulfilled, or even parts of, like, all of Revelation's been fulfilled, and then it starts getting weirder and weirder. Basically what people do is they create a small error, a small problem, and they have to create even bigger problems by trying to fix it, okay? Whereas, you know, good doctrine's not going to bring confusion, good doctrine's going to bring clarity. False doctrine always makes things more confusing, you have to ask more questions, it doesn't really fit. And another thing is it has to fit with reality or it's not scripture. God even said that. God literally said when someone's saying, thus say the Lord, if it doesn't come to pass, it's not the thing that the Lord has spoken, okay? We have to realize that. Also, we realize that in the verse proceeding, when it says that the people, the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary, and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war the desolation and the determinant, and he shall confirm the covenant with many one week. In verse 26, everyone that knows history will agree that that's talking about 70 AD, okay? That the city and everything is destroyed, right? And the people there is talking about the Romans and Titus. Well, why would you go from 70 AD back to like 33 AD in verse 27? That's not even chronological. You're kind of breaking the chronological system that's even being here. You're like, well, here's what's going to happen to 70 AD, and then let's just randomly go back to 33 AD and then bring up another random event. No, you already had it in verse 26. And after threescore and two weeks, shall Messiah be cut off. There's where Messiah was killed, right? Here's a question. If he was killed at the 62nd, at the end of the 62nd week or section of years or whatever, why do you have a whole other week then? That doesn't even make any sense. It already happened. So you have the seven for the temple, you have the 62 for Messiah, then you have another week. But if you say that the Messiah is here in this other week, now you kind of have them in two different spots, and you're kind of like picking both? Doesn't make sense again. Some people would say, though, how can you assign he to the prince back in verse 26? Because it makes sense. It's that simple. Some grammatical rules would say a pronoun, it would typically go to the most recent noun that makes sense. The most recent noun is prince. And I can find this over and over in the Bible where a noun is even using a prepositional phrase and then later subsequently pronouns are used for it. But let's just ask this question. Let's see if we can just figure out pronouns with grammar alone. Let's go back to our chapter, Genesis 41. And look at verse number 13. And it came to pass, as he interpreted to us, so it was. Me, he restored unto mine office, and him, he hanged. Now, here's the thing, unless you know the story, no one could tell you what all those pronouns mean. Because let's think about what they are. And it came to pass as he interpreted. Who's the he that's the interpreter? Joseph, okay. But let's say we don't know that. Let's say we're just going to use the passage alone. Let's go backwards, okay. And it says, and there was with us a young man, in Hebrew, servant to the captain of the guard, and we told him, who's the him there? Joseph, but he couldn't be the guard, and he interpreted to us our dreams to each man according to his dream, he did interpret. So again, I understand it because I understand this passage, but could it be the captain of the guard? Yeah, that's kind of confusing. Let's just say we know it's Joseph, okay. So it says, and it came to pass as Joseph interpreted to us, so it was me, he restored. Now who's the he there? Is it Joseph? Is it the captain of the guard? No, it's Pharaoh, right? But then how do we know that from grammar? Because this he is way after the other he, and Pharaoh was mentioned way before him. The only way you know this is because it makes sense. Not because it follows some special grammar rules of like, well, if it's the second usage of the pronoun after the first usage of the, you couldn't even make up grammar rules to interpret this. You just have to know the story of what he's saying, right? He restored unto mine office, and him he hang. Who's the him? The baker, right? But I'm just saying, we could just read this and we figure it all out. Why? Because it makes sense to us. You have to know the context in the story. But there would be no way to craft grammar rules to interpret verse 13 by itself without having understood the story, okay? I only make that point just to make the point that you can't just sit here and make up whatever rules you want about grammar. I've heard a stupid interpretation of 1 Timothy chapter number 6, even, with pronoun usages, trying to confuse Jesus with God the Father to end up teaching oneness, okay? But again, you have to let sense tell you what the context, you know, the context is going to drive what the pronouns should be interpreted as, not your interpretation of grammar rules or what you believe about particular grammar rules, okay? Now let's keep reading in this passage. I want to read verse 14 again and explain that a little bit more. Then Pharaoh sinned and called Joseph and they brought him hastily out of the dungeon and he shaved himself and changed the raiment and came in and the Pharaoh. Now what's cool is Joseph is now finally getting restoration, okay? He gets to change his raiment and he's now going to stand before Pharaoh. Keep your finger and go to Psalms 113 for a moment, go to Psalms 113. Now Joseph throughout his whole life, every time he goes to a new transition, it's always even worse. You know, he got sold to the Israelites and then he's falsely accused and put in prison. So him getting called before Pharaoh, he probably doesn't know that it's good yet, right? Like every other time it's been really bad, so he could be pretty nervous. But here's the thing, if you're trusting in the Lord, you just know everything's going to always work out, right? And look at Psalms 113 verse number 7. He raises up the poor out of the dust and lifted the needy out of the dung hill that he may set him with princes, even with the princes of his people. So notice, God will literally take people from really low situations and bring them up and restore them and set them before princes, meaning rulers, meaning great leaders and everything like that. And we see him literally be taken from the dung hill in a sense, from the prison right to Pharaoh. Pretty much from the bottom that you could possibly be all the way to the top in one move. Just like that. And so we should never doubt where God places us. You know, we may think like, why would you put me in the prison, but that was the place to get to Pharaoh. To get into the place that he needed to be, he needed to get into the dungeon, right? And you can think about with the symbolism of Christ, you know, for Christ to be in the elevated position he's in, he had to go through the cross and hell, right? Pretty much the lowest of the lows to then get to the highest of highs, right? And to have the recognition that he gets. Well, let's go back to Genesis chapter 41 and let's see what happens in the story. Verse 15, and Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I have dreamed a dream, there is none that can interpret it. And I have heard say of thee, thou canst understand a dream to interpret it. Joseph answered Pharaoh, saying, it is not a me. God shall give Pharaoh an answer of peace. I love Joseph's answer here. And again, you know, this would be the time of all times to basically just kind of steal a little bit of glory from God, this would be the opportunity, right? Wouldn't it be like, yeah, of course, you know, but here's the thing, wouldn't that be the dumbest thing to do? Because you finally have the opportunity to interpret the dream, right? And you realize God's the only one that can give it to me, I might as well go ahead and basically stay humble so that God will give me that interpretation. Because if he doesn't, he's going back to prison, right? So this is an opportunity to shine through the Lord, right? Let the Lord shine through him and potentially give him, you know, something good. But it's not like he's promised anything, okay? But it does make it clear, look, when I give you this interpretation, I don't want any recognition for it, it's all coming from God. Verse 17, and Pharaoh said unto Joseph, in my dream, behold, I stood upon the bank of the river, and the older came up out of the river seven kind, fat-flesh and well-favored, and they fed in a meadow, and the old seven of the kind came up after them, poor and very ill-favored, lean flesh, such as I never saw in all the land of Egypt for badness, and the lean and the ill-favored kind did eat up the first seven fat kind. When they had eaten them up, it could not be known that they had eaten them, but they were still ill-favored, as at the beginning, so I awoke, and I saw in my dream, and behold, seven ears came up in one stock full and good, and behold, seven ears withered thin and blasted with east wind sprung up after them. Then ears devoured the seven good ears, and I told this unto the magicians, but there was none that could declare it unto me. And Joseph said unto Pharaoh, the dream of Pharaoh is one, God has shown Pharaoh what he's about to do. Seven good kind are seven years, and the seven good ears are seven years, the dream is one. And the seven thin and ill-favored kind that came up after them are seven years, the seven empty ears blasted with east wind shall be seven years of famine. This is the thing which I have spoken unto Pharaoh, what God is about to do, he showeth unto Pharaoh. Behold, there come seven years of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt, and there shall arise after them seven years of famine, and all the plenty shall be forgotten in the land of Egypt, and the famine shall consume the land. The plenty shall not be known in the land by reason of that famine following. It shall be very grievous, and for that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice, because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass." So we have the dream, he gives the very clear interpretation, he says actually both of your dreams have the exact same interpretation. Because what God is going to do is he's going to give you seven years of the greatest blessing, the food is just going to be really abundant, but then you're going to have the seven years of complete famine, and they're going to be so bad that you would forget about all the good and everything like that. And he says it's very clear that God's going to do it, that's why he was given the dream twice. Also very interesting that God is communicating with arguably unsaved people, the Pharaoh and the butler and the baker and all these different people, because again, God is trying to communicate to all people at all times, and I believe he has. Find me a person that's never heard John 3.16, find me a person that's never heard any verse from the Bible. They all have heard verses from the Bible, they've all heard the word of God, it's just some don't like it, some don't want to hear it. You know what, how foolish would it be to have heard this and then be like, well I don't care anymore, see ya. But it's the same thing when you hear John 3.16, you know it's incredible to me when I knock on someone's door and they're not very interested, and I'm like can I give you just one verse, and they're like okay, and I give them like Ephesians 2.8.9 or I give them John 3.16 or I give them something and I'm like if you don't believe in Jesus you're going to hell, and you know, and they'll even say they believe in the Bible and God's like, they're not like an atheist or something, like they believe that the Bible's real and God's word and whatever, and I'm like you have to believe what I showed you and it's different than what you said, or you're going to go to hell, or you have to, you know, but if you believe you go to heaven it's a free gift, you want to hear more? Nah. It's just like what? I mean, you know, isn't it kind of crazy? But it would be kind of the same to me as like saying, look you're going to have seven years of famine and you're going to have this crazy thing that's going to happen to you, what if it was just like send them back to prison? I don't care. You know, I was hoping for something cooler. You know, I was hoping for a third seven jackpot, you know, down in Vegas or something. It's like, how foolish to ever turn away from the word of God no matter how good or how negative it is. You know what? Whatever God has to say for us, we need to just be willing to hear it. And some people, they only want to go to church if it's seven years of plenty. They only want to hear a message that's seven years of plenty. And in fact, they get very offended at hearing that there could be seven years of famine. You know, here's the thing, God is the one that's giving the famine. It's not even like the devil is doing something against God's will or, you know, like this is just man doing his own thing. It's like God is going to do this. Because isn't it abundantly clear in verse 32, God will shortly bring it to pass. So it's God's hand that's moving here. God's bringing the famine. God's bringing the destruction. God's going to bring the evil. And you know, the Bible even makes it clear, if there's evil done in the city, God's done it. Now some people get confused by that. I've even had Christians repeat atheist talking points. The word evil could mean one of two things. It can mean wicked or it can mean harm. Okay. When the Bible says that God's doing evil, meaning harm, not meaning wicked. He never does wicked. Okay. But obviously God does bring all allows all the harm to happen is always God allowing it to happen. And it's either direct or indirectly through his will. Okay. And so what you have to realize is that the evil that comes in this world is indirectly God's will. The doctrine that really screws this up is Calvinism which basically makes it his direct will. You know, it basically makes it that God's the author of wickedness and God's the author of, you know, Satan's ideas and everything like that. But here's the thing. God did create hell. Want to talk about harm? There's some harm there. That's why I think it's really funny when I bring up this point to people and I'll say, look, obviously God is the author of evil in the context of harm because he created hell, my friend. You know, what else could be more harmful than hell? But that doesn't make him wicked. That doesn't make him evil in a wicked sense. That just means that God is someone to be terrified of. Why would you be terrified of him? Because of the evil that he can bring. Because of the harm that God could bring. And it's not even just in hell. It's even on this earth. And Christians should still be our Lord because we can still receive a lot of evil in this life. It's just that we can't receive the evil in the next life because Jesus took that for us. And that's why we love the Lord Jesus Christ. Because he loved us. When we think about this dream, it's also going to take a lot of planning and a lot of effort. And here's another thing that I think is interesting about this is God is going to put them through two really radically different seasons. But think about the timeline. This is a giant timeline if you think about it. We're talking about 14 years. Also, could you imagine, in fact, what if God just basically, you know, told you, like, you're going to go through seven of the worst years of your life? Like, that would be kind of hard. You know what? He may actually do that to some people. And I'm just throwing out seven years of the sense that, like, if it was seven years here, why would it not be a long period of time for other people? You know, Job seemingly is going through a hard time for a pretty long period of time. And you know, there's other men of God who go through difficult seasons. How about Joseph in his life? Now, this is what's interesting. How old was Joseph when he was sold into slavery? 17, right? How old is he when he stands before Pharaoh? 30. Okay, give or take that's, that's 13 years, almost 14 years. You know, if you think about it, is it interesting that Joseph went through an affliction like that for about almost 14 years to then have to go through another 14 years of kind of an interesting life circumstance? You know, that could, that's probably not a coincidence. And I would say it's probably exactly 14 years. I can't say that for sure. The reason why I say that is because I don't think the seven year timeline starts ticking right now. Probably they're going to end this year, right? So he's probably like 30 going on 31. And then entering into the next year when he is 31 is probably when that that 17 year ticker is going to start. But it's like there's a 14 year and then there's a 14 year. There's something about 14 in your Bible, because when you read the book of Matthew in chapter number one, there's like 14 generations from like Abraham unto the carrying away into Babylon and then there's like another 14. And so you have like these interesting 14 that are being brought up in the Bible as like seasons or as like, I don't know how you would want to word that. But all that to say this, you may go through a really difficult period in your life, that's a lot longer than just even a year. It could be seven years. You could go through a year, a time of like seven years of plenty and everything like that. And all of it's still God's will. All of it is still God's desire for you to go through good, evil, bad. And we have to be willing to accept the good with the evil. And sometimes he gives us seven good years to prepare for the bad seven years. Maybe God gives you a lot of wisdom, strength, money or whatever so that when you go through the hard times, you can actually get through it. Whereas if God had not given that to you, you know, if you hadn't been saved, you hadn't gotten a lot of Bible knowledge or whatever, when you finally got through that seven years, things may have been worse, may have destroyed your marriage or may have destroyed, some people might have commit suicide or some people might have done even worse things to themselves or got on drugs or other things when they didn't have an alternative to turn to the Lord during that difficult season of their life. So if you're going through a good time, continue storing up for the next bad season. If you feel like you're going through a bad season, well, just hang on. You know, it might be a while, but maybe, you know, we don't know when God can turn the tides. And just for Joseph, it was like that. He wasn't even expecting it. All of a sudden, he went from the lowest of lows to now he's going to be in the highest of highs, right? Let's keep reading, verse 33. Now, therefore, let Pharaoh look out a man discreet and wise and set him over the land of Egypt. I like this. I just, you know, he basically just like shot the game-winning three, okay, for the championship. Or he just, he almost like, he like threw the touchdown pass and caught it himself. Like, you know, he was basically the quarterback and the receiver for the Super Bowl championship on the fourth quarter, everybody's down. And then he's just like, still like, why don't you find someone legit, you know, to go ahead and take care of this. Because, you know, it's just, it's more commonly to let someone else praise you. You know, let another man praise thee and not thine own mouth, a stranger not thine own lips, right? So according to the Bible, you don't want to give, you don't want to be like, now, since I kind of gave you the interpretation, maybe you should pick someone, you know, to look over the fairs. Now, he just says, you know, now, therefore, let Pharaoh look out a man discreet and wise and set him over the land of Egypt. Let Pharaoh do this and let him appoint officers over the land and take up the fifth part of the land of Egypt and the seven plenteous years. Let them gather all the food of those good years that come and lay up corn under the hand of Pharaoh and let them keep food in the cities. And that food shall be restored to the land against the seven years of famine, which shall be in the land of Egypt if the land perish not through famine. And the thing was good in the eyes of Pharaoh and in the eyes of all his servants. And Pharaoh said to the servants, can we find such a one as this is, a man in whom the Spirit of God is? Now, again, I don't know Pharaoh's spirituality or religion per se, but that's a pretty good statement. He's like, hey, this guy's got the Spirit of God in him. And why? Because he can understand the things of God, right? Why did he have it? The interpretation? Because the Spirit of God is in him. He recognizes the Spirit of God. And I would say this, even the unsaved can recognize the Spirit of God. You can see this throughout the Bible. When you get a little bit further in, you start reading Exodus, even the magicians and whatever of Pharaoh later, they see the plagues and stuff, it starts getting to an escalated point where they're like, this is the finger of God, okay? We can't do that, right? Even the devils, right? The devils are inside people, possessing people and doing kinds of weird tricks and stuff like that. But then when Jesus shows up, they're like, here's Jesus, here's Paul, here's the servants of the Messiah God, we can tell the Spirit of God in these type of people. And it's because the Spirit of God is power. The Spirit of God is not weak. You should see the power of God. That doesn't mean that everybody wants it. That doesn't mean that everybody likes it. That doesn't mean that everybody is going to agree with it, or do it, or follow it. It just means they can at least recognize it, okay? They can see it for what it is, and the reaction is going to always be different. They may have a positive, negative, neutral reaction, but they're going to at least be able to recognize the Spirit of God. Unfortunately, most people are filled with the devil, or at least they're his pawns, so when they recognize the Spirit of God, they want to destroy it. They want to smash it. They want to attack it. They want to cover it. They want to basically do some kind of damage to it. That's why you see really Spirit-filled people, or people doing great works for the Lord, or those that are trying to live godly are constantly being attacked is because they can recognize the Spirit of God's in you, and they're coming after you. Whereas a church where they aren't doing anything good for the Lord, the reason why they're not attacking him is they don't see the Spirit of God there. They don't see the power. They don't see, you know, basically the works of the Lord being done, so there's nothing to stop. There's no threat. There's no real issue. It's the fact that they can identify the Spirit of God, and they just hate the Spirit of God, okay? Because if you think about it, what separates me physically from all the other Baptist churches in this area? Probably almost nothing. It's positive. I mean, especially to most people. You know, I'm probably younger than most of these guys. I probably have less accolades when it comes to, you know, physical things. I don't have some, you know, I don't have, like, Dr. Shelley, you know. I don't have some great accolades before my name. I don't have some seminary degree. You know, we don't have some fancy building or something like that, you know, compared to a lot of churches. I mean, a lot of churches, again, I love our building. I think it's great. You know, I think it's more fancy than I need. But I'm just saying if we're just comparing, right, most Baptist churches probably have a nicer facility, maybe more money, more, like, in a physical carnal aspect, they just have more in every category, right? Yet, why would our church potentially have more persecution, more attacks, or whatever? It's because they can see the Spirit of God in you. They see the Spirit of God inside of you, and you know what? They have a visceral reaction to the Spirit of God, okay? Whereas someone that doesn't have the Spirit of God, it doesn't bother them. In fact, they can get along with them. In fact, they'll show up and pray with them, you know, we'll have literal Baptists show up and pray with the devil, you know, incarnate. I mean, it's just crazy. It's crazy how they have it. And you say, well, why aren't they getting mad at that person? Because they don't see the Spirit of God in that person. They see the Spirit of the world. And you know what? The Spirit of the world doesn't bother them. They love the Spirit of the world. They hear their own, you know? Whereas the Spirit of God, they just cringe at it, they hate it, or whatever, they don't like it, but at least they can recognize it. And you know what? Pharaoh can recognize it, too. Verse 39, And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, As much as God hath shewed thee all this, there is none so discreet and wise as thou art. Thou shalt be over my house, and according unto thy word, that all my people be ruled. Only in the throne will I be greater than thou. Now, this is really cool because I believe that Pharaoh and Joseph are one of the best pictures in the Bible of understanding the complexities of the Trinity, okay? And what's cool about Joseph is he pictures Jesus in so many ways, but this one's really unique as far as a picture in the Bible of comprehending what God is like and what the Father and the Son's relationship is like. But really, when you think about it, this is a great description of that. Because when it comes to God the Father and it comes to Jesus Christ, it's like Jesus is doing everything, Jesus is in control of everything and doing everything, and he's really the one in charge. But in the throne, technically, God the Father is greater, right? And God the Father, you know, is still the ruler, ultimately. But they're both the ruler. They're both the Lord, you know, in a sense. They're both the one that's in charge. But they're distinct persons with their own personality, their own, you know, whatever. Now, obviously, some of these analogies fall apart a little bit, right? Pharaoh and Joseph are not as similar in unity as the Father and the Son because the Father and the Son look identical, okay? The Son is the express image of the Father, right? And we also know that the Father and the Son have the exact same attributes as being the truth, from the beginning, they're holy, they're righteous and everything like that. But as far as their roles are concerned, their roles illustrate some important truths that we find in the Scripture. If we go to 1 Corinthians chapter 15, go to 1 Corinthians chapter number 15, and we kind of see this illustrated. But here's an interesting point that I hadn't really thought of until I kind of read this verse for this sermon, is think about the word throne there, right? And when we think about God's throne, who's kind of sitting the chief in the throne? It's the Father, right? And then at the right hand is Jesus. So in a sense, while Jesus is on the throne, you kind of have the Father as being the central, the more prominent figure on the throne, right? And when we go into heaven, we see one sitting on the throne. It's the Father, right? And we see Jesus being the active one, taking the book out of the hand of him that's sitting on the throne and everything like that. So you kind of see what? Jesus is kind of the active ruler, whereas the Father is kind of the sitting ruler in a sense, right? And that's kind of the same with Pharaoh and Joseph in the sense that Pharaoh is kind of the sitting ruler, he's in the throne, no one's going to usurp his seat of authority whatsoever. In fact, his seat of authority is what gave Joseph that power and that authority. And it's the same with God the Father. God the Father is never going to be usurped in his seat of authority, yet he decided of his own volition to give his authority and his power unto the Son. Look at 1 Corinthians chapter 15 verse 23, that every man in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, afterward they their Christ is coming, talking about the resurrection, then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, talking about Jesus Christ, even the Father, meaning specifically the Father, when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. So how much power and authority and everything does Jesus have? The Bible's saying all of it, right? It's saying he has all rule, all authority, all and power, right? And he must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet, the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death, for he hath put all things under his feet. Now the Bible's just trying to make it a really abundant point. Jesus is the top, the top, the top, the top, everything's under him, he's conquered everything, he's in charge, he's everywhere. And then Paul's like, I just want to put in a caveat though, okay? But when he saith, all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is accepted, which did put all things under him, okay? So, and I love his caveat too, because his caveat, he's saying like, I didn't even have to caveat this, because it was so obvious, it was just too clear that I didn't even have to say this, but I'm going to say it anyways, that God the Father is obviously not under his authority though, okay? Because he's the one that even gave him all that authority in the first place, all right? So it's obvious that he is accepted. Another thing that's important when you think about this is that sometimes when it says all or uses these words, there is exceptions outside of the context of which that's put in that are really obvious or that are really clear. But that doesn't mean that every time that's the case, you know, the Calvinists love to say that the word all doesn't mean all when it talks about, you know, he's a ransom for all, but here's the problem, he is the ransom for all, okay? Because there is no context in that chapter that explains away all there, okay? This one actually literally gives you the caveat, and it makes it even further clear when it says in verse 28, and when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him that God may be all in all. So again, the Son is still subject to the Father, but could we say that Jesus is the ruler of all? Yes, we don't have to constantly caveat that statement. We don't have to constantly say like, but technically the Father is above him, you know. He's doing it one time for us in the Bible to make it clear, but then everywhere else in Scripture, don't we have it where Jesus is just the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, everything is talking about Jesus, he's the ruler, he's the top, and everything like that. And it's kind of the same with Joseph. Joseph is really considered the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the ruler, in the realm and context of which he's in, he's considered the guy, the Lord, the one in charge, the master, the boss, everything you could ever imagine, ever want, it's him. But technically there's an exception. In the throne, Pharaoh is really still in charge, and he gets all of his power from Pharaoh, he didn't derive it from himself. So we get a cool explanation and picture of what the Trinity looks like with Joseph and Pharaoh, with God the Father, and with Jesus Christ. Go to John chapter 5 for a moment and look at verse 22. John chapter 5 verse 22. So when trying to explain the deeper things of the Trinity, I feel like Joseph is actually kind of a beneficial story to kind of show that. And really, I don't know that there's a better picture of explaining that particular aspect of the Trinity than showing Joseph there with the Pharaoh. And the thing I like about that picture though is that Joseph is one of the easiest people to show that he's Jesus in the Bible over and over. So when you show him that he's Jesus over and over, then it's just that much easier to show, like, here's how the Trinity kind of operates and works and everything like that. But look at John chapter 5 verse 22. For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son. Going again. Kind of like how Pharaoh's going to do nothing and Joseph's going to do everything, right? And whenever people are coming in the later chapters, they're coming unto Joseph. They stand before Joseph. Joseph judges. Joseph decides what's going to happen. Who's going to get what. He makes all the determinations and the rules. And really, that's kind of how it is. God the Father is letting Jesus Christ do all the work and do all the judging and do all the different stuff. And so, you know, that's why you don't want to piss him off as what Psalms chapter number 2 says, okay? I'm paraphrasing, all right? But that's basically it. Kiss the Son lest he be angry, you know, and thou perish in the way when his wrath the kindle but a little. Okay. So, don't piss him off, all right? That's my message version for you, okay? Go back to Genesis 41. Go to Genesis chapter 41. But also we kind of see the picture of the throne and stuff like that. So, I don't think this is just coincidental or accidental. I mean, these wordings have great meanings to me, you know, talking about only in the throne, right? It goes beyond just Pharaoh and Joseph relationship kind of showing a picture stereotype of what it's like of the Father and the Son. It says in verse number, let's pick back up in verse, let's start in verse 39 and keep reading all the way down, okay? And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, for as much as God has showed thee all this, there is none so discreet and wise as thou art. Thou shalt be over my house and according unto thy word, shall all my people be ruled. Only in the throne will I be greater than thou. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, see I have set thee over all the land of Egypt. Pharaoh took off his ring from his hand and put it upon Joseph's hand and rayed him investors of fine linen and put a gold chain about his neck. They made him to ride the second chariot which he had and they cried before him, bow their knee. And he made him ruler over all the land of Egypt. Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I am Pharaoh and without thee shall no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnath Panea and he gave him to wife Asenath, the daughter of Potipharah, priest of bond. Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt. Joseph was 30 years old when he stood before Pharaoh king of Egypt and Joseph went out in the presence of Pharaoh and went throughout all the land of Egypt. Now again, if we take the symbolism of Jesus here, it just kind of just keeps knocking out of the park for a second. Because you think about it, like all these accolades and all these things that he's giving to Joseph are pictures of how God the Father is honoring and glorifying Jesus Christ, right? And he's giving him a change of raiment, kind of showing what? How Jesus gets the glorified body, okay? And how his raiment is changed, okay? Also how everybody is going to call him, you know, basically the ruler over all the land. Again, does it have an exception here? He made him ruler over all the land, except for Pharaoh. No, it's just, you don't have to say that, okay? We got it, okay? He's the ruler, period, okay? He gets to ride in the second chariot, meaning that it's like, you know, you kind of have this picture of the one-toothed punch here of what? Like the father and the son, right? And so you kind of have that same picture. No man's going to lift up his hand or his foot, meaning that, you know, you're subject unto him, period. They're going to all cry before him and bow the knee. That reminds me of Philippians chapter number two, right? I mean, you could just, we could spend all night on this. I'm just kind of giving you a few ideas here, right? Also, he said that he gave him a name, right? I just think that's, you know, it's kind of reminiscent of Philippians 2 again, where he's given him a name which is above every name, the name of Jesus, right? So even though he gets this kind of new name and, you know, we kind of see Jesus is given the name of Jesus in a sense, so obviously we could look at it from historical past, but he's kind of given that name at his birth and it's kind of a symbol and it's a special name. Also, he's given a wife, Jesus. He gets to marry the church, right? And then he's going to rule over all the land picturing Christ's millennial reign. So again, it's just sitting here and just hitting like every kind of parallel that Jesus is going to do Joseph is fulfilling right here and we get to see all of the future prophecy of that. Verse 47, and in the seven plenteous years the earth brought forth by handfuls and he gathered up all the food of the seven years which were the land of Egypt and laid up the food in the cities and the food of the field which is round about every city. Lady up in the same, Joseph gathered corn as the sand of the sea very much until he left numbering for it was without number. And then Joseph were born two sons before the years of famine came which Ashenath, the daughter of Potipharah, priest of on bear unto him. Joseph called the name of the firstborn Manasseh, for God said he hath made me forget all my toil and all my father's house. And the name of the second called the Ephraim, for God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of mine of my affliction. The seven years of plenteous that were in the land of Egypt. So he gets the seven years of plenteous. So this seven years been great. And I say seven plus because I don't think the ticker started at the interpretation they probably had a little bit of time to get everything set up and then the seven years was coming. It was going to come shortly, it was come to pass shortly. Okay, shortly bring it to pass. Sorry, that's the right phrase. Now, in the seven years, though, it goes so well and he gets Manasseh's son that he kind of just forgets how his life sucked for 13 or 14 years. Okay. And that's what God can do. God can literally give you so much blessing at some point in your life, you kind of forget all the really horrible stuff that you like went through, you know, and I even think about it like this way, that sometimes you could think like, maybe church was like bad at some point in time. But then it got so much better, that now you don't remember how it was so bad, or thinking about it being bad, just funny now, or, you know, it's just kind of comical or wasn't that, or maybe your marriage is bad at some point in time. But now it's good. So now you're kind of like, you laugh about how it was kind of bad at some point, right? Or a relationship, maybe a family member, your mom, your dad, your brother, your sister was bad for a while. But now it's good. And now it just kind of doesn't matter anymore. Right? Or maybe someone was barren for a while. And then they finally had a kid. And it's like, it doesn't matter all that time that we struggled, all that time we didn't have, or whatever, you can just have all kinds of issues. You didn't have money for the longest time, then you finally get money. You know, it's like, when you finally get fixed or cured, all that suffering just kind of doesn't matter anymore. And you kind of forget about it. It makes me think of Psalms 23, He restoreth my soul. You know, and it's kind of that restoration of you kind of get that healing cure. And the Lord can give that to you. So you know, just continue to be faithful to the Lord and believe that He'll give it. And even if you don't get in this life, when you get in heaven, you'll finally, you'll be like, all right, good now. Okay? You finally, finally get to rest. And everything's been fixed. You know, and God can fix a broken heart. I think sometimes it's hard in the moment to realize that you could have joy again. But you know, and I have, there's lots of verses we could look to, but I kind of want to just finish this chapter real quick. But you know, when you go through difficult things, let this chapter be a reminder that good things can happen. And that God can take all the evil that you've gone through and make it to where you even forget about it. It's not even that big a deal anymore that you kind of can move past it. And God can still give you joy in your life no matter what evil has befallen in the past. Okay. Let's keep reading a little bit. Verse 53, or verse 54. In the seven years of Dirth began to come, according as Josephus said, and the Dirth was in all lands, but in the land of Egypt, there was bread. When all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread. And Pharaoh said, and all the Egyptians go unto Joseph what he sayeth to you do. The famine was over all the face of the earth, and Josephus opened all the storehouses and sold unto the Egyptians, and the famine waxed sore in the land of Egypt. And all countries came into Egypt with Joseph for to buy corn because the famine was sore in all lands. So this long chapter, here's kind of a couple last thoughts. And this is just kind of me thinking in timeline. But I've thought it out like kind of a general timeline in the past of like the Bible. And I was just always curious about where this story kind of fits. But I believe that they entered into Egypt in like year 2,298 from the beginning. But from a BC perspective, that would be 1,986 B.C. from the beginning. And then they're there for about 430 years. So that's all the way to about 1,556 B.C. And I looked it up and I'm like, when were the pyramids built? Okay. Now here's the thing, most secular history just sucks because they'll say crazy things. They say the first pyramid was probably built in like 2,670 B.C. I don't believe that's possible. Because the first time, if you study the timeline of the flood, that would have been during the flood. Not necessarily during the flood, but that would have been like the flood would have happened after that. So that would mean the flood didn't touch the pyramid or whatever. The flood would have washed that thing away. So that's not possible. And they try to date things being 3,000, 4,000 B.C. and stuff like that, which no. Pretty much no. Obviously those timelines are legitimate in the sense that there was human history at that point in time. Probably not. They use weird dating methods to get to these things. I believe pretty much all secular history probably would stop around 2,500, 2,600 B.C. because that's basically when you have flood and you have language changing and that's kind of where you have these types of things. And typically their dating methods to get to these things are just crazy. No real consistency to them. But even in their own dating, okay, even within secular dating, they say a lot of pyramids and stuff were built between the 1900 B.C. and the 1500 B.C. era. And the reason why I believe the pyramids were built during this era and a lot of these things is because you have to think about all the events that are happening. But, and go to Exodus chapter 1 for just a minute. But, God is doing something special here where he's going to cause a famine to go to the entire world and all the world has to come to Egypt to buy. Meaning what? Egypt is going to literally become a one world power with all the money in the world. Another reason why I also believe Egypt is one of the seven kingdoms that are mentioned. There's kind of like seven kingdoms or given to us in the book of Daniel. And you're kind of wondering where the first two were coming into play. The seventh is the coming kingdom. And then the eighth is the anti-Christ. The anti-Christ is of the seventh and then just basically picks the seventh to the curb and is like I'm the eighth or whatever. So where are the first two? I believe the first two would be one would be Egypt and the other would probably be the Syrian empire. This would be your moment in history though where Egypt is basically going to rule the entire earth. You think about it. No one has food. And kind of what's a big component or what's a big component of the anti-Christ system? You can't buy or sell without the mark, right? Unless you come and worship or whatever. And so kind of a similar component here is the fact that if you want to eat and live, you got to go to Egypt. You got to submit to Egypt. You got to buy of Egypt, right? Okay, so we kind of see that parallel, that correlation. What's going to happen to Egypt? It's going to become the richest place ever and it's going to have so much gold it doesn't even know what to do with it, okay? Now, that's reminiscent of a lot of different things too, but I believe that's why Egypt had so much riches and wealth. Another thing that's interesting is when you read about Egypt in the Bible, it doesn't sound like the Egypt that you look at in today's world, okay? Because you read about Egypt and it sounds great. It's like lush hills and grass and meadows and whatever. When we think about Egypt, it's just dirt and sand, you know? It's just like a nothing wasteland. I recommend this. Just go to Google maps, okay? And just kind of look at the like topographical area of the Middle East. It looks like just nukes have gone off in all these places. And I will submit to you the fact is all these areas used to look great, but then because they just hated God for so much longer than everybody else, God just made it a wasteland. And then it's just stayed a wasteland. I mean, you just look at these areas and they're just like giant wastelands or whatever and it's probably just the curse of sin, okay? These people hated God and God just had to constantly destroy the land and destroy all this area where they're at. And it's like the reason why America was such a beautiful land is because no one was there. And now that we come here, you know, California is going to start looking like a wasteland pretty soon, you know? I'm just kidding, but I'm just saying like, you know, these areas are going to start looking horrible because they're a rebellion to God and they're hatred for God or whatever and it just takes that time or whatever to become the desolate wasteland. But Egypt at some point was a beautiful oasis. And of course, then they ride on the backs of the smartest people, God's people, end up building them these great pyramids and these great wonders and all these treasures and they got all this money. And think about it, where do I get all this money and wealth from God? Through Joseph, through God's people. And look, you study history, God's people are the ones that bring in wealth, prosperity and everything and then all the cockroaches and devil-worshipping freaks come and steal it. They never really make it or have it of their own accord. It's just God blessing them and giving them and they're just coming and leeching off of God's people. Just like America. America is built by God's people and by people that love the Lord and by Christians and by Christian standards and morals and then you have all these freaks coming in, parasites coming in trying to attack and basically steal all these goods. Look at Exodus chapter 1, verse number 8. Now there arose up a new king over Egypt which knew not Joseph and he said unto his people, Behold, the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier than we. Come on, let us deal wisely with them, lest they multiply and it come to pass, that when there falleth out any war, they join also under enemies and fight against us and so get them up out of land. Therefore they did set over them taskmasters to afflict them with their burdens and they built for Pharaoh treasure cities, Pithom and Ramses. So after Joseph dies, then they ride the backs of the Hebrews to do what? Build these great treasure cities. Why are they building treasure cities? Because Joseph just racked up for them all kinds of treasure and you think about where the treasure come from? From the fact that they have the only food, they were the only game in town and so basically they just racked it all up, didn't they? Kind of makes me think of COVID. I'll go on another tangent here for a second. Isn't it interesting, it's like, oh, we have to shut down all the restaurants and all the places where you can buy goods except for Wink Wink, our buddies and neighbors, Amazon and Walmart and McDonald's or whatever and what's going to happen? They're going to rack up all the treasures of the earth while every mom and pop shop and everything else gets shut down and closed down and everything else because it's the same kind of system. The devil is wise, actually. Now he doesn't understand the Bible but he is wise in a carnal sense, in a physical sense and you know what? He knows how to rack up cash. He knows how to rack up wealth and money because he constantly is, you know, all the evil, wicked people constantly have it but at the end of the day, you know, we're not supposed to lay up for ourselves, you know, treasures on this earth. We don't really care about that kind of thing. Now, we have to understand about Joseph doing this though and here's one practical tip that I give you. When we think about this story, the Bible warns us not to lay up treasures on the earth, right? I don't think that having savings is a sin or wrong. Think about it. Joseph is laying up money for a very specific purpose for the years of famine, okay? He's not just like, let's just see how much money we can get. Let's just see how much wealth we can get, you know? Let's just see how much food we can store. No, he was laying it up on purpose, right? Because isn't there a guy that brings forth plentiful fee and then he builds a greater barn so that he can store it and then God rebukes him? But he's not rebuking Joseph for doing the same thing because it's the motivation that was the difference, okay? What's Joseph's motivation to be preserved for this specific instance? The other guy just was greedy and selfish and wanted to be lazy, okay? So, here's my viewpoint. When it comes to saving money, if there's a good purpose or a good reason, there's nothing wrong with it, right? If you're saving up money to buy a house, there's no problem with that. If you're saving up money because you have a savings for your, you know, just emergency fund or whatever, I don't see any problem for that. Or you're saving up for a trip that you're going to take to the Bahamas to get a bunch of people saved, no problem for that. You know, you're saving up money, you know, there's lots of reasons to save money, okay? You're saving up money for a specific reason. But if you just say, I have everything I could ever want or need right now and I just want to start saving up even more money, then you might have to start saying like, what's wrong with your heart? You know, like, what do you do? Did you give that money? Is there another better use for that money? Or like, are you just trying to see how much money you can just stack or whatever? I mean, these multi billionaires, they're not sitting here like I have a really good reason to save up even more money. It's like, No, no, no, no, you're just a greedy cup of this person. Okay, you know, and so when it comes to savings, you have to kind of check text yourself and ask yourself this question, why do I have this money saved up? And if this is what comes to mind, nothing, then you might want to think of a different reason. You know, you might want to think of like a different use for that money. Because that might not be right. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with saving or having money stored up or whatever. But when it has no purpose, then you kind of have to ask yourself the question of like, what, what, what is my real purpose? Do I have an evil heart or am I throwing this up for a wrong reason? And when it comes to the storage of the food, they ought to come to Joseph, right? This is what's cool. He said that was bread in Egypt, right? So he's comparing it to bread. Where's the only game in town for the spiritual bread? Jesus. There's a dearth in the land. And the only way you can get that bread is to go to Joseph. There's a dearth in the land and the only way to get salvation is to come to Jesus. Let's go to prayer. Thank Heavenly Father for this great chapter. There's so many great truths in the Word of God. Thank you for helping us to understand some of them better through the pictures of Joseph. I pray that as we go through, you know, our lives and we don't know what's on the horizon, that we would constantly be comforted with the fact that you're always with us, you're leading and guiding us, that you can restore us at any moment in time. And that if we have to go through years of evil, whether that be four or seven or eight or who knows, that we'll still just be faithful servants and realize that, you know, blessed be the name of the Lord, and that we can just rest and endure providence and realize that you're going to guide us through it. And that when we go through the years of plenty, we want to remember the years of famine anymore. And I pray that you just be with those that are struggling right now, that you'd help encourage them and strengthen them. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Turn to our last song for the evening. 316. 316. I have decided to follow Jesus. 316. You're on the first. I have decided to follow Jesus. I have decided to follow Jesus. I have decided to follow Jesus. No turning back. No turning back. Though none go with me, still I will follow. Though none go with me, still I will follow. Though none go with me, still I will follow. No turning back.