Genesis 45:1-15
How good and pleasant it is when sisters and brothers dwell together in unity (Psalm 133:1). That was on the huge banner in the front of the sanctuary at the church I served in my last year of seminary. When we gathered for worship, it was these words from the psalm that centered us. How good and pleasant it is when sisters and brothers dwell together in unity. It was so big that you couldn’t see the cross. That was intentional though. They were not denying the centrality of the cross in their lives. That wasn’t the point at all. Instead, they’d put that huge banner over their altar because of their relationship with their Jewish sisters and brothers. Every Friday night their sanctuary transformed into the synagogue for B’nai Jeshrun. Indeed. How good and pleasant it is when sisters and brothers dwell together in unity.
Those words have been on my heart this week as I traveled to North Carolina to be with the members of The Young Clergy Women Project. This group is not new to me. I’ve been in their midst from almost the instant I moved to Maine. I was the only ordained human under the age of 50 in the entire state. For a long time, it felt as though I was the only one that wasn’t approaching retirement. I want to say that was an exaggeration, but it’s not. I truly felt like the only one. With this group of young clergy women, I get to remember that what I knew was true in seminary. I get to feel it and know it to be true because there are young people going into ministry. There are young women serving the church. These women get it and they get me. Surely, this past week, I have repeated that ancient blessing. How good and pleasant it is when sisters and brothers dwell together in unity.
I want to tell you more about my experience with these young clergy women as we found rest and relaxation together. And I will. But let’s be clear. That’s not where Joseph is in this story. He’s not excited about finding his people. He’s stuck with his family. There may be some truth that blood is thicker than water, but not here. These brothers conspired to kill their own (Genesis 37:18). There’s no poetic metaphor there. I wish there was. But, there it is. Off in the distance, Joseph’s brothers see him. Before Joseph comes near, they grumble about their brother the dreamer. But he’s still far away. When Joseph finally does get close, his loving brothers throw him in a pit to be consumed by wild animals. They sit above that same pit and have a picnic. While they eat, they have enough time to decide that this pit-thing was actually a really bad idea. Not for reasons you might think. Or hope for. No, their blood is so thick that they amend their plan to make some money out of the deal. So they sell their brother Joseph to the Egyptians for twenty pieces of silver. Indeed. How good and pleasant it is when sisters and brothers dwell together in unity.
But we want the words of this psalm to be true, even though our birth families have in one way or another sold us out. This may reveal why some of us come into the church to create our own families. No matter how much we’ve tried to love those that share our blood, they’ve kept us at a distance. They’ve called us names far worse than dreamer. They’ve made us feel that we shouldn’t belong, no matter how we try. We just don’t fit. Not with them. They’ve tossed us in some pit — and then thought better of it and made us feel worse. Maybe not intentionally but it sure feels intentional. It always does when you’re left to the wild animals of your own imagination.
And yet, what will always surprise me about rejected people is that we don’t give up. Joseph is one among many. There are other stories like it here in the sanctuary of this church family. Something within each of you has determined that those voices from your birth families don’t matter. You know that you are loved by God. And so, you search for those people that will hold your hands, look into your eyes and say with deep conviction, How good and pleasant it is when sisters and brothers dwell together in unity.
On Thursday morning, I had that experience. I admit that it’s been a long time since I paid enough attention to actually hear that blessing in another’s voice. But there it was. Encircled by young clergy women of every denomination, I heard that blessing. We stood side by side as we told the story of our salvation, broke bread, drank wine and sang our faith. And then, in that circle, we took each other’s hands and offered a blessing. I heard… No, I felt God’s presence in a way I hadn’t felt in a long time. As my sister in Christ took my hands in her own and whispered words I don’t remember, I felt God come closer.
Come closer to me, Joseph summons his brothers (Genesis 45:4). The words are so gentle I can’t imagine them being spoken above a whisper. But these are determined words. They are insistent. There is more love. I deserve more love. And so, the words don’t falter. There’s no hesitation. These words are simply offered. Come closer to me. The brothers no longer keep their distance. They come near. They get close.
That space is important. There’s something about distance where these brothers deal poorly with Joseph while far away. They don’t look in his eyes. They never take his hand. There’s distance — and Joseph notices. He tells his brothers how this rift made God come down (Genesis 45:9). The distance in their broken relationship made God come close. Joseph didn’t ask God to come. This relationship isn’t like those he shares with his brothers or even his father. Joseph asks that his father come down, but he never summons for God in this way.
God came close. God came to be near him, but Joseph doesn’t explain it. Maybe because he can’t. Maybe there really are no words for it. So, he gives the facts. God has called him to preserve life (Genesis 45:5) which is a blessing because there’s a famine going on. It’s already been two years. People are starving. Joseph’s brothers are starving. And it’s going to get worse. Much worse. Joseph isn’t insensitive to this. He knows that hunger in his own way.
His brothers are starving. That is hunger that we rarely see even served in our Emergency Food Pantry. But Joseph is not starving. His hunger is different. Joseph is hungry like Sara Miles is hungry. Like Joseph, she reports it as fact. One morning, Sara Miles did what tens of millions of Americans do all of the time. She ate a piece of bread and drank some wine in a church she never thought she’d attend. In that meal, she noticed it. She tasted the rift she was never before been able to name. Of course, in her book Take This Bread, that’s not how she describe it. Instead, Miles explains that in eating that bread and drinking that wine, she discovered that she was supposed to feed people. It was an awareness that was there before, but in that meal the realization came near. God came close.
It seems we’re never quite sure it happened. I stood in that chapel talking myself out of it. It’s not supposed to happen like this. No, that couldn’t have been God. That’s not what I’m feeling. It can’t be. I stopped myself. Why not just let it happen? Why not allow myself to feel God take my hands and look into my eyes?
There. God comes near. God gets close. Joseph is so certain that God came down that he tells his brothers that it wasn’t their fault that he was sold into slavery. It was not you but God, he tells them. God came down to be part of that story. God intervened to change history. And that may be true for Joseph. That may be the faith that he needs to claim, but it doesn’t work for me. It’s why my head sometimes trumps my heart. I can’t believe that. And I don’t. I don’t believe God would choose slavery for any one of her children, but I don’t want to get stuck there. I don’t want to focus on that. Instead, I want to listen so carefully that in all of the distance I feel around so many broken relationships, I can still hear God whisper, Come closer to me.
God knows that our hearts are broken. God knows that we feel far away. God knows that we don’t feel transformed each time and every time we eat bread and drink wine. God knows we don’t always find those people that will love us when our birth families fail.
Come closer to me, God whispers. I felt that distance lessen this week. God got close. God came near to me. I’m not sure I’m ready to hang a huge banner over my heart, but I’m more ready to proclaim those ancient words. How good and pleasant it is when sisters and brothers dwell together in unity. I felt that space shift. I can’t describe it any better than Joseph tells his brothers perhaps because there aren’t enough words to explain it.
Still, I can say with certain faith that this week, God took my hands, anointed them with oil and looked deeply in my eyes. God came into my space. And now, like Joseph, I want to whisper those divine words over and over again, in prayer and hope for all of our relationships, Come closer to me.