Preserving the Remnant

Dec 25, 2022 | Torah Portion

Joseph explained to his bewildered brothers that God had ordained his descent into Egypt in order to “preserve life” and “to preserve a remnant.” (Genesis 45:5). Joseph goes on to state that, “God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant in the earth, and to keep you alive by a great deliverance” (Genesis 45:7).
When Joseph is understood as foreshadowing the work of Messiah, a similar statement may be made. Yeshua’s brothers the Jewish people rejected Him, but God ordained that rejection to accomplish a great deliverance.
Paul seems to have read Joseph’s story in this light as well. In Romans 11, he struggled with the difficult question of Israel’s rejection of Yeshua. Though he did not directly invoke Joseph as an analogy, he seems to have alluded to it in a few places in this discussion. For example, he pointed out that Israel’s rejection of Messiah has meant riches for the world. The brothers’ rejection of Joseph resulted in riches for the famine-stricken world of Joseph’s day. Similarly, Paul pointed out that Israel’s ultimate reconciliation with the Messiah will be “life from the dead.” Joseph said, “God sent me before you to preserve life (lemicheyah, למחיה).” Jewish liturgy typically uses the same Hebrew word for the resurrection of the dead.

For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead? (Romans 11:15)
I say then, they did not stumble so as to fall, did they? May it never be! But by their transgression salvation has come to the Gentiles, to make them jealous. Now if their transgression is riches for the world and their failure is riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their fulfillment be! (Romans 11:11-12)

Paul saw the Jewish estrangement from Messiah as a necessary part of a divinely ordained plan whereby God extended salvation to the entire world. In this regard, the Jewish estrangement from Messiah closely mirrors the events in Joseph’s story. Paul conceded that Israel has stumbled (though not fallen), but he insisted that even the nation’s stumbling plays a part of God’s plan. Just as Joseph and his brothers ultimately reunited and reconciled, Paul said that “all Israel will be saved.”

All Israel will be saved; just as it is written [in Isaiah 59:20-21], “The deliverer will come from Zion, he will remove ungodliness from Jacob. This is my covenant with them, when I take away their sins.” (Romans 11:26-27)

Paul did not suppose that all Israel must wait until the culmination of the age before entering into reconciliation with the Messiah. He maintained that, just as the LORD preserved a remnant of His people in the past, so too a remnant had recognized King Messiah. Again, the discussion seems to allude to the story of Joseph:

God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant in the earth, and to keep you alive by a great deliverance. (Genesis 45:7)
In the same way then, there has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God’s gracious choice. (Romans 11:5)

This Too Is for the Good

Dec 18, 2022 | Torah Portion

The life of Joseph demonstrates God's sovereign hand in human lives. Though the world seems to follow a completely random course around us, God is actually working out His purposes in the midst of it. From Joseph's point of view, there was no reason to suspect that God had his best interests in mind.
Joseph had been kidnapped and betrayed by his own brothers, sold into Egypt as a slave, falsely accused of attempted adultery and imprisoned in a dungeon. His life seemed to be following Murphy's Law of “if anything can go wrong, it will.” So far, everything had gone wrong.
Joseph stubbornly clung to an unshakable confidence in the God of his fathers. Even though everything had tumbled down around him, He kept looking to God and believing that God was working through the chaos. He never fell into depression or despondency because he always believed that he was right where God had placed him.
The late first-century compendium of instructions to Gentile believers entitled the Didache says, “Accept the things that happen to you as good, knowing that apart from God nothing comes to pass” (Didache 3:10). Similarly, Paul says, “We know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28).
This can be compared to the story of a rabbi from the days of the Apostles named Nacham. Everyone called him “Nacham This-Too” because, no matter what happened, he would always say, “This too is for the good.” Amazingly, God honored his faith by continually providing miracles for Nacham.
Once it happened that Nacham This-Too was serving as an ambassador to Rome. He was presenting the Roman Emperor with a gift from the people of Judea in an attempt to bribe him into reversing some anti-Jewish legislation. While en route to Rome he stopped at an inn. While he slept, the inn-keeper stole the precious treasures meant for the emperor from Nacham's chest and replaced them with sand! Nacham went to Rome, unaware that he was carrying a box of sand. When the emperor opened the chest and saw the sand, he ordered Nacham to be put to death. Nacham simply replied, “This too is for the good.” Just then Elijah the prophet appeared in the guise of a Roman officer and suggested that perhaps the sand was “magic sand.” The emperor agreed to test the theory, and indeed, when his troops hurled the sand at their enemies, they prevailed in battle. The emperor immediately released Nacham, reversed his decree against the Jews and rewarded Nacham with great wealth.
The story of Nacham This-Too is a good illustration of Joseph's story. Like Nacham This-Too, Joseph refused to be pushed around by life's circumstances. Instead he looked to God for strength and encouragement, and he kept on believing.
In this week's Torah reading, we will see how Joseph's this-too-is-for-the-good type of faith was rewarded and how his fortunes changed.
Miketz – מקץ : “At the end” Torah : Genesis 41:1-44:17 Haftarah : I Kings 3:15-4:1 Gospel : Luke 4:16-31