Restoration 2019:  Brokenness

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Restoration Ministry

2019:  Motivations of Bible Characters (Noon Meetings)

Dean Cullinane

How to Say No

Charge That to My Account

Ransom and Reunion

How to Know God’s Will for Your Life

Father in heaven, Lord, this is your time.

We thank you for the physical food, and we pray that you would now bless us with the spiritual food.

Father, we desire for your presence to be here in this room.

We beg and plead, Lord, that You would speak to us, that we would hear Your voice.

Our theme for this program, for the entirety of the program, is brokenness.

And I don't know if there's many more characters in the Bible that have experienced brokenness quite like Joseph.

Just a show of hands, you can keep your burrito in the other 1.

How many of you feel like you've experienced brokenness at some point in your life?

Maybe not a complete shattering, but some brokenness nonetheless.

Alright, so I want to take you through just briefly some of the brokenness that Joseph suffered and you tell me if you can relate.

Joseph grew up in a household where His dad was married to both of his moms.

Joseph was brought up in a household where he was married to both of his moms.

His biological mother and his mother by marriage.

He grew up in a household where he had 10 older brothers.

His mother died when he was relatively young.

And then after her death, listen to this, his oldest brother went and slept with his dad's concubine.

He was best friends with his mom when she was alive.

Not to mention the fact that his brothers came together and decided that the best thing to do to him and with him would be to take his life because essentially God spoke to him.

After the passage that we're about to look at today, he found himself in prison again because God spoke to him, albeit in a different way.

So, we're going to look at Genesis chapter 39, and I'm going to read from verse 1.

And Joseph was brought down to Egypt, and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, captain of the guard, an Egyptian, brought him of the hands of the Ishmaelites, which had brought him down thither.

And the Lord was with Joseph, and he was a prosperous man, and he was in the house of his master the Egyptian.

And his master saw that the Lord was with him, and that the Lord made all that he did to prosper in his hand.

It seems like at least at the beginning stage that Joseph made no real effort to share his faith.

It seemed like he didn't really try and proactively reach out and say, hey Potiphar, hey Potiphar's wife, and hey everyone that's in Potiphar's house, I just want to let you know that even though I'm a slave and even though I've been delivered here, in actual fact, I am a Hebrew.

In actual fact, I believe in a God that trounces and trumps all of your gods.

He doesn't really seem interested in sharing that, at least from the offset.

But notice that Potiphar still sees God in Joseph.

It seems like there's very little intentional evangelism, intentional outreach, but it says in verse 3, and his master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord made all that he did to prosper in his hand.

Reaching out to people just by literally being there, by being there with the Lord, by praying and by trusting that all that you do, that everything that you put your hand to doing would be blessed by God.

However, I do think that perhaps maybe we've taken it now to the extreme because sometimes I feel we sacrifice actual intentional verbal evangelism in the hope that our presence evangelism will be all that we need.

It's kind of a cover for the fact that we say, yes, I'm Christian, yes, I'm Adventist, or yes, I know the Lord and I want people to know, but I'm kind of embarrassed and I'm a little bit shy and I don't wanna be rejected.

So if I just try really hard to live like a Christian, then maybe someone that's never even heard of Jesus will come up to me and say, hey are you a follower of Jesus?

And then I'll say, yeah how did you know?

And they'll be like, oh I just saw in the way that you walked and in the way that you dressed and the way that you talked and the way that you combed your hair and tied your laces, I just seen Jesus in you.

Now, I don't know if many of you have had that experience.

People have come to me and said, hey, I really saw the way that God used you when you were preaching or when you were studying or when you were doing this or that.

But I don't know anyone that's just come up to me, I don't think so, maybe my wife can correct me, although I don't think she will, will come up to me and say, hey wow I just really saw God in you today.

Like I just saw it and now I want to give my life to the Lord.

Now, fair enough Potiphar hasn't taken that stance, but I think that Joseph is really the exception to this rule rather than the rule itself.

Presence evangelism, being an active witness is awesome and I bid you this Matthew 24 14 that the gospel goes to the world as a what?

Sure people people need to see it and not just hear it But if they see it, if they just see it and they're not hearing anything, then they might just think that we're just really nice people.

And I don't know about you, but nice people is kind of the in thing right now.

I'll try and treat you well and I'll make sure not to judge you.

And if anything, just being nice and not sharing Christ intentionally sometimes looks like the opposite of Christianity.

It says, and that the Lord made all that he did to prosper in his hand.

And Joseph, it says, found grace in his sight, and he served him and made him overseer over his house and all that he had put into his hand.

And it came to pass from the time that he had made him an overseer in his house and over all that he had, that the Lord blessed the Egyptians house for Joseph's sake, presence evangelism.

And the blessing of the Lord was upon all that he had in the house and in the field.

And he left All that he had in whose hand?

And he knew not what he had save the bread which he did eat.

Now listen, Potiphar was no doubt a very wealthy man.

Everything that he owned was left in the hand of Joseph.

He took no care on his own personal things that had to be done.

He put no thought into his own finances or accounting.

Nothing, everything that he had was trusted into this 1 man who was not from Egypt, who was not bowing to the same God, who was not even intentionally reaching out, who was just someone, and here's the point that I think is key, he was just a man that had integrity.

And we don't really use that word anymore, right?

Potiphar knew that his entire household could be left in the care of this man.

It said he knew nothing that he had save the bread that he put in his mouth.

Everything was left in the hand of Joseph.

And then it gives us this tad little piece of information.

And sometimes, sometimes we go through the Scriptures and we think that all we're being presented with is information until we get to the main thing, right?

Until we get to the action set piece, when everything kind of goes down and everyone loses their rag.

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Series

2019: Motivations of Bible Characters (Noon Meetings)

How to Say No

Transcript

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

Restoration 2023

Are there Ghosts in Loma Linda?

47m

God’s Last Message: Christ Our Righteousness

1h 17m

The Truth about Temptation - Self control in an out of control world!

44m

Faithful Talks

2. The Bridegroom is Coming

1h 10m

Elder, Deacon, Deaconess Basic Training

Managing Theological Conflict in the Local Church

1h 11m

Abraham and the Ancient Blood Path

57m

Summary and Conclusion

39m

Alan & Nicole Parker: Love Me, Love Me Not

Overcoming Addictions

51m

Prophecy Seminar

The Mark of the Beast

43m

The Almost Overmastering Delusion

54m

For a Gift From God

43m

WYC 2012 Breakout Sessions

Overcoming As Christ Overcame, Part 2

53m

Sound Doctrine