God is > Your Betrayers

WELCOME
Pastor Chris Paavola:
Thank you, band. Hey everybody. Good morning. Happy Father’s Day to you guys. My name is Chris Paola. I’m the senior pastor here at St. Mark, and it’s great to be with you on this Father’s Day. I know you got plans for today, whether it’s golfing or grilling or opening homemade cards or whatever it might be, watching the US Open. Whatever you’re doing today, just really grateful and thankful that you decided to include St. Mark and those plans, and I think God’s going to bless you for taking the time to just be with him this morning and with his people. So thank you so much for being here. Honestly, happy Father’s Day to you guys, uncles, grandpas, dads, brothers, all of you who are father figures to us. Thank you for who you are. And yeah, just everything that you are to us. Actually, today it’s kind of fitting because in week two of our series, greater Than We’re looking at the lives of these people who are called the patriarchs of the faith.
And today we’re looking at this guy named Joseph. We’re kind of in the second week of this and like you heard from Xylinn a minute ago, Joseph, 2000 years before Jesus as this young man, brilliant managerial mind, and we met him last week and this week is really the catalyst event in his life where everything changes. And man, at the beginning, at the end of today’s account, it begins and it ends with a picture with his father. And in the middle of it is this betrayal, just betrayal. And it’s kind of a hard theme for Father’s Day. But as we look at this, we needed to talk about just betrayal. And when we look at it, we’re going to see three distinct ways that we can respond when we are betrayed. And honestly, if I took a microphone and put it right here and asked anyone who’s been betrayed to come forward and share a story of betrayal, I think we’d be here all day.
Every single one of us have been betrayed in some way. And there’s kind of the first level of betrayal. And then second, right? So, the first level of betrayal is just this idea of a social contract we have with somebody. There’s an expectation, and they fail to do that, intentionally fail to do that expectation we have with them. So, this would be like you’re in a relationship with someone and you find out they’re texting someone else or you share a secret with them, and then they put it on blast to all their friends, and suddenly this very private thing has gone very public, and that’s betrayal. Or you have a coworker who withheld information for personal gain and they betrayed you in a workplace. And we’ve all experienced that kind of betrayal where there’s just this agreement. But then there’s another level of betrayal where the person gives the appearance of loyalty, but actually they’re deceiving you.
They give the appearance of being faithful, but there’s actually unfaithfulness at work and they, they’re wearing this disguise as looking like an ally, but really they’re an enemy. And that’s when betrayal becomes really sinister. And that’s what we see in the story with Joseph today. And again, as we look at this, we’re going to see ways that we can respond to betrayal. Whether you’re betrayed now, you’re going through a betrayal or you will be betrayed in the future. And actually, it brings us to a place that’s really appropriate to Father’s Day, but we have some work to do if we’re going to get there.

ABOUT JOSEPH
So, this starts out, Joseph, like we said, 2000 years before Jesus, brilliant young managerial mind. He’s the beloved son of his father Jacob. He has 11 brothers. And these 10 brothers, we assume that the 10 brothers are off managing his father’s herds up in Shechem.
And so Jacob sends Joseph to check him and check him on the sheep Dad joke, father’s Day. So anyway, so he sends Joseph to go check him and check him, and he gets up there and Joseph being the brilliant manager he is, sees these guys who are just not good at managing. And he’s just like, are you kidding me right now? These guys are terrible. And he goes back and tells his father, well again, Jacob sends Joseph back again to check on his brothers. And when they see him coming, the brothers see Joseph wearing this robe that his father gave him. And when the director of what to do theater goes to your church, you have access to this kind of stuff. So yeah, he looks ridiculous in this thing as I do too.
Stop smiling so much, Ken. All right. So anyway, he’s wearing this robe, and this robe is a robe that distinguishes him. It’s a sign of royalty. It’s a sign of a high office and a high position that he has. And he’s wearing this amazing, do not take pictures, Devin. She just took a picture. I mean, delete. Anyway, so he’s wearing this robe and they see the silhouette of this robe in the distance, and they just can’t endure another time where he is going to be wearing this thing, carrying a clipboard in a coffee cup. We don’t, don’t need this.

​​​18…before he reached them, they plotted to kill him.
​​​​​​​​​​​Genesis 37

And so, we find out in Genesis 37, verse 18, “before he reached them, they plotted to kill him.” So this is where there are thoughts and emotions about their hatred for Joseph became more than a healing Boston. They actually went through the plans to kill him.
It’s not just that they felt the hatred. Now they put an actual plot together to end Joseph’s life. And so Joseph, and right before Joseph gets to them, Ruben, one of the brothers named Ruben, he does this kind of weak leadership thing. It’s very spineless. And I’ll just say, I don’t think he’s being a man. He’s like, guys, come on guys. We really want to do this. We shouldn’t do this, guys. Come on guys. Think of what dad would say. And he’s not saying like, no, you’re not doing, you want to get to Joseph, you got to come through me. He doesn’t do that. He does this kind of spineless thing. It doesn’t prevent anything.

23 When Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe – the ornate robe he was wearing – 24 and they took him and threw him into the cistern. The cistern was empty; there was no water in it.
​​​​​​​​Genesis 37
And so, we find out then in verse 23, “when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe, the ornate robe he was wearing, and they took him and they threw him into his cistern.
The cistern was empty; there was no water in it.” Now, commentaries kind of make this observation that okay, maybe they mentioned that the cistern was, it wasn’t full of water. Joseph wasn’t treading water, it was empty. But they’re kind of indicating the kind of death they want him to have. They don’t want it to be quick and painless. They want him to suffer for a long time till he dies of dehydration and starvation. So they put him in this pit, the stone pit in the middle of the desert, and they leave him to die. And we find out as we read the verses that they walk away a few yards from the cistern and they sit down to have lunch in Genesis 42, 21. Later on, we find out that Joseph, while he’s in the cistern, is crying out to them. My brothers know. Think of what? Our father, no, I love you. How could you do this to me? And he’s shouting in the cistern and they can hear him, but it’s their mealtime entertainment. And while Joseph is crying out to them, they’re like, Hey, pass the salt. You want to a refill?
That’s how cold and heartless and sinister, these guys are just absolutely calloused towards their own flesh and blood lying in the cistern.

26 Judah said to his brothers, “What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? 27 Come, let’s sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him; after all, he is our brother, our own flesh and blood.” His brothers agreed 28….They sold him for twenty shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt.
​​​​​​​​​​​Genesis 37
And then while they’re eating, they see another silhouette on the horizon. They see this caravan of gypsies. And Judah is like, it’s not enough for us to get rid of our brother. What if we maximize the gains here? Let’s maximize the, and so Judah comes up with this bright idea. “What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? Come let’s sell him to the Ishmael Lights and not lay our hands on him. After all, he’s our brother, our own flesh and blood.” It’s almost like he’s quoting Joseph, and it’s not like they’re agreeing with him enough to rescue him. They’re agreeing him with enough to be like, yeah, we should get money off of this too.
So, his brothers agreed, and “they sold him for 20 shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites who took him to Egypt.” That’s the price of how much their brother was worth to them. But they got a problem. Now, Joseph goes off to the Ishmael lights, he rides off into the sunset. We got to tell our father what happened, and they see this robe. And so they go up to the robe and they kill a goat from the father’s herd, right? So he’s down one goat and they dip the robe in blood and they bring it back to Jacob, and they let Jacob connect the dots, fill in the blanks, and he’s like, my son has been killed by a wild animal. My son is dead. My beloved Joseph is dead.

34 Then Jacob tore his clothes, put on a sackcloth and mourned for his son many days.
​​​​​​​​​​​Gensis 37​​​​​​​​
And so, “Jacob tore his clothes” because his son was stripped of his robe. “He put on a sackcloth and mourned him for many days,” happy Father’s Day.
This is terrible. So he sees what happens and he grieves his beloved son. And this grief goes on for decades, and the coverup is worse than the crime. In some ways. That’s just so cold and deceptive. And that’s where betrayal goes. It gives the appearance of faithfulness, the appearance of loyalty in it. But as we look at the story, it actually demonstrates three ways that we can respond to betrayal. There’s in this story a demonstration of three ways that we can respond when we feel betrayed.

RESPONDING TO BETRAYAL WITH VENGENCE
And the first one isn’t a good one, but it’s the brothers. You can take vengeance.
How do the brothers feel betrayed? Who do they think betrayed them? The father, their father is playing favorites. Their father loves Joseph more than them. That’s not fair. We’re his own flesh and blood. He should love us all equally. And favoritism is not good in homes. It is divisive. And so they’re angry at their father. They feel betrayed by Jacob in psychology, this is called displacement, right? They’re angry at one person and they take it out on another. Do they really hate Joseph that much? Displacement is like you have a fight with your spouse and you kick the dog, you fight with a coworker, and then you yell at your kids. You’re taking it out on the wrong person to make yourself feel better. It’s called displacement. And here they feel betrayed by their father and they take it out on their brother. I don’t need to tell you that when we take matters into our own hands, we make matters worse.
We do. And this is why scripture. I mean, Jesus talks about if someone betrays you, don’t repay evil with evil, repay evil with good. If they hit you on one cheek, turn the other one and let them strike that one too. If they take a coat from you, give them the shirt off your back. If they force you to go one mile, go two.

19 Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord.
​​​​​Romans 12, Cf, Deuteronomy 32:35

And then the apostle Paul picks up on, he says, “don’t take revenge, my dear friends. Leave room for God’s wrath.” In other words, let God take care of it. And then he quotes Deuteronomy, “it is mine to avenge. I will repay, says the Lord,” not you.
And when we try to take vengeance and we try to hurt someone else, I’m going to hurt them more than they hurt me to somehow heal myself. It never works. It’s backwards thinking. No one’s healed in that scenario. And God’s like, let me handle it when my kids are fighting and they’ll make a report to me of like, dad, so-and-so is doing this. And then I start talking to them and they interject. And that’s not what you said. I’m trying to deal with your sister. Please be quiet. Walk away so I can stop dealing with you and deal with them. If you’re a parent with more than one kid, this has happened. Shh, go away. I’m taking care of it. That’s what God is saying. Please stop. Let me handle it. Stop taking matters in your own hands so you can absolutely. When you feel betrayed, when others betray you, you can absolutely take revenge. You can absolutely do something passive aggressive. You can absolutely give them the cold shoulder. You can absolutely gossip about them like they gossiped about you. But that’s making things worse.
And I can’t help but think about the brothers with this robe. They dip this robe in blood, give it to their father. Do you really think Jacob would just throw this robe away? No. It’s like a memento of his beloved son, like a Bronze age pitcher on the nightstand, something to remember him by. And so this robe was most likely in a prominent place in the home, hanging in the backgrounds. And every time the brother sat there at the dinner table there in the background was a memento of their betrayal. It’s like Ed gr po telltale heart and the floorboards are beating, right? Reminding him of the crime he had committed and always haunting him, taunting him. Every day he has to walk over the floorboards. It’s the same thing. They don’t make matters better. They make matters worse. And instead of getting rid of a brother, all they did was give their father more grief and themselves just this haunting memory.
It’s regret that hung in the background for decades. So you could do that. I wouldn’t recommend it, neither would God. The second way then to respond to betrayal would be to trust. And the story of Joseph, this is kind of the antithesis of vengeance, is well, okay, I’m going to let the Lord repay. As the story continues, Joseph goes to Potiphar’s house and he’s a servant there, and he’s a slave and Potiphar’s house, the captain of the Pharaoh’s army, right? And while he’s there, Joseph gets the opportunity to betray Potiphar, but he refuses and he could do the displacement thing, take out on Potiphar what my brothers did to me. But he doesn’t do it. He doesn’t do it. He refuses to betray his master.

RESPONDING TO BETRAYAL WITH TRUST
He continues to trust God’s plan for his life. These dreams that God spoke to him, that the sheaths of wheat would bow down to him and the stars would bow down to him. And God had this promise and this calling in his life, and he continued to trust God in spite of evidence to the contrary.

CHOOSING TO TRUST GOD
AFTER SOMEONE BETRAYS YOU
IS CHOOSING TO NOT
LET BETRAYAL
HURT YOU TWICE

Because listen, choosing to trust God after people betray you is choosing to not let betrayal hurt you twice. I’m just going to let that sit in the room for a second. It is mine to avenge, says the Lord. I will pray. So keep trusting him. So those are the two options that are immediately apparent when we look at this text. But the longer you sit with it, there’s actually a third example of how you can respond to betrayal in this story. It starts by recognizing what we talked about last week. And if you weren’t here to refresh your memory, Joseph is a picture of Jesus.

JOSEPH AS A PICTURE OF JESUS
He is a foreshadowing. This is what the Messiah will be. This is what the Messiah will look like. And we get evidence that Jesus is the chosen one by looking at the life of Joseph. And there are things, there are clues and hints and whispers of Jesus all throughout the life of Joseph. And in this story, it is remarkable.

JOSEPH / JESUS
It starts again with the Father Joseph, like Jesus is sent by his father.

SENT BY HIS FATHER
He says, go check on the sheep and check him. Go check him and check him. Jesus repeats over and over that the Father has sent him. He has been sent by God for God’s purposes.

WILLINGLY SUBMITS
And just like Joseph responded to Jacob and said, very well, very well, I will do this thing you ask me, father, even though it’s risky, even though I know my brothers mistreat me and hate me, I will go do this thing. Jesus submits to the will of the Father repeatedly. He says, I have come to do my father’s will. My will is to do the will of him who senses me and the Garden Gethsemani, not my will, but thy will be done. And he teaches us to pray. Thy will be done.

SILVER
And we see it in Joseph, but it gets really nuanced and specific. Joseph is rejected by his own people. John begins, his gospel says that Jesus is sent to his own, but his own did not receive him. He was hated by the descendants of the 12 tribes, the 12 sons of Jacob, and then he’s betrayed for silver. Judah sells Joseph for 20 pieces of silver. Judas betrays Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.

ROBE
And then like Joseph’s robe is dipped in blood, Jesus’s bloody robe stripped from him, and Roman soldiers gamble for it.

BELOVED
And just like Jacob’s heart breaks for what they’ve done to his son, our heavenly Father grieves what they’ve done to his son.
Look at that. It’s incredible right there, 2000 years before Jesus, a picture of him. And you know what though? If Joseph is a picture of Jesus and Jacob, there’s a picture of God, our heavenly Father, and you know who you are. Who are you? Who are you? The brothers. You are not Joseph, you the brothers. Every time you lie, you betray your heavenly Father. Every time you cheat and steal and hurt others made in his image, you betray your heavenly Father. Every time you gossip and slander, every angry thought you have, you betray your heavenly Father.

9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
​​​​​​​​​​​1 John 1
And this then gets to a third response to betrayal.

CONFESSION
The Apostle John in one of his letters has this interesting word. He says, if we confess our sins, if we confess betrayal, God is. And then he uses a very interesting word, faithful meaning you have been unfaithful, you’ve given the appearance of loyalty, but you have been disloyal. You have appeared faithful, but you have been unfaithful. But even though you have been unfaithful, God remains faithful. He cannot lie. He cannot betray you. He’s faithful and just and will forgive your sins and cleanse you from your bloodstained hands.
I can think of no better way to celebrate Father’s Day than to give you an opportunity to be made right with your Father in heaven and confess. You’ve been betrayed. But one of the ways you can respond to betrayal is to recognize that you two have betrayed your heavenly Father, but he’s faithful to forgive you no matter what you’ve done to him. I think deep inside every single one of us is a longing to be made right with your Heavenly Father, that the story of humanity is a father who loves his children and goes out to rescue them and to be made one with them. Again, nothing deep inside of you in the center of your DNA at the core of your very Adams is a longing to be made right with God. That’s what we look at the story and we’re like, there’s this tension in the story that needs to be resolved. And it takes 22 years finally for Joseph’s brothers to reconcile Joseph and to reconcile with their father and to be made right and to admit the betrayal that they’ve done. And when it happens, you’re just like, ah, yes. And it’s this feeling of resolve. And some of you have been carrying that around. You feel far from God, been rebellious, you have betrayed him. It’s time to be reconciled with God, to be made right with your Father. And there’s no better way to celebrate Father’s Day. So I invite you to pray with me.

PRAYER
Heavenly Father, we confess that we are sinners and we have sinned against you and what we think, what we say, what we do, and what we fail to do. We have not loved you with our whole hearts, and we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. And we justly deserve your presence and eternal punishment for these sins. But we are sorry for them and repent of them. And we pray because of the innocent, bitter sufferings and death of your beloved son, Jesus Christ, to have mercy on us, forgive us, renew us, and lead us so that we may delight in your will, walk in your ways to the glory of your holy name. It is a joy and an honor on this day to call you together, our Father who art in heaven, hall, be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever. Amen.

250515 – Greater Than – Your Betrayal (Completed 06/16/25)
Transcript by Rev.com
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