A few weeks ago on Things Unseen, I suggested that the reason Satan tempted Eve before he tempted Adam

was because the strongest leverage the devil has is often found in manipulating God's best gifts. That's what makes

him so hateful. He doesn't use discarded trash. He uses the best to try to bring about the worst.

Think about marriage. How is it that two people who couldn't bear to be apart from each other a few years later can't stand being in the same house and get divorced?

The old Roman proverb was right. Corruptio optomy, pessimist. The worst is the corruption of the best.

One of God's very best gifts, obviously, is family. He sets the solitary in families, we're told, and we know that family life is one of God's greatest

blessings to us. But that's exactly why Satan seeks to corrupt and to destroy families.

And the dysfunctional family life that's become so characteristic of the 21st century is surely one of the devil's greatest triumphs.

But this week we've been thinking about a biblical illustration of a dysfunctional family in the story of the family

of Jacob and the story of Joseph in Genesis chapter 37 through 50. What a mess. An unwise father,

a naive and apparently self-centered youngest son, jealous brothers, a potent cocktail of

sinful tendencies that led to a great deal of misery for all of them.

And yet in his providence God transformed it.

Yesterday we were thinking about the way in which God's providence unraveled and began to untwist

Jacob. And today I want to reflect with you for a moment about how he did the same thing

in Joseph's brothers. They were jealous of him and angry with him, and they sold them into slavery,

and then they deceived their father into believing he had been

killed.

And then no doubt they tried their hardest to forget about him, out of sight, out of mind.

But while they tried to forget, God was working.

And because of a providential need that affected the ancient Near East, they found themselves

all unknown to themselves standing in the presence of their brother, but not recognizing

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