Jacob and Joseph reunited is where we're at. Genesis chapter 46. And we started this a week ago. And I want to finish out this chapter. We're studying the life of Joseph, of course. Jacob has been en route down to Egypt. deal with the lingering famine that's going on. They've got about five years. Joseph, of course, in charge. He brings Jacob and the family down. And they're arriving there. Let me begin reading in verse 28. It says, And he sent Judah, this is Jacob, sent his son Judah before him unto Joseph, to direct his face unto Goshen. And they came into the land of Goshen, and Joseph made ready his chariot, and went up to meet Israel his father to Goshen, and presented himself unto him. And he fell on his neck and wept on his neck a good while. And Israel said unto Joseph, Now let me die, since I have seen thy face, because thou art yet alive. And Joseph said unto his brethren and unto his father's house, I will go up and show Pharaoh and say unto him, My brethren and my father's house, which were in the land of Canaan, are come unto me. And the men are shepherds, for their trade hath been to feed cattle. And they have brought their flocks and their herds and all that they have. And it shall come to pass when Pharaoh shall call you and shall say, What is your occupation? That ye shall say, Thy servant's trade hath been about cattle from our youth even until now, both we and also our father's house, that we may dwell in the land of Goshen. For every shepherd is an abomination to the Egyptians. So Jacob and Joseph reunited. Let's pray. We'll review briefly, and then I want to have a few new thoughts for tonight. Father, I ask You to bless now our study of this passage. Lord Joseph has been quite a challenge for us to follow. His example has been exceptional. And so I pray we can learn some things from these events and these portions of Scripture. I ask that Your Holy Spirit would do what You promised He would do, and that is to teach us all things from Your Word. So I pray the Holy Spirit would be our teacher tonight. I yield my will to You, my mind, Lord, that He can take control of my thinking and lead me to say the things I ought to say and not say the things I ought not to. I present my body, Lord, anew, and I pray You'd fill me with Your Spirit again tonight in this message. and speak through me. And I pray you'd help those of us that are here, those that are tuned in online, that our faith would grow and we'd see the areas of our life that need attention and you would just use this message to help. And we ask these things in Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Verse 8 through 27, we kind of skipped over that. We didn't skip, but we just kind of bypassed it. I guess that's the same thing as skipping it. But it's a list of names, and God gives us all the names of Jacob's family, and everybody goes down there. It's 70 names. 70 members of Jacob's family moved down to Egypt. And as I said last week, it's just amazing to me. They go into Egypt, a family of 70 members. They come out of Egypt, a million plus, and they become out a nation. They go in a family and they come out a nation. And so we have the list of names there. We talked about respect, showing respect. I noticed that Joseph shows tremendous respect to his father. We talked about that a little bit. They show respect to Pharaoh, who is really a pagan king in a lot of ways. But nevertheless, he is an authority. And governments are ordained by God, as much as we may get frustrated with governments, nevertheless, It's ordained by God, just like the home and the church. God has established government. The fact that having government is not so bad, it's the abuse of those that use the position and authority. So nevertheless, Joseph and Jacob, they show tremendous respect to Pharaoh. We'll see that here a little bit later. We started with the first couple thoughts, and the first one was the prudence of Jacob in that he sends Judah and not Reuben ahead. And if you remember, Reuben had proven himself unreliable. He's a very gifted, very talented man, very good looking, very strong, but he did not have character. And he was unstable as water, Jacob says. And I emphasize this every time we reference Reuben. The fact is, God can use somebody. They might not be the most talented. They might not have the highest IQ. They might not be the strongest and best looking. But I tell you, if they have some character about them, God can use them. They have a little integrity and they can trust Him. That's somebody God can use. And that was Reuben. And Jacob saw that. So he sends Reuben on ahead to make arrangements and make sure they're going to the right place, let Joseph know that we're arriving here in country. And so the prudence of Jacob there, we looked at that. And then the presentation of Joseph, and we talked about how Joseph immediately makes himself ready, didn't make his daddy wait, didn't make his family wait, just immediately made ready his chariot there in verse 29, and he goes to meet Jacob. And I appreciate that about Joseph. I think in his position, Joseph is number two in Egypt. Tremendous authority. Tremendous responsibility of organizing and administrating these supplies that they've been gathering up during the plenty. And now they're in the famine and it's his responsibility. Now think about this. It's his responsibility to make sure that these supplies last for seven years. And so this requires tremendous administration, and no doubt he has many, many people working under him, probably hundreds and hundreds, maybe thousands, working under him, each delegated authority and delegated responsibilities. And so I think my view is that I think Joseph understood the value of time. I mean, he's got a lot on his plate, and he can't dilly-dally around. And I think he understood and appreciated the fact that daddy's coming down here, the family's coming down here, and he had enough respect there that he did not make his father wait. He respected his father's time. You follow where I'm going with this? And Joseph understood the value of time and he understood that he did not want to take away from his father's time. And I'll just throw this out there. You know, when we make someone wait on us, we're stealing their time. You follow what I'm saying? They're counting on us to do, you know, we're counting on them to do something or whatever. And then we have to stand around, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. That's taking away people's time. And I think Jacob or Joseph respected Jacob enough to say, I'm not going to take away his time. He's here. And plus, he wanted to see his daddy really bad. So he goes immediately right up to see his daddy. He prepared himself. He goes to meet Jacob. Then he presented himself. He fixed himself up and showed tremendous respect to his father. So alright, that's what we talked about before. Now, tonight I want us to notice in verse number 29, Notice it says, "...Joseph made ready his chariot and went up to meet Israel his father in Goshen, presented himself unto him, and he fell on his neck and wept on his neck a good while." Now I put this down, my third thought in this here is the passion of their reunion. The passion of their reunion. This is the first time in over 20 years that he's laid eyes on his father. Jacob is showing up. He was convinced for over 20 years that his boy, who he loved dearly, He was convinced he was dead, that he was torn apart by a wild beast. And now, he lays eyes on his son. And the passion of that reunion as they are together all these years. After all these years, all these changes have taken place. Would you agree with me? Jacob probably aged a pretty good bit. in 20 years' time. No doubt his hair is grayer. No doubt there's more wrinkles there. Maybe we know he's more feeble than he was when Joseph saw him last time. And I would imagine maybe one of the first thoughts that came to Joseph's mind, we're not told, but I wonder if maybe one of the first thoughts when it came to Joseph's mind is, man, daddy's aged. Man, he's gotten older. He's weaker than he was when I saw him before. And he's an older man. And so all these changes taking place. And then on Jacob's part, he sees Joseph. And he was just a young boy when he sent him out there to check on his brothers. Remember way back yonder? And go check on your brothers. Make sure they're doing okay. He's just a teenage boy. And now he's probably in his thirties or so, and he's married with kids, and he has a tremendous responsibility. And I wonder what Jacob's first thought was when he saw Joseph. Man, he's turned into a fine man. My boy's a man now. He's grown. And just the emotions that would have gone through their hearts and minds as they met each other. The years that have gone by. The changes that have taken place. The hurt that they've experienced. Think about Jacob's broken heart when he thinks his boy died. And he can't even have a funeral. It never sees the body. It's just gone. He's convinced he's dead. I remember my father passed away during the COVID lockdowns. We couldn't do a funeral. I couldn't even go up to be part of the graveside. They only let 10 people there. And so my sisters were there. And this past week, I was home with my mom for a few days. I swung by, got to see the gravestone and all. But I just, the heartache and the emotions that they would be experiencing, the hurt, that Jacob has felt for years, and now he sees his boy. The hurt on Joseph's part, betrayed by his brothers. They attempted murder, selling him as a slave and betraying him and abandoning him. But here's the thing I noticed. Joseph sees his daddy, weeps, hugs him on the neck. He sees his brothers, he's already dealt with them. And here's what I took away from this. Joseph's love for his brothers and his family was unconditional. I don't know, I'm reading too much into this, I know I am, but I wonder if Joseph ever thought, why didn't daddy come looking for me? Why didn't daddy try and come and find me? Why did he just stay home? Why didn't he do something, come and find me? Can you imagine Joseph maybe going through his mind, something like that? And I don't know, but I know there was a tremendous amount of hurt. And regardless of that, Joseph still loved his family. I put this down, Joseph's love was unconditional. for his family. His love for his family, he didn't love, let me put it this way, Joseph did not love his family for what they did for him. He didn't love them because they treated him well and they did all that. He loved them because they were his family. It was unconditional love. Now, let me ask you this. Let's have some group participation. If somebody has conditional love, somebody loves someone, and that's a conditional love, what do we mean by that? What's that mean? Yeah, there's certain conditions need to be met. What would that look like? Right, there's certain thus, then maybe they have a criteria. You scratch my back, I'll scratch my back. Conditional love is just what it sounds like. Conditions must be met before I will love you. Before I'm going to show affection to you, before I'm going to show any sort of compassion to you, you have to meet this criteria first. At its root, conditional love is selfish. I have to get something out of it before I will give anything. I tell you, that type of relationship, particularly in a family, is devastating. And that's going to be very, very difficult to survive. Conditional love is rooted in pride. And I want to suggest to you conditional love, at least the biblical sense, pure, genuine love that were displayed in the Bible. Conditional love is not really love at all. Conditional love is a reward for pleasing me. If you please me, if you're what I want, if you bring pleasure to me, and you satisfy me, and you do what I want you to do, and you say what I want you to say, and you are what I want you to be, then I will reward you with my compassion. I'll reward you with my kindness. That is not love, that's bargaining. Are you with me? That's negotiating. Alright, you be this, and then I'll show you love. I am glad that our God does not love us conditionally. That we have to live up to a certain level, that we have to treat Him a certain way, we have to be a certain thing, then He will love us. Joseph's love for his family was unconditional. They did all these awful things. He had been so hurt for so long. and yet he just loved them. He just loved them. It's called unconditional love. It is the purest form of love, I think, in existence. I put a few things about unconditional love. First of all, unconditional love is sacrificial. I put aside my comfort so that the one I am loving unconditionally, so they can have comfort, so they're comfortable. I put aside my will for their best interests. It's a sacrificing myself. I put aside my comfort for their comfort. I put aside my pleasure so that they're taken care of. Follow what I'm saying? Unconditional love is not easy. Unconditional love is not cheap. It requires sacrifice. Our old sinful flesh does not love unconditionally. the flesh. God is love, and genuine, pure love must come from God. Unconditional love is not easy, and it is not cheap. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, cost Him the Son. While we were yet sinners, God commanded His love to us, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. I know Jesus expressing and displaying the love of God for you and me was not easy. You know how I know it wasn't easy? Because the night before he was crucified, he wept, Hebrews tells us, with loud crying. He wept to God, asking God to please let this cup pass from me. That was not an easy thing. That was not a cheap thing that he was doing to spray the love of God for us. But he loved us unconditionally. And he says at the end of his prayer, we always highlight this, nevertheless, what? Not my will, but thy will be done. It was an unconditional expression of pure love. for you and me. And I see that to an degree here with Joseph. And he accepts his family in. He accepts his daddy and all the extended family. I put down unconditional love is sacrificial love. I put this down. Unconditional love is stubborn. It's stubborn. In other words, it doesn't quit. You love them and you just keep loving them. You say, well, they're doing this, they're doing that. No, I just keep loving them. Just keep loving them. Just keep loving them. You just stay at it. You just press on and you just love them. If you would, keep your place here. And I thought of this passage when I was studying here Joseph's treatment of his family. Romans, if you would. Just real quick, keep your place because I want to move on here in a bit. But Romans chapter number 8. I think, describes to an extent the love that Joseph displayed to his father and his brothers. Romans chapter 8, and look with me at verse number 38. All the way at the end of the chapter. Romans 8, 38. This is Paul, of course, writing under the inspiration of God to believers in Rome. And look what he says, "...for I am persuaded..." I mean, he's settled in this. "...that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature..." Now look at this. "...shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." He said, basically he's saying, there's nothing in heaven or hell, there's nothing in outer space or in the deepest ocean, nothing can separate us from the love of God. Would you agree with me? God's unconditional love is stubborn. Nothing can get it to stop. Not brothers who attempt to murder you and betray you, and yet His love is unfazed for them. a daddy that never comes looking for him. Maybe I'm putting too much on Jacob there, not coming after him. But nevertheless, he loved him. Unconditional love is sacrificial. It's stubborn. Here's our problem. Here's our problem. We get stubborn about things we probably ought to give in on, and then we're not stubborn about stuff we ought to just lock in and say, I'm not going to move on that. Right? How many people here would say, my spouse is, no, how many people say, I'm stubborn? I'm stubborn. Yeah, probably most of us. And here's our problem. We get stubborn on stuff that really probably isn't worth being a knucklehead about. Right or wrong? You guys are going, all right, I got to get this out. I got stirred up the other day. We get stubborn on things. Hey, how about we just decide we're going to love our brothers and sisters in Christ. We're going to love our family. We're going to love our enemies. And we're just going to be stubborn about it. You can do whatever you want. You can say whatever you want. You can treat me however you want. I am not going to stop loving you. That's what Joseph is doing. Unconditional love. I'm glad God says, now He cares about what we say and do. Don't misunderstand what I'm saying. But my actions and my behavior and my attitude does not affect God's love for me. His love is stubborn. So unconditional love is sacrificial. Unconditional love is stubborn. And I put one other one down. Unconditional love is settled. In other words, it doesn't fluctuate. Sometimes I love you, sometimes I don't. Our feelings affect us. Sometimes we feel like loving our spouse or whoever. Sometimes we don't. Come on, right or wrong? I don't feel like it. But I do not allow my feelings to affect my love, my commitment, and my love for my brothers and sisters and family members. Our feelings change constantly. In fact, our feelings change throughout the day. I get up in the morning, I don't love nobody. until I get that coffee, you know, or something. And I cannot let my emotions, I cannot let my feelings affect my commitment, my stubbornness, my love, my unconditional love for others. And Paul put it this way, and Dr. Lee Robertson used to hammer this all the time. He says, you've got to die to self. Just die to self. If there is a key to the Christian life and the family life and the church life, if there's any key, it would be that statement, die to self. Just die to self and love him. Just love him. And that's not easy. Loving unconditionally means making a decision. I've got to decide. I'm not going by my feelings. I'm not going by emotions. I am deciding I'm going to love this person the way 1 Corinthians 13 tells me to. Love is kind. Love is patient. Endureth all things. Thinketh no evil. I've got to decide that because my emotions are going to fluctuate all the time. And so, unconditional love is settled. I just see this love of Joseph for his family and it amazes me. And now I think he struggled a little bit with his brothers there. We talked about that when they first showed up. I think those emotions, this is Leathermanism a little bit, but I think Joseph was struggling with those emotions. You know, one minute he's thrown in prison, the next minute he's feeding them the best food in the country. Then the next minute, he's accusing them of stealing stuff. I think there was a battle going on there. But when it was all said and done, I think he just decided, listen, God's in control here. God's doing something. I'm just going to love Him unconditionally. A heart that is functioning on unconditional love is unshakable. If you get a home where the people love each other unconditionally, that home is unshakable. The devil cannot crack that. Love unconditionally. Love unconditionally. You say, well, if my spouse loves me unconditionally, then I'll love them unconditionally. Anybody see a problem with that? That's conditional. Well, they're not loving me like that. Well, then you're putting conditions. And if I can get to the point, and I believe this, and I came to this conclusion when we were studying 1 Peter chapter 1. Remember when he said there, add to your faith virtue, and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge temperance, and to temperance patience, and to patience godliness, and to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness charity? It was a top of the list. That is the ultimate goal. That is the ultimate development of a Christian maturity. If I can get to that place where I love the way God loves, where charity is unconditional love on display, in action. And I believe that is God's ultimate goal for you and I as believers. Unconditional love. And so, I see here Joseph loving his family unconditionally. Now, come back to chapter number 49 there. Notice a few things here. At the end there he says, chapter 46, I'm sorry. Notice here in verse 29, he says, "...and presented himself unto him, and he fell on his neck, and wept on his neck a good while." I put this down, it was overwhelming compassion and love for each other. There's no words being spoken here. They embrace each other. There's no words, there's just weeping. They're overwhelmed. with emotion, and it says a good while. That means a long time. This was longer than your average embrace. Now, I'm not big on hugging, and I think you need to be a little careful about that, but did you ever get someone that's a hugger, and they hang on a little longer than is your comfortable? Anybody know what I'm talking about? And it kind of gets awkward. You're trying to ogre her. Well, this wasn't awkward. This was emotion taken over. And they couldn't let go. It was a father and a son weeping, holding each other a good while, longer than your normal hug. And so, it was overwhelming. I got thinking about this, while Jacob and Joseph are there bawling, weeping hard, and they're holding each other on each other's neck, and tears are falling on their shoulders, and they can't even say anything. I got wondering, what are the brothers doing during this time? They're just standing around, you know? They're watching this and observing this going on. Are they weeping? I would imagine some of them are probably weeping, seeing their father and son. Do you think maybe there's a ting of guilt down inside, realizing what we did and how deeply we hurt our father and our brother? Here's the thing about sin, we never see how awful it is until after we've done it. If we could see, if we could grasp the consequences of our sin before we commit it, I think we'd commit a whole lot of less sins. We don't even think, they didn't even think, they just acted. And their anger and their rage and their hatred. And now here they are, 20 plus years later, they're standing around, they're watching their father and their young brother weeping so hard. It was overwhelming emotion. I think it was satisfying emotion. Look at verse 30. Look at this statement. Now you've got to think about what Jacob is saying here. He says, and Israel said to Joseph, finally they composed themselves, they wiped the tears, they wiped the stuff coming out their nose. They clean themselves up, and I can see Israel, Jacob taking son Joseph and holding him back. And he says this, he goes, Now let me die, since I have seen thy face, because thou art yet alive. He's looking Joseph in the face, tear-stained cheeks. Now let me die. Now, let me ask you a question. Do you think Jacob was wanting to die? No. He wasn't saying, alright, I want to die now. I saw my son, I want to die. No, it wasn't a death wish that he's expressing. It was an expression of satisfaction. My life is fulfilled. My life is satisfied. Whatever happens, I'm ready to die. I've seen my Son again. I've seen my Son again." And so it was an expression of satisfaction on Jacob's part. Actually, Jacob's going to be with Joseph for maybe 17 more years. I mean, he's going to be with him for a while yet. But he's satisfied. He says, what he's saying is this, now I can die happy. I can die in peace. I think he's saying something like this, if God never does another thing for me, I'm satisfied. I'm satisfied. And I've thought that so many times. If God saved my soul, if God never does another thing for me, just Him saving my soul, that's pretty good. That's pretty good. And so it is the passion of the reunion. It's overwhelming. It's satisfying. And the unconditional love of Joseph for his family is an amazing thing. Then last of all, verse 31 through 34, and I'm not going to break all this down, but I notice the providence of God here. The providence of God. God is in control. And Joseph sees this all going on, taking place. God is moving. God is taking these circumstances. God has a plan and a purpose for everything He's allowing. Look there in verse 31, And Joseph said unto his brethren and unto his father's house, I will go up and show Pharaoh and say unto him, My brethren, my father's house, which were in the land of Canaan, are come unto me. and he gives them instructions on how to greet Pharaoh and what to say to him. Now, regardless of our opinions, nevertheless, if we had an opportunity to meet the President of the United States, arguably the most powerful man, humanly speaking, in the world, we probably would want to be briefed a little bit on what's proper protocol, or how do you do this? How do you approach them? I know the Queen of England, they would always have a protocol you would go through, a certain way to approach. And I saw a video where I guess apparently the prince of one of the Middle East countries, it's illegal to touch him. You greet him and everything, but you're not allowed to touch him. And I saw a video of when Trump was president, he walked by and patted him on the back. Went right by. I kind of like that. But anyway, so Joseph is briefing his family on, hey, when you get to Joseph, I'm going to go ahead and tell him you're here. You're going to meet him. This is what you need to say. This is the way you approach him. We need to be respectful here. And I believe God is directing Joseph and Pharaoh to have Joseph's family live in Goshen. Did you notice they mention several times, you're going to be in Goshen. You're going to be in Goshen. You're going to be in Goshen. Now what's the significance of Goshen? Why is it so important that Jacob's family stays in Goshen. Well, I did a little research on Goshen, and Goshen is as close to Canaan, which is the promised land where God said they would be. Goshen is as close to Canaan as you can get and still be in Egypt. I mean, it is just across the border. And so, they say, alright, we're going to put Jacob and all his Joseph's family, we're going to put them up here in Goshen. It's just across the border from the Promised Land. Goshen is about 900, at this point in time, was about 900 square miles of extremely fertile pasture land. I mean, this is top-notch soil. and perfect for shepherds. Now what's the Egyptians' attitude towards shepherds? They hate them. They're an abomination to them. We can't stand shepherds. And so this is perfect Land for shepherds. It's right across the line from the promised land where God said they're going to ultimately have. This is 900 square miles of extremely fertile pasture land. Perfect for shepherds. Perfect for a family to multiply greatly. I mean, they can plant their crops, and they can have their herds and their flocks of sheep, and they can multiply. They've got room to spread out. They've got resources and meadows and water, and they can just multiply greatly. Of course, they're in a famine now, but eventually, this is ideal. for a 70-member family to multiply and multiply and multiply and multiply and have the resources they need to turn into a million-member nation. It's ideal. If they were in the city, it would have been difficult. Another thing about Goshen, there was hardly any Egyptians living in Goshen. They didn't want to be up there. They were city folk. And there was hardly any Egyptians living in Goshen. Now, what would be the significance of... Here's the Hebrews, God's people. They got to Promised Land. They're not too far away. God makes sure they're not too far from the Promised Land. He puts them in an area that is perfect for reproduction, perfect for prosperity. And there's hardly any Egyptians there. Anybody take a guess, why would that be significant? Ah, God does not want the Hebrews intermingling with the Egyptians. These Egyptians are pagans. They are wicked. They do not worship Jehovah. They are ungodly. And so there is an element of separation here. between the ungodly, worldly, wicked Egyptians and the people of God. And there's a purpose. God moved them, I'm convinced, to have them living in Goshen. Hardly any Egyptians there. This is far from any of the big Egyptian cities. The center of their pagan worship. The center of their ungodly society and social life. God knows what he's doing. Israel ended up living there for 400 years in Goshen. That's almost double the age of our country. They lived there, multiplied, multiplied, multiplied, prosperous. So here's the significance. as kind of touched on it. Here you have, it's helping them avoid intermingling with the Egyptians and their influence. There are children going to be born in Egypt. And they're going to grow up in Egypt. And those Hebrew boys see those Egyptian girls, what's going to happen? And those Hebrew girls see those Egyptian boys, and what's going to happen? They're going to start intermarrying. And the Bible is very, very clear, especially in New Testament. The Bible is very, very clear that a believer is not to marry an unbeliever. Now whether that's popular or not, that's Bible fact. And God knew what He was doing. He was keeping this distance between the two to avoid intermingling with the Egyptians, to avoid intermarriage with them, to help them avoid adopting the morals and the paganism of the Egyptians. He's wanting them to protect their identity as God's people. He's wanting to protect the purity of their worship of the true God. And so he has them up in Egypt. You know, there's a doctrine. I always call it the most neglected doctrine in the Bible. But it is so vitally important for the Christian life. It's the doctrine of separation. And God calls us, and we don't have time. I wanted to look at a bunch of verses. But in 2 Corinthians 6, he talks about, come out from among them and be ye separate, saith the Lord. He is what fellowship has light with darkness. In fact, we've got a couple of minutes. Let's turn there real quick. 2 Corinthians 6. And I'm convinced this is exactly what God is doing with Jacob's family when He puts them up in Goshen. 2 Corinthians 6 and verse number 14. I have these underscored in my Bible. These are, I believe, very important passages. Verse 14 says, Be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers. Unequally yoked. For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And the answer to that question is what? None. And what communion hath light with darkness? The answer is none. And what concord? That means agreement or contract. What concord has Christ with Belial? Belial is the devil. And the answer is none. What part hath he that believeth with an infidel? None. And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? That's Egypt. For ye are the temple of the living God. For God has said, I will dwell in them and walk in them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore, come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing." And what was true for the Old Testament people of God is true for the New Testament people of God. We are not to put ourselves in position where we're influenced by this world. We are in the world, but we are not of the world. And there should be a clear distinction. You have this Hebrew family, Jacob and all 70 members of that family, and you have Egypt and all the Egyptians with their paganism and their wickedness and their materialism. There is a fundamental difference between the Hebrews, the people of God, and the Egyptians. Their values are not the same. What was important and valuable to the Egyptians was not important and valuable to the Hebrews and vice versa. Follow what I'm saying? Their priorities were different. Yes? That is a good question. And I think we talked about that when he went back there. Yeah. And there's several answers that we gave and I'd have to go back and look at some of them. But it's a good question. That's kind of a question people ask. I'm convinced Joseph in his integrity perhaps had won them over to the worship of Jehovah before. Maybe it was a political type thing. But we find that he gave his kids Hebrew names. And that is profoundly significant, him living in Pharaoh, marrying Pharaoh's daughter there. So, it's a good question. I think he did it in his integrity, but I know God does not want the Hebrews intermingling and intermarrying with the Egyptians. So, good question. I hate it when people ask me questions I can't answer really quick. Yeah. Right, but they were converted, yeah. So, nevertheless, I'm trying to get back to my train of thought, but nevertheless, oh, difference in values. Difference in priorities. Difference in the principles we live by. They worship Jehovah. Jehovah is holy. He is pure, righteous. These pagan gods were anything but holy. and they were very immoral. And God's judged Egypt severely later on. And so there's a fundamental difference. And there's a fundamental difference between a child of God and the world today. I believe that we ought to be distinctive in our Christian life, distinctively Christian. And we ought to look like Christians. We ought to talk like Christians. We ought to live like Christians. We ought to use our money like Christians. Every aspect of our life ought to be distinctively Christian. Right. They married non-Jews, but for the most part, Joseph perhaps being the exception, they had converted. I'm no doubt Moses, the Ethiopian woman, was a follower of Jehovah at that point. I'm pretty certain. And maybe these gals were. And so, nevertheless, there's a clear distinction between the two. And here's the thing, and I'll wind down now with this. Here's the thing. For 400 years, Israel maintained their distinction. They never did adopt the values, the lifestyle, and the principles of the Egyptians. That separation works. Now we mingle with people, we do that. And here's the key to being separate from the world and separate from these ungodly influences in the world we live in. Here's the key. It's being devoted to the Lord. You follow what I'm saying? If all I'm doing is trying to separate myself from the world, and I'm not devoted to the Lord, that separation is meaningless. But the fact that I'm in love with the Lord Jesus Christ, and I've committed my life to Him, I want to live for Him, therefore that immediately puts a distinction between me and the world. And I don't want that. I want to please the Lord. I want to live for the Lord. And so I think that is the root of separation, isn't just to be different for the sake of being different, but I'm different, not even on purpose, but different because I'm in love with Jesus. When I got saved, the friends I had, quote unquote friends, at that lifestyle, that's the level of friends you get. But when I got saved, I didn't deliberately say, all right, I want nothing to do with you guys no more. I got saved. I just started going to church, reading my Bible. I quit doing all this garbage. God took it all away and all of a sudden my friends lost interest in me. You know? And so the separation there, the distinction took place, not so much a deliberate action on my part. I was just being what God, I was just, God was doing stuff in my life and they were no longer interested in it. And I think if we just fall in love with Jesus and live for Him, this world won't be interested, and eventually it'll turn on us sometimes. And here's the thing, 400 years later, Israel comes out of Egypt intact. They're the people of God. They've not been affected in their spiritual life by the Egyptians. Now it is interesting, when they came out, Exodus tells us there was a mixed multitude came out with them. In other words, some unbelieving Egyptians were in the crowd when Israel came out of Egypt. When they went through that Red Sea, there were some unbelieving Egyptians tagging along with them. And later on, they caused a lot of problems. It was an issue. And so they put him in Goshen, and a perfect place for them to maintain their identity and their commitment to the Lord. Now, later on, when they've got Kings and Saul, and later on in the first and second Kings, Chronicles, brother, they had all kinds of problems with separation. And they brought the wicked in and all of that. But for 400 years in Egypt, they stayed true. And I believe where they were was a factor in that. So let's pray. Father. I pray you'd help us learn from some of these lessons and these observations we make. Lord, we're not better than the world. We know that. We're just old sinners. But God, we don't want to live like this world produces. God, we want to please you. We want to live for you. So help us be careful. God, help us keep that distance, so to speak, from the world's influence. I wonder with our heads bowed, eyes closed, maybe there's some who say, Preacher, I need to pay more attention. to not letting this old world influence my thinking and my behavior and not winning my affections. Is there any like that? Preacher, I need to be careful there. Sure, sure. We're in the world. We're in an old fallen world. We have to be careful. Father, bless our imitation, I ask. Help us to love unconditionally. In Jesus' name, amen.