Do you hear this evening because you did not get your fill of bow-tied pastors wearing blue suits this morning? Fuzzy chins? Or perhaps you're here because you can't imagine being anywhere else, the house of the Lord, to worship the triune God, to call out and praise and petition, to hear that same creator and redeemer God speak to you through his word, which is what he does now in the reading and particularly the preaching of his word. So I invite you to turn to Genesis chapter 45, beginning in verse 16 of Genesis chapter 45. You may recall our last time together, last month, the younger brother of Joseph Benjamin as well as his 10 older brothers had finally been told by Joseph that this man to whom they had been in fear before in the presence of the second most powerful man in all of Egypt was in fact their long lost, long sold into slavery brother, Joseph. And after that sweet, sweet reunion, we will pick up the text beginning in verse 16 of chapter 45 in which they will begin the process of moving the family. from the famined promised land to Egypt, where the Lord in his provident care of people there had, through Joseph, stockpiled food. So we'll begin reading in chapter 45, verse 16, and we'll read through chapter 46 in verse 27. So yes, this is God's word, so pay attention to it. When the report was heard in Pharaoh's house, Joseph's brothers have come, it pleased Pharaoh and his servants. And Pharaoh said to Joseph, say to your brothers, do this, load your beasts and go back to the land of Canaan, and take your father and your households and come to me, and I will give you the best of the land of Egypt, and you shall eat the fat of the land. And you, Joseph, are commanded to say, do this, Take wagons from the land of Egypt for your little ones and for your wives, and bring your father, and come. Have no concern for your goods, for the best of all the land of Egypt is yours. The sons of Israel did so, and Joseph gave them wagons according to the command of Pharaoh, and gave them provisions for the journey. To each and all of them he gave a change of clothes, but to Benjamin he gave 300 shekels of silver and five changes of clothes. To his father he sent as follows, 10 donkeys loaded with the good things of Egypt, and 10 female donkeys loaded with grain, bread, and provision for his father on the journey. Then he sent his brothers away, and as they departed he said to them, do not quarrel on the way. So they went up out of Egypt and came to the land of Canaan to their father Jacob. And they told him, Joseph is still alive, and he is ruler over all the land of Egypt. And his heart became numb. for he did not believe them. But when they told him all the words of Joseph, which he had said to them, and when he saw the wagons that Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of their father Jacob revived. And Israel said, it is enough. Joseph my son is still alive. I will go and see him before I die. So Israel took his journey with all that he had and came to Beersheba and offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac. And God spoke to Israel in visions of the night and said, Jacob, Jacob. And he said, here I am. Then he said, I am God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for there I will make you into a great nation. I myself will go down with you to Egypt and I will also bring you up again. And Joseph's hand shall close your eyes. Then Jacob set out from Beersheba. The sons of Israel carried Jacob their father, their little ones, and their wives in the wagons that Pharaoh had sent to carry him. They also took their livestock and their goods, which they had gained in the land of Canaan, and came into Egypt, Jacob and all his offspring with him, his sons and his sons' sons with him, his daughters and his sons' daughters, all his offspring he brought with him into Egypt. Now these are the names of the descendants of Israel who came into Egypt, Jacob and his sons. Reuben, Jacob's firstborn, and the sons of Reuben, Hanak, Palu, Hezron, and Carmi, the sons of Simeon, Jemuel, Jamin, Ohad, Yaqin, Zohar, and Shaul, the son of a Canaanite woman, the sons of Levi, Gershon, Kohat, and Merari, the sons of Judah, Er, Onan, Shelah, Perez, and Zerah, but Er and Onan died in the land of Canaan, and the sons of Perez are Hezron and Hamul. The sons of Issachar, Tola, Puva, Yov, and Shimrum. The sons of Zebulun, Sered, Elan, and Jalael. These are the sons of Leah, whom she bore to Jacob and Padana-Ram together with his daughter Dinah. Altogether, his sons and his daughters numbered 33. The sons of Gad, Zephion, Haggai, Shunni, Esbon, Eri, Arodi, and Areli. The sons of Asher, Imna, Ashva, Ishvi, Beriah, with Sarah, their sister, and the sons of Beriah, Eber, and Malkiel. These are the sons of Zilpah, whom Laman gave to Leah, his daughter, and these she bore to Jacob, 16 persons. The sons of Rachel, Jacob's wife, Joseph and Benjamin. And to Joseph in the land of Egypt were born Manasseh and Ephraim, whom Asenat, the daughter of Potipharah, the priest of Owen, bore to him. and the sons of Benjamin, Belah, Beker, Ashbel, Gerah, Naaman, Ahai, Rosh, Mupim, Hupim, and Ard. These are the sons of Rachel who were born to Jacob, 14 persons in all. The sons of Dan, Hushim, the sons of Naphtali, Eziel, Juni, Ezer, and Shalim. These are the sons of Bilhah whom Laban gave to Rachel, his daughter, and these she bore to Jacob, seven persons in all. All the persons belonging to Jacob who came into Egypt, who were his own descendants, not including Jacob's sons' wives, were 66 persons in all. And the sons of Joseph who were born to him in Egypt were two. All the persons of the house of Jacob who came into Egypt were 70. This is God's holy and inspired word. Let us pray as he would bless its reading and its preaching. Lord God, we know that your word abides forever. It does not return to you void, but accomplishes the purposes for which it is set out. So we rely, we stand upon that promise tonight, that as your word goes forth in this pulpit, we pray that it would accomplish the purposes of glorifying your son, of drawing our hearts near to you in love and affection and desire for obedience as you School us as you train us, as you build us up through your holy word. We pray through Christ's name, our savior and mediator, amen. I was recently reading a book review of a book called The Metamorphoses of Fat, A History of Obesity. Now, this was not the first book I would have picked up off the library shelf. That's why I read a lot of book reviews. It introduces me to books I may not otherwise read. And this is a social history. The book is really exploring how society's perceptions of the human shape have changed over time. And you know this. You have seen pictures of perhaps the Renaissance era where to be a larger, to be well-rounded was a sign of of wealth, a sign of health. Society in that day and age believed that a woman couldn't give birth, couldn't survive childbirth if she were skinny. Of course, it hasn't always been that way. We know a thousand years ago, for instance, William I of Normandy, William the Conqueror of England, was criticized for being fat. He was compared to a pregnant lady. And then, in the Renaissance, you can think of the rosy-cheeked painters like Rubens in these images of more well-rounded figures. And then, of course, coming into the latter half of the 20th century, things switched again. And to be a size zero, it was too big to be on the cover of a magazine. Recently, though, it seems like the tide has shifted once again. And to say anything of any sort of critique about another person's size is to shame that person. But as I was reading this book and thinking about sort of that history as things went up and down over the centuries, I realized that the way in which Christians consider other sorts of physical prosperity and blessings have often actually followed a similar path of up and down. You can think of the fourth century where to be poor, to have no possessions, to go out into the desert and live on a pedestal was considered the epitome of spirituality, to be reliant solely on the charity of others. Well then, by the time you got into the late medieval era, for instance, you could think of the Pope and all his riches, his lavish living to be considered a spiritual, a godly person was evidently to be obscenely rich. The Reformation didn't much to push back against that, you can think especially of the Radical Reformation and the Anabaptists who eschewed so many of the physical goods of this world. But of course now, the screw has seemed to turn again, hasn't it? That if you are not, as a Christian, healthy and wealthy, you must be doing something wrong. What does Scripture tell us? What does Scripture tell us that how Christians are to consider Prosperity, physical blessing of the Lord. And as we read this text, and really throughout all of scripture, we see that that physical prosperity, that that material blessing, it can be wonderful. As long as it points somewhere. As long as it points to the promise-keeping God who fulfills every spiritual blessing in Christ. You see, as we see even from these two chapters this evening, the physical blessing of these men and their families is wonderful, as long as it was pointing towards that promise-keeping God who gives us every spiritual blessing in his Son. So as we consider that this evening, we'll consider our text in three portions. We'll begin in verses 16 to 28 of chapter 45. We'll call that prosperity. And then the first seven verses of chapter 46, that's promise. And then verses 8 to 27, that's progeny. We begin with prosperity, that's the physical blessing. Then we'll see promise, that's the spiritual blessing. And then the progeny we'll see is how the physical blessing was supposed to lead to spiritual blessing. The proof of the will of the first two points comes in the third. But we begin in verse 16 of chapter 45 with prosperity. We begin our text with this incredible blessing that the Lord places on Joseph and his family by Egypt. by Pharaoh, beginning in verse 16. You notice, of course, that when the report is heard that Joseph's brothers have come, we see that it pleases Pharaoh and his servants. We wonder, well, why would that be the case? They don't know Jacob. They don't know, really, the older brothers at all. It's clearly the case that they're pleased for Joseph, that Pharaoh is pleased that his prime minister, if you will, Commandant is blessed to have this reunion with his family. Admittedly, Pharaoh has seen Joseph's faithfulness, his competence, and the way in which he has carried out the task that Pharaoh and the Lord had given him, and so Pharaoh is pleased to bless Joseph. And that's exactly what happens, isn't it, beginning in verse 17. He tells him through verse 20, Go round up your family. And notice what he says, especially in verse 20, have no concern for your goods. Or as you see on your footnote, let not your eye pity. Don't feel bad for all the stuff that you're gonna leave behind because it's worthless compared to all the riches, all the provisions, all the wealth that your family is going to have here in Egypt. Now think about if you've ever moved. Think about, as you prepare to move, how much time you spent going through all your clothes. Do I really need to pack this up and bring this to a new house? You've got your furnishings. You've got your appliances. Am I going to leave my appliances? Am I going to take my washer and dryer? You've got all the other things that you're trying to decide. You know you're going to end up leaving a lot on the curb for the neighbors to come by and sort of sort through. But Pharaoh tells them, leave it all behind. Leave it all on the curb for your fellow Canaanites to come by and pick up. You'll forget your old stuff. One commentator called this the ultimate extreme makeover through the blessing of Egypt. It's a foreshadowing, isn't it, of the Exodus, when the people are now leaving Egypt, and how does the Lord bless them? by plundering the riches of Egypt. We see that even now as Pharaoh is choosing to do so because he has seen how the Lord has blessed Joseph in his service to this king. You may wonder why the text keeps returning to wagons. You may notice at least four times the text mentions these wagons. Jacob's heart even perks up when he sees, oh, there's wagons. You may think, wagons? What's so great about wagons? Well, in that day and age, those were like the SUVs of the day. Really, to have a wagon in which you could have a draft animal to pull your possessions. Of course, they weren't pulling possessions. They were pulling people. All the way through the desert was a ride in luxury of that day. We were out of 10 female donkeys loaded with grain and bread and other provisions for the journey in verse 23. They're leaving behind famine. They're being provided with donkeys that are loaded, literally, grain and bread and other provisions. Think about this means especially for Jacob. Remember back in Genesis when Jacob, because He made perhaps the not best decision to steal his brother's blessing. He had to run away from his father and his brother. He came to Laban. Do you remember what he had with him? Nothing, not a thing. He had to be treated by his uncle as a hired hand. And now he's in the lap of luxury. the greatest kingdom on the face of the earth. You know, this is actually foreseen in the book of Genesis. Do you remember all the way back in chapter 12, when Jacob's grandfather Abraham was blessed and commissioned by the Lord, what the Lord told him in that text, chapter 12, verse 2, he says, I will bless those who bless you. The Lord envisioned that Abraham and his offspring would be blessed by others. And now things have come full circle as through the blessing that Joseph delivered to Egypt, blessing now comes to Abraham's family. Even foreign leaders, even powerful men, even the great Pharaoh is not outside the sovereign purposes. the sovereign plan of the Lord for his people in this book. But the text isn't in there, does it? We hope that this isn't all that there is for Joseph and his family. After all, we see some interesting warning signs, don't we? Joseph telling his brothers not to quarrel in verse 24. We see what's perhaps still favoritism, verse 22, when each of them gets a change of clothes, but Benjamin gets 300 shekels of silver and five changes of clothes. But that's not the only question mark we have as they go down to Egypt, is it? Do you remember in chapter 15, Verse 13, when the Lord came to Abraham another time. And he told Abraham that his family would descend to Egypt for 400 years and end up as slaves. If this physical blessing is all that there is, it's going to end up, they're obviously going to lose it all eventually. They're all going to end up in slavery, their descendants. There's going to arise a Pharaoh who never heard of Joseph. who is worried about the increasing population of the Israelites and enslaves the entire population. If this physical blessing is all that there is, it's going to eventually fade. Those five changes of clothes that Benjamin has will eventually unravel, turn to dust. But as the text turns to chapter 46, We see that this physical blessing the Lord is lavishing upon the people of Israel is in service of something more important. Something longer lasting than shekels of silver and changes of clothes or even SUVs and donkeys laden with food. We've seen this outward blessing, but now comes the inward blessing as Jacob comes into the presence of the Lord. This is the promise that is reestablished in the first seven verses of chapter 46. As we transition to this second point, I want you to think for a second. Joseph and his family, particularly now Jacob, has been blessed in incredible ways. Pharaoh has basically given him a blank check. You know, whatever you need will be yours. But until the encounter with the Lord happens, that has no eternal significance. And for a lot of us, if we're in that situation, we might say, I'll take that deal. I mean, imagine your child, if your child had every physical provision, if he got into the right college, married the right sort of person, got the right kind of job, a wonderful house, healthy children, new cars every two years, vacations in exotic places, but didn't know the Lord. Would you be satisfied? Would you say your child is successful? Well, let's not keep it at arm's length with your children. What if that's yourself? If you have all the riches that the world has to offer, but you don't have the promise of the Lord that he will be with you, that he will be with your family, that he will provide spiritually, would you be satisfied? Or would you see all that riches as nothing as long as it was not driving you to the Lord who provided those things? comes upon Jacob in these first seven verses of chapter 46. He comes in verse one to Beersheba. Now that might not mean much to you, but this is a place of significance for Jacob and his family. In chapter 21, verse 33, the text tells us Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba and called there on the name Yahweh, the everlasting God. and Abraham sojourned many days in the land. In chapter 26, Isaac went up to Beersheba and Yahweh appeared to him the same night and said, I am the God of Abraham your father, fear not, for I am with you and will bless you and multiply your offspring for my servant Abraham's sake. So Isaac built an altar there and called upon the name of Yahweh and pitched his tent there. And Jacob himself leaving the promised land for the first time, as I alluded to earlier in chapter 28 comes to A knight's journey from Beersheba. He hears from the Lord. Chapter 28 tells us, I am Yahweh, the God of Abraham, your father and the God of Isaac. The land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring. Your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south. And in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go. and will bring you back to this land, for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you. So when Jacob finds himself in Beersheba, he surely had echoing in his ears those promises of the Lord the first time he left the promised land, fleeing from his brother who wanted to kill him and his father whom he had just conned. And he indeed was brought back to the promised land. And that time, you remember, because of the Lord's blessing on his flocks that he inherited or worked under from Laban, was blessed by the Lord. And now that he's at that place again, the Lord says, ah, you see, I am a God who has kept my promises to you. And not merely to you, but to your father, Isaac, at this very place. to your grandfather, Abraham, who worshiped me, who saw me in a vision at this very place. In other words, the Lord had been faithful to his word for generations. And Jacob need not fear. Think of the reasons Jacob may have feared going down to Egypt. Perhaps he feared because he was an old man. didn't know if he could make the journey, knew he would never see his home again. He knew Egypt was a pagan land. He knew Egypt was a place in which the name of the Lord was not worshiped, not revered. He surely remembers the bad trouble that his father and grandfather had there before. He had been warned, as we have seen, of future evils that will befall there. Perhaps he's concerned that his entire family is going there, and no remnant will be left behind in the promised land. But as he departs the promised land for the second time, the Lord makes the same promise in verses three and four. Do not be afraid, for there I will make you to a great nation. I will go with you. I will also bring you up again. The Lord promises the greatest thing that he could possibly promise to Jacob. Not donkeys laden with more food, not all the changes of clothes he could want. He promises himself. I myself will go with you. I will be with you. My presence will be guiding, protecting, caring for you, tending for you. It's wonderful to have the favor of Pharaoh. That's nothing compared to the eye of the Lord upon you in mercy and protection and his presence. Think of all the promises the Lord has made to his people. He's telling Jacob those promises will not fail. And so friends, if that is true of Jacob, it is true of you. Think of the promises that the Lord has made to you. For as you open the pages of scripture, you see that the Lord has promised to be with you. The Lord has promised not to leave you in this land by yourself. The Lord Jesus himself, when he was prepared to depart, This earth said what? I will not leave you. I will return to you. I will come to you in the Holy Spirit. The Gospel of John tells us that Jesus spoke of this in reference to his own death and resurrection and ascension. How do we know how important those promises were to our Lord? He was willing to die to enact them. The Lord says, I will no longer be with you. I will be raised up. I will be crucified. I will be executed. I will be laid in a tomb. But that is all a part of my program of fulfilling my promise to be with you forever. Those are no mere idle words the Lord issued to his disciples and therefore to you. He paid for them with his very blood. He paid for them with His very life, the anguish, the sorrow, the dereliction of the cross, so that He could rise again and pour out His Spirit. And one day, because of that penalty for sin that was paid, He could be with you forever in holiness and righteousness, not in a vision, as wonderful as this is, but before your Savior face to face. He is a God who has made to you promises and he has paid with his very life to see that those promises will come to fruition. All the physical, all the prospering of this world is nothing if it doesn't lead you to that place of seeing the same God who provides those wonderful things will provide you the riches of his presence forevermore in glory. and every spiritual blessing in Christ, every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, the apostle tells us. That is the promise that the Lord makes to you. So how do you respond? How do we know that Jacob understands the relationship between these physical and spiritual blessings? What does he do in verse five? He gets up and goes. He doesn't really say, oh, that's interesting. Oh, why, thank you, Lord. I'll file that away in my promises. No, he gets up and obeys. He responds to the promises of the Lord with faithful obedience. He has heard the word of the Lord. Now he heeds the word of the Lord. He gets up and goes. This is a mark of someone who understands. This is someone whose heart has been pierced by those promises of the Lord. He gets up and goes. All his offspring he brought with him into Egypt. The promise of the Lord has not merely intrigued his curiosity. It's changed his heart. has revealed itself in his behavior. And this relationship between the physical prosperity and blessing the Lord leading to the fulfillment of his spiritual promises comes to a head, comes to fruition, comes to beautiful flowering in the final portion of our text this evening, the progeny that we see listed for us in verses 8 to 27. The portion of the text is easy to skip over, these long lists of names, but this is where the book of Genesis ends, genealogically speaking. The entire book has been punctuated again and again by lists of descendants and families, and this is the last one. We know that Genesis ends with these people, these 70 people in Egypt. But understand how the story ends here. We need to remind ourselves of where it started. Do you recall chapter 11, verse 35? The text tells us that Sarah, verse 30, that Sarah was barren. She had no children. And yet in chapter 12, verse two, the Lord says to her husband, I will make you a great nation. As you recall, Abraham says, well, I better make sure Eliezer Damascus has his ducks in a row because he's going to inherit my estate because I don't have any children. Again, in chapter 15, verse four, the Lord says a son coming from your own body will be your heir. Look up into the heavens, count the stars, so shall your offspring be. Abraham can only say what, huh? Chapter 17, verse two, I will greatly increase your numbers, huh? 17, verse four, you'll be the father of many nations. He doesn't get it. 18, verse 10, Sarah, your wife, will have a son. Sarah laughs. She thinks it's hilariously ridiculous that the Lord would promise such a thing in her old age. But then remember chapter 21 and verse one. Moses tells us that Yahweh was gracious to Sarah. As he had said, he was gracious to Sarah. As he had said, he fulfilled his promise. And Yahweh did for Sarah what he had promised. Sarah became pregnant. And we know that she gave birth to Isaac. Okay, but Isaac in chapter 25, verse 21, prays to the Lord, why? Because his wife was barren. And here we go again. Made it one generation and died. We can't even get to the second level of the video game before dying. And yet the Lord answered his prayer. That's the very next verse. The Lord answered his prayer, verse 22. That's Jacob. We know that he runs off to marry Leah and Rachel. But 29, 31 tells us what? Rachel was barren. Rachel could have no children. They're the woman of Jacob's heart, the love of his life. But 30, verse 22, God remembered Rachel. God remembered in scripture, is acting on his covenant promises that he has made in the past. That's what it means when God remembers. God remembers Rachel. He listened to her prayers. He opened her womb. And now, one generation, two generations later, the text tells us that the number of Jacob's family departing for Egypt was 70. You know your scripture, you know 70 is a doubly complete number. Seven is a holy number of perfection. 10, a scriptural number of completion. Multiply them together, you have 70 persons coming down out of the promised land. Remember that Abraham was a wealthy man, that Isaac prospered in the land of Ahimelech, that Bimelech, that Jacob was a wealthy man, but all that wealth was serving the purpose of preserving for them a remnant, a population, progeny, growth. And why is this so important in the book of Genesis? We don't go back to chapter 11, or 10, or nine, or eight, or seven, or six, or five, or four, but chapter three. What does the Lord promise the very first humans? before any progeny were on the earth, that although they had sinned, God would provide a Redeemer through their offspring, one who would crush the head of the evil serpent, yea, though he be himself crushed. The only way in which you or I are here today singing songs to our Redeemer is because of these 70 who survived the famine to go down in luxury to Egypt. You see now why the physical blessings are wonderful as long as they point and serve the reality that God is a promise keeping God who gives us every spiritual blessing in that offspring, in that seed, in that serpent crusher, the Lord Jesus Christ. Just as these 12 sons led to 70, so that same Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, with 12 apostles, started a new family, the New Testament Church of God, which grew to 70, 120, and 3,000, as we saw in Revelation, myriads upon myriads of people. Because the Lord used this wonderful prosperity to fulfill his spiritual promises to his people in Christ. Friends, as you look around you, whether you're spiritually skinny or spiritually more rounded, as the Lord has blessed you in these ways, know that it is for that purpose, to win for himself a people in his Son, Jesus Christ. Because as he fulfills those promises to you, he is bringing you to completion, bringing you to those eternal heavenly blessings that you will enjoy forever. The presence of that same offspring, the presence of that same serpent crusher, that same seed of the woman, your savior and mine, the Lord Jesus Christ. Hallelujah and amen. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, when we have a chance to take a step back and to see the ways in which you are working through kingdoms and through powers and through the things that this world turns to its own purposes that you have given for our good and in your glory, Lord, we are in awe of your power, of your sovereignty, of your faithfulness, of your covenant-keeping word. But mostly, Lord, we are in awe of your Son who gave up all those riches and many more beside to become one of us, or that he could die as one of us, that he could rise again and be our savior forever. May our eyes be fixed firmly on him as we travel through this world. Whether you place us in wealth or poverty, may we serve him, covenant promise keeping Savior Jesus Christ. Pray this in his name, amen.