Year 7, Day 41: Genesis 42

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Just because one is righteous does not mean that one cannot enjoy a little bit of sport.  I know this lesson very much from being a pastor and being a teacher.  When trying to get another person to learn something, there are multiple approaches.  You can lecture the right answer and let the person learn passively.  You can set the student free to discover the answer themselves.  Or, you can disciple the student by asking leading questions that lead the student to the answer.  There are proper times to choose each of these techniques.  The third technique is my personal favorite, though.

In order to lead the student through a series of guided questions – those in the know call this the Socratic Method, named after its designer, Socrates – know that dialogue and conversation are the key.  The disciple maker asks questions that continually push the learner to the edge of their knowledge base in order to cause them to learn more.  As the disciple learns, the disciple maker pushes a little further.  In this way, the student grows.  The student always feels precariously close to the tipping point of overextending, but the disciple-maker always has the disciple securely in their hands.

This process is often made more fun when the disciple-maker, or master teacher, has a sense of play.  When the master teacher can use their sense of play to create relationship, the learning becomes personal, intimate, and a genuinely shared experience that is eventually enjoyed by all.

This is what Joseph is doing to his brothers.  They are at all times safe in his hands.  The problem is that the brothers do not realize it.  They don’t recognize Joseph.  However, Joseph takes this opportunity to help them get up to speed with how God has been moving in their life.  Joseph wants to teach them to trust God and to realize that God was able to take their sinful act of selling him as a slave into a great thing.

However, Joseph doesn’t just lecture them.  They wouldn’t have learned the lesson as well by just giving them the answer.  They wouldn’t have learned the lesson by listening to one of Joseph’s sermons.  Joseph teaches the lesson to the brothers by guiding them through a series of situations.  First, there is the interview.  Then, there is the imprisonment.  Then, there is the return trip home leaving Simeon in Egypt.  Then, there is the debate with their father about bringing Benjamin.

In all of these things, the brothers perpetually feel like their life could come crumbling down at any moment.  They are fearful for Benjamin and fearful for Simeon.  They are afraid of the wrath of their father.  What they don’t know, and can’t know, is that they whole time they are resting quite safely in Joseph’s most skilled hands.  Even more importantly, they are learning that they rest completely and securely in God’s most capable hands. 

That’s a great thing to learn.  I love Joseph’s playful method of teaching this lesson to his brothers.  I don’t think it is mean-spirited or in bad taste at all.  Joseph keeps them safe while constantly putting them on the edge of their comfort zone.

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