How a Wise Leader Functions Under the Providence of God
Note: This sermon was preached at a Bible Conference in Sebring, Fl. There is much in this sermon that is repetitious of the sermon on Integrity at Work (#3 in the series), but there is a section that is new that I draw your attention to on pages 3-6.
We are facing a leadership crisis in our country. Everywhere one looks—at politics, business, education, academia, or the clergy—one sees a lack of integrity or competence or both in leadership, starting at the very top. Our political leaders run the country with an eye on polls and their #1 priority seems to be getting re-elected. Business leaders run their companies with the focus on the bottom line and short-term stock prices. Religious leaders, too, for the most part
More than anyone I can think of, Joseph’s life reflects the biblical truth that there is no substitute for integrity at work. There are three particular events in Joseph’s life that give us insight into how he ministered effectively as a leader in the marketplace to which God called him. We’re going to focus on the third one in Genesis 47, but I don’t want to ignore the other two. Joseph’s first job in Egypt was as a slave.
Joseph as a slave in the house of Potiphar (Genesis 39)
The LORD was with Joseph and he prospered, and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master. When his master saw that the LORD was with him and that the LORD gave him success in everything he did, Joseph found favor in his eyes and became his attendant. Potiphar put him in charge of his household, and he entrusted to his care everything he owned. From the time he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the LORD blessed the household of the Egyptian because of Joseph. The blessing of the LORD was on everything Potiphar had, both in the house and in the field. So he left in Joseph’s care everything he had; with Joseph in charge, he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate.
What is obvious from this paragraph is that Joseph was extremely successful in his first job. In a relatively short time he rose from being a lowly slave to being business manager over everything Potiphar owned. We are clearly told the source of this amazing success–the Lord. Four times in this paragraph the Lord is identified as the Mover behind all that happened. However, I believe there is another reason for his success, and that is that Joseph was a hard worker and a man of absolute integrity. He was honest, faithful, congenial, and competent.
Joseph’s second job was . . .
Joseph as a prisoner of Pharaoh (Genesis 40)
We are specifically told that he is put in the place where the king’s prisoners were confined. That doesn’t mean he would be treated better than most prisoners– probably just the opposite. This was a maximum security prison. It says at the end of verse 20 of chapter 40:
But while Joseph was there in the prison, the Lord was with him; He showed him kindness and granted him favor in the eyes of the prison warden. So the warden put Joseph in charge of all those held in the prison, and he was made responsible for all that was done there. The warden paid no attention to anything under Joseph’s care, because the LORD was with Joseph and gave him success in whatever he did.
Principles from Joseph’s life as a prisoner of Potiphar and Pharaoh.
1. Character is who we are, not what we do. Bill Hybels wrote a book entitled, Who You Are When No One Is Looking. He states an important fact: character is not the same as reputation–what other people think of us. It is not the same as success or achievement. Character is not what we have done, but who we are–deep down inside. Joseph lives by the same principles in prison as before–because that’s who he is. It’s bad enough to be a slave in a rich man’s house; it is far worse to be a prisoner in Pharaoh’s dungeon. But neither situation affects Joseph’s character. He is going to be a godly man, a hard worker, and a faithful steward no matter what!
2. Success is possible in the worst of jobs. I like that statement in chapter 39:23, “The warden paid no attention to anything under Joseph’s care.” (That’s similar to what is said back in verse 6 of Potiphar: “he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate.”) Can you imagine that? Joseph is a convict, friends, but he has demonstrated such integrity that the warden could take a vacation and leave Joseph in charge of the prison! It reminds me of the jailer in Philippi (Acts 16) who was ready to take his own life because an earthquake had destroyed his prison and allowed his prisoners to escape. He knew that even an act of God would not excuse an escape from a Roman prison. Then he heard Paul’s voice calling to him, “Don’t harm yourself. We’re all here!” And the first words out of the jailer’s mouth are, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”! When believers demonstrate integrity, a lost world can’t help but sit up and take notice!
Now quickly we fast forward to the next chapter of Joseph’s life, where we find that God elevates him to the position of Prime Minister of Egypt.
Joseph shows wise leadership as Prime Minister of Egypt (Genesis 41)
So Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I hereby put you in charge of the whole land of Egypt.” Then Pharaoh took his signet ring from his finger and put it on Joseph’s finger. He dressed him in robes of fine linen and put a gold chain around his neck. He had him ride in a chariot as his second-in- command, and men shouted before him, “Make way!” Thus he put him in charge of the whole land of Egypt.
Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I am Pharaoh, but without your word no one will lift hand or foot in all Egypt.” Pharaoh gave Joseph the name Zaphenath-Paneah and gave him Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest of On, to be his wife. And Joseph went throughout the land of Egypt.
Joseph was thirty years old when he entered the service of Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from Pharaoh’s presence and traveled throughout Egypt.
During the seven years of abundance the land produced plentifully. Joseph collected all the food produced in those seven years of abundance in Egypt and stored it in the cities. In each city he put the food grown in the fields surrounding it. Joseph stored up huge quantities of grain, like the sand of the sea; it was so much that he stopped keeping records because it was beyond measure.
Note well that Joseph the faithful worker doesn’t suddenly become Joseph the greedy, hard-nosed tyrant when he goes from being a slave and a prisoner to #2 man in the nation. Believe me, that could have happened. It would have been the expectation of the day, or for that matter, of our day. You’ve seen it, and so have I–people who were friendly, considerate, and very ordinary, who experienced an extreme makeover in their personality when success went to their heads. No, he continues instead to use the influence God has given him to do his job with absolute integrity, undoubtedly pointing people to God as the source of every good gift.
Now before we examine some principles of leadership which Joseph exhibited as Prime Minister, I want us to look for something else in this story.
It’s what I would call “the simplicity of God’s providence.” Have you noticed that there are no miracles in the Joseph story, none except possibly the revelation of the dreams of Pharaoh to Joseph? I suppose you could call that a miracle, but it’s not the kind of miracle that takes our breath away! It’s a minor-league miracle compared to the plagues on Egypt, and the crossing of the Sea, and the later crossing of the Jordan. Frankly, one of the things that attracts me to the Joseph story is the lack of miracles. I don’t know about you, but I can relate better to someone who faces ordinary circumstances with extraordinary faith than someone like Moses who could hit a rock with his stick and produce water. I can’t do that. But I can be like Joseph!
While the term “providence” is not found in Scripture, it has been traditionally used to summarize God’s ongoing relationship to his creation. We may define it as God’s continuing action by which He preserves the creation He has brought into being, and guides it to His intended purposes. Providence stands in opposition to Deism (which teaches that God created the world but then essentially abandoned it) and to Pantheism (the view that creation is just a part of God and is not distinct from Him).
I believe that faith in God’s Providence is central to the conduct of the Christian life. It means that we are able to live in the assurance that God is present and active in our lives. We are in His care and can therefore face the future confidently, knowing that things are not happening merely by chance. We can pray, knowing that God hears and acts upon our prayers. We can face danger, knowing that He is not unaware or uninvolved. There are a multitude of Scripture passages that teach God’s providence. Daniel 2:21 says, “He changes times and seasons; he removes kings and sets up kings.” Paul says of Christ in Col. 1:17, “He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” The writer to the Hebrews speaks of Him as “upholding the universe by his word of power.” (1:3). Countless passages teach the inseparability of God’s children from His love and safe keeping.
Now while God’s providence is supernatural, it is not always miraculous in the normal sense of the term. By miracle we refer to those acts of providence which are not explicable on the basis of the usual patterns of nature.
There were only three great periods of miracles in the Scripture–the time of Moses, the time of the greater prophets (Elijah, Elisha, etc.), and the time of Jesus and the Apostles. The reason for this, I believe, is because those were the primary periods of revelation. Those were the three times when the vast majority of Scripture was written. God used miracles to validate His messengers–the prophets and apostles–so that there would be no doubt in anyone’s mind that God was speaking through them.
The rest of human history has been largely devoid of astounding divine interventions into the laws of nature. Oh, I’m not saying that God has been doing no miracles, only that large, public displaysof first-class miracle-working power have generally not been evident. Instead God is generally ruling this world through divine providence. If you stop to think about it, this should surprise no one. If miracles were ordinary, everyday, run-of-the-mill kinds of things they wouldn’t be miracles! The very thing that makes them so stunning and thus so impactful is their extreme rarity.
Yet there are many today who just can’t seem to accept that God is working any differently today than He did in the first century when Jesus and the apostles were doing all kinds of miracles as they were speaking God’s Word to us. So they interpret many normal acts of providence as miracle, and they speak of any unusually fortuitous event as though it were a first-class miracle. For example, if a tumor shrinks after prayer, they will call it a miracle, even though this sort of thing happens for unbelievers who never pray, as well as for believers who pray. Or if they survive a terrible accident, they call it a miracle, even though surviving terrible accidents is fairly common. I certainly think a believer should thank God for a tumor shrinking or for surviving an accident, but I think it is wiser generally to view these things as the exercise of God’s providence rather than carelessly tossing around the term “miracle.”
You see, I don’t think it’s demeaning to God one whit, or demeaning to the believer’s faith, to say that God chooses to work through providence most of the time rather than through miracle. It’s still God working. It’s just that He’s working more behind the scenes to arrange timing and circumstances and relationships to bring about His perfect will.
Now I have put these two themes–Joseph’s wise business leadership and the providence of God–together to come up with my title for this lesson, “How a Wise Leader Functions Under the Providence of God.” Here’s my theme in a nutshell: a wise leader refuses to sit back and wait for God to perform miracles. Instead he seizes opportunity by the throat, uses the brains God gave him, and makes wise decisions based upon the information he has, all the while acknowledging God’s sovereignty and giving Him gratitude and glory.
Let’s move to chapter 47 and the account of Joseph’s leadership during the famine itself. Let’s read from 47:13-31.
There was no food, however, in the whole region because the famine was severe; both Egypt and Canaan wasted away because of the famine. Joseph collected all the money that was to be found in Egypt and Canaan in payment for the grain they were buying, and he brought it to Pharaoh’s palace. When the money of the people of Egypt and Canaan was gone, all Egypt came to Joseph and said, “Give us food. Why should we die before your eyes? Our money is used up.”
“Then bring your livestock,” said Joseph. “I will sell you food in exchange for your livestock, since your money is gone.” So they brought their livestock to Joseph, and he gave them food in exchange for their horses, their sheep and goats, their cattle and donkeys. And he brought them through that year with food in exchange for all their livestock.
When that year was over, they came to him the following year and said, “We cannot hide from our lord the fact that since our money is gone and our livestock belongs to you, there is nothing left for our lord except our bodies and our land. Why should we perish before your eyes—we and our land as well? Buy us and our land in exchange for food, and we with our land will be in bondage to Pharaoh. Give us seed so that we may live and not die, and that the land may not become desolate.”
So Joseph bought all the land in Egypt for Pharaoh. The Egyptians, one and all, sold their fields, because the famine was too severe for them. The land became Pharaoh’s, and Joseph reduced the people to servitude, from one end of Egypt to the other. However, he did not buy the land of the priests, because they received a regular allotment from Pharaoh and had food enough from the allotment Pharaoh gave them. That is why they did not sell their land.
Joseph said to the people, “Now that I have bought you and your land today for Pharaoh, here is seed for you so you can plant the ground. But when the crop comes in, give a fifth of it to Pharaoh. The other four-fifths you may keep as seed for the fields and as food for yourselves and your households and your children.”
“You have saved our lives,” they said. “May we find favor in the eyes of our lord; we will be in bondage to Pharaoh.”
So Joseph established it as a law concerning land in Egypt—still in force today—that a fifth of the produce belongs to Pharaoh. It was only the land of the priests that did not become Pharaoh’s.
Now our first reading of this passage may cause us to doubt Joseph’s qualifications as a man of God and think of him as just one more Middle Eastern tyrant. I think that would be a serious misunderstanding of the text. We, of course, must not evaluate Joseph against the backdrop of western democratic ideals or capitalistic economic principles. We must understand as well that Joseph was not Pharaoh; he was under Pharaoh. And Pharaoh was an absolute monarch. His word was law.
Bible heroes, you know, lived in two worlds–the political and economic and social milieu they grew up in, and the world of biblical faith. Frequently there were clashes between those worlds. Never did God tell them to abandon their culture or to institute a revolution against it. They were to be in their world while not being of it. That’s still our responsibility, and I believe Joseph is a good example of how to do that.
The first principle I want to share with you is:
A wise leader practices delayed gratification. (41:46-49, 53-57) One of the greatest problems our political leaders exhibit today, in my estimation, is almost a complete rejection of the principle of delayed gratification. With the exception of Senator Tom Coburn of our neighboring state of Oklahoma, I’m not sure I could point to a single legislator in Congress who regularly practices any significant degree of self-control regarding the spending of taxpayer money. The issue of earmarks has been much in the news lately. An earmark is a line-item that is inserted into a bill to direct funds to a specific project or recipient, usually a political supporter of a senator or congressman, without any public hearing or review, and without identifying the legislator who approved it. In a recent year there were over 14,000 earmarks costing well over $50 billion dollars! At the same time Congress, because of partisan politics, completely ignores the looming crises in Social Security and Medicare. All the while the national debt continues to climb into the stratosphere.
But I don’t entirely fault our Senate and House of Representatives. I fault the American people, because we send those characters to Washington to represent us. Everyone wants his piece of the pie and as long as our representative is bringing home the bacon to our district, most of us will keep sending him back up the Potomac.
That’s one of the reasons I see the story of Joseph as so amazingly refreshing. He exhibits the leadership and the courage to institute a plan of forced savings for an entire country. It all started, you will recall, when as Prime Minister Joseph insisted that the nation set aside huge amounts of grain for seven years. Look back at 41:46-49:
Joseph was thirty years old when he entered the service of Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from Pharaoh’s presence and traveled throughout Egypt. During the seven years of abundance the land produced plentifully. Joseph collected all the food produced in those seven years of abundance in Egypt and stored it in the cities. In each city he put the food grown in the fields surrounding it. Joseph stored up huge quantities of grain, like the sand of the sea; it was so much that he stopped keeping records because it was beyond measure.
Now I don’t think that is meant to be taken literally–that he “collected all the food produced in those seven years.” If he did that, no one would have had anything to eat. I think it means that he collected all the extra food, i.e. all the food that exceeded what was grown in a normal year. Even that is amazing. With most people when they discover they have more than what they expected they just spend more. That’s certainly normal with our political leaders.
I have little doubt that Joseph faced opposition for doing this. I can just hear some of the politicians of his day saying, “Let’s sell this extra food and use the proceeds to cut taxes or launch universal health coverage.” Almost never do you hear anyone seriously suggesting that government should save anything for a rainy day or even pay down debt.
Rainy days do come, you know. You can count on it. They sure came on Egypt. Maybe I should say “dry days come.” Famine arrived. We read about that in verses 53-57 of chapter 41:
The seven years of abundance in Egypt came to an end, and the seven years of famine began, just as Joseph had said. There was famine in all the other lands, but in the whole land of Egypt there was food. When all Egypt began to feel the famine, the people cried to Pharaoh for food. Then Pharaoh told all the Egyptians, “Go to Joseph and do what he tells you.”
When the famine had spread over the whole country, Joseph opened the storehouses and sold grain to the Egyptians, for the famine was severe throughout Egypt. And all the countries came to Egypt to buy grain from Joseph, because the famine was severe in all the world.
Delayed gratification. It’s the best way to have what you need when you need it. It’s the best way to enjoy some extras without mortgaging your future. It’s actually the best way to enjoy almost anything because the longer you wait for it, the more enjoyable it will be (or in some cases you’ll discover you didn’t need it in the first place). Delayed gratification, of course, is not just an economic principle but a spiritual one as well. It’s God’s way, and always has been. For example, He calls upon us to delay gratifying our sexual urges until marriage so that the real fullness and satisfaction God intended can be realized. Listen to how Moses got in the Hall of Faith and ask yourself if this isn’t speaking about delayed gratification (Hebrews 11:24-26):
By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a short time. He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.
Is sin pleasurable? Is it gratifying? Sure it is. But it’s only gratifying temporarily. Moses chose delayed gratification instead, actually eternal gratification. And Joseph practiced delayed gratification for his nation as a business leader and as a political leader. May his tribe increase!
Now I’ve spent a lot of time on this first principle because I believe it’s so critical and because it’s a dominant theme of the Joseph story. The others I will cover more quickly.
A wise leader submits to authority and practices accountability. (47:13-14) As we have noted, Joseph was #2 man in Egypt. As #2 it was his job to further Pharaoh’s interests. Not the people’s interests, mind you, nor the interests of immigrants from Canaan, nor the interests of other countries in the Middle East, but Pharaoh’s interests. As long as Pharaoh’s interests were not in conflict with the laws of God Joseph was perfectly within his responsibility, even obligation as a believer to do so.
Joseph did not give grain away, he sold it, and the money went into Pharaoh’s coffers. Note verse 14: “Joseph collected all the money that was to be found in Egypt and Canaan in payment for the grain they were buying, and he brought it to Pharaoh’s palace.” That not only infers that Pharaoh was getting very rich but also that Joseph wasn’t skimming off the top. All the money came to the palace. There’s a lot of corruption in American business and politics and sports. Believe me, a lot. And the greater the amount of money that is being transferred, the greater the corruption (witness the aftermath of Katrina and the rebuilding of Iraq as two notable examples). But next to most third-world countries the U.S. is definitely in the minor leagues when it comes to corruption. There are many countries where you can’t get anything done without a bribe. Joseph was accountable in regard to the huge amounts of money he was handling.
By the way, if you are troubled by the fact that Joseph sells this grain, keep in mind that he undoubtedly bought it in the first place. Furthermore, I am sure he didn’t hide why he was doing this. I am certain that he couldn’t have stored up such massive amounts of grain without it being widely known that a famine was expected. Private citizens could have stored up grain as well so that they would have what they needed and wouldn’t have to use all their money to buy grain from the government. They just didn’t do it. Let’s place responsibility where it lies.
A wise leader faces extreme circumstances with creativity and competence. (47:15-21) There is no question but that Joseph faced extreme circumstances. Probably never since Noah had the civilized world faced a greater crisis than this extensive famine. It’s at times like this that people look for great leaders, creative leaders, competent leaders to solve huge problems. Franklin Roosevelt, whatever you think of his politics, was just such a leader. He found ways to provide hope for a nation in despair. Churchill did the same thing for England in the dark days of WWII. And Joseph did it for his nation.
He built granaries all over Egypt. I saw some of those ancient granaries when I was in Egypt a few years ago. Rows and rows of them recently uncovered from the endless sands! Then he devised a way to dispense the grain. It must have taken quite a bureaucracy to dispense huge amounts of grain to the whole nation, plus foreign countries. And he devised a system of payment, first involving currency, then livestock, and then the land. Just imagine how this was done without riots or chaos! It is evidence of Joseph’s competence and creativity. He must have set up amazing systems for all these transactions long before they were even needed. Do you think we would have the problems with HealthCare.gov if Joseph had been secretary of HHS?
By the way, another evidence of Joseph’s competence is that he knew what was going on in his own bureaucracy! When Joseph’s brothers came from Palestine to get food, Joseph knew about it!
But you say, something can be creative and competent but still not be moral. All the currency is now in Pharaoh’s coffers, all the livestock all belong to him, and all the land has been deeded to him. Instead of private ownership, now everything belongs to the state, which means it belongs to one man. Yes, but is this immoral, or is it simply distasteful? Did Pharaoh steal it? If he is a benevolent dictator, is the power he exercises automatically immoral?
But then we learn something even more disturbing. It says in verse 21, “and Joseph reduced the people to servitude from one end of Egypt to the other.” That sounds totally unacceptable to our ears, but I don’t think we should read the English or American slave trade back into this verse. Quite the contrary, I think this paragraph illustrates still another principle:
A wise leader acts responsibly in behalf of the people under him. (47:23-26) Joseph was providing the single greatest need the people have–the need for food. And it is clear from verses 23-24 that he didn’t take away from the people their income-producing capacity, for Pharaoh took only 20% of the produce and the people retained ownership of the other 80%. There was no private ownership in slavery in the U.S. In fact, 80% is more than our government today lets us keep!
Not only that, the people’s attitude in verse 25 is one of extreme gratitude: “‘You have saved our lives,’ they said. ‘May we find favor in the eyes of our lord. We will be in bondage to Pharaoh.’” So whatever kind of servitude they were placed into, they agreed willingly and considered their present state far superior to the alternative–starvation. We may look with disfavor on the political and economic results of Joseph’s plan, but I think the people who experienced it are better evaluators of its effectiveness and its morality than we are nearly 4000 years later, and they were grateful.
I thought of adding one more principle today:
A wise leader exempts the clergy from paying their fair share. (26) Now I say that with tongue in cheek, but perhaps you noticed this in verse 26: “It was only the land of the priests that did not become Pharaoh’s.” Some of you undoubtedly receive a clergy housing allowance, as I do. In early December a federal judge ruled that such an allowance is unconstitutional unless the clergyman is actually living in a parsonage, and I don’t know how the appeal is going to turn out. In all honesty I believe erse 26 is best understood in view of the fact there was no separation of church and state in that day. This was apparently Pharaoh’s desire, or at least a political reality he had to accept.
Conclusion: I return to the theme I began with: A wise leader refuses to sit back and wait for God to perform miracles. Instead he seizes opportunity by the throat, uses the brains God gave him, and makes wise decisions based upon the information he has, all the while acknowledging God’s providence and giving Him gratitude and glory. The wise leader knows that God will work all things after the counsel of his own will and for the benefit of those who love God and are called according to his purposes, but he also knows that God expects him to act with integrity, competence, and creativity as though he is God’s ambassador to a secular world, which he is. He is an ambassador of the Good News that God has dealt with our sin problem through the Cross of Jesus Christ and accepts everyone who puts his or her faith in Christ into His forever family.
Tags:
Leadership
Character
Providence
Miracles