Focus: The Sold Becomes the Sovereign

Text: Gen.37:28

"Then there passed by Midianites merchantmen; and they drew and lifted up Joseph out of the pit, and sold Joseph to the Ishmeelites for twenty pieces of silver: and they brought Joseph into Egypt."

Joseph's brothers sold him to slave traders from Midian, descendants of Ishmael. We read that "the Midianites sold him into Egypt unto Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh's, and captain of the guard" (Gen.37:36). The book of Revelation tells us that commercial Babylon will engage in the merchandise of "the souls of men." 

According to Judges 16:5, Delilah was well paid by the lords of the Philistines to deliver Samson into their hands. The amount was eleven hundred pieces of silver from each of the five lords of the Philistines, and that is huge.

It is terribly terrible that human beings can sell their fellow human beings for material gains. Man has lost his conscience. He sells his fellow man for money. He kills his fellow man for money. He has turned his greed into his creed. He doesn't lose sleep, selling another human being for money.

Evil begets evil.

Joseph's brothers thought of killing him, but on a second thought, they felt it was better to use him to make money, and when the opportunity presented itself, they didn't bark an eyelid in selling him off to the Midianites, who in turn sold him to Potiphar, the Egyptian official. Joseph was enslaved for years, but divine providence was working in his favor. The Scripture declares, "And Joseph was the GOVERNOR over the land, and he it was that sold to all the people of the land: and Joseph's brethren came, and BOWED DOWN themselves before him with their faces to the earth" (Gen.42:6). 

In the land of Egypt Joseph became the second in command to Pharaoh. All of Egypt was under his control. A slave became the semi-sovereign of the empire of Egypt, and his older brothers who sold him to slavery bowed down before him. Joseph said to them, "I am Joseph your brother, whom YE sold into Egypt" (Gen.45:4). Egypt saw the treasure in him. Pharaoh saw in him the spirit of excellence and exalted him to the position of a prime minister. In a land where he lived as a stranger and served as a slave, God raised him to become the governor over the Egyptians and the savior of the world.

Joseph said again to his brothers, "Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither: for God did send me before you to preserve life" (Gen.45:5). God went ahead of the evil machinations of his brothers. They SOLD him to Egypt without knowing that it was in the plan of God to SEND him there. God used their evil plots to achieve his own agenda.

There are many ways in which man is being sold and bought by another fellow man.

We sell others away by gossip and slander. Malice and envy lead to one person selling another person. Evil heart and bitterness are further reasons man sells his fellow man for monetary gain.

Check your heart. Examine yourself. Ensure that you are not a tool in Satan's hands to betraying or selling your own brother or sister by natural or spiritual blood. Shun hate and practice love. Sell nobody, and let nobody sell you. Keep your heart pure. Love God and people.

by Bishop Moses E. Peter