The Bones of Joseph

By faith Joseph, when he was dying, made mention of the exodus of the sons of Israel, and gave orders concerning his bones. Hebrews 11:22

Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to die, but God will surely take care of you and bring you up from this land to the land which He promised on oath to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob.” Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely take care of you, and you shall carry my bones up from here.” So Joseph died at the age of one hundred and ten years; and he was embalmed and placed in a coffin in Egypt. Genesis 50:24-26

Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for he had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear, saying, “God will surely take care of you, and you shall carry my bones from here with you.” Exodus 13:19

Joseph was Jacob’s favorite son. Jacob already had ten sons by Leah, Leah’s servant-girl and Rachael’s servant-girl before Rachel was ever able to conceive. Rachel was Jacob’s favorite wife. Theirs is a rather sordid story. Rachel’s father, Laban was at least as conniving as Jacob, and he had tricked Jacob into marrying Rachel’s older sister first. These Old Testament women seemed to have a practice of using their female servants as surrogates to conceive and bear children for their husbands. It was an unsatisfactory substitute, in the cases we are told about. Nevertheless, these were all sons of Jacob; but when Joseph was born, he became the center of his father’s world. We would expect the older sons to be jealous. Genesis chapter 30 gives us the story of Joseph’s birth. Then chapters 37-50 tell about the life of Joseph and his rise to power in Egypt.

Even more than the obvious favoritism, Joseph possessed special gifts of spiritual perception, and was an interpreter of dreams. In his dreams as a youth, he was portrayed as superior to his brothers, who would someday bow to him as an authority. He was a good boy, but apparently couldn’t resist telling his dreams. This incensed his brothers, who schemed to get rid of him. When the opportunity came, they convinced Jacob that Joseph had been devoured by a wild beast. They had actually sold Joseph into slavery, when a caravan came by going to Egypt.

In Egypt, Joseph’s special gifts and high integrity combined to make him second in command to Pharaoh. He was given total control of the economy of Egypt at a time when all the surrounding lands were in famine. Eventually, Jacob and his sons had to relocate to Egypt to escape the famine in Canaan. They were in submission to Joseph, whom they did not recognize, and he put them through the ringer. Not maliciously, really, because he was happy to see them. He was ecstatic to see his little brother Benjamin, and Jacob, when they came. Joseph arranged to have his family stay in Egypt with their herds, and make their life there.

Even though the brothers had done a terrible thing to Joseph, he had forgiven them. He knew God had protected and promoted him, in spite of their ill will at the time of the misdeed. God had a plan for Joseph and for Israel that included their stay in Egypt, and those early men of faith understood the principle of Romans 8:28, “all things work together for good to those who love God and are the called according to His purpose.” Joseph had no doubt that this was the direct will of God for him and his family. Genesis 45:5-8 clearly spells out Joseph’s divine viewpoint, “God sent me before you to preserve life….it was not you who sent me here, but God.”

That Pharaoh was kind to the Hebrews because of Joseph, and they did very well in Egypt for many generations afterward. At age 110, Joseph was dying, and he made his family swear they would not bury him in Egypt. He knew they would someday return to Canaan, the land of promise, and when they went, he wanted his bones to go with them. His body was embalmed and placed in a mummy case and kept above ground for the coming centuries, as a memorial.

The next Pharaohs were not as benevolent toward the Hebrews. They became enslaved and oppressed for a time, but they always had Joseph’s memorial as a reminder of Whose they were, where they had come from and where they would return someday. This was before the Bible was written. They had the oral history of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and their covenant with God. The Hebrew parents would tell their children about the patriarchs and the promises, and they had the visible sarcophagus as an encouragement for their faith. “Our father Joseph knew that our people would go out of Egypt someday, back to the land God gave our father Abraham. When we go, we will take Joseph’s bones with us.” It became their tangible symbol of God’s perfect Word.

The faith that Joseph represented not only stabilized him for all his life in a foreign land, it also stabilized his people, as it gave each generation of Jews a confidence (hope) in their future, as the people of God. They had the bones of Joseph for the duration of their time in Egypt, and all those years they had to wander after the exodus, they had those bones with them.

Those bones represented the grace provision of God, the certain fulfillment of God’s promises, and the sovereign authority of the God who “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

Joseph knew the character of God. He believed the promises of God. He fully expected that God would “visit” the Hebrews and deliver them out of slavery someday. He made plans accordingly.

That was the faith of Joseph.