The Coat of Different Colors

And we're just thrilled that you are joining us this morning. A very special welcome also to all of our members that join us weekly on a regular basis. And a very special welcome to you that are joining us from across the country and around the world like you do every Sabbath, to worship with us and gain a blessing and draw closer to Christ. We know that you will be filled this morning. Our first hymn this morning is going to be hymn number 189, "all that thrills my soul.

" And this comes as a request from jeffrey in antigua and barbuda, nola in australia, Benjamin in belgium, kerian in the british virgin islands, daphnie and Karen in florida, doreen in Georgia, abigail and anowuo in ghana, ula in Hawaii, bob and Paula in Idaho, claudette, dalton and jonmarc in jamaica, donna in Missouri, jamie and jenny in North Carolina, kiuk in papua new guinea, jean claude in saint lucia, charleston in saint vincent and the grenadines, tito and alma in South Dakota, leah in Texas and joy and nannette, sherrine and sillon in trinidad and tobago. Hymn number 189, "all that thrills my soul." And we will sing the first, the second and the last verse. [Music] If you have a favorite hymn that you would like to sing with us on a coming Sabbath, I invite you to go to our website at saccentral.org. And there you can click on the "contact us" link, and you can request any song in our hymnal. And we would love to sing that with you on a coming Sabbath.

Our next hymn this morning is one of my favorites, "to God be the glory," hymn number 341. And we're going to sing all three verses. This comes as a request from lavonne in barbados, don in Canada, Mark, jane, Joshua and eliesha in england, nicola in germany, bob and Paula in Idaho, edison in Illinois, reyes in Mexico, dick in Michigan, chidi in scotland and emusk in sir lanka. Hymn number 341, "to God be the glory." [Music] Amen. Let's pray.

Our Father in Heaven, we do give you the glory and we give you the praise this morning, because you and you alone are worthy. And so we thank you so much for this Sabbath day that we can come and just give a little bit back of our love to you and our honor and our worship. Because we love you, Lord. And we are looking for the day that is coming soon when we can put all of our burdens behind us, that we can live with you forever and that we can worship you face to face. Lord, what glorious--what a glorious day that will be.

So we thank you for Pastor Doug this morning and the message he is about to bring to us. Just open our hearts and our minds to you, Lord. Change us from the inside out, that we can be who you want us to be and that we can hasten your coming. We just thank you for all your blessings, Lord. And we just thank you and honor you on this, your holy, special day.

And we love you and cannot wait to see you. And we pray these things in your blessed and holy name. Amen. This morning, our lesson study will be brought to us by Pastor Doug Batchelor who is the senior pastor here at Sacramento central. Thank you, jenny and jolyne and our musicians, appreciate it.

I like those songs. I want to welcome our extended Sabbath school class watching on television or listening on the radio, and any visitors we may have there. We're very glad that you joined us. We do have a special offer dealing with our subject today. And it's called, "reconnecting the family.

" If you would like to get a free copy of that, you can call the resource number. And that number is 866-study-more, 866-788-3966. And we'll be happy to send that to you just for asking. And if you are joining us, we're going through a new quarterly. Well, it's relatively new.

We're on lesson number 4, dealing with "garments of grace: clothing imagery in the Bible," "clothing imagery in the Bible." We're on lesson four today. And I'm going to take some liberties today with your permission, because in our lesson today, we're going to be talking about Joseph's coat of many colors. But there's some other background stories I think we need to look at that are all connected with this. So the lesson title is, "the coat of different colors," or the coat of many colors. And I got a number of memory verses--or a number verses we're considering from Genesis all the way to 1 Corinthians 9.

But the memory verse is Genesis 37:3. And we'll be reading the whole thing again later, but why don't you say that with me, Genesis 37:3. And all together, ready? "Now Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, because he was The Son of his old age. And he made him a coat of many colors." Now I don't know what you think. Are parents supposed to have favorites? No.

We should all love our children equally. But do parents sometimes show favoritism? Parents sometimes identify or connect maybe more with one child than another, or sometimes they're too much like one child. And it creates tension. You know, there's a rumor out there that sometimes your children end up like you. And there's some truth to that rumor.

And what really goads me is that whenever I was growing up, I'd hear my parents say things. And I'd say, "boy, I'm never going to say that to my kids." And you end up saying it. In spite of your best attempts, you sometimes become like your parents. But parents will sometimes show favoritism. How many of you had a sibling? Let me see your hands, you have a sibling.

Come on, come on, everyone let's--this is a class. Did you ever at times think that one of your siblings was getting special treatment? Let me see. I did. I felt that way. I was the youngest and had, well, a couple of step-brothers and step-sisters and one step-brother in particular.

And when I lived with his mom, who was married to my dad, I don't felt like I got treated the same way that she treated him. All these blended families. And I tell you, talk about blended families, Jacob had a blended family. I mean my family really was interesting, but I didn't have three concubine mothers, or two concubine mothers and two sisters that were married. And 11 brothers and at least 1 sister, it mentions.

That must have been very interesting around the dinner table. And so there was rivalry there that--i think another reason that my brother got special treatment, my real brother of course had cystic fibrosis. So you could understand that he might be treated differently. And I understood that too. But when your parent gives--well, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Let's get to our lesson here and talk about some of the verses that are covered in it. I want to read chapter 37:2, 'cause this is left out also of the memory verse. "This is the history of Jacob. Joseph, being 17 years old, was feeding the flock with his brothers. And the lad was with The Sons of bilhah and The Sons of zilpah, his father's wives; and Joseph brought a bad report of them to his father.

" How do you think that made the brother's feel? Have you ever felt conflicted when you've got one child tattling on the other? And you're thinking to yourself, "don't be a tattletale." And you're thinking to yourself, "but I do want to know what's going on." And sometimes we've found ourselves telling the boys, "you know, you're friends aren't going to like you if you're always tattling," but at the same time we're thinking, "now if they're doing something really bad we want to know." And nobody appreciates when somebody's always breaking the story of what the others are doing. And the brothers did not appreciate that Joseph-- you know, maybe he was really concerned about their behavior and the consequences, maybe they were in danger, or what it would represent to the nations around them. I mean his intentions might have been very pure. Joseph seems to have a very pure heart. But the brothers didn't appreciate that he was telling on them, what they were doing.

It doesn't go into details of what it was, but it probably wasn't good. He'd get, you know, eleven boys together out on the range by themselves, and who knows what's happening. "They're throwing the sheep around!" I mean who knows what they were doing. You can only imagine. And he would tell on 'em.

And I guess The Father sensed there was some animosity there. So he said, "Joseph, maybe you better not be keeping the sheep with your brothers. You kind of hang out with me and--" 'cause at one point he gets sent to his brothers again. Now read Genesis 37:3-4, mike. Genesis 37:3-4, "now Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, because he was The Son of his old age.

Also he made him a tunic of man colors. But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peaceably to him." Alright, Joseph is showing preferential treatment--sorry--Jacob is showing preferential treatment to Joseph. We need to wind the tape back now and find out a little bit about why. Who did Jacob love and want to marry? Rachel. In the Bible, it says he kissed rachel and then he wept.

She must have been some kisser, huh? And it tells us that when he worked for her seven years for that bride, it was like nothing to him because of the love he had for rachel. Now rachel had a sister. What was her name? Leah. One of our daughter's name is rachel leah. That's Jewish.

It's actually rachel leah. Got a daughter named rachel. She'll be out here soon for stephen's graduation. And it was interesting. We named rachel, had no idea years later, my grandfather said, "that was very nice of you to name rachel after my grandmother.

" We said, "what?" "Yeah, my grandmother was rachel leah." "Really?" We had no idea. It was just coincidence. Well, not that big of a coincidence, two sisters right? But Jacob never said he had any feelings at all for leah. Now it says regarding rachel, she was beautiful and well-favored. Regarding leah, it said she was tender-eyed.

Now some have thought that meant that she had big, beautiful eyes as opposed to being totally beautiful. Others have interpreted tender-eyed meaning her vision was weak. But otherwise she may have been beautiful. It doesn't comment on that. So you know, the jury's out on that.

And anyway, any event, he loved rachel, but she was younger. So while we're talking about clothing, you've got to consider this story, 'cause it involves deception connected with clothing, which Jacob had a black belt in. You all with me? We're going to go there in just a minute. Genesis 29:21. After working seven years to get rachel, "Jacob says to laban, 'give me my wife, for my days are fulfilled, that I might go into her.

'" And they used to go in a tent together, meaning you were married. "And laban gathered together all the men of the place and made a feast." Now in that feast there could have been some aged wine. You just wonder. "And now it came to pass in the evening, that he took leah his daughter and brought her to Jacob, and he went in to her." In other words they had the honeymoon. "And laban gave his maid zilpah to his daughter leah as maid.

So it came to pass that in the morning--" and you know, it's just so amazing the way this is worded-- "behold, it was leah." You would think that he would know before that. But these are sisters. They may have sounded a little bit alike. I've noticed that when my boys at varying stages have answered the phone, people have said, "doug?" You know, once their voices change and they get a little older, "hello?" It takes a little more than that to know who it is. But a lot of them have thought it was me.

And when the boys were younger, they thought it was Karen. Well, we don't say that when they're sitting here, but they're at their classes right now. And I know they won't be watching this program, 'cause it's dad teaching. So I'm probably pretty safe, unless you tell 'em. And then we'll have to talk.

So but one reason he was able to pull this over the eyes of Jacob is because leah was dressed up in rachel's wedding clothes and veiled. So there was a clothing cover-up and a deception. Now if you read someone--matter of fact, I gave this out. Genesis 24:65, who'd we give this to? Right here. "For she had said to the servant, 'who is this man walking in the field to meet us?' The servant said, 'it is my master.

' So she took a veil and covered herself." Alright, this is Rebekah when she had been called and chosen and accepted to be the wife of Isaac. By the way, we're going to go into this in just a moment. When Abraham wanted Isaac to get married, and he sent eleazar to go to his hometown to find a wife, how many wives was he looking for? One. He didn't say, "go find wives for my son?" He said, "go find a wife for my son." Isaac did it right. He only married one.

Abraham had at least three: hagar, Sarah, keturah. Jacob had four. Then we go down the line, you get to Solomon finally. And he sort of holds the record. What was it? Three hundred wives, seven hundred concubines, so like a thousand all together, something like that.

I mean once you get over three it doesn't matter anymore, right? So anyway, she covered herself, 'cause she was coming now to be the bride. She said--the servant said, "oh, that's my master, Isaac." When she realized this is the groom, they veiled themselves. You know the old tradition: the groom is not supposed to see the bride on the wedding day in her dress, until she comes down the aisle. How many remember that? Well, that dates back to this very old tradition that they were not to look upon their face. And so when leah dressed up like her sister, she's probably not only wearing the wedding dress that had been prepared.

They didn't just go buy that off the shelf somewhere. There's a lot that went into that. Jacob knew that they were making a dress for her. Wearing rachel's dress. I wonder how rachel felt about all this.

Also tells you something about the obedience of children back then. And she's got her face veiled. So this clothing cover-up added to the deception. This comes into play later. Alright, back to our story about Joseph and his brothers.

I want to read something to you from "Patriarchs and Prophets," page 208 and 209. This is in your lesson. "The sin of Jacob and the--" the sin of Jacob was in taking multiple wives. No, the sin of Jacob in deceiving his brother, I'm sorry. "The sin of Jacob, and the train of events to which it led, had not failed to exert an influence for evil, an influence that revealed its bitter fruit in the character and life of his sons.

As these sons arrived at manhood, they developed serious faults, the results of polygamy were manifest in the household. This terrible evil tends to dry up the very springs of love." It just brings up all kinds of competition and jealousy and lack of trust into the relationship." This terrible evil tends to dry up the very springs of love, and it's influence weakens the most sacred ties. The jealousy of the several mothers had embittered the family relation. The children had grown up contentious and impatient of control. And The Father's life was darkened with anxiety and grief.

" So every now and then we get a phone call on "Bible answers live." "What's wrong with polygamy? They did it in the Bible." Yeah, they did it. And none of them were happy doing it. Look at what happened to Solomon. His wives drew his heart away after idolatry. Look at Abraham's household, had to send away hagar.

Look at Jacob's household. It is so obviously not God's plan. And you've heard me quote before when someone asked Benjamin franklin, "please produce one Scripture that says a man can't have more than one wife." And he said, "no man can serve two masters," was his Scripture. That's always worth a cheap laugh, so I like to re-quote that. Now this cover-up dealing with the coat of Joseph.

Before we can get to that, you've got to look at--it just referred here in "Patriarchs and Prophets" to the sin of Jacob that began a train that led to all these other actions. You know, it says in your lesson, page number 1, that--I'm sorry, it's page number 2 in this lesson. It's under Sunday. "Einstein's theory of general relativity teaches that all matter in the universe has a gravitational pull on all other matter. That is your body, no matter how big or small, exerts a gravitational pull, not only on your neighbor, but on the sun, the moon, and everything else in the created world.

" All that we do for good or evil is going to have some kind of eternal consequences. Every day you're having a gravitational pull. That's something to think about. Everything you say, everything you do is affecting the universe in some way. You all know what I mean.

It's like a stone thrown in the water that creates ripples that just can't be stopped. They interact in one way or another. So what was it that Jacob did, what was that sin that reacted and interacted all through his life? And it's interesting how often it has to do with clothing, deception and cover-ups. When Jacob wanted to get the blessing from his brother-- now you're going to have to turn in your Bibles to Genesis 27. Genesis 27 please, and I'll read verse 15 to 17 here.

Just to give you the background. Isaac was blind. He tells esau, "I don't know how much longer I'm going to live, could go anytime." Turns out he lived about another hundred years, but he didn't know. He said, "I've lost my sight. Who knows what else is failing.

I might not last long, but I want to bless you before I die. So go hunting." Another father that showed favoritism, Isaac, right? Did that play out then in Jacob's family? And he said, "go hunting and make venison. It'll be like a sacrifice. I'll feast and then I'll bless." Don't forget that. Rachel heard what he was saying.

She was kind of wondering because she really, she had favoritism too. Who was her favorite? I'm sorry Rebekah. Who was Rebekah's favorite? Jacob. Isaac's favorite? Esau. Created contention.

She then tells Jacob, "look, your father's getting ready to bless your brother. He's going to eat, and he's going to have some wine, and then he'll bless. But if I dress you up like your brother, and if you kill two kids, and I'll give you wine and bread, you go in, he'll feast--" well, let me read it to you here. Genesis 27:15, "Rebekah took the choice clothes." What kind of clothes? Might have had many colors. These are not the clothes that esau used when he was out hunting.

These were choice clothes of the firstborn-- "her elder son, that were with her in the house." This is one interesting point is while Abraham dwelt in tents, Isaac is now in a house. "And put them on Jacob her younger son. And she put the skins of the kids." She sacrificed these kids that will be part of the meal, but she "took the skins of the kids," still warm, put them on the backs of his hands. She must have been pretty quick with a needle and a thread. On the back of his neck.

And that also tells me that esau must have been hairy like a goat, because if Isaac is going to feel the back of his hands and the back of his neck and say, "yep, that's my boy." Ha-ha! He must have been eating a lot of rogaine or something out there. I don't know what was going on. But yeah, he was a fuzz ball. And so now their voices may have been a little bit the same as brothers, but there's other differences here. And it says that "she put the skins of the kids on his hands and the smooth part of his neck.

And she gave the savory food and the bread--" notice the word, bread, "that she prepared into the hands of her son." So finally Jacob goes in, I'm in verse 22, "and went near to his father, and his father felt him and said, 'the voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of esau. And he did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy like his brother esau's hands; so he blessed him." Now one more thing, Genesis 27. I got someone to read that for me. "And his father Isaac said unto him, 'come near now and kiss me, my son. And he came near and kissed him; and he smelled the smell of his raiment, and blessed him and said, 'see, the smell of my son is as the smell of a field which the Lord hath blessed.

'" So who's clothes? Does it ever say that Isaac feels Jacob's clothes? He's smelling his clothes. Now think about this. There's a spiritual analogy here that is very, very, very, very, very, very powerful. Jacob is getting ready to receive a blessing that belongs to the firstborn son. He receives it based on a sacrifice and wearing the garments that belong to the firstborn, the elder brother.

Jesus is the firstborn, beloved son. Isaac was the ancient of days, he was an old man when he blessed his son. He's blessing his beloved son. He had a favorite, his beloved son, but he doesn't give it to the beloved son. He gives what belongs to the beloved son to the one who's wearing his clothes and the sacrifice of the goats.

Do you see the plan of salvation in there? We receive the blessing that really belongs to Jesus, because of a sacrifice that is made, because we put on the robe of Christ's righteousness. Isn't that wonderful to think that you and I get that kind of credit? And the birthright that belonged to esau is transferred to Jacob, especially a spiritual birthright. That birthright that belongs to Jesus because of faith and that sacrifice, God closes his eyes, just like Isaac was blind. Bible tells us he winks at our ignorance. He feels his son through the sacrifice and he smells his clothing.

Psalm 45:8. This is one of the beautiful Psalms of David. "All your garments are scented with myrrh and aloes and cassia, out of the ivory palaces." Any of you ever heard that song? They don't sing it much anymore. [Sings] out of the ivory palaces into a world of-- there's a line in there about the garments. And now I can't, if you just close your eyes and I know you're not watching I can think of it.

[Sings] garments glorious he will come. No that's not the one. It talks about the aloes and the cassia in one of the verses. How many of you, you know what I'm talking about? Any of you know that song? I thought I was a new adventist. I know that song.

It's an old song, beautiful song. We sing it in our family. "Out of the ivory palaces." Christ when he was anointed in the tomb, was there myrrh and aloes? And see this is telling us that we get the credit for Jesus. He sees us. But now back to our story.

Jacob deceives his father through dress. That was the sin of Jacob. There's a spiritual analogy, but set that aside. On a human perspective, he was a scoundrel, and his mother, for deceiving The Father. It was an ambitious maneuver.

And so--but there's another spiritual application here. He says, "make me savory food, such as I love." Bring it to me that I might eat and my soul might bless you before I die. You know, there's one more thing. Let me just look at this real quick. In Genesis 27, go back in the Bible.

I got some notes that are in my lesson notes here. And then I've got some that I've got 'em circled in my Bible so I have to go back and forth. Help me remember, is this the old or new testament? Genesis. Okay, here we go. Just kidding.

Notice what it says in verse 17, "she gave him the savory food and the bread she had prepared." And you go down to verse 25, "and he said, 'bring it near to me, that I might eat my son's game, that my soul might bless you.' So he brought it near to him, and he ate; and he brought him wine." Did Jesus eat a meal of bread and wine and then bless the disciples? Eat, drink, bless. You see that in the Bible. Someone read for me John 13:4-5. "He riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments; and took a towel, and girded himself. After that he poured water into a basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded.

" What did Jesus do before he ate this meal with them? He laid aside his garments. Then he ate a meal. And did he bless them then at the last supper? Was the new covenant established then? After Jesus rose from the dead, Luke 24, what does he do when he appears to him? He says, "peace unto you." And the next thing he says is, "do you have anything to eat?" Isn't that strange? And even at the sea with the fish, he said, "children, have you any food?" And he already had stuff cooking on the fire. But he asked them. They ate together.

It says, "and he led them out," I'm in Luke 24:50 now, "he led them out as far as bethany, he lifted up his hands, and he blessed them." He ate, drank and blessed. This is what Isaac did with his sons. "My food," Jesus said, "is to do the will of him who sent me," and to finish his work. Alright, well I've said an awful lot now about Jacob. Let me see if I'm forgetting anything especially relevant here.

Oh, one more thing about that. There were two goats that were used. Can you think of another important ceremony in the Jewish culture where there were two goats? On the day of atonement, there were two goats that were sacrificed and used to separate the people from their sins. So that's another analogy here. Rebekah takes two goats.

So this death of the goats gave Jacob the appearance of the firstborn. The death of the kids feeds The Father and satisfies him. The skins cover his hands to cover his works. You notice where the skins are put on his hands. He was wearing the royal robes of the firstborn.

And he has the fragrance and the feel of the firstborn. And Isaac is blind. Notice what it says here in Isaiah 42:19, "who is blind, but my servant?" Who is the servant in Isaiah 42? The suffering servant? It's Jesus. "Who is blind, like my servant, or deaf, as my messenger whom I will send? Who is blind as he that is perfect, and blind as the Lord's servant?" Christ, through the sacrifice, through his sacrifice, The Father is blind to our past sins that are repented of and confessed. Now I want to make that very clear.

Some people say he's just blind to everything you continue to do. No. The eyes of the Lord are open to everything we do. But he'll be blind to our sins, our past confessed, repented sins, when we come clothed with Christ and we accept his righteousness. Alright now, we've talked a lot about what led up to this coat of many colors.

Now we got to get to the coat itself here. "A family disaster." Alright we got rachel of course, or leah dresses up like rachel and that causes a problem. And so he ends up saying, "but I also want to marry rachel." He says, "okay, I'll let you have rachel in one week." He didn't have to wait seven more years before he got rachel. What he said is, "fulfill leah's week." There was a honeymoon week that lasted. He said, "give her her week.

" He says, "then we'll have another wedding. You can have rachel. But you've got to agree to work seven more years," which he did. Then he worked another seven years to take care of getting some property. And with each wife came a concubine.

Now the concubines were not supposed to be these maidservants. It was often when you got a bride, if you had a wealthy family, the servant of this daughter went along with the daughter. It wasn't necessarily supposed to be a wife. Remember Sarah had hagar has a servant. It wasn't until she was desperate she said, "why don't you make her a wife, 'cause she's my friend, may as well be someone close.

" And in the beginning, rachel and leah, it was just rachel and leah. But when they weren't having children fast enough, they said, "why don't you also take my handmaiden?" And Jacob gave into that. And now you've got this motley family with all these sorted relationships and jealousies. And that leads into this coat of many colors. Have you ever tried to picture what that coat looked like? See typically in Bible times, it was very laborious to dye color.

You know, you go right now to the yardage shop and you can get pre-rainbow-dyed clothing. You can just buy it and sew it into whatever you want and it's got all the rainbow colors just that are woven right in there, either through dye or through electronics or I don't know how they do it. But in Bible times, it was very labor-intensive to make a color. Some people specialized in one color. Rahab had flax on her roof that was dyed scarlet.

That's why she had that scarlet rope handy. Who was the dealer in purple that you read about in the new testament? Lydia was a seller of--not all different colors, but one color. So it was very expensive if you could get all these different colors. Some dyes just came from one part of the world. You know the story behind, I think it's called cochineal red? One of the most effective dyes.

Red was a very hard color to dye. And when the conquistadors came to central America, they found that the indians there, in the area around Mexico, had the most beautiful red clothes that they would die. And they wanted to find out where'd they get the dye? And it took quite a while to pry the secret out of them. It came from what they thought were little beans that they would crush up. They later found they weren't beans.

Those beans were actually beetles, little cochineal beetles. And it was very labor intensive. They found them in the mesquite cactus out in the desert. And they'd collect millions of them to make a little bit of this dye. But that die would not come out.

And it became a very expensive process to get this. And eventually, those cochineal beetles were worth more than gold to the conquistadors for many years because they'd send them back east. They didn't want people to know that they were beetles. They said it was seeds. And the people for years thought that the cochineal beetles were really seeds in europe.

They had no idea, 'cause they tried to hide the secret. The british red coats, you know where they got the dye for the red coats? From those beetles that had come from Mexico and central America, from the deserts there. And you ever heard the experience--the expression, "dyed-in-the-wool?" Yeah, it was because they would have to kill these beetles and crush 'em up to--it was real, dyed-in-the-wool red, this cochineal red. Alright, so I just gave you a little amazing fact on one color. If you were able to get purple and red and blue and yellow and all of these dyes and these colors, only Kings could afford a garment like that.

And then you had to weave each strand, a little band of this and a band of that, and you know, might have had patterns like the navajo rugs. You ever seen some of these mexican ponchos that look like a rainbow? That's what I think of when I think of Joseph's coat. But in Bible times, what it said to the brothers was when The Father around the campfire one night with all--probably wasn't very smart to do this--with all the other brothers watching, Jacob says, "I wanted everyone to see what I'm giving Joseph for his birthday, for his 17th birthday, here is a coat of many colors." And not too many people were going, "ooh and ahh." At this point rachel's dead. And Jacob couldn't understand why everyone didn't applaud. What the brothers read into that is, "so even though he is the second to the youngest, you plan on treating him like the firstborn because you really just wanted to marry rachel.

And he was the firstborn of rachel so you're going to pass us all by. And the firstborn, double inheritance, is going to Joseph, little tattletale?" Can you understand the tension that that caused in the family? Let me give you a verse. 2 Samuel, someone read this for me, 2 Samuel 13:18-19. Who'd we give that to? Got a hand right here. "And she had a garment of diverse colors upon her: for which such robes were the King's daughters that were virgins appareled.

Then his servant brought her out, and bolted the door after her. And tamar put ashes on her head, and rent her garment of diverse colors that was on her, and laid her hand on her head, and went on crying." Alright, this is that story where amnon rapes his sister tamar, beautiful sister of absalom. Because she was one of the King's daughters and she was a virgin, she wore a robe of many colors. Only the King's children had that. I'm sure the girls had different ones than the boys.

But they wore some distinctive clothing that talked about their rank. And so when Jacob gives this to Joseph, you can see he's treating him like royalty, like majesty. He might have even spoiled him a little bit. Now what do the brothers do? Genesis 37. I'll be reading Genesis 37:23-24, "so it came to pass, when Joseph had come to his brothers, they stripped Joseph of his tunic, his tunic of many colors that was on him.

Then they took him and cast him into a pit. And the pit was empty, and there was no water in it." Did Jesus come to his brothers to save them, seeking them? The Bible says Joseph was sent from The Father seeking the welfare of his brothers. He came seeking them. And by the way, they weren't where they were supposed to be. He went where they were supposed to be, a place called dothan.

And they had wandered from where they were supposed to be. Jesus came seeking his brethren, and they weren't where they were supposed to be. He came to the fig tree, and there was no fruit on it. They had all the forms of religion and they didn't have the power. And they took him, they stripped him, they threw him in a dry hole.

Jesus was sold for the price of a slave. Joseph was sold for the price of a slave by his own brothers. Came into his own and his own received him not. You see the parallels here? Alright, please read for me Genesis 37:31-32. "So they took Joseph's tunic, killed a kid of the goats, and dipped the tunic in the blood.

Then they sent the tunic of many colors, and they brought it to their father and said, we have found this. Do you know whether it is your son's tunic or not?" So now they're using this robe as a big cover-up. They're using this robe to deceive their father to their sin. They're using a blood-stained robe to cover their sin. They're using the blood-stained robe of The Father's beloved son to cover their sin.

Do you see the analogy there between--what did Christ leave behind at the cross? Wasn't it a blood-stained robe that he left? And what is it that we present to The Father? It's not that we're wanting to deceive God. You know this is an analogy and they all break down somewhere. And I don't want to over-spiritualize everything. But I think there is a very real analogy here that in the same sense, Jesus is sold for the price of a slave. He's betrayed by his own.

Did Jesus forgive his people? Yeah, some people have not gotten over it and they still think that they're under a curse. Joseph forgave his brothers. Jesus also forgives anybody. "Whosoever will," comes to him for forgiveness. Were they tested in--did Joseph put his brothers through a trial? And God sometimes puts us through trials to help reveal our character and to come to our senses.

But just notice the impact of this. Now who is it that pleads in behalf of Joseph, or Benjamin, when the brothers are finally told that Joseph is alive? Which one of the brothers? It's judah. Do you remember that? Judah pleads. Now while we're talking about the example of Rebekah, rachel and leah, Joseph, and talking about these robes that are kind of used to deceive, now you've got to look at how this sin of Jacob goes one more generation here. Look what happens to judah.

If you look in--let me just see where I put it here. Oh yeah, Genesis 38. Go in your Bibles to Genesis 38. And I've got to give you the background of it. Well, maybe I better look at it real quick here right out of the Bible.

While you're hearing this story about Joseph, there's a chapter that interrupts Joseph. You ever notice that? Verse 36 of Genesis 37, "now the midianites had sold him," Joseph, "in Egypt to potiphar, an officer of the pharaoh, captain of the guard." All of the sudden, I mean you're hanging--it's called a cliffhanger. You're saying, "what's going to happen to Joseph?" Moses stops and he puts in this very strange story about judah, of course which is an ancestor of Christ. It's almost like God is saying I'm telling you really about Jesus through this story, because judah of the brothers, it doesn't go through the family of anyone else but judah. And then it goes back in 39, "now Joseph," you see that? Chapter 39:1, "now Joseph.

" Chapter 37:36, "Joseph is sold." And 38, it's talking about an event with judah, which is who Christ comes through. Now in this he's got his sons. And first of all, judah makes a mistake. He marries a canaanite woman. He shouldn't have done that.

Has two boys that are raised partially by their canaanite mom, actually he has three boys. And he's got er and onan. They marry--er marries this girl named tamar. Judah takes tamar. And it says, "he was evil, and the Lord slew him.

" Then as the custom of the day, he says to his brother, onan, "go to your brother's wife," I'm in verse 9, "and raise up seed to your brother." There's no one to take care of her. She's a widow. You're a brother, that's what they did. I'm not going to go down that road right now. And then he dies.

He didn't want to raise up children. He wanted all the benefits of the relationship, but he didn't want to have to take care of her household. And so he dies. the Lord slays him. Now he's got this one child left that he's supposed to eventually, when he gets a little older, he's probably a teenager and too young.

And judah says in verse 11, "to tamar, his daughter in law, 'remain a widow in your Father's house." "Go back to your Father's house, let him take care of you. You stay there. And when my son shelah is grown, I'll let him marry you and he'll take care of you then. But in the process of time, judah's wife dies." Don't miss that point. And she could see that shelah had grown up, but he wasn't being given to her.

So what does she do? I'm in chapter 38 of Genesis, verse 14, "she took off her widow's garments," that she's been wearing for years, "and she covers herself with a veil and wraps herself, and sits in an open place on the way to timnah." Interesting that that's also where Samson found the wrong kind of woman. "For she saw that shelah was grown, and he was not given to her. And when judah--" now judah's wife is gone, he's maybe feeling lonely. He's walking down the road, she's dressed up like a harlot. That's exactly what she'd planned, probably has a veil on, maybe a lot of makeup.

I don't know. But he didn't recognize her, evidently; she's disguised by her apparel. We all agree? And she deceives him. And she deceives him into having a relationship with her. And she says, "I want to pledge.

" And tamar heard he was coming down the road. "So she takes off her widow's garments," I'm back in verse 14, "covers herself with a veil, wrapped herself, and sat in an open place which was on the way to timnah." Judah saw her. "He thought she was a harlot, because she covers her face. Then he turned into her by the way and said, 'please let me come to you,' for he didn't know that she was his daughter in law. And she said, 'what will you give me?'" That you might have that privilege.

And he said, "I'll send a goat." Isn't it interesting how these goats keep showing up in the story. "I'll send a goat from the flock." "And she said, 'will you give me a pledge 'til you send it?'" This will be the payment. This will be the sacrifice. "What pledge will I give you?" "I want your signet ring and a cord, and your staff that's in your hand." They all had very peculiar staffs that had their kind of family emblem notched in them. And he went to her, she got pregnant.

Interesting, just one time. And finally he hears that his daughter in law was pregnant. That pompous patriarch, he said, "bring her out and stone her! Let's burn her with fire! She played the harlot!" And she's brought before the crowd, and they're going to execute her in taliban style. And she says, "just can I have a word? The Father is the one who owns this staff and this signet here. You might want to check it out and just see who The Father is.

" Judah realizing that he had lied about giving her his next son, according to the law, that she had taken matters into her own hand. And she was now going to have a child by her father in law. I know you think that's horrible. But keep in mind, back in Bible times, that was not as uncommon. It wasn't really 'til the time of Moses that that was outlawed.

Remember what lot did. I'm not justifying any of that. I'm just saying the mindset back then was these were shepherds. The way they thought was if you were a viable bull, didn't really matter who the ewe or the cow was. I mean they just had a very base mentality about that.

And she ends up pregnant. Now this story is interesting because who ends up in the genealogy of Jesus that's in Matthew? There are four women that are mentioned: Sarah, rahab, Ruth, tamar. She ends up, by this deed of a cover-up and this deception, starts with Jacob doing deception through clothing, ends up going down through his sons and then going into Jacob or judah rather. She becomes an ancestor of Jesus. Isn't that amazing? All this had to do with that cover-up.

You know, you wonder what ever happened to Joseph's robe. When his father was reunited with him, had he ever cleaned that thing up and hung it up as some kind of an heirloom? And he thought, "boy, I don't want the robe anymore; I want Joseph." And then when he was reunited with Joseph, I wonder as they were unpacking their father's things one day if he saw that old robe that his dad had been saving all those years looking at to remember his son that he had lost. But did he need it now? Joseph's dressed in the best finery of heaven. They have all these people wondering, "whatever happened to the robe of Christ?" And some say it's the shroud of turin. Or I think they even made a movie with--all those movie stars called "the robe.

" The robe was that on Christ, where did it ever go? Did they fold it up? Did they pass it around? Is that what we're supposed to look for, that relic? Or is Jesus going to have something much better than that? Does John see him in Revelation covered with a robe? Yeah he does. He's wearing beautiful garments in Revelation, glowing robes. And he's offering those robes of righteousness to each one of us. Isn't that wonderful when you think about it? Thank you for studying with us, friends. Free offer is on your screen, "reconnecting the family.

" Call the number there, we'll be happy to send it to you. God bless you 'til we study again together. Journey back through time to the center of the universe, discover how a perfect angel transformed into satan, the arch villain, the birth of evil, a rebellion in heaven, a mutiny that moved to earth. Behold the creation of a beautiful, new planet and the first humans. Witness the temptation in eden.

Discover God's amazing plan to save his children. This is a story that involves every life on earth, every life. "The cosmic conflict," if God is good, if God is all powerful, if God is love, then what went wrong?