Joseph’s Forgiveness

Next week will be the last sermon in our series on Genesis. Over the past several weeks we’ve been looking at the life of Joseph. Yesterday during worship, the primary point was that Joseph chose not to take revenge on his brothers for what they had done to him, even though he easily could have in his position as second in command of all Egypt. I made the point that it shows that Joseph had placed himself in God’s hand and trusted that God was working in his life.

It’s important that we can see that Joseph’s brothers did act badly toward him. Think about it—they were going to kill him, and they ended up selling him into slavery. To forgive does not mean that we ignore what has been done to us. It means that we recognize that we have also hurt others and that we are in need of forgiveness as well. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said this:

“For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.” (Matthew 6:14-15, NIV 2011)

Summer has pretty much come to an end with students and teachers alike back to school. Remember that next Sunday is Labor Day weekend, and so we’ll be continuing our summer schedule one more week. Worship Service will be at 9am with a fellowship time to follow. But then in two weeks, on September 9th, we’ll be resuming our normal schedule. Sunday School will begin at 9am and our Worship Service will be held at 10:10am.

Remember to be inviting others to our worship services this Fall. We’ll be looking at the book of 2 Corinthians. We will be particularly considering what it means to be a Christian in Corinth. How do we live out our faith in a world where there are so many challenges.

Hope you have a great week, and I hope to see you Sunday!

God bless,

Brian