Joseph’s story begins in Genesis 37 and continues through the remainder of Genesis. It is a remarkable story to say the least. We’re introduced to Joseph when he was seventeen and thrown into a cistern by his brothers. Then he was trafficked by them to Midianite traders who sold him to Pharaoh’s captain of the guard—a man named Potiphar. From there, Joseph ended up in prison where he started a prison ministry of sorts. He was later released and became second only to Pharaoh in terms of his position and power in Egypt.
One of the things that stands out about Joseph was his determination to do what was right—no matter what. In fact, the narrative offers us a contrast between Joseph and those he interacted with in regard to pursuing what was right. In Joseph’s story, we see at least four different levels of doing right.
1. At the lowest level, there are people who will do right only when it suits them. (Selfish obedience). Potiphar’s wife appears to belong in this category. It suited her to view Joseph as someone who would be sexually pleasing to her. When he refused her advances, she turned the tables and accused him of pursuing her. As a result, Joseph ended up in prison. She doesn’t appear to have had a thought about the toxicity of her actions—how they were unfaithful to her husband, extremely damaging to Joseph, and ultimately self-destructive. She simply wanted what she wanted.
Other people from the Bible who belong in this category would be the Pharaoh of Moses’ time and Jezebel. Paul talks about such people in Philippians 3:19 when he says, “Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things.” They just want what they want and on the rare occasion that they actually do what is right, it is only because it happens to intersect with their self-interest.Proverbs 13:15 warns us about how “the way of the unfaithful leads to their destruction.”
2. A level above this are people who will do right only because they fear the consequences of doing wrong. (Joyless obedience). Eight of Joseph’s brothers initially wanted to kill Joseph, but two of the brothers (Reuben and Judah) talked them down, so that they ended up trafficking him instead. They did what was right only in the sense that they didn’t kill Joseph and they did this because the consequences of murdering him were worse than the consequences of trafficking him—so there’s not much there in the way of doing right, but it is more than what we saw in Potiphar’s wife.
This level of obedience is both bad and good. Let’s start with the bad. It’s bad in the sense that it’s conformity rather than obedience from the heart. The brothers should have not killed Joseph because it was an evil thing to do—not because they feared the consequences. Doing or not doing something because of the consequences is fear-based behavior. God wants us to have faith-based behavior.
Peter showed the same fear-based behavior as Joseph’s brothers in Luke 5 when Jesus appeared to him and his partners and told them to cast their nets out in the deeper water. Peter and his companions had been fishing all night and had caught nothing. They were cleaning their nets and probably just thinking about going home and going to bed. But Peter said, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets” (Luke 5:5). He was going to conform to what Jesus asked because he feared the consequences of saying no, but it’s clear his heart wasn’t in it (see v. 8).
There is a sense though in which doing right because you fear the consequences can be a good thing. I think there’s something of this when the writer of Provers says that “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge” (1:7). For example, parents tell their children to clean up their room. Few children are delighted by that—they grudgingly clean up their room because they fear the consequences of not doing so. And parents are fine with that because the realize that this is where obedience begins. You do something not because you want to do it, but because you don’t want to suffer the consequences of not doing it.
But they also realize that their children are smart and as they mature, they will grow to understand the benefits of a clean room. This is the way it works with God. We obey Him because He tells us to and we don’t want to suffer the consequences. But as we grow and mature, we see the wisdom of God’s way and we no longer just want to do the right thing—we want to do the right thing for the right reason.
So how do we know when acting at this level is good and when it’s bad? It has to do with where you are. If you have stopped at this level, it’s not a good thing. If you have arrived at this level because you know doing something is the right thing to do (even though you don’t “feel” like doing it) and you do it anyway—that’s good and commendable. Every disciple experiences this at some time—we just don’t want to stay there. We want to continue growing and allowing God to work on our heart until we want to do the right thing for the right reason.
3. At the third level are people who want to what is right if it doesn’t cost them too much. (Partial Obedience). Reuben didn’t want Joseph to be killed by his brothers so he intervened and had them throw him in the cistern so he could later rescue him and take him back to Jacob. On the surface, this looks good (and it is)—it just didn’t go far enough. Reuben was the oldest brother. He was the one in charge. Based on that, a better thing for him to have done would have been to take a firmer stand and simply say that no one was going to be killed. As it turned out, his “half-way” plan didn’t work out. Joseph was sold to the Midianites. Rueben was devasted but rather than go after the Midianites to rescue Joseph (as Abraham had done with Lot), he instead conspired with his brothers on how to cover up what happened with Joseph. He wanted to do the right thing, but there was a limit to what he was willing to do. This is Peter denying Jesus, Demas forsaking Paul, and Mark leaving Paul and Barnabas to go back to Jerusalem.
It’s interesting that when people come to the fork in the road where going one way will end a commitment and going the other way will increase it, they often say they are “uncomfortable” to go the way of the greater commitment. Uncomfortable. As though being a disciple of Jesus is a promise of always being comfortable. No parent expects to always be comfortable being a parent. The same is true for an employee, a student, a teacher—basically anyone in any realm of life. Why do we expect this as a disciple of Jesus? What is there about bearing a cross that’s comfortable?
4. The highest level is people who will do right no matter what. (Jesus Obedience). Joseph refused to take advantage of the situation with Potiphar’s wife—which possibly could have worked to his short-term advantage. He did what was right. He landed in prison because of it but refused to pout about it—instead he started a prison ministry. He did what was right. He could have exercised vengeance on his brothers, but instead he extended mercy and forgiveness. He did what was right.
This level of doing right is Jesus obedience because Jesus always did what was right no matter what. The Hebrews writer says, “Son though He was, He learned obedience from what he suffered” (5:8). He obeyed all the way to and through the cross. Yet it was never a loveless, “Woe is me” type of obedience. It was characterized by joy (12:2).
He joyfully did the right thing no matter what. Joseph modeled it and we’re to pursue it as is disciples. Let’s do the right thing for the right reason.
A Taste of Grace with Bruce Green 