God’s Discipline

An instructive combination of ideas in Genesis 42:24 makes a useful introduction to this study. In the first half of that verse we are told that for the first time Joseph began to break down in the presence of his brothers and weep out of his great love for them. His weeping related to God’s work in bringing them to a confession of sin, which they had made to one another and which Joseph had heard, though they did not know that he had understood them. In the second half of Genesis 42:24 we are told of an entirely different action. “He [that is, Joseph] had Simeon taken from them and bound before their eyes.”

Before these men started for home, the story tells us, Joseph caused each man’s silver to be returned to him in one of his purchased sacks of grain. In addition, he gave them provisions for their journey. The use of these provisions would have kept them from opening their sacks until well along in their journey. But at last, for some reason or another, perhaps because the traveling provisions ran short, one of the brothers opened his sack and discovered the money Joseph had returned. What consternation! “My silver has been returned,” he said to the others. “Here it is in my sack.”

Yesterday, we concluded with the idea that when Joseph’s brothers found the money for the grain in their sacks, what bothered them was the providential nature of the event. However insignificant this discovery was, for them it was proof that God was present in their circumstances and that he was going to demand a reckoning for their sin where Joseph was concerned.

How do you know that you are beginning to come to grips with the true God of the Bible and not a mere figment of your imagination? It is when you become conscious of sin and are troubled by it.

I say again, as I often have in these studies: I cannot see your heart, and therefore I do not know what it conceals. I do not know whether you are hiding unconfessed sin. I do not know whether God is working through the pinch of want, the pain of harsh treatment, the press of solitude or the circumstantial proof of His presence to bring some sin to light and lead you to a saving repentance. But I do know this: If God is working (or has worked), there will be confession. Sin will be repudiated.