Metz 03/03/19

Joseph Encounters an Explosion of EvilGenesis 37:1-24

We interrupt our Matthew series this morning to begin a seven week series on the life of Joseph. I had the privilege of sharing these seven messages at Awana Honors Camp this past summer and the elders were kind enough to give me permission to share the messages with you.

The story of Joseph is meaningful on a host of levels. It’s definitely one of the epic stories in the Old Testament; in this first message today we’ll meet Joseph at the age of 17 in Genesis 37 and we’ll follow him over the seven weeks until his death at 110 in Genesis 50. One author writes, “The story of Joseph is by far the longest and most masterful narrative in Genesis, if not the entire Bible.”1 A writer for the New York Times book review said… “purely as narrative and background there is a magnificent story here which exceeds in drama, opulence and movement anything that Hollywood has ever dreamed”2 The story of Joseph is indeed a beautiful story!

Secondly, Joseph’s life foreshadows the life of our Savior in so many ways. Think about the shape of Jesus’ life as Paul presents it in Philippians 2; it’s a parabola--Jesus starts out high, descends really low and then in the providence of God he is exalted to the highest place. Well Joseph’s life has that same shape. And that’s one of the many ways Joseph’s life parallels Jesus’ life. One author suggests 101 parallels between the life of Joseph and the life of Jesus.3 So a study of Joseph in a sense is a study of Jesus.

Third, because life isn’t the cake walk we wish it would be, Joseph’s story resonates with us

…I’m sure you’ve either done a cake walk or you know what they’re all about. There are numbers on the ground in a circle… While the music plays you march around the circle…sometimes you dance around the circle… and when the music stops you move to the nearest number…. The person in charge picks a number from a bowl and the person standing on the winning number gets a cake….typically you just keep playing until most everyone leaves with a cake…march, march march, music stops, am I a winner?....march, march, march, music stops…am I a winner?.... march, march, march, music stops…am I a winner? Life isn’t a cake walk is it?....

No we struggle don’t we? At times our lives are colored by hardship and difficulty… one difficulty after another….topping it off our families can be painful places….or we encounter health issues… …sometimes we’re betrayed or rejected…no life isn’t a cake walk…. And because of that we can resonate with Joseph’s story. Gary Inrig writes this--and this quote was 1 Hughes, Genesis, page 4352 Hughes, Genesis, page 4353 As quoted by Boice, page 859

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in the Friday email--“Few people in scripture experienced such deep, soul crushing betrayal and injustice, for such a prolonged period (as Joseph). (Joseph’s) lows were deep, devastating, and enduring.”

Again some of you can resonate with that.

Well with that intro let’s dive into the text. If you have your bible, we’ll begin in Genesis 37, verse 1….Genesis 37, verse 1

37 Jacob lived in the land of his father’s sojournings, in the land of Canaan. 2 These are the generations of Jacob.

(…those first words in verse 2 are probably better translated “This is the account of Jacob’s line” 4 . In other words what follows is what happened to Jacob’s descendants. Similar words have occurred ten times before this in Genesis and each time the words mark significant divisions in Genesis, so this phrase, “These are the generations of Jacob” introduce the beginning of the last major section in Genesis.)5 And the account of Jacob’s line goes to the end of the book of Genesis.

Joseph, being seventeen years old, was pasturing the flock with his brothers.

(The word ‘brother’ is used twenty one times in the chapter which is terribly ironic when you realize what goes on in this fourth generation of Abraham’s descendants --Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and all of Jacob’s sons)

He was a boy with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah, his father’s wives. And Joseph brought a bad report of them to their father. 3 Now Israel (that’s another name for Jacob) loved Joseph more than any other of his sons, because he was the son of his old age. And he made him a robe of many colors. 4 But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully to him.

5 Now Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers they hated him even more. 6 He said to them, “Hear this dream that I have dreamed: 7 Behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and behold, my sheaf arose and stood upright. And behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.” 8 His brothers said to him, “Are you indeed to reign over us? Or are you indeed to rule over us?” So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words.

4 Waltke, page 4995 Boice, page 864

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9 Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, “Behold, I have dreamed another dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” 10 But when he told it to his father and to his brothers, his father rebuked him and said to him, “What is this dream that you have dreamed? Shall I and your mother and your brothers indeed come to bow ourselves to the ground before you?” 11 And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind.

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One of the things about Awana camp is that you have to have a central theme because they’ve got to make t-shirts for the kids to wear that communicate the theme. In other words T-shirts are the tail that wags the nightly bible messages dog. I say that rather flippantly but hammering out a single theme actually helped me organize the seven messages--what would I talk about and what would I leave out.

That being said, the theme for the week, collaboratively generated, was ‘God’s got me in his grip.’ Here’s the theme in picture form….

Now what are we trying to communicate with this theme? What do we mean by the phrase “God’s got me in his grip”? In the slide, whose hands are those invisible larger-than-life-hands holding the sheep? Those larger-than-life hands represent God’s hands. And God’s hands are powerful and strong. You and I are safe and secure in the hands of God. That’s what we mean when we say “God’s got Me in his grip.” Using words from Romans 8, ‘For I am sure, Paul writes, that neither death nor life, nor angels or rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height or depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God…. 6 So God’s got me in his grip affirms that we as God’s sheep are ultimately safe and secure. But the phrase also affirms for me that God is involved in everything. The Westminster Shorter Catechism defines providence like this: “God’s work of providence is his most holy, wise, and powerful preserving and governing all his creatures, and

6 Romans 8:38-39

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all their actions.”7 That means that our great God uses his creative power to keep all creation in existence, to involve himself in all events, and to direct all things to their appointed end.8

The story of Joseph, one author says, is a “locus classicus” for the idea of providence. What’s a “locus classicus” you say?

God superintending and moving and overseeing all of life for our good and his glory. Well the other thing that we had to have because of Awana camp was a key verse. And there was one verse that was perfect…. Romans 8:28

Paul is speaking to believers here in Romans 8:28. What are the two key phases that tell us that? Those who love God AND Those who are called according to his purpose.

For the ones who love God and the ones who are called according to his purpose, all things work together for good. “To illustrate the phrase ‘all things work together for good’, the ingredients which go into a cake are not very tasty when eaten individually. Flour, sugar, shortening--Here taste a spoonful of this shortening! Ugh! …eggs, salt, baking powder, and spices are not things you want to eat by themselves. But mix all the ingredients together in just the right proportions, and then bake the combined mixture and you have a delicious treat. The events of our lives are each like the ingredients of a cake. By themselves, the events may not seem good, but when mixed by God with other events, they will surely produce what is good.”9

7 As quoted in Hughes, page 4408 Hughes, page 4409 Bob Deffinbaugh, A Solace in Suffering

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Well Joseph’s story illustrates Romans 8:28 perfectly. As we walk through his story over the next weeks, we’ll see that all kinds of bad things happen to Joseph but amazingly, stunningly all of those bad things are used by God to accomplish an incredible purpose. It’s an amazing story!

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Just a couple more background ideas before we look at the details of the text in Genesis 37. So here’s a visual outline for the book of Genesis.

Four events--creation, fall, flood, and nations (that’s the Tower of Babel)

Four people--Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph

Turn to your neighbor and give them the outline for the book of Genesis.

And then let’s look at a representation of the family Joseph grew up in:

This slide shows us that Jacob had 12 sons, the names along the bottom of the slide. Let’s say them together out loud from left to right… Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulin, Joseph and Benjamin.

The next level up is the mothers. How many different mothers were there? Four: Leah, Bilhah, Zilpah, and Rachel.

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To make sure we’re altogether, let me ask some questions.

Who is the firstborn, oldest son in the family? REUBEN. (We’re going to find Reuben stepping up to save Joseph this morning, because that’s what firstborns do.

How many sons did Leah have? SIX. How many sons did Rachel have? TWO Who was the youngest son? BENJAMIN. Joseph and Benjamin had the same mother. What was her name? RACHEL.

Now we ought to point out that this large family, who God was ultimately going to use to bless the world, was a mess. Anybody know a family that’s a mess? (There’s hope for such a family)

As we said there was favoritism. It was a family where insecurity and competition reigned. There were alliances where the brothers from one mother were closer to each other than to the other brothers. It wasn’t “one for all and all for one” Essentially there was a large relational triangle--Jacob at the top vertex, Joseph at another vertex, and the rest of the brothers at the final vertex. And that’s a connection to our lives for each of us lives at some point in such triangles--we are like Jacob who loves too much, or we are like Joseph who is loved too much, or we imagine ourselves at the final vertex feeling like those who are loved too little, the other brothers.10 Can God clean up and use such a mess?

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Well enough of the background, let’s move into the story.

Look at verse 2. Verse 2 tells us that seventeen year old Joseph was tending flocks along with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah. If we look at our diagram of the family that would mean that Joseph was with four of his brothers, Dan, Naphtali, Gad and Asher…

And verse 2 tells us that on one occasion Joseph brought Jacob, his father, a bad report about these four brothers. In the rest of scripture the word used there is always used in the negative sense of an untrue report.11 Joseph was sharing news that was slanted to damage his brothers. 12 So that could mean that Joseph was lying about his step-brothers. 13 Could we use the term tattle tale to describe Joseph?

Verse 3 tells us that Jacob loved Joseph more than any of his other sons and he gave him a coat of many colors.

Could I get a 17 year old to model our ‘coat of many colors’?

10 Brueggeman, page 30011 Hughes, Genesis, page 43712 Waltke, page 49913 “One can interpret the ‘bad report” Joseph brings concerning his brothers (37:2) as bringing their nasty words to his father—that is they are verbally abusing him. Even if he does bring a negative report about his brothers’ work, there is no indication that his assessment is spiteful or unjustified (though the word used in the text often has slander in its undertone.” Walton, Genesis, page 692; Waltke, the Hebrew scholar, says “the word report by itself denotes news slanted to damage the victim. (See Prov. 10:18)”Waltke, Genesis, page 500

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I mean Joseph would be styling in this thing, don’t you think?

So what was behind the gift of the coat of many colors? Jacob was showing his love right? He could also have been communicating that he believed that Joseph was the one who should rule in the family.14 Most tunics stopped at the knees; they were worn by working men. But this garment had nothing to do with working.15

Let me ask you a question. How does favoritism feel in a family? Some of you know. It doesn’t feel good. It leaves the children competing with each other for their parent’s love. Do you think Joseph’s brothers were aware that their dad loved Joseph more? Look at verse 4, Yes! And they hated Joseph for it. They resented him. Joseph’s brothers loathed his presence.16

{Now the special coat that Joseph was given is often pictured this way. If you’ve grown up in church you probably have seen something like this before for joseph’s coat. But there’s a chance that the writer of Genesis may have meant something completely different along the line of a full-length coat or a long-sleeved coat17 instead of this multi-colored thing. The term is used for the garment worn by Tamar in 2 Samuel 13:18-19 and it’s hard to imagine her in something like this18}

So this special coat set Joseph apart from his brothers as the favored one, probably indicating that he would receive the inheritance (the leadership and double portion)19 It distinguished him as “management and not labor” is how one writer said it.20

Well where was God in all this?

Well God is about to add fuel to the fire of Joseph’s brothers hatred. He’s going to call Joseph to a significant but mysterious destiny through two dreams--a harvest dream and a celestial dream.

Joseph’s harvest dream is in verses 5-8.

5 Now Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers they hated him even more. 6 He said to them, “Hear this dream that I have dreamed: 7 Behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and behold, my sheaf arose and stood upright. And behold, your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.”

14 Waltke, page 500, “Many commentators suggest it has something to do with royalty15 Boice16 Hughes, Genesis, page 43817 Walton, Genesis, page 663 and Inrig, “The Hebrew expression is ambiguous, used elsewhere only in 2 Samuel 13:18-19 where it refers to the garment of Tamar. The Hebrew text suggests a robe to the palm of the hands thus ‘long-sleeves’. The rendering ‘many colored’ comes from the Septuagint. 18 Waltke, page 50019 Ross, Creation and Blessing, page 59820 Walton, Genesis

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So here is Joseph explaining the dream to his brothers…

And here he’s showing them how their sheaves would bow down….

And finally here’s another picture of the actual sheaves bowing down as Joseph may have dreamed it.

8 His brothers said to him, “Are you indeed to reign over us? Or are you indeed to rule over us?” So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words.

Don’t miss the escalation of hatred…Vs. 4 they hated him and could not speak peacefully to himVs. 5 they hated him even more

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Vs. 8 they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words

{In the space of eleven verses, the family situation between Joseph and his brothers becomes “Cain-and-Abel” explosive.}

{And this is the family through whom God said He would bless the world. Clearly they need some work before God can use them to change the world}21

Joseph’s celestial dream is in verse 99 Then he dreamed another dream and told it to his brothers and said, “Behold, I have dreamed another dream. Behold, the sun, the moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.” Here’s a representation of the second dream…

It’s hard to represent the stars bowing!

Why did Joseph have two dreams? Later in the story we’ll learn a principle about dreams at least for this time in history--when a dream was given in two forms that means the matter has been firmly decided by God. Joseph will say that very thing to Pharaoh in Genesis 41…

Again we said that that’s for the particular time of history of our story

Look at verses 10-11

21 Inrig, page 35

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10 When he told his father as well as his brothers, his father rebuked him and said, “What is this dream you had? Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?” 11 His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the matter in mind. 22

{So what about dreams? We’re going to see that Joseph’s story is all about dreams. Does God

today show us his will in dreams? Does he speak to us in dreams? “It is worth noting how little

significance dreams have in the bible. The bible is a big book covering thousands of years of

history. But there are only three places where dreams figure prominently. In the Old

Testament they are restricted to Genesis and to Daniel. In the New Testament people

sometimes had visions, as John did on the isle of Patmos. But strictly speaking there were only

six dreams and these occur in Matthew. Did they reveal the future? Yes.

But largely at a time when the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments had not been given.”23

HERES THE BOTTOM LINE-- When we’re trying to discern God’s will it’s better that we look for

God’s will in the scriptures.}

Let’s also make the point that Joseph is a bit immature in the way he deals with his brothers. Is

he naïve? Is he arrogant? Is he out for revenge for all the bullying he’s taken? Why did he feel

the need to even tell his brothers the dreams? Where’s his judgment? One author said , God’s

future agent and mouthpiece could hardly make a worse first impression on his first

appearance: spoiled brat, talebearer, braggart. AND HERE’S THE BOTTOM LINE ON THAT--

OUR YOUNG MAN JOSEPH NEEDS SOME WORK DOESN’T HE? HE NEEDS SOME MATURING. And

that raises a question, HOW DOES GOD MATURE US? The short answer is difficulty, hard things.

But keep that issue at the back of your mind.

12 Now his brothers went to pasture their father’s flock near Shechem. 13 And Israel (again that’s another name for Jacob) said to Joseph, “Are not your brothers pasturing the flock at Shechem? Come, I will send you to them.” And he said to him, “Here I am.” 14 So he said to him, “Go now, see if it is well with your brothers and with the flock, and bring me word.” So he sent him from the Valley of Hebron, and he came to Shechem.

Let’s locate these place names on a map.

22 The Holy Bible : New International Version. electronic ed. Grand Rapids : Zondervan, 1996, c19823 Boice, Genesis Volume 3, page 951

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Now the family lived near Hebron. You can see Hebron toward the bottom of the slide, west of the Dead Sea.

And the brothers traveled up to Shechem, some 50 miles north 24…about a 5 day journey north.25 Seems like a long way to go to graze your sheep, doesn’t it? And secondly Shechem is the city in Genesis 34 where Simeon and Levi killed all the men and plundered everything. So it seems like a long way to go and a dangerous place to go. Maybe the brothers knew that the grazing was good there.

Look at verse 15-17…

15 And a man found him (Joseph) wandering in the fields. And the man asked him, “What are you seeking?” 16 “I am seeking my brothers,” he said. “Tell me, please, where they are pasturing the flock.” 17 And the man said, “They have gone away, for I heard them say, ‘Let us go to Dothan.’ ” So Joseph went after his brothers and found them at Dothan.

Now I don’t want you to miss how weird these verses are. Here’s Joseph, a well-dressed Hebrew wandering around in a place where his brothers recently killed all the men of the town. And an anonymous ‘all-knowing’ overly helpful man--we could say that he seemed a tad ‘omniscient’ walks up to Joseph and says basically, ‘You look lost! How can I help?’ And it just so happens that the anonymous man just happened to have overheard that the brothers and their flocks had headed up to Dothan. You can see Dothan on the map about “12 miles northwest of Shechem.”26

That such a mysterious stranger showed up at just the right time with all the information that Joseph needed, led many early Jewish rabbis to suggest that he was an angel in the form of a

24 Waltke, Genesis, page 50225 Hughes, Genesis, page 44426 Inrig, page 49

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man.27 Whoever he was, you have to chalk it up to God’s providential involvement. This is one of those details that cause people to say the Joseph story is all about providence. The unseen hand of the Lord is apparent here. God ‘s fingerprints are all over this story even though God is not mentioned in Genesis 37 at all.

Look at verses 18-20…

18 They saw him from afar--with a coat like this they could see him from miles away!-- and before he came near to them they conspired against him to kill him. 19 They said to one another, “Here comes this dreamer…. literally they say to one another…..“Here comes that “master of dreams” Notice how preoccupied they are with the dreams that Joseph shared with them. Joseph’s dreams really got under their skin.

{Now there’s irony here because the title “master dreamer” is actually the perfect title for Joseph when you consider his entire story….Joseph will become in a sense the master of dreams in Egypt. But here his brothers are making fun of him with that title.}

Verse 20….20 Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits. Then we will say that a fierce animal has devoured him, and we will see what will become of his dreams.”

What’s the best way to ensure that dreams don’t come true? Put an end to the dreamer himself! 28 Except when God is behind the dreams right?

So as Joseph approaches, their initial plan was to kill Joseph and throw him into one of the nearby pits. And the cover-up would be that a ferocious animal ate him.

21 But when Reuben the firstborn heard it, he rescued him out of their hands, saying, “Let us not take his life.” 22 And Reuben said to them, “Shed no blood; throw him into this pit here in the wilderness, but do not lay a hand on him”—that he might rescue him out of their hand to restore him to his father.

So Reuben, the first born, basically said, “Let’s not kill him…throw him into this pit here” for he was determined to save Joseph from his brother’s hands.

Why Reuben came to Joseph’s aid we don’t know29. Did he believe, as the firstborn, that he would be held responsible for what happened? Was he trying to get back in his father’s good graces after ravishing Jacob’s concubine in Genesis 35? What we can say is that God is protecting Joseph providentially. God’s unseen hand has moved the brothers from “Let’s kill

27 Matthews, Genesis, page 69528 Hartley, Genesis, page 31129 As to why Reuben had this moment of conscience we can only wonder. He was the first born; he would be held responsible for Joseph’s death. Perhaps he was trying to win his father’s heart back after the scandalous thing he did back in Genesis 35 when he went into his father’s concubine, Bilhah. Perhaps he saw this as his way back into his father’s good graces. That’s one side of it. The other side of it is that God is determined that Joseph is going to Egypt.

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him” to “Let’s throw him into this pit.” What would it be like for Joseph to hear his brothers deliberating--“Should we kill him?” or “Should we put him in this pit?” It would be a little like being on a cross and having the people at the foot of the cross gambling for your clothes!

Verse 23…23 So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe, the robe of many colors that he wore. 24 And they took him and threw him into a pit. The pit was empty; there was no water in it.

The verbs of verse 23 and 24 describe a brutal assault. “They stripped him” is a term to describe the “skinning of an animal” (Lev 1:6).30

One writer described it this way…“Like a pack of dogs, his …brothers were upon him, scratching and pulling the hated coat from him and likely his remaining clothing, finally dumping him like a dead body into a pit so deep and vertical that he could not climb out.”31

They threw Joseph into a cistern32 which was dug to collect water. Archaeologists have found a large number of cisterns all over Israel. Here is a picture of one.

Though it’s not recorded here, we know from the brother’s testimony later in the story that Joseph was pleading for his life.33 Reuben, help! Naphtali, Dan, help me! Judah, this is wrong! Help! Look again at the end of verse 24… The pit was empty and there was no water in it.

Joseph encountered an explosion of evil and we want to know “Where is God?” For all the times when you and I experience hard things--betrayal, rejection, persecution--let’s get a sounding from you. What difficult things have you experienced?

30 Hughes, Genesis, page 44531 Hughes, Genesis, page 44632 “Archaeologists have found a large number of cisterns all over Israel. They were typically shaped like a bottle with a small opening at the top, and often covered with a stone. They were hewn deep in the rock, and the narrow vertical shaft near the top was for letting down pitchers. In most cases they would be water-proofed with plaster made from burnt and slaked lime.” Hamilton, Genesis, page 418 33 Genesis 42:2121 They said to one another, “Surely we are being punished because of our brother. We saw how distressed he was when he pleaded with us for his life, but we would not listen; that’s why this distress has come upon us.”

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Where is God when we encounter evil? Couldn’t we broaden the question? Where is God when our heath fails? When the diagnosis is the last thing we want to hear? When our finances run out? When suffering is our lot? Where is God?

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Well as we bring our time to a close, three takeaways….

1. Our families can be very painful places but God can use the difficulty and pain we experience in them for his purposes.

The Bible is not silent about the presence of pain in families.

After the first family, Adam and Eve, rebelled against God, you know what happened to their children Cain and Abel.

In Joseph’s family there were four mothers who were always competing with each other. And that competition between the mothers had to show up among the 12 brothers. And to make it worse for Joseph and Benjamin--their mother had died when Benjamin was born so they were left to fend for themselves. There was lots of pain in Joseph’s family. We could say they were the poster family for dysfunctionality. But is all that brokenness beyond God’s providential hand?

I remember having a short discussion with one of our Trek girls several years ago. In a moment of candor she said, “God really screwed up when he gave me my mom and dad.” She had encountered a lot of hurt in her family and she blamed her parents for all of it.

But the truth from Joseph’s story is that God is powerful to bring good from all of that pain.

2. Our lives are lived Coram Deo!

What does that mean? Our lives are lived in the presence of God. He sees everything in our lives. He sees the trials we are going through. He sees our concerns, our struggles. And he is committed to help us through it all. Doesn’t Psalm 139 say as much?

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Psalm 139:7–10 (ESV)

7  Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence?

8  If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!

9  If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,

10  even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.

Our lives are lived coram Deo…our lives are lived in the presence of God

3. When evil explodes around us, God is still present.

This is hard isn’t it? Why would God allow evil? Why would he stand by as one of his dear children encountered an explosion of evil? If we take the entire story of Joseph in view, we could say that God allows such terrible things because He’s got some big purpose coming down the pike. We’ve got to trust that he can take all things --even the evil actions and hatred of siblings--and bring good out of them.

Each week we’re together I will include a story that illustrates the idea that God’s Got Us in His Grip. On the back of your sermon notes you’ll see the first story…

God’s Got Us in His Grip, Story #1

Benjamin Warfield taught at Princeton Seminary for 34 years until his death in 1921. Students still read his books today but few know his story. In 1876, at age twentyfive, he married Annie Kinkead. On their honeymoon, in an intense storm, lightning struck Annie and permanently paralyzed her. Warfield cared for her until she died in 1915. Because of her extreme needs, Warfield seldom left his home for more than two hours at a time during thirty-nine years of marriage.

Warfield viewed his personal trials through the lens of Romans 8:28-29 and wrote this:

“The fundamental thought is the universal government of God. All that comes to you is under his controlling hand. The secondary thought is the favor of God to those that love Him. If He governs all, then nothing but good can befall those to whom He would do good….And He will so govern all things that we shall reap only good from all that befalls us.”

Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him! Ps. 34:8

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