Whosoever
does not delight in that story, simply as a story, whenever he hears
it read, cannot have a wholesome human heart in him.
But why was this story of Joseph put into Holy Scripture, and at
such length, too? It seems, at first sight, to be simply a family
history--the story of brothers and their father; it seems, at first
sight, to teach us nothing concerning our redemption and salvation;
it seems, at first sight, not to reveal anything fresh to us
concerning God; it seems, at first sight, not to be needed for the
general plan of the Bible history. It tells us, of course, how the
Israelites first came into Egypt; and that was necessary for us to
know. But the Bible might have told us that in ten verses. Why has
it spent upon the story of Joseph and his brethren, not ten verses,
but ten chapters?
Now we have a right to ask such questions as these, if we do not ask
them out of any carping, fault-finding spirit, trying to pick holes
in the Bible, from which God defend us and all Christian men. If we
ask such questions in faith and reverence--that is, believing and
taking for granted that the Bible is right, and respecting it, as
the Book of books, in which our own forefathers and all Christian
nations upon earth for many ages have found all things necessary for
their salvation--if, I say, we question over the Bible in that
child-like, simple, respectful spirit, which is the true spirit of
wisdom and understanding, by which our eyes will be truly opened to
see the wondrous things of God's law: then we may not only seek as
our Lord bade us, but we shall find, as our Lord prophesied that we
should.
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