Two of Pharaoh’s officers land in Joseph’s prison and wake up troubled by dreams. Joseph reads them — freedom for one, the gallows for the other — and asks only that the survivor remember him. He forgets, for two full years. Then Pharaoh himself dreams: seven fat cows, seven gaunt ones, and no one in Egypt can explain it. A Hebrew is rushed up out of the dungeon, tells the king the famine is coming and what to do about it, and by nightfall is the second man in the kingdom.
A study in Genesis 40-41 · Arthur Baldwin · StandUp4Jesus.Org · 9 min read
Do Not Interpretations Belong To God?
“And they said unto him, We have dreamed a dream, and there is no interpreter of it. And Joseph said unto them, Do not interpretations belong to God? tell me them, I pray you.”
Genesis 40:8
Joseph noticed they looked sad and asked why — the small act of attention Ellen White said “opened the way for his future prosperity and honor.” He is the one man in Egypt who can do what they need, and the first thing he says is that he cannot: the reading belongs to God. He said the same thing to Potiphar’s wife — God is the one who sees — and he will say it again to Pharaoh. The gift is real; the credit is not his.
He reads both dreams true. In three days the cupbearer is restored and the baker is hanged, exactly as Joseph said.
Yet Did Not The Chief Butler Remember
“But think on me when it shall be well with thee, and shew kindness, I pray thee, unto me, and make mention of me unto Pharaoh, and bring me out of this house… Yet did not the chief butler remember Joseph, but forgat him.”
Genesis 40:14, 23
Joseph makes one modest ask: remember me. The butler walks back into the palace and forgets him completely. Chapter 41 opens with a hard little clock: “at the end of two full years.” Two more years in a dungeon because a man who owed Joseph his life did not think of him once. The timing turns out to matter — had the butler spoken sooner, Joseph would have been freed as a favor, not summoned as the only man who could save the nation.
“For two years longer Joseph remained a prisoner. The hope that had been kindled in his heart gradually died out, and to all other trials was added the bitter sting of ingratitude.”
Ellen G. White · Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 219
It Is Not In Me
“And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I have dreamed a dream, and there is none that can interpret it: and I have heard say of thee, that thou canst understand a dream to interpret it. And Joseph answered Pharaoh, saying, It is not in me: God shall give Pharaoh an answer of peace.”
Genesis 41:15-16
They shave him and change his clothes and stand him in front of the most powerful man on earth, who has just told him he has heard Joseph is skilled. It is the perfect moment to take the compliment. Joseph refuses it in four words: it is not in me. Thirteen years a slave and a prisoner have not made him bitter and have not made him grasping. The same steadiness that held in Potiphar’s house and the dungeon holds in the throne room.
“Joseph’s reply to the king reveals his humility and his faith in God. He modestly disclaims the honor of possessing in himself superior wisdom.”
Ellen G. White · Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 220
God Hath Shewed Pharaoh What He Is About To Do
“And Joseph said unto Pharaoh, The dream of Pharaoh is one: God hath shewed Pharaoh what he is about to do… And for that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice; it is because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass.”
Genesis 41:25, 32
Seven fat years, then seven of famine so severe “the plenty shall not be known in the land.” The dream came twice — cows, then grain — because it is fixed and near. And Joseph does not stop at the reading. Unasked, he gives Pharaoh a policy: appoint a wise man, tax a fifth of the harvest through the good years, store it in the cities. The boy who once could not stop talking about his own dreams now uses a king’s dream to save a continent.
A Man In Whom The Spirit Of God Is
“And Pharaoh said unto his servants, Can we find such a one as this is, a man in whom the Spirit of God is?… Forasmuch as God hath shewed thee all this, there is none so discreet and wise as thou art: thou shalt be over my house, and according unto thy word shall all my people be ruled: only in the throne will I be greater than thou.”
Genesis 41:38-40
A pagan king, watching Joseph, names the reason out loud: the Spirit of God is in this man. That was always the point of the “the LORD was with Joseph” refrain (Genesis 39) — that outsiders would see it and have to account for it. In a single day Joseph goes from the dungeon to the second chariot, with Pharaoh’s signet ring on his hand.
“The same fidelity to God was manifest when he stood in the palace of the Pharaohs as when in a prisoner’s cell.”
Ellen G. White · Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 222
God Hath Made Me Forget All My Toil
“And Joseph called the name of the firstborn Manasseh: For God, said he, hath made me forget all my toil, and all my father’s house. And the name of the second called he Ephraim: For God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction.”
Genesis 41:51-52
Joseph reads his own life in his sons’ names. Manasseh: God has let him set down the weight of what was done to him. Ephraim: God has made him flourish in the very country where he was a slave. Not despite the affliction — in the land of it. Then the seven good years end, the famine begins “in all lands,” and it reaches Canaan, where an old man and eleven brothers are running low on grain. The dream of the bowing sheaves is about to come due.
