Sermon: "Who Are You Leaning On (When No One Is Looking)?"

2nd in the "Who Are You...?" series.
Delivered November 11, 2007 by Rev. George Antonakos.
Other sermons in this series - 1 / 2 / 4

The audio file of this sermon is available for download and listening in MP3 format.

Click to Download & Listen (4.2MB)

The movie that you have just seen the beginning of was called, "Catch Me if you Can" with Tom Hanks and Leonardo DiCaprio. It's a fascinating account of one person's living a lie with a capital "L". There are complex reasons why he was in to that pathological way of living even as a very young man.

Last week we focused on a man named Zacchaeus who was living a lie with regard to who he was, but he listened to the voice of Jesus and the Lord's word was realized in his life; that you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. In a moment we are going to read an Old Testament account of a man named Joseph and as nearly as we can tell Joseph always lived the truth. He always put integrity first, but those of us who are familiar with the story realize that living the truth didn't set Joseph free, it sent him to prison. So what's up with that? Is it really worth it to live and tell the truth?

Well it seems like a lot of people don't think so these days. In a September issue of USA Weekend that comes in the paper there was an article called, "Are you For Real?" The article focused on a three-year-old company called Alibi Network. Maybe some of you read this. It had to do with this company who will make up convincing lies for you. If you are looking to skip a day of work or secretly leave town for the weekend, this service can provide fake airline receipts, make a phone call to your boss explaining your absence and they will even make up an itinerary for a bogus conference you supposedly attended. It takes falsehood to a whole new level. One person asked the service for help in getting out of week-long training that was mandated by his office and so they had a courier dress up, come in to the class, inform the man that his house had been robbed and that he needed to go home right away. And people use this business all the time to purchase lies. Many of them disturbing, and many of the people who use the service admit that they are using it for the purpose of committing adultery. Well that's not a whole lot of uplifting news to start our day, but it shows that some people think that lying or not living in the truth can work. Lies may seem to be a great shortcut to getting our way or protecting ourselves and many think that there is no harm unless we are caught, but is that really the truth or is this the big lie?

Let's look at a moment of integrity testing in the life of Joseph in order to learn more about the inner character of true discipleship. The text is found on page 30 in your red pew Bibles if you care to follow along. It's from Genesis, Chapter 39. I am going to pick it up in Verse 6. The story is about Joseph having been sold in to slavery. He is now sold to Potiphar who was an official of Pharaoh and Potiphar trusted Joseph with everything in his household. God's blessing was on him and he fully was in charge of everything in Potiphar's house, because the favor of the Lord was with him. So picking it up in Verse 6:

"So he left in Joseph's care everything he had; with Joseph in charge, he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate. Now Joseph was well-built and handsome."

See this is a soap opera text. This is... you can tell right here. He was well built and handsome just like those guys on the soap operas, although I never do watch them.

"And after a while his master's wife took notice of Joseph and said, "Come to bed with me!"

But he refused. "With me in charge," he told her, "my master does not concern himself with anything in the house; everything he owns he has entrusted to my care. No one is greater in this house than I am. My master has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?" And though she spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her or even be with her. One day he went into the house to attend to his duties, and none of the household servants was inside. She caught him by his cloak and said, "Come to bed with me!" But he left his cloak in her hand and ran out of the house.

When she saw that he had left his cloak in her hand and had run out of the house, she called her household servants. "Look," she said to them, "this Hebrew has been brought to us to make sport of us! He came in here to sleep with me, but I screamed. When he heard me scream for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house."

She kept his cloak beside her until his master came home. Then she told him this story: "That Hebrew slave you brought us came to me to make sport of me. But as soon as I screamed for help, he left his cloak beside me and ran out of the house." When his master heard the story his wife told him, saying, "This is how your slave treated me," he burned with anger. Joseph's master took him and put him in prison, the place where the king's prisoners were confined."

Gracious Lord we ask that the hearing of your word preached would be not a human hearing, not just be the words of human beings, but your very word to our souls through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Last week we said that life can be loud. This week we are saying that life can be slippery. Here was Joseph recovering from one of the most traumatic events of his life. Things seem to be looking upward and then life sticks its foot out and trips him up and he is faced with a dilemma. Will he compromise his values; take a shortcut and avoid pain or does he live in the truth? We can see the good choice that he made from heaven's perspective, but there was a bad short run choice or consequence from human perspective. It was not at all pleasant losing a life of comfort, standing, and position to say nothing of spending time in prison, but God was in it all.

In this sermon series we are focusing on a discipleship that is both internal, as well as external and here is the big idea; here is what I want you to take away. Real discipleship involves living in the truth no matter what the cost and is truly tested when it hurts in some way to do so. Joseph is a powerful example of integrity, the integrity of a disciple. The word integrity comes from the same root word that we get integer from. It means equivalent. On the outside and the inside. Integrity is about living in a unified way instead of a disintegrated way. But I don't want you to misunderstand; a disciple of Jesus isn't just a nice, self-actualized person, but rather someone who is integrated around the truth of God's word. Integrity is not about preening our own moral feathers, but about assimilating the truth that comes from God's word; truth like in Proverbs, Chapter 12, Verse 22 and aligning ourselves accordingly. So you want to know what Proverbs 12:22 says, here you go: "The Lord detests lying lips, but he delights in people who are truthful." From Proverbs 11:3 "The integrity of the upright preserves them, but the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity." Being a disciple of integrity means integrating, assimilating that truth in the power of the Holy Spirit and living it out.

Actually there are three main human characters in this story who demonstrate very different levels of dealing with truth and reality and the first two do so very poorly. Mrs. Potiphar, we will call her Mrs. Potiphar could have been the president of Alibi Network. She is a combination of Mrs. Robinson /Cruella DeVil. Her reality was about self-satisfaction and notice how the internal focus on herself was expressed in a demanding spirit. Did you know she pestered, did you see she pestered Joseph day after day. There was a demandingness to her character or lack thereof. She focused only on her desires and had no concerns for how her actions would affect or hurt others. In a word she was a user. You know it is kind of easy for us to look at her and say, "Boy I really feel good about myself today. I am glad I am not that rotten." But there is a Mrs. Potiphar part in all of us; maybe not to the level of that expressed behavior, but how do we respond internally when people don't meet our demands? And we can do a pretty good job sometimes of mischaracterizing others when they don't meet our expectations. And I think if we thought about it long enough we might even recall a time when we have all asked others to compromise their principles for our benefit or times when we have been blind to how our selfishness is affecting people around us.

Stephen Covey shares in his book, "The Eighth Habit", about the time he was consulting with a bank president. There was a problem with employee morale. This bright and charismatic young man had risen to the top of his ranks only to see his institution faltering: profits and productivity were down. When he sat down with his consultant Covey he said, "No matter what incentives I provide, we can't shake off this gloom and doom." Covey would interview employees and he would hear statements like this from employees, "How could anyone trust what is happening around here", yet no one would tell him what the problem was. Finally, he discovered what the source of the distrust was and the truth emerged and guess who the problem was with? I am sure you have guessed it. It was with the bank president. He happened to be having an affair with an employee and everyone knew it. But while the company was being damaged by his conduct, the greatest damage he was doing was to himself, thinking of his own gratification, disregarding long-term consequences, to say nothing of violating a sacred trust with his wife.

In a survey involving 54,000 respondents asking them to rank the essential qualities of an effective leader the number one answer by far outstripping all the other answers like communicator, visionary, etc.; the number one answer was integrity. When Covey finally told the bank president that he knew of the affair and the effect that it was having on his staff the younger man runs his fingers through his hair and he says, "I don't know where to begin." Referring to the affair Covey looked at him and said, "Is it over?" The man looked him in the eye and said, "Yes, absolutely." Covey said to him, "Then begin by talking with your wife." No small task. She ended up forgiving him, also no small task, and then he called an employee meeting and he said the following, "I have found the cause of the morale problem. It's me. I am asking you to give me another chance." And things slowly did improve in the bank, but in the end the greatest favor that he did was to himself, because he was finding his path to life and to character.

See a maturing disciple pays the price of integrity and character learning to win many private victories over themselves and this was something that was outside the scope of Mrs. Potiphar's reality. In spite of the fact that Joseph's repeated response to her was like a flashing neon light, the very character thing that she needed to hear "Your husband trusts me. Your husband trusts me." The very thing she needed to assimilate was right in front of her. She couldn't hear it. She couldn't see it. She was blind.

Here's a question. Is there something that God is trying to show you that you are not seeing these days? That's a hard question to answer, right? If you are seeing it, maybe you would do something. Well here are the glasses (holds up Bible). These are the glasses that help us to see so we will align the truth of God's word with internals.

Then there is Mr. Potiphar. He is also one pretty dysfunctional responder, because dysfunction is related to how we deal with what is real. His internal focus is seeing not in a spirit of demandingness per say, but an external spirit of rage. A couple of weeks ago our visiting speaker, Marcus Young, suggested that Mr. Potiphar may have been a eunuch, but the same word that is translated eunuch in many places is also translated in more places as official, which is the way it is translated in Genesis 39:1. I think the interchangeability of the English words is about underscoring the loyalty of those who serve their superiors. There is no way to be sure, but the story sure seems more believable if he is not a eunuch. But questions abound either way; why would someone with so much positive data about Joseph have allowed no room for investigating the truth? Was he fearful of his wife? Was he just taking the easy way out? Was he protecting his status, less embarrassment affect his political standing? Who knows. What we do know is that he was so overwhelmed with a negative emotional impact of his wife's accusations it overcame his ability as one author said to metabolize reality. He couldn't metabolize reality.

Now we all understand what it is like to get bowled over by the shock of unexpected news or experiences, but to constantly close our eyes to the truth in favor of believing a lie, because it's easier hurts others deeply as well. It's a sad fact that in many abusive homes and some of you have lived in them; some of you may be living in them, there is a repetitive interplay. It's like a triangle between abuser, collaborator and victim. Sadly the victims are often the weakest members of the system who no one usually listens to. It seems that Mr. Potiphar was a collaborator for his own self-oriented ends whatever they were. Now if you have ever had to fight the collaborator temptation and stand up against an abuser you are among the most courageous of people. If you are feeling victimized in some way, take heart because Joseph is the victim and the hero in this story. And I would say a further thing to those who may be feeling in that victim position. One way to empower yourself is to ask for help: to speak. I know it's hard. If you are tempted lately to live in any type of collaborator role, here is a question or two. Who is God calling you to stand up for? Is God challenging you to let go of your view of things and the discomfort that a search for truth might bring? Let me say the big idea again. Real discipleship involves living in the truth no matter what the cost and is truly tested when it hurts in some way.

And then there is Joseph; a man who teaches us the way of integrity. He teaches us who to lean on when no one is looking, not through a demanding spirit, not through a spirit of anger, but a spirit of trust in the living God. Three quick points here in integrated living. Number one, a discipleship from the core involves living before God's face; the Latin is Corum Deo. Look at Verse 9 of Genesis 39; he says, "How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God." There was an integration of value based on God's perspective of life in Joseph's heart. He didn't frame caving in primarily as a sin against Mr. Potiphar, although that would have been the truth in the case, but against God. The term "wicked thing" is also translated in other Bibles as "this great evil." If you break it down he is basically saying, how could I do this distressful thing, this thing that will be full of distress before God and people, that will dishonor God and rot. Whatever it touches will bring calamity. He didn't need a false validation of his manhood.

Again we all know how easy it is to start to feel badly about ourselves and to be set up for some manipulative seduction. We all know the line to be listening for in the movies whether it comes from a man or a woman: "it sounds like your husband or wife just doesn't understand." If you can't see I am batting my eyes. But Joseph wasn't buying any of it. He knew who he was in God. He was centered in the truth. Listen, because he believed at the core of his being that God was truly in control of his life and that if he did things God's way, no matter what the consequences, it would lead to blessing. And he never said that we can tell, "Well look how God treated me. Why should I serve him or remain faithful?" And because he didn't buy in to all of that, he eventually was led to heights that he could have never imagined at the moment of testing.

Secondly, not only live before God's face, but a discipleship from the core involves a sober assessment of our limitations. Notice in Verses 10 and 12; he refused, but he couldn't just keep refusing on his own strength. It says that he not only refused, but he wouldn't even be with her and then, of course, he ran so fast that he left his cloak behind. Joseph's integrity, honesty was with himself. He knew the limits that he had. He was a human being and he knew that he couldn't hang around temptation and not be affected. And he teaches us how to deal with seduction and that's to run. To stand against the devil and flee the Bible says, but when it comes to youthful lust, we need to flee. Stand against the devil he will flee. Youthful lust, you flee.

And then thirdly a discipleship from the core involves not letting external circumstances, like power, wealth or position determine our behavior. He was in a place of power. He was in a place of position, in spite of being in slave status. You know some people when you ask them, "Why did you do what you did?" They say, "Because I could, because I can" and they kind of flaunt their power. You see positions of power can be just as seductive as people. Why is it that so many politicians struggle so much with the whole seduction thing and fall? Because the higher you go the more powerful you think you are and the boundaries don't apply to you. Joseph has an amazing discernment about not letting high altitudes make him spiritually woozy.

I like the way Pastor Wayne Cordero illustrated this truth. He said,

"Sometimes God will allow the plane in which we are traveling to dive for good reasons. When we are cruising at 32,000 feet it's smooth flying. The same can be true in our lives. We can be on autopilot, we can cut a few corners, we can compromise, we can miss a few cues, but we are still in the pilot seat. But let God cut an engine. Let the plane list to one side and start to dive. Increase the speed of descent and decrease the hope for survival and an urgent hunger for God beings to arise within. Pilots are pulling back on the wheel and calling out mayday signals to people who are powerless to help. As the wings skip the tops of trees everyone is intently listening to God. Those who didn't believe before sure do now. And it's at that precise moment in full realization of our own mortality that God teaches us lessons of humility, dependence and devotion. Our hearts are suddenly pliable, defenses vanish and receptivity is increased. All the petty problems that seemed so big before are utterly trivial. Our new priorities are God, family and the hereafter. Then God by his grace flattens the dive, altitude slowly increases, death fades and while we are wiping our brows, God whispers in our ear, "When you get back to 32,000 feet, live the lessons learned at 10. I brushed your life with death so that I could color your life with eternity."

Joseph lived at 10 feet before God even when his outward circumstances were looking like 32,000. And when outward circumstances look like 10, like they did at the end of this passage, which I am going to read for you, the dive was flattening out. He could manage. Listen to the last few verses after being in thrown in prison.

"While Joseph was there in prison the Lord was with him. He showed him kindness and granted him favor in the eyes of the prison warden. So the warden put Joseph in charge of all those held in the prison. He was made responsible for all that was done there. The warden paid no attention to anything under Joseph's care, because the Lord was with Joseph and gave him success in whatever he did."

All this Old Testament passage points to another one who was raised to power, our Lord Jesus Christ. His cloak was ripped from his body. He experienced naked exposure to lies and unjust accusations of others. He died an innocent man for our sins and was raised to the heights of heaven for us all. As we respond to this word through the singing of our hymn, I want to ask you to commit or to recommit yourself to him, to the Lord Jesus Christ, to call on his strength, to challenge and face any compromising position you might be in, to seek him and his ways and live.

Let us pray: Lord we ask that your Holy Spirit again would seal this word to our hearts in whatever way we need to apply it. We know that apart from your spirit we can do nothing. So even as we offer ourselves to you, to singing our prayers and through the giving of gifts and through listening for your voice in prayer, we ask that you would make a difference and that we would remember the lessons of Joseph through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

© 2007, Rev. George Antonakos
Central Presbyterian Church, Baltimore, MD 21204 410/823-6145
www.centralpc.org