Genesis 45:1-15; 50:15-21; John 20: 1-13
April 17, 2022
- The flow of emotions at the Resurrection of our Loved Ones
Even if you have never seen the popular television show Undercover Boss, you probably have heard something about its plotline. Even the name pretty much gives it away. In every episode, a boss (CEO) of some good-sized business decides to dress up and assume a false identity and WORK IN THAT BUSINESS down in the trenches to learn more about the company and its employees, thereby finding a more accurate assessment of how things are. After all, the employees will tell a stranger the unvarnished truth about how life is as an employee long before they will tell the boss who can fire them. Then, once the boss has learned enough, they will reveal their true identity and talk about what they will change. The underlying premise to all this is that the boss wants to make things better. It can be a bit heartfelt as the bosses encounter employees who are having a tough time with life. The show searches out employees who have stories that tug on the emotions. That’s just good television.
But one story I have never seen on the show (and even though I have not seen many, I feel confident that this has never happened) is to have the boss show up after everyone honestly believes the boss has died. Sure, people are shocked to find the boss working alongside them, but to have the head honcho show up after everyone is convinced that person no longer is alive… THAT would be a real feat – people running every which way for an exit. It’s a ghost! Also, there might be a few tears but more likely out of sheer terror. We could call it resurrected boss, but that is probably for some other television show.
And yet, this is exactly what happens here in Genesis 45 as we finally get into the point for the whole Joseph story. All of the plot has been moving us to this one day. Chapters and chapters of Genesis have been moving us to this moment. Finally, the great reveal. Joseph’s dreams are coming true for everyone to see. The Egyptian Empire bows down to him. His family all are bowing down to him. It is time to see the real Joseph and for everyone to recognize the bigger picture. Masks off, no more fake mustache or wig, false identities aside – back comes the curtain – Joseph is still alive.
Hopefully, it is not a surprise why I found this story a good one for today. This is a great resurrection story. The brothers were so shocked that they did not know what to say or do. They probably could not hear themselves even try to think over Joseph’s weeping. I never realized until I put these passages together that Joseph seems to cry a lot. That is not a judgment but simply a recognition that I don’t really recall anyone else crying in our series, let alone a couple of times. Today seems to be a day of tears with Mary Magdalene also weeping, but we can understand her crying a little more easily since she believes Jesus has been stolen. Her beloved teacher, after everything else that has happened (all the insults and torture and murder and inhumane treatment), has now been stolen and cannot even have a proper burial. Such an idea is so alien to us that we struggle to even imagine what that must be like, to have a family member stolen right out of the coffin. Mary is staring at that fact and can do nothing else but weep.
Joseph’s tears were very different tears. He was not overcome with sadness or grief in the face of new life. The first time he weeps, so loud that the whole household can hear (that’s an interesting detail), he is weeping out of joy to finally reveal himself. He desperately misses dad and asks, again, whether their father still lives. He can finally hug his little brother whom he has not seen in many years. Joseph left as a teenager and is now a father of two himself. His road has been truly hard, much harder than we can imagine, between betrayal, slavery, imprisonment, and acclimating to a foreign culture so much so that his brothers do not even recognize him. Now, he could lay all of that aside and welcome them as Joseph. After all of the evil, Joseph is overcome with love and joy.
It is the second time Joseph weeps that really piques my interest, however. After Joseph brings all his people, all of his big, big, big family down to the land of Goshen, and provides for them and secures a future for them, this strange incident reminds us of the frailty of family connections. Jacob has finally lived his last day – dad is finally at rest and peace after many years, but Joseph’s brothers are now terrified. They think Joseph only helped them and was nice to them and welcomed them because dad was still alive. Now that Jacob was not around, they would see the real Joseph and his revenge, so they concoct this story – “Jacob’s final command” – that Joseph forgive them for the evil they did to him. Joseph’s response is striking to me: he wept, again. He is so overcome by compassion for their confusion and doubts, maybe hurt that they didn’t believe him before. You can almost hear in Joseph’s emotion Jesus’, “O ye of little faith.”
It is still so raw for Joseph, so real for him, so emotional for him, and his passion comes right out, his love for his brothers AND for his realization of how God used all of their actions to lead to the family’s salvation. They would literally not have survived without this plan working. All of Egypt would have starved. The family would have starved. It would have been beyond brutal except for the twists and turns of Joseph’s life. “What you meant for evil, God meant for great, great, great good.” This is one of my personal bedrock passages in Scripture. If this is not true, not only in that time but still in situations today, I’m packing the bags and going home.
What I wanted to dwell in for just a couple of minutes, though, is Joseph’s tears. It turns out that the Jewish people have a history of great passion. Sure, you could say we all are passionate people in some degree, but some peoples seem to be a little less passionate than others. I think Americans have a bit of a reputation for passion and emotion. We certainly do our wrestling with God like the ancient Jacob called Israel. Our passions have been running higher and higher nationally, and I don’t think that is a healthy thing, but we do recognize the need to let out our emotions, especially as we trudge through these pandemic days. We may all have shared a bit more in tears than we would have normally.
Our emotions are an interesting thing. Not only is this one way we reflect God and are made in God’s image – God is a very passionate being in Scripture, but our passions are also a way that God speaks to us. They show us genuine feelings and give us a glimpse to how people honestly feel. We are led by our hearts, and God has given us these emotions to help us take action in what’s important to us. Take Joseph’s brothers, for instance, because Joseph felt so sincerely about them, he was able to forgive them and help them out of love. Maybe he struggled with hate sometimes. We can only imagine. Love and hate are emotional cousins, but when Joseph was confronted with their need and their desire to do what was right, his love was able to chart a path forward for them all.
When they still questioned and doubted and feared for Joseph, those tears were Joseph’s response to their brokenness, their hurting story. He never played the blame game or ascribed guilt or condemned them. He could have easily and justifiably. Instead, he gave them his passion.
The word passion literally means suffering. There is a history of this in religious art, but passion is when you feel so much for something that it actually hurts. That is how we connect that to romantic feelings, but fundamentally, it is really just about suffering. Joseph suffered tremendously, even at their hands, but his suffering became even more when he grew into COMpassion. Compassion is literally when we suffer WITH someone esle. Joseph saw past himself and his hurt and his need and discovered how God was working an amazing story of salvation all along. Joseph didn’t know the plan until it fell in his lap. Then, the beauty of God’s grace overwhelmed him, too, and he wept for joy. He was consumed by the love of God that brought him back to life for his brothers and father and brought them all to new life in Egypt.
Today is a day of new life. It is a day to remember and to dream. It is a day to seek God’s help and to find God’s help. It is a day to weep for joy and for our sorrow. Real life is here for us, and God is in the middle of it all, working all things for good for those who love God. To God be the glory. Amen.