On Your Level | Genesis 45 | Crossroads Daily

God's redemption, that's the thing that's amazing when God's redemption. It's like, no, no, I'm using that too. I'm gonna use that too, right? That's something in our earlier conversations you pointed out to me. Yeah, because that sticks with me too, bro. I'm like, wow. Yes, he just redeemed it, man. This is the Crossroads Daily. No experts, no perfect people, just honest conversations about what happens when the Bible shows up in real life. Hey, I'm Chuck. I'm Debo. I'm Miko. I'm Peter. Joseph reveals himself to his brothers and the redemption story happens. I mean, this is a long walk, right? This is multiple chapters of Genesis and yet it comes to this beautiful, beautiful conclusion where we see God's redemption. So we're gonna talk about redemption today. We're talking about forgiveness today. But before that, let's talk about emotions. What song is that? Isn't that from Mariah Carey? Mariah Carey's emotion song? Sing it for us.

That's a little too high for me. I don't know if I can hit that note. You can hit that note, but you've got two songs. Whistle register in that song. I can't hit the whistle register. Oh man, but like, there's a lot of, I love it. I actually love that there's a lot of men crying in Genesis, particularly Joseph and his two brothers. Yes, man. So, well, let's talk about emotions because I think we can fall into one of two camps. You can either be a person who like, your emotions dominate everything and can cloud maybe good judgment sometimes, or you stuff your emotions. And so what part of that extreme do you tend to fall in? I'll be honest and tell you, I can be too emotional. My wife will tell you, I can be too emotional and I need to kind of bring it down a level. But I can also still be very unaware of my emotions. They're real, but I'm like not facing them. How about you guys, where do you struggle? That is a loaded question for me, man. I could say that if I had to pick between those two, it would probably be somewhat more leaning towards the being emotional to a degree. But I remember some years ago, there was a song and in the song it says, Lord over my emotions. And that has been like a regular prayer of mine. And to the point where I'm to like now where I'm like,

Lord, have you answered that prayer and are you communicating to me through my emotions? Because I'll find myself dealing with emotions when I'm like, where is this coming from? You know what I'm saying? Why am I sad right now? Why am I, is this empathy? Is this something, maybe this isn't mine. Should I be praying for someone else and you're putting someone on my heart right now and or whatever. So I'd say like, I definitely lean into my emotions, but I'm always like, okay, God, or kind of filtering it through him, I feel like. And it's stemmed from that prayer, Lord over my emotions. I can tend to, I would say my struggle is I tend to modulate my emotions too much based on environment of what I perceive to be appropriate. It's like, oh, and I think that leads to some inauthenticity sometimes, at least some like maybe overprotecting myself. And that's why as this chapter kind of sticks out to me in a way, because Joseph doesn't do that. He is completely unashamed. Can I Bible nerd out for a second? Please. The scripture specifically calls out that the Egyptians heard him and Pharaoh's household knew. And I think that they call that out because in Egyptian culture, an Egyptian ruler

is supposed to be stoic and project divine perfection. All their art is stoic. It doesn't, like you look at a Greek statue, it's like the face is contorted with grief and rage and passion and Egyptian art. It's all, everybody's just one expression. And so Joseph was completely bucking every societal expectation. And potentially, I mean, that would disrupt his ability to command in his position. And he did not care. He's like, I am just gonna show you guys all this built up emotion because that joy and that grief mixed together. I think David Kessler said this, grief demands a witness. And he's letting everybody witness everything that he's feeling and just how special that is. Oh, that's powerful. Yeah. Wow, that's powerful. Thanks for sharing that. That was really good. Yeah. That's so good. I was not expecting that. That's why we tuned in, right? Yeah, absolutely. I learned something. Look, I'm tuned in. Yes.

Yeah. That's good. I'm a natural suppressor. Like, I suppress my emotions out of fault. And I think, similar to what you said, like, I learned so much in my marriage because it's like a mirror. I'm like, I didn't even know that I did that until I, you know, started dating a husband and now we're married and learning so much about my emotions and how, like, it's unhealthy to, like, not be open. And I love this chapter too because, and even we see throughout the Bible, we see Jesus weeping. We see people showing their emotions. Absolutely. And I think it's a beautiful thing. So, yeah, that's good. That's good. I'm glad we talked about that. Yeah. Yeah There there's a redemption story that's playing out here and so I wonder where have you seen that in your life Where have you seen God redeem over the long haul? even hard Difficult things in your life. Yeah, I feel like I always keep pointing to this, but I think just my role now, you know as The prison director and just my whole life now like just everything that That that you know for my wife to our family just Not anything that like I would say like I pursued or went after but it was like this was God's plan Yeah, and I'm always like I always reflect and I'm like god. I can't believe this is the life I was running from all of these years

You know what I'm saying is I was trying to do things my own way And I didn't have to settle with like your consolation prize when I finally decide to like, you know Begin walking with you. It's not like okay. Well you blew it. So now you just get yeah, you know what I'm saying? It's like you you you placed your best for me exactly What do I would end up and I get to live that now in spite of all of the mistakes? I've made and all of the reason I would have you know I've given you to not allow me to you know experience this and live this so yeah Not even in spite of it in some reason because of yeah, absolutely Earlier conversations you pointed out to me. I'm yeah, cuz that sticks with me too. Wow. Yes. He just redeemed it man. Yeah Yeah, so he doesn't waste anything. He does not he doesn't he doesn't waste anything I mean, I'm even thinking about I just I just let it our high school camp, you know Got a group of boys that I'm you know And I was even just thinking like all they want to talk about was girls, yes, right And I could share I mean I I have a story with that and and it's not all good I can I can show like oh I can relate to this I was this is what I was doing in high school Like I can I feel I feel they know that I'm not just speaking out of a place of theory I'm speaking out of a place of personal experience and it adds weight and It felt so terrible at the time But now it's like it's it's become a source of ministry and I just I can't I can't thank him enough for that Yeah, it's like it gives purpose to all of that Whenever you get to like, you know, yeah someone else in this season now I can give so much purpose That's what that's the question every philosopher through all of history. It's like what is the meaning of life? What's our purpose? How do we find meaning like that's what everyone's always asking and it's God's like I got the answer I Also think there's something in here about forgiveness You know Joseph Because Joseph forgave and I truly believe he forgave his brothers. He's weeping over each of them like that's powerful I think it's cuz he forgave them. Yeah Why is forgiveness so hard and what does it take to genuinely forgive?

Gosh we got us. It's not it's not about the other person at all. It's about you. Yeah Forgiveness is a gift that you give to yourself. Mm-hmm. It's say that again This is a gift you give to yourself I mean and it's all about your own heart transformation Like there are so many people in my life that I will never get an explanation for what they did I will never get an apology from them I whenever like it like forgiveness is not a reaction to them and say it's it's a it's a welling of the healing and grieving and love that got what's working on inside of you and so and Yes, it's it's a it's a blessing to you and it can be a blessing to others, but don't make it about the other person That's my I love in the story that like Joseph didn't like, you know demand answers before he like showed me. He's like why he just Showed forgiveness and I find that hard for me because I'm that way where I'm like before I can forgive you you need to like Explain everything and then I can forgive you I'll evaluate you know, but like it's such a powerful thing that like Joseph is like, I don't even need to know why like he He has such a God perspective and he's like, I know why even God didn't like God even allowed for this to happen And so that's just like dang. I feel like I missed that a lot And I operate in this like fleshly thinking of like how I deliver forgiveness and how I should so yeah And it is funny cuz even in the story, I mean he says to him like don't beat yourself up He knows where they're coming from and there's just a freedom that comes I love you said forgiveness is a gift not for others, but for you Yeah, there there's probably a place in all of us. I know for me. I'm thinking about particularly Family relationships where it seems like it can be really hard to forgive And it goes back to what you said, because I'm not sure they're going to change. I might get hurt again. And yet, as God has kind of put me in places of saying, but I call you to forgive, I do keep coming back to this one thing, which is when I remember how much I have been forgiven, you know, Jesus talks about this,

stories about this, when I remember how much I have been forgiving, that's the thing that at the end of the day allows me to say, you know what? I will extend forgiveness. And so whenever I'm stuck, what God always points me to is, I just gently, lovingly want you to see how much I've forgiven you of. And weigh that against holding this offense, little offense over a person. It's a sobering, but beautiful thing. And I think forgiveness is that, it's a sobering, but beautiful thing. So I think we're out of time, but man, this is great. We could talk about redemption and forgiveness for an entire week. So I hope you've been blessed today. I hope you've been blessed today.