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Dinner with some friends.

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They're from another state.

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They're vacationing in Pismo Beach.

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So we made the sacrifice to go to Pismo Beach to join them for dinner on Thursday night.

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As we were driving south on 101 toward Morgan Hill, and you know you get out of the city

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and you're just starting to see the open space and you're feeling good, and I had a big smile

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on my face and I turned to Jeanette and I said, this is the life, isn't it?

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Out on the open road.

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And she gave me one of those looks like you and I are on different pages.

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I love the open road.

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She, well let's just say enjoys it less than I do.

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But I thought to myself that life is an awful lot like an open road trip, isn't it?

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Life has a destination, but it holds many detours and stops along the way.

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Life is a journey.

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It's about the journey as much as it is about the destination itself.

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Nothing like a road trip with life, you need a map.

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You need a map to tell you where the destination is and where you are in relation to that goal.

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Life is an awful lot like a road trip.

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I heard about a man who was traveling in Texas.

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He was heading toward Brownsville and he came to a fork in the road, didn't know which way

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to go, and there was a rancher standing over in the field.

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And he said to him, hey old timer, I'm heading for Brownsville.

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Does it make any difference which road I take?

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The rancher looked at him and said, no, not to me it don't.

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Well, it may not to him, but it makes a big difference to the one who's on the journey.

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As we come to our text today in Genesis chapter 50 and conclude this series on the life of

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Joseph.

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We see that Joseph is about to arrive at his destination after living 110 years.

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We've traced the journey of his life giving thanks to God for such an unblemished example

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of one who lived a God-centered life.

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I think perhaps only Daniel equals Joseph in the record of the Old Testament as one

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who had no unblemished record as far as the word of God is concerned.

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And one of the things that we admire about Joseph is that Joseph never allowed himself

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to become the victim of the detours and the stops of his journey.

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As he traveled along the road, he suffered many losses, great losses, but Joseph endured

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through them and his faith was ultimately rewarded.

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In your journey this morning, you may be at a fork in the road or at a rest stop or a

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detour, or maybe you've come to a screeching halt because of something that's happened

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in your life.

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And you're facing change, you're facing interruption, you're perhaps even facing the loss of your

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dream.

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It's possible that like Joseph, your future may be quite different than what you've always

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dreamed it would be.

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What you need to understand is that this is a time of test for you.

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It is a time when it will be made known what you have chosen to build your life on.

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And the thing I hope to write in your heart and mind this morning is this, that our faith

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foundation is made especially evident as you and I encounter loss, or as we face interruption,

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or as we go through change.

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It's true with Joseph.

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We find out what his faith rested on because of what he experienced.

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I ask myself the question, how do you strengthen the faith foundation of your life in times

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like these?

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In times of detour, times of change, times of screeching to a halt, how do you strengthen

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your faith foundation?

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I believe there are several answers we could give.

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One is that you need to look to your past.

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Look to the past and ask yourself the question, how has God already proven himself to me?

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Because we tend to do that, don't we?

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We forget what God has done in the past.

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I was with the men in the men's Bible study last Tuesday night and we saw that as the

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people of Israel got out of the Red Sea and they were away from the bondage of Egypt,

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the first thing they did was to what?

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They started grumbling.

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And in chapters 15 and 16 and 17, you see the people of God complaining to God, complaining

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to Moses about the lack of food, the lack of water.

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They forgot already what God had done.

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So when you and I are in the time of test, we need to ask ourselves, how has God already

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proven himself to me?

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And then secondly, look at the present.

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What is God saying to me right now?

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You say, well, I don't know what God is saying to me in what I'm passing through in my journey.

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Then ask him.

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God's not trying to keep it a secret from you.

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Ask God what he's doing and then remember you have to be quiet enough to listen to what

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he has to say.

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Because that's the issue.

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It's a great quote I want to share with you by C.S. Lewis.

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It says, God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks to us in our conscience, but shouts

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in our pains.

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It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.

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If you're going through the pain of some detour in your life and your journey is uncertain

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today, God perhaps is shouting to you.

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Ask him.

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Lord, what are you saying?

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So look to your past, look to your present, then look to the future.

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And ask yourself the question, what are the promises of God that I can claim in this time

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of testing?

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By taking these three looks and asking those three questions, you will be able to strengthen

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your faith.

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You will be able to build your faith foundation.

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Now Joseph's faith foundation was solid, like his parent Jacob and his grandparents Isaac

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and Abraham.

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He is listed too in the great hall of faith of Hebrews chapter 11, where it says in verse

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22, by faith Joseph, when he was dying, that's chapter 50 where we are today, when he was

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dying, made mention of the exodus of the sons of Israel, that they would one day leave Egypt

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and gave orders concerning his bones.

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Joseph was believing God as his journey came to an end.

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Now Joseph in his journey had helped his family, but beyond helping his family, he was able

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to see also the future that God had for them.

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When our faith foundation is in the living God as was Joseph's foundation, we have the

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privilege of bringing blessing to others and in the end, God's reward for ourselves.

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I don't know of a better way to live, do you?

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When we have a faith foundation that rests upon the living God, we bring blessing to

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others as we go through the journey and when the journey concludes, we receive God's reward.

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What did Joseph believe?

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What did he believe about God that empowered him to overcome such loss and tragedy in his

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life with such grace and character as he did?

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As we examine even this chapter, chapter 50, I'd like for you to look at three statements

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that express the essence of Joseph's belief.

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I would like you to look at these three statements as like three bricks that you can put into

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your own faith foundation for your life journey.

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The end of chapter 49 and the first part of chapter 50 records for us the death of his

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father Jacob and how the Jacob was buried back in Canaan.

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When all of that was finished, we come to verse 15 in the chapter and that's where I

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pick it up for the first point and it says this, that when Joseph's brothers saw that

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their father was dead, they said, what if Joseph holds a grudge against us and pays

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us back for all the wrongs we did to him?

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So they sent word to Joseph saying, your father left these instructions before he died.

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Oh really?

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If he did, we don't have any record of it.

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Maybe he did, more probably he didn't.

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But these are the words at least that they say, he said, this is what you're to say

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to Joseph.

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I ask you to forgive your brothers the sins and the wrongs they committed in treating

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you so badly.

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Now please forgive the sins of the servants of the God of your father.

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When their message came to him, Joseph wept.

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Isn't that interesting?

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Here's the first statement.

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You can trust God with the hurts of your life.

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You can trust God with your hurts.

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I believe we see that in Joseph right here.

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Now the issue of his brother's crimes against him resurfaces at an interesting point and

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we can understand their fear.

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After their father died, they were worried that Joseph would now use this opportunity

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to retaliate against them.

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You see for these years they have carried with them their guilt and they've worried

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about the retaliation for the past.

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They said, oh now Joseph may hold a grudge.

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He may pay us back and so they confessed their crimes to him.

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They use words like the wrongs we did, the sins we did.

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We treated you badly.

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In essence they say, Joseph we've harmed you.

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We've trespassed.

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We've crossed a line of what's right in treating you the way we did.

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We did offensive things to you Joseph and our father before he died had this message

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to give to you now.

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Please forgive your brothers.

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To forgive means to release them from their responsibility.

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And when Joseph heard this plea for forgiveness, he breaks down into tears and I wonder why

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there are two possible answers.

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I think the better one is that Joseph wept because he had already forgiven his brothers

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17 years before this.

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And he weeps to think that his brothers didn't get the message then and that for these years

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they have unnecessarily carried with them the burden of this guilt.

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He weeps to realize that now after proving himself to them for 17 years they still don't

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trust him.

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So Joseph reassures them with these words.

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He says, don't be afraid.

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I'm not in the place of God.

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What is he saying?

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He's saying I have forgiven you and I'm not in God's place.

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Remember when we talked about forgiveness a few weeks ago?

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How Joseph forgave his brothers?

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We said that what forgiveness really is that you release the other person from what they

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did.

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You don't hold it against them any longer.

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It doesn't mean that what they did was okay, but it means that you're not going to hold

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it against them.

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You're not going to take revenge on them.

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And that you give to God the right for any judgment.

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You give it up yourself.

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That's what Joseph means here.

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He says I did forgive you 17 years ago.

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I'm not God.

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God is the one who judges.

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The rule of all things belongs to God.

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And Joseph responds to them with words of grace and mercy.

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I want to ask you a question.

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On your life's journey, have you come into a detour?

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Have you gotten bogged down on the journey because you're hanging on to your hurts?

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Are you holding your hurts against those who injured you?

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Unforgiveness says I hold you accountable to me.

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I have a grudge against you and I'm looking for a chance to get even.

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And I want you to hurt like I've hurt.

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And that unforgiveness can detour you on your life's journey and destroy the reward that

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God wants to give you at the end of it.

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But forgiveness releases the hurt to God.

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Who is the judge?

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And it no longer holds the grudge against the person accountable for it.

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Paul writes in Colossians 3, bear with each other and forgive.

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Forgive whatever grievances you may have against another.

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Forgive just as the Lord has forgiven you.

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Do you want to live like the overcomer we sang about earlier in the service?

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Are you today enduring some loss?

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Because of what someone did to you?

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Are you hanging on to that?

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If you want to be the overcomer, if you want to journey with a firm foundation, you have

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to put in place this brick.

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And here's the statement that I would put on the screen for us to look at.

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I must be able to say I can trust God with my hurts.

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Would you read that with me?

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I can trust God with my hurts.

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One more time, I can trust God with my hurts.

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I can trust God.

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If I can say that, then my faith response follows on it.

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And here is the faith response.

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I will what?

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I give my hurts to God.

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I will forgive.

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You put that into place in your life.

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Like Joseph, you will journey on in your life, be a blessing to others.

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But if you hang on to bitterness, you will curse those who come in contact with you,

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including those closest to you.

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I can trust God with my hurts.

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I can release them to Him.

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I will forgive.

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Would you say that with me?

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I will forgive.

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But as we move on in the text, there is another statement that we can see in Joseph's faith.

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It's part of his faith foundation.

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It's a brick I hope that you would put into your faith foundation.

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We're going to pick up the reading in verse 20 where it says, you intended to harm me.

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This is Joseph speaking.

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But God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many

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lives.

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So then, don't be afraid.

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I will provide for you and your children.

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And He reassured them and spoke kindly to them.

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Brick number two for your faith foundation would say this.

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You can trust God with your circumstances.

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What I've just read really is the key to the whole story of Joseph.

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The key to it is this, that God overrode the evil intentions of His brothers in order to

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achieve His divine purpose in Joseph's life.

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Notice the word intended used twice.

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You intended, but God intended.

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That word is the picture of fabric being woven together.

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The strings coming together.

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What it's saying is that Joseph's brothers wove together a scheme that was evil.

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But behind their weaving was the master weaver and he was weaving something different.

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And it was good.

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God weaves together the strings of the fabric of your story too.

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There is absolutely nothing that can come against you that will present an obstacle

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for God.

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God is bigger than it all.

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Nothing can prevent Him from what He determines for your life.

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Romans chapter eight.

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I have it there in your notes for you.

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Just look at it with me.

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Can anything ever separate us from Christ's love?

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Does it mean He is no longer, He no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity or

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are persecuted or hungry or destitute or in danger or threatened with death?

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Or you lose half of your retirement?

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Or your home is put up for sale by the bank?

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Or your spouse leaves you?

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Well it doesn't really say that does it?

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But that's what it means.

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Whatever loss you have encountered, nothing can separate you from the love of Christ.

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Nothing.

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And so He goes on to say, and I want you to underline these words, verse 37, know despite

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all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ who loved us.

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Overwhelming victory.

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Your journey may be taking you through lost dreams right now like it did Joseph.

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You may be on a detour because of things that have happened to you and you felt like the

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victim.

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Does Joseph understand, understand those feelings?

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My friend, whatever comes against you, you are already in Jesus Christ, an overwhelming

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conqueror.

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Nothing can succeed against you.

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As we are looking to Tuesday, an election day, we do not know yet the outcome of it.

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We face the possibility of loss on several things that are important to us.

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May I say to you that it's important to get out and vote and do our part as Christian

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citizens?

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But in the end if our cause or our candidate wins, let's not think, oh thank God, we've

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found the answer to the problems of our country.

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And if our candidate loses, let's not think, oh dear God, what's going to happen now?

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Because in Jesus Christ, whatever the outcome of the election, we who are the people of

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God are already the victors.

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We're already the victors.

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We don't have to worry about it.

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Now we can be disappointed, but we are the victors.

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We have a statement that we can make, and that statement is this, I can trust God with

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my circumstances.

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I can trust God with my circumstances.

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Would you say that please?

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Would your circumstances be those of loneliness today, or a financial crisis of some sort,

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or health, or divorce, or betrayal, or you're looking for a job?

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Put this into your faith foundation.

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I can trust God with my circumstances.

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And so my faith choice, my faith choice is this.

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I will be what?

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Confident.

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I'm not going to be depressed.

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I'm not going to be disillusioned.

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I'm not going to be overwhelmed.

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I'm not going to be the victim.

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I will be confident because I can trust God with all of my circumstances, and whatever

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comes against me is not greater than God's sovereign purpose for my life.

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What a great part of a foundation to trust God with your circumstances.

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Joseph did.

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He was a blessing to others.

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He got reward in the end because this was present in his life.

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As we look further into the text, we see that there was yet another statement, a faith concept

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in Joseph.

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In verse 22 it says, Joseph stayed in Egypt along with all his father's family.

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And in that one sentence, 54 years pass.

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Joseph lived 110 years.

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And he saw the third generation of Ephraim's children and the children of Maker, son of

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Manasseh, were placed at birth on Joseph's knees.

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Then Joseph said to his brothers, I am about to die.

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But God, but God will surely come to your aid and take you up out of this land to the

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land he promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

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And Joseph made the sons of Israel swear on an oath and said, God will surely come to

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your aid and then you must carry my bones up from this place.

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And so Joseph died at the age of 110.

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And after they embalmed him, he was placed in a coffin in Egypt.

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He was buried in Egypt.

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But Joseph had this as part of his faith foundation.

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You can trust God with your future.

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Even out of his lifetime, he knew what the future held.

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We come here to a significant point.

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Joseph is 110 and most probably when it says he said to his brothers, it doesn't mean his

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literal brothers because most of them are probably dead too by this time.

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But he's talking to their descendants.

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And what's happening here is a generation is passing.

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It's a very significant time.

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And he's speaking to the next generation.

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And after that generation will come another generation and another generation.

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And with each generation, the people will become more comfortable in Egypt until they're

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put into slavery.

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And then they cry out to God in their bondage some 400 years after they went down into Egypt.

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And God sends them a deliverer and the person of Moses who's writing this story for us by

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the inspiration of God's Spirit.

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A generation is passing.

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Those are critical times in families and in nations.

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We as a nation are losing a generation.

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Tom Brokaw called it the greatest generation.

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The generation that fought World War II.

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Born beginning in 1901 up through about 1924, the youngest of the greatest generations today

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would be 84.

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Some of you fall in to this generation.

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But we're losing this generation.

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The values of this generation were dedication, sacrifice, hard work, conformity, law and

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order, respect for authority, patience, delayed reward, duty before pleasure, adherence to

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rules.

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We're losing that generation with its values.

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This is a critical time for us.

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And this election is critical.

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I was telling Dave as we were walking into the church together this morning that as I

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look out in our country today and I listen to what's being said and I see what's happening,

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I feel like our nation is in a period similar to the 1930s in Germany.

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We are at the cusp of change in this nation, however the election goes.

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And you and I say, I can trust God with my future.

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Joseph had seen his father pass away and in fact it so struck him apparently that when

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he dies he uses some of the same words his father died with.

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And in doing so he acknowledges the continuity of the covenant that God had made with his

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father, his grandfather and his great grandfather.

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And he speaks to the next generation and he points them to the faithfulness of God in

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their family.

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And he expresses his own faith about the future by the command concerning his bones.

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He knows he will be buried in Egypt but he doesn't want his bones to rest in Egypt and

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when the children of Israel left some hundreds of years later they took with them the coffin

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of this man because of the oath that was sworn on this occasion.

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You see Joseph would die in Egypt but his heart was already in Canaan.

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He knew what the future held because the future was secured by what God had already said.

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The loss of his dream to return to Canaan he knew would be realized one day in the future

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and the reason he wanted his body there was so that when he was resurrected he would be

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there.

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He didn't want to travel in time.

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He wanted to be there.

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As you and I face change and our journey with a lot of others is entering into a very uncertain

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time in our nation it will be very possible for us to get hung up in our journey to get

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detoured and sidetracked and come to a screeching halt if we don't have this brick in our faith

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foundation.

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You can trust God with the what?

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The future.

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In fact I have a statement.

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I can trust God with my future.

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Would you say that with me?

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For my faith choice is this.

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I will be what?

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Optimistic.

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Optimistic.

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I'm not going to be gloomy and down in the mouth.

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I don't care what happens on Tuesday.

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And I'll tell you why because I know the end of the story.

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I know who's in charge of history.

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No matter what happens on Tuesday he's the one in control.

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Joseph knew that.

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Do you know that?

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Let's build our lives on that truth not upon an election and its outcome.

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Let's build our lives on the promises of God.

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What God has already said he's secured and that is our future.

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Now these bricks for your faith foundation are important because what you believe determines

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how you live and how you die.

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You see it in Joseph.

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If you live by faith in the living God your faith foundation will embrace these bricks

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and you as a result will be a blessing to others as you go through your journey and

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when your journey is done you will receive God's reward.

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I have a statement I want to read to you up here about God.

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God's invitation is this.

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00:31:47,120 --> 00:31:52,880
He invites you to build your faith on the only foundation that will support you through

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00:31:52,880 --> 00:32:00,760
the rest of life's journey, take you to heaven when it's over to receive his reward and leave

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00:32:00,760 --> 00:32:03,880
blessing behind in the lives of others.

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00:32:03,880 --> 00:32:09,240
Is that the kind of life you want?

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There's the foundation.

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No other foundation can anyone lay than Jesus Christ.

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That's what God says.

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If you build your life upon him you will have the kind of a life that Joseph did in your

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generation.

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Your life journey will face all kinds of temptations and you may come to forks in the road and

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you may have a detour now and then but if your life is built upon this kind of a foundation

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00:32:37,520 --> 00:32:42,400
as you move along through life with all of its issues and all of its trials and all of

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00:32:42,400 --> 00:32:48,080
its losses you will bless people as you pass by.

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00:32:48,080 --> 00:32:56,240
As you touch them you will bless them and then when your years are done you'll be called

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00:32:56,240 --> 00:33:01,800
home to receive God's reward for a life well lived.

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00:33:01,800 --> 00:33:04,920
I can't think of a better way to live, can you?

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Is that your foundation?

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00:33:08,280 --> 00:33:14,160
If it's not Jesus Christ can become your foundation today if you'll simply receive him into your

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life as an act of faith and say I believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God that he

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died for my sins on the cross that he rose again from the dead and I receive him into

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my life as my Lord and my Savior.

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David and I as sub-elders went yesterday at the invitation of a family to pray with a

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man who has only attended here on occasion.

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He's been a hard working man seeking to provide for his family.

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00:33:49,240 --> 00:33:54,640
He belongs to a union and he's been a carpenter in his life and he has put out his best effort

427
00:33:54,640 --> 00:34:01,800
to provide for them but in September something was wrong and he went to the doctor and the

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00:34:01,800 --> 00:34:07,240
doctor performed some tests and he got the call saying there's a spot on your kidney

429
00:34:07,240 --> 00:34:10,080
and we know it's cancer.

430
00:34:10,080 --> 00:34:12,880
You need to come in.

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00:34:12,880 --> 00:34:19,600
So they performed surgery and the cancer has already spread to his lungs.

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He got that word and at that point it seemed like everything was hopeless.

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Now they have a treatment that they may be trying that will give him an 8% chance of

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living.

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00:34:37,200 --> 00:34:41,520
But that night that he got the news he went to bed and he woke up at 3 o'clock in the

436
00:34:41,520 --> 00:34:45,960
morning because that had been his routine for years and he got down on his knees beside

437
00:34:45,960 --> 00:34:52,920
his bed and he says God I need you and he opened his heart to the Lord and God has come

438
00:34:52,920 --> 00:34:54,600
into his life and is changing him.

439
00:34:54,600 --> 00:34:56,920
It's an amazing thing to see.

440
00:34:56,920 --> 00:35:00,760
He's very vocal about his faith.

441
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He's ready to go and meet the Lord if that's what the Lord wants but he says I'd like to

442
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live here too and be with my family a little while longer.

443
00:35:06,840 --> 00:35:12,000
He's got teenagers.

444
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You don't have to wait to a point like that.

445
00:35:15,240 --> 00:35:20,720
You can make the decision today and God's invitation is that you would receive his son,

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00:35:20,720 --> 00:35:23,840
Jesus Christ.

447
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Build your life on what will last for your journey.

448
00:35:30,880 --> 00:35:32,880
Let's pray.

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00:35:32,880 --> 00:35:39,120
Father, thank you for your presence here this morning with us.

450
00:35:39,120 --> 00:35:46,200
Thank you for the wonderful example of Joseph's life and I pray that every one of us will

451
00:35:46,200 --> 00:35:53,880
put into place in our lives these bricks, these truths that will see us through the

452
00:35:53,880 --> 00:35:56,040
journey.

453
00:35:56,040 --> 00:36:02,700
We trust you with our hearts Lord and we choose to forgive.

454
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We trust you with our circumstances.

455
00:36:07,260 --> 00:36:09,800
We trust you with our future.

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00:36:09,800 --> 00:36:18,480
Lord, we choose to be optimistic about life because you're the living God.

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And if some of us have gotten into detours or we have stopped along the way and we're

458
00:36:22,240 --> 00:36:29,280
in that slew of depression and we're kind of lost out there in the journey, I pray today

459
00:36:29,280 --> 00:36:37,800
we'll make some decisions to get back on the road and journey on with you.

460
00:36:37,800 --> 00:36:45,360
Father I pray especially for that one who's here today without Christ as the foundation.

461
00:36:45,360 --> 00:36:51,320
Right now open that heart to receive Jesus with our heads bowed and our eyes closed.

462
00:36:51,320 --> 00:36:58,720
If you're here today and you have never before received Jesus Christ into your life as Lord

463
00:36:58,720 --> 00:37:05,760
and Savior, if you're building your life on other foundations that have and will surely

464
00:37:05,760 --> 00:37:11,720
fail you, will you choose today in the midst of whatever you're passing through, whatever

465
00:37:11,720 --> 00:37:17,640
your loss has been to say I want Jesus Christ as my solid foundation.

466
00:37:17,640 --> 00:37:19,240
I receive him this morning.

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00:37:19,240 --> 00:37:22,440
Would you just lift your hand to say that?

468
00:37:22,440 --> 00:37:26,280
God bless you.

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00:37:26,280 --> 00:37:30,760
Anyone else?

470
00:37:30,760 --> 00:37:35,040
I want that foundation for my life.

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00:37:35,040 --> 00:37:41,200
Father thank you for what you have said to us in your word and how it instructs us and

472
00:37:41,200 --> 00:37:46,600
builds our lives so that we can live, so that we can journey through life and be a blessing

473
00:37:46,600 --> 00:37:51,360
to others and then someday receive your reward.

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00:37:51,360 --> 00:37:55,240
So help us to live that way I pray with Christ as our solid rock.

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In his name I pray, amen.