Genesis 47:12
Joseph also provided his father and brothers and all his father's household with food for their families.
Sermons
Types of the Holy EucharistGenesis 47:12
The Settlement of the Children of Israel in GoshenR.A. Redford Genesis 47:11, 12














I. A CONSUMMATION. Distinctly the act of Joseph, under the command of Pharaoh.

1. The fruit of righteousness reaped.

2. The fulfillment of God's word.

II. A NEW LIFE BASED UPON THE TESTIMONY OF DIVINE GRACE. The weak things have been proved mighty, the elect of God has been exalted. The "best of the land is for the seed of the righteous: The meek shall inherit the earth." Goshen the type of the Divine kingdom.

And Joseph nourished his father, and his brethren, and all his father's household, with bread.
I. WHO WAS THIS THAT FED HIS BRETHREN IN THE TIME OF DEARTH? (Acts 7:11). Joseph, "separate from his brethren" (Genesis 49:26), "sold to be a bond servant" (Psalm 105:17), tried, afflicted, and imprisoned, so that "the iron entered into his soul" (Psalm 105:18), was a true type of Jesus our Lord, Who became a "stranger unto His brethren, an alien unto His mother's children" (Psalm 69:8; Psalm 88:7, 18), Who took upon Him the form of a servant" (Philippians 2:7), was afflicted and smitten (Isaiah 53:4, 5, and cf. Psalm 88:8). Then, too, as Joseph brought out of prison (Psalm 105:19, 20). set over all the land of Egypt (Genesis 41:41, 43; Psalm 105:21), saluted as Zaphnath-pasneah (Genesis 41:45), "the Saviour of the world" (Neals), sustained the life of all nations by miraculous supplies of bread (Genesis 41:57): even so Jesus our Lord, the true Joseph, "taken from prison and from judgment" (Isaiah 53:8), entrusted with all power (Matthew 28:18; Ephesians 1:20-23), "exalted to the right hand of God to be a Prince and a Saviour" (Acts 5:31), now feeds countless thousands throughout all the world, with Himself, the Living Bread, in the Holy Eucharist.

II. WHOM DID JOSEPH FEED?

1. All countries — for "all countries came into Egypt to Joseph for to buy corn: because that the famine was so sore in all lands" (Genesis 41:57). So in one sense our True Joseph "giveth food to all flesh" (Psalm 136:25), and "openeth His hand, and filleth all things living with plenteousness" (Psalm 145:16; Psalm 104:27, 28).

2. Joseph fed his people, the Egyptians, for "when all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread: and Pharaoh said unto all the Egyptians, Go unto Joseph; what he saith unto you, do .... And Joseph opened all the storehouses, and sold unto the Egyptians" (Genesis 41:55, 56). "And when money failed... all the Egyptians came unto Joseph, and said, Give us bread... And Joseph gave them bread" (Genesis 47:15, 17). So now Jesus our Lord, the True Joseph, prepares a table in the wilderness of this world, at which He feeds His people, not with common food, but with spiritual good things, help, benedictions, knowledge, grace, "to deliver their soul from death and to feed them in the time of dearth" (Psalm 33:18), so that they may eat and crave for that still greater food, the Holy Eucharist, of which He spake (Psalm 81:11), "open thy mouth," &c.

3. But Joseph specially cared for his brethren — his kinsfolk according to the flesh — for he brought them into his house and feasted them (Genesis 43:17, 34), he gave them provision for the way (Genesis 42:25). So now our own Joseph, Jesus our Lord, hath special care for His elect (Wisd. 3:9), the saints of the Most High whom He is not ashamed to call His brethren (Hebrews 2:11), He brings them into His house, He makes them to sit down to meat, at His table in His kingdom, He comes forth and serves them, saying, "Come, eat of My bread and drink of the wine that I have mingled" (Proverbs 9:5), "for My flesh is meat indeed and My blood is drink indeed" (John 6:55). Thus do the poor eat and are satisfied. They are full, yet hungry still.

III. WHEN DID JOSEPH FEED THEM?

1. "When the dearth was in all lands," "and the famine was over all the face of the earth," and was "sore in all lands" (Genesis 41:54, 56, 57), "and there was no bread in all the land: for the famine was very sore, so that the land of Egypt and all the land of Canaan fainted by reason of the famine" (Genesis 47:13), then "Joseph nourished his father and his brethren and all his father's household, with bread." So now, "in the time of dearth," when there is a sore and grievous famine in the weary land of this world and multitudes are perishing with hunger, because they cannot satisfy the cravings of their immortal spirit with the husks that the swine do eat (Luke 15:16), our True Joseph feedeth the hungry, satisfieth the fainting soul with Himself, the bread of God, and saith to every soul that is hungering and thirsting after righteousness (Matthew 5:6), "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it" (Psalm 81:11.)

2. After he had "made himself strange unto them" (Genesis 42:7, 8), he nourishes them with bread. So now Jesus our Lord appears "in another form," and makes Himself strange as it were unto us by veiling His beauty and His brightness under the veils of bread and wine, as it is written, "Verily Thou art a God that hidest Thyself, O God of Israel, the Saviour" (Isaiah 45:15).

3. When his brethren had repented of their wickedness and fault, and were sorry for their sin — for they said, "We are verily guilty concerning our brother." So now it is when we have confessed our wickedness, and are sorry for our sins (Psalm 38:18; Psalm 51:3), when we have examined ourselves (1 Corinthians 11:28, 31, 32), when we "do truly and earnestly repent us of our sins... and have made our humble confession to Almighty God, meekly kneeling upon our knees"; then is it that our dear Lord vouchsafes to feed and nourish us with that True Wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and that True Bread that strengtheneth man's heart, in the Holy Communion.

IV. WHERE DID JOSEPH NOURISH HIS BRETHREN WITH BREAD?

1. He fed and feasted them in his house, at his princely table, albeit sitting apart from them (Genesis 43:16, 17, 32); whereas the Greater One than Joseph, even Jesus our King, receiveth sinners and eateth with them (Luke 15:2) at His own royal table of Sacred Communion (Luke 22:30), in His house the Church (1 Timothy 3:15; Hebrews 3:6).

2. Also Joseph gave his brethren provision for the way (Genesis 42:25; Genesis 45:21): so our Blessed Lord invites us to draw nigh unto the altar of God, and "strengthen ourselves with the Bread of Life" now, whilst we are in the way, saying, "Arise and eat" of My Flesh and drink of My Blood, "because the journey is too great for thee" (1 Kings 19:7).

3. He fed and nourished them in Goshen (Genesis 46:28; Genesis 47:1, 4, 27; Genesis 50:8, 22); so it is in the true Goshen that Jesus our King Eternal feeds His brethren at the marriage Supper of the Lamb (Revelation 19.), and reveals Himself to them face to face.

V. How DID JOSEPH NOURISH HIS BRETHREN?

1. He fed his brethren at no expense to themselves — for "Joseph commanded to fill their sacks with corn, and to restore every man's money into his sack, and to give them provision for the way; and thus did he unto them" (Genesis 42:25, and cf. 43:12, 21-24, 45:20-24, 47:11, 12, 27, 50:21) not once nor twice. So Jesus our Saviour feeds us with His own most Blessed Body and Blood, and satisfies our mouth with good things, "without money and without price" (Isaiah 55:1, 2), again and yet again throughout our earthly pilgrimage.

2. He nourished them with corn (Genesis 42:19; Genesis 50:25), and wine (Genesis 43:34), and bread (Genesis 47:12), and so "saved their lives by a great deliverance"; and yet the food which Joseph provided was perishable in its nature, and they who partook of it died at their appointed time. Whereas our True Joseph — Who is the Corn of Wheat (John 12:24), the Wine that cheereth God and man (Judges 9:13), and the Bread of God which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world (John 6:33) — gives us Food which is incorruptible, and is the seed of immortality, seeing that "This is the Bread which cometh down from heaven that a man may eat thereof, and not die," "if any man eat of this Bread he shall live for ever."

(W. F. Shaw, B. D.)

People
Egyptians, Jacob, Joseph, Pharaoh
Places
Canaan, Egypt, Goshen, Rameses
Topics
Bread, Brethren, Brothers, Care, Dependents, Families, Father's, Giving, Household, Infants, Joseph, Maintained, Mouth, Needs, Nourished, Nourisheth, Ones, Provided, Sustained
Outline
1. Joseph presents his father, and five of his brothers before Pharaoh.
11. He gives them habitation and maintenance.
13. He gets the Egyptian's money;
16. their cattle;
18. and their lands, except the priests', to Pharaoh.
23. He restores the land for a fifth.
28. Jacob's age.
29. He swears Joseph to bury him with his fathers.

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Genesis 47:11-12

     5501   reward, human

Genesis 47:12-13

     5061   sanctity of life

Library
Two Retrospects of one Life
'And Jacob said unto Pharaoh, Few and evil have the days of the years of my life been.'--GENESIS xlvii. 9. 'The God which fed me all my life long unto this day; the Angel which redeemed me from all evil.' --GENESIS xlviii. 15,16. These are two strangely different estimates of the same life to be taken by the same man. In the latter Jacob categorically contradicts everything that he had said in the former. 'Few and evil,' he said before Pharaoh. 'All my life long,' 'the Angel which redeemed me from
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Growth by Transplanting
'Then Joseph came and told Pharaoh, and said, My father and my brethren, and their flocks, and their herds, and all that they have, are come out of the land of Canaan; and, behold, they are in the land of Goshen. And he took some of his brethren, even five men, and presented them unto Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said unto his brethren, What is your occupation? And they said unto Pharaoh, Thy servants are shepherds, both we, and also our fathers. They said moreover unto Pharaoh, For to sojourn in the land
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Seven Sanctified Thoughts and Mournful Sighs of a Sick Man Ready to Die.
Now, forasmuch as God of his infinite mercy doth so temper our pain and sickness, that we are not always oppressed with extremity, but gives us in the midst of our extremities some respite, to ease and refresh ourselves, thou must have an especial care, considering how short a time thou hast either for ever to lose or to obtain heaven, to make use of every breathing time which God affords thee; and during that little time of ease to gather strength against the fits of greater anguish. Therefore,
Lewis Bayly—The Practice of Piety

The Shortness and Misery of Life.
1 Our days, alas! our mortal days Are short and wretched too; "Evil and few," the patriarch says, [1] And well the patriarch knew. 2 'Tis but at best a narrow bound That heaven allows to men, And pains and sins run thro' the round Of threescore years and ten. 3 Well, if ye must be sad and few, Run on, my days, in haste; Moments of sin, and months of woe, Ye cannot fly too fast. 4 Let heavenly love prepare my soul, And call her to the skies, Where years of long salvation roll, And glory never dies.
Isaac Watts—Hymns and Spiritual Songs

A Cloud of Witnesses.
"By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau, even concerning things to come. By faith Jacob, when he was a-dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph; and worshipped, leaning upon the top of his staff. By faith Joseph, when his end was nigh, made mention of the departure of the children of Israel; and gave commandment concerning his bones.... By faith the walls of Jericho fell down, after they had been compassed about for seven days. By faith Rahab the harlot perished not with them that were disobedient,
Thomas Charles Edwards—The Expositor's Bible: The Epistle to the Hebrews

Elucidations.
I. (Deadly Sins, cap. ix., p. 356.) To maintain a modern and wholly uncatholic system of Penitence, the schoolmen invented a technical scheme of sins mortal and sins venial, which must not be read into the Fathers, who had no such technicalities in mind. By "deadly sins" they meant all such as St. John recognizes (1 John v. 16-17) and none other; that is to say sins of surprise and infirmity, sins having in them no malice or wilful disobedience, such as an impatient word, or a momentary neglect of
Tertullian—The Five Books Against Marcion

A Believer's Privilege at Death
'For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.' Phil 1:1I. Hope is a Christian's anchor, which he casts within the veil. Rejoicing in hope.' Rom 12:12. A Christian's hope is not in this life, but he hash hope in his death.' Prov 14:42. The best of a saint's comfort begins when his life ends; but the wicked have all their heaven here. Woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation.' Luke 6:64. You may make your acquittance, and write Received in full payment.' Son, remember that
Thomas Watson—A Body of Divinity

Genesis
The Old Testament opens very impressively. In measured and dignified language it introduces the story of Israel's origin and settlement upon the land of Canaan (Gen.--Josh.) by the story of creation, i.-ii. 4a, and thus suggests, at the very beginning, the far-reaching purpose and the world-wide significance of the people and religion of Israel. The narrative has not travelled far till it becomes apparent that its dominant interests are to be religious and moral; for, after a pictorial sketch of
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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