"Examples of Faith – Joseph: The Forgiveness of Faith" Hebrews 11:22
- Senior Pastor, Robert Dennison, preached this message on November 26, 2023.
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Audio Transcript
We invite you to take your Bibles. We will read Hebrews 11:22, but we’re going to be spending most of our time in Genesis 45 and 50 not reading everything. But that’s where our examples will be coming from. If you are a family with children and you did not pick up one of our advent block boxes, there are more of those here in the front pew. Please pick up one of those before you leave.
Today we’re continuing our series on examples of faith in Hebrews chapter 11. And today again, we are looking at Joseph and the forgiveness of of faith. And we read in Hebrews 11:22 that by faith, Joseph, as he was nearing the end of his life, mentioned the exodus of the Israelites and gave instructions concerning his bones. So by faith, we know that Joseph lived his entire life. And it is by faith that he was in a supernatural way able to forgive his brothers from casting them into a pit, selling them into slavery, and him being away from his family, in jail, prison for so many years.
What it means to truly forgive must have been a very difficult thing for Joseph if he had not had faith in the Lord to give him that strength. Let’s pray. Heavenly Father, as we look at your word today, once again, we thank you for the example that we have here in Scripture from Joseph that it is possible to offer the type of forgiveness that you give to us in a similar way you want us to give to others. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
We look at a definition of forgiveness. There are two parts to it. The first is that it’s the action or process of stopping angry or resentful feelings. If you feel angry or you feel resentful towards someone, more than likely you need to be extinc extending forgiveness to that person. The anger and the resentful feelings can be the result of an offense that someone has or takes against you.
It could be just because they have a flaw in what they’re doing that bothers you and makes you angry, or possibly unintentionally, they make a mistake. But when you feel angry or resentful toward people, when you stop that anger, and when you stop that resentful feeling, you are extending forgiveness to them. The second part of the definition isn’t forgiveness. That is the action or process of canceling a debt. In other words, someone calls you and says, we have forgiven your loan on your house.
You don’t have to make any more payments or your credit card. Everything you spent at Christmas has been forgiven. The debt has been canceled. In all of this, today, we’re going to be seeing that God extends forgiveness to us. And in the life of Joseph, we see the type of forgiveness that he wants us to have.
Joseph is an example of how we can live. And he’s an example that it is possible to forgive in this way. But we also see in the example of Joseph that he was a picture of God’s forgiveness towards us. So when we look at the definition here, the first thing I want to point out that God has no angry feelings towards those who have placed their faith in Christ. Now, Satan wants you to continue to feel guilty.
He wants you to continue to feel shame after God has forgiven you. And he says, you know, God can’t possibly forgive you completely. But Scripture tells us that once our sins are forgiven and God isn’t angry with us anymore, we shouldn’t be angry with ourselves. But also we see in forgiveness that God has canceled the debt of those who have placed their faith in Christ. He’s completely wiped out anything that we owe because of the sin in our life.
Let’s go to Ephesians 4:32, and we’re going to see the example of forgiveness for us is God himself. In Ephesians 4:32 we read, Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving one another, just as your grandmother forgives you. You know, grandmothers are great about forgiving grandkids for breaking things and messing things up, but that’s not what it says here. Our example is not a human example. Our example is that God forgave us in Christ.
And it’s in this same manner, the way that God forgives us, that we are commanded to forgive one another. So we have the example of forgiveness is God himself. But we also have the extent of our forgiveness. Therefore, as God’s chosen ones, holy and dearly loved, put on compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience bearing with one another. And the next quality is forgiving one another.
If anyone, not just certain people, not people close to us, but anyone that has a grievance against another. And we do this just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you are also to forgive. God is the example of, of forgiveness. And he also shows us the extent that our forgiveness is supposed to be to others. In Matthew 6:12, we come to part of the Lord’s Prayer and we see the frequency of our forgiveness.
It says, forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors, or forgive us what we have done wrong, as we’ve already forgiven those that have done wrong against us. And the prayer that Jesus gave to his disciples Was what not to be prayed just on Sundays. It wasn’t a monthly prayer because earlier on it says, give us this day our daily bread. Our prayer to the Lord to help us to forgive others is supposed to be a daily occurrence. There shouldn’t be an unforgiving spirit of anger in our life that goes from one day to the next.
That slate should be wiped clean with everyone in our life that has offended us or wronged us in the life of Joseph. Today we’re going to be seeing five characteristics of forgiveness. Five characteristics of forgiveness. The first one is that faith forgiveness has no desire to punish or elicit guilt. In other words, faith forgiveness that we offer to people doesn’t say I’m forgiving you, but I want you to continue to feel bad about this.
It doesn’t say I’m forgiving you, but you know, you should really feel guilty about breaking that thing or forgetting my birthday, whatever it is that you’re upset about. Faith forgiveness has no desire to punish or to elicit guilt. Faith forgiveness also forgives not some grievances, but what’s the three letter word there? It forgives all. Faith forgiveness doesn’t say, well, I’m going to forgive everything but that one thing that you did years ago.
I’ll never forgive you for that one thing. Faith forgiveness forgives all grievances. Thirdly, faith forgiveness sees the sovereignty of God at work in even in the worst situations. And we have to keep in mind the situations that Joseph had been in. There was conflict in his family and it wasn’t his enemy that threw him into the pit.
It was his very brothers that cast him into the pit and were planning on killing him. As if that wasn’t bad enough, then they sold him into slavery and he was taken to Egypt, away from from his family. I doubt that any of us have had that severe of negative actions happen to any of us today. But Joseph, in spite of these deep, awful situations, continued to see the sovereignty of God at work and that allowed him to forgive his brothers. Faith forgiveness also looks for the good that God does in spite of evil.
Faith forgiveness says, well, I know that God can bring good out of this awful situation because he works all things together for good. He doesn’t cause the evil, but he’s still able to work in spite of it. And the last thing we’re going to see is that faith forgiveness perseveres to the end of our life. We don’t ever withdraw it or take it back. Characteristics of faith forgiveness and Joseph are a picture for us of how we are supposed to forgive.
But they’re also an example of how God Himself forgives us. Because if a human can forgive his brothers in this way, God even more so can forgive us. Let’s go to Ezekiel 18:32. First thing we look at today is that faith forgiveness has no desire to punish or elicit guilt. In Ezekiel 18:32, God says, I take no pleasure in anyone’s death.
This is the declaration of the Lord God, so repent and live. The world wants to tell us that God is angry, that he is always against us, that he is an unkind and unloving Father. But Scripture tells us something different. God is a a loving God. He doesn’t want to punish anyone.
He doesn’t want them to die physically and much more so spiritually, which means separation from him and an eternity in hell. God does not desire that for anyone, and he offers us a way to avoid that. He does that in John 3, 16 and 17, where he tells us that he gives us the means by which we don’t have to experience the punishment. God loved the world in this way. He gave his one and only Son so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him. God intends and wants and desires and has provided the way that we might have forgiveness. God is good and He’s a righteous judge. Therefore he’s going to punish sin and things that are bad. When we think about earthly judges, if someone is brought before a judge and they’ve molested a child and they’ve also murdered that child, we expect and we want that judge to be righteous and good.
And he’s going to say, there has to be punishment for this crime. There has to be payment. There has to be a penalty. There has to be imprisonment or there has to be death. We don’t want that judge to just forgive that person.
Well, God in the same way, is a good and righteous judge. He does require punishment for sin, and we should be imprisoned. We should make payment. We should have penalties. We should even die and go to hell because of the sin in our life.
But instead of us paying that debt ourself, God sent His Son, Jesus Christ. And Jesus paid for our sins. He was imprisoned. He made the payment. He had the penalties upon his life, and he even suffered death.
Because God’s desire to forgive is so great that he is made the way that we can be forgiven. That’s why Jesus came in the flesh, so that we could be forgiven and not have to suffer the punishment or feel the guilt of our sin. God wipes it away completely. Genesis 45:5 we see this in the life of Joseph. When his brothers were standing in front of him, he said, don’t be grieved or angry with yourselves for selling me here because God sent me ahead of you to preserve life.
It’s miraculous that God enabled him to forgive his brothers, but then to tell them, just forget it. Don’t feel bad about it. Don’t. Don’t feel angry about it. Joseph wanted his brothers to experience complete forgiveness without guilt and without any punishment on them.
John 8, verses 10 through 11 we see the example in Jesus where the woman that was caught in adultery was brought before him, and Jesus tells those standing around, let him who has not sinned cast the first stone. The only person in that group of people was Jesus Christ, that he himself had not committed any sin. If anyone had a right to throw a stone at that woman, it would have been Jesus. But instead he said to her, woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?
No one, Lord, she answered. And Jesus said, neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin sin anymore. Jesus forgave her. He didn’t tell her to leave and to feel sad about it or to feel guilty.
He gave her a clean slate because he was forgiving her in the way that true godly forgiveness forgives us. Psalm 103:11:12 Find out that God doesn’t just forgive some grievances, but he forgives all of them. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his faithful love. And here again is his reason for forgiving us, that as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed not just some of our transgressions, but he has removed all of our transgressions from us. He forgives all grievances.
Romans 8:1 reiterates this. Therefore there is now not some, but no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. God no longer condemns us for past sins in our life. Once we have come to faith in Jesus Christ and asked him to extend forgiveness to us. Micah 7:18:19 we read, who is a God like you.
Micah finds this very interesting, that he is the only God. But what is interesting is that he forgives iniquity and passing over rebellion for the remnant of his inheritance. He does not hold onto his anger forever because he delights again in faithful love. He will again have compassion on us. He will vanquish our iniquities You, God will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea.
As wicked as Israel had become, they were sacrificing their children to idols. They were following idols, they were committing atrocities. They were not taking care of the widows, they were abusing children. All these awful things were going on. But Micah said, God one day will still provide a way to forgive us.
And when he does that, he will forgive all grievances and cast them into the depths of the sea where they are not to be looked at again and supposedly would never be able to be found. Let’s go back to Genesis 45 now, and we’re going to see that faith forgiveness also sees the sovereignty of God at work, even in the worst situations. So when we talk about the sovereignty of God, we’re saying that God is ultimately in control. God’s purposes will all be achieved. God is never surprised by anything he doesn’t say, wow, I didn’t see that coming.
Now I have to change my plan. He knows everything in advance. And even though he does allow evil in this world because we have chosen to sin, it doesn’t defeat his purposes. There was nothing that anyone can do. There was nothing that Satan could do that would have prevented Jesus Christ from coming and dying on the cross.
There was nothing that anyone could have done to prevent his resurrection from the dead. And we know that there is nothing that anyone can do, even Satan himself, that will keep us from having the new creation that God promises to us. And so it is because of God’s sovereignty. Joseph knew that God was in control. And knowing that God was in control and that he was going to work everything out, it allowed him to find strength to forgive his brothers.
Here we read in Genesis 45, and now don’t be grieved or angry with yourselves for selling me here because God sent me ahead of you to preserve life. He saw how God was using the evil they had done in order to do something wonderful. Then in verses seven through eight, God sent me ahead of you to establish you as a remnant within the land and to keep you alive by a great deliverance. Therefore, it was not you who sent me here, but God. And he has made me a father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler over all the land of Egypt.
Instead of Joseph thinking how he was going to pay his brothers back someday, how he was going to punish them, and how he was going to get back at them by faith, he was seeing that God was still in control and God was achieving his purposes in the world for us. And through us. We go on to read again how in these same verses we see that faith forgiveness looks for the good that God does does in spite of evil. So not only did Joseph see that God was still in control here, it emphasizes the point that he saw that God was actually doing good in the midst of his bad circumstances. God sent me ahead of you to preserve life, and God sent me ahead of you to establish you as a remnant within the land and to keep you alive by a great deliverance.
In the same way, when people wrong us, it will help us in forgiving them if we say, you know, they didn’t mean good by this. It’s been an awful experience for me, but I know that God can still bring good out of this in some way. And that is part of what allows us to be like God in forgiving others, to see that God is in control and he is doing good. Let’s go to Hebrews 12:1 2. And we see the example of Jesus that he was looking for the good that God was going to do through all of his pain and his suffering.
And in the same way, we are commanded to run with endurance the race that lies before us, keeping our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, for the joy that lay before him. He endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. It was because of the joy that Jesus saw ahead of him. Not only just joy for himself, but joy in seeing people come to faith, people being forgiven of their sins and having a right relationship with him. It was that joy that that allowed him to endure the cross and despise the shame.
Because out of forgiving others, he was looking for the good that God does in spite of all the evil that was happening to him. The last thing that we’re going to see today is that faith forgiveness perseveres to the end. It doesn’t forgive today and hold someone to blame tomorrow. It doesn’t forgive and then years later say, well, remember that thing that I Forgave you about 20 years ago? Well, I never really forgave you because it’s still bothering me today.
That’s not faith forgiveness. And we find here, toward the end of Joseph’s life, after his father had died, his brothers were concerned that, well, now that Dad’s dead, now Joseph is going to get back at us. He’s going to throw us into prison, he’s going to make us suffer because of what we did to him, and they’re concerned about that, but we’re going to See that Joseph gives us the example that he prevails. His forgiveness is still there to the end of his life. We read that when Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said to one another, if Joseph is holding a grudge against us, he will certainly repay us for all the suffering we caused him.
So they sent this message to Joseph before he died. Your father gave a command, say this to Joseph. Please forgive your brother’s transgression and their sins, the suffering that they caused you. Therefore, please forgive the transgression of the servants of the God of your father. Now, Joseph could have said, well, if they’re expecting me to do something, I’m sure going to give it to them now.
But instead, Joseph was like, why in the world are they feeling this way? Because I forgave them completely in the past. And it says that Joseph wept when their message came to him. He did not want them to suffer anymore or feel guilt or shame because he had forgiven them. His brothers then came to him.
They bowed down before him and said, we are your slaves. But Joseph said, don’t be afraid. Am I in the place of God? You planned evil against me, but God planned it for good, to bring about the present result, the survival of many people. Therefore, don’t be afraid.
I will take care of you and your children. And he comforted them and spoke kindly to them. Joseph’s faith persevered to the end. God’s faith likewise will persevere throughout eternity. He’s never going to bring up our sins and grievances against us again.
But Satan is in there like he was with Joseph’s brothers. Satan tells us, no, God didn’t really forgive you, or God’s going to hold this against you. Satan wants us to live like these brothers, in fear that God is not going to persevere to the end in his forgiveness. But God, like Joseph, is troubled whenever Satan brings those feelings to our mind. And it makes him sad because he’s like, I’ve forgiven you completely.
Don’t feel bad about it anymore because I certainly do not want you to. Forgiveness. Again, the definition is the action or process of stopping angry or resentful feelings towards someone for an offense, flaw or mistake. And it’s the action or process of canceling a debt. So the application today is, is there anyone in your life to whom you have not extended faith forgiveness?
Is there someone that you are angry at or resentful toward for any reason, whether it’s a recent offense or a previous offense or something way in the past? You need to ask God to help you by his power to extend to them the same forgiveness that he does to us. In Luke chapter 23:33, 34, Jesus is hanging on the cross and he’s asking the Father to forgive the people that don’t even know that they have offended him. So often we think, well, that person doesn’t even understand how much they hurt me. I have to make them understand how much they hurt me before I’m going to extend my forgiveness to them.
But that’s not what we see in Jesus. Example, when they arrived at the place called the skull, they crucified him there along with the criminals, one on the right and one on the left. And then Jesus said, father, forgive them because they do not know what they are doing in application. If forgiving like God forgives us, even when people don’t understand how much they’ve hurt us, or even that they have hurt us, we are still supposed to extend faith filled forgiveness to them. How often are we supposed to do this?
Peter asked this question in Matthew 18 Lord, how many times must I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Am I supposed to be a very spiritual person and forgive them seven times? He probably thought, wow, if I can forgive somebody seven times, I must be pretty spiritual. But when number eight comes around, I don’t have to forgive them again. But Jesus answered him, I tell you, not as many as seven, but 70 times seven.
And Jesus wasn’t saying, count up the number of times to forgive, 70 times 7, and then you don’t have to forgive them after that. He’s using these sevens here as perfect numbers to say that you must forgive like I forgive, that it perseveres and it continues to forgive forever. How long is needed? Once again, what does faith forgiveness look like? In Joseph’s life, we see that it has no desire to punish and no desire to elicit guilt.
Faith forgiveness tells people, look, I’m forgiving you and I don’t want you to ever remember this. I don’t want you to ever feel bad about it again. Faith forgiveness also forgives not just some grievances, but all grievances. Faith forgiveness is able to see that God is at work even when we are going through awful situations that people are bringing up against us. Faith forgiveness looks for the good that God does in spite of evil.
If people hurt us, we’re still looking how God might work that out for good in someone’s life. And lastly, faith forgiveness perseveres to the very end and it never changes its mind. The only way to be able to forgive people like this is to have the power of God in our life. And that happens when we give our life to Jesus Christ by faith. There has to be some point that we understand that we are sinners, that we desire punishment and we desire forgiveness from God so we don’t have to carry on with our grief, with our shame and our guilt.
And God says that the way that you get rid of that shame and that guilt, and you know that I forgive you, is to believe that Jesus died on the cross for your sins, that he rose from the dead, that you might have eternal life and you’re willing to express to everyone else now God is the Lord of my life. And when you make Jesus the Lord of your life, then he infills you with his Holy Spirit. And among other things, he helps you to be able to forgive other people supernaturally, as Jesus did and as Joseph did in his life. May we pray. Heavenly Father, help us to search our own lives to see where we might not be forgiving others, whether they’re aware of it or not.
And Father, help us to understand that we need to put the attitude of forgiveness on so that we can move on, Father, and not hold those others in fear of guilt or retribution from us. Help us to forgive like you do. And Father, also help us to fully appreciate the forgiveness that you extend to us. That once we have placed our faith in Jesus Christ, once he has cleansed us of our sins, that we know that we no longer have to feel guilty or ashamed of those things because you have made us new. In Jesus name we pray.
Amen.
Amen. We were just learning from Pastor Robert from a story of Joseph that.