Joel M Bradshaw

Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance. 7And after a time his master’s wife cast her eyes on Joseph and said, “Lie with me.” 8But he refused and said to his master’s wife, “Behold, because of me my master has no concern about anything in the house, and he has put everything that he has in my charge. 9He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?” 10And as she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or to be with her.–Genesis 39, with emphasis

Joseph saw falling to temptation with Potiphar’s wife as a great wickedness. This is the same word used in the Esther story to describe the racist plan of Haman to exterminate the Jewish people. So Joseph gave the strictest category to falling to the sexual temptation. Many young men today would have given themselves excuses to indulge if they were in Joseph’s situation.

Instead, Joseph resists with words. This tells us that he had been resisting in his self-talk for some time. All those opportunities to sleep with the master’s wife as she threw herself at him. All those lonely nights as a slave in a foreign land. He had to have been going to war in his thoughts. Constantly reminding himself of the words he told Potiphar’s wife. They came naturally to him for a reason.

David would utter famous words much later that also speak of the nature of sin. I underlined what jumped to my mind.

“For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight…” (Psalm 51:3-4a)

Remember David had pursued married Bathsheba, slept with her, and got her pregnant while her husband was off at war fighting in David’s army. He then concocted this scheme to invite hubby home to sleep with his wife, but the man was honorable and refused to disrespect all the guys on the front lines who couldn’t come home to their wives. So then David simply had him killed.

David had sinned against a husband and a wife, but he recognized something deeper about his sin. It was ultimately against God. Had Joseph succumbed to temptation he would have sinned against both Potiphar and his wife. But Joseph saw the situation from a theological lens. How could he sin against the God who was obviously with him?

Joseph’s self-talk took him out of the immediate and to the eternal. We often think with a short-sighted lens that sins quick and then seeks forgiveness quick. Joseph looked deeper and longer at his life and realized that his relationship with God was more important than his momentary feelings. And he did this at 17! Heart check time, my friends. I am so grateful for all of you who follow this blog daily. You are an encouragement to me.–JMB