Genesis 45:1-3 Then Joseph could not refrain himself before all them that stood by him; and he cried, Cause every man to go out from me… No one doubts that Joseph is a type of Christ; in nothing is he more so than in that significant record,. "there stood no man with him while Joseph made himself known to his brethren." Egypt and its idols were shut out; Pharaoh and his pomp; officers of state; obsequious servants; men of business — "he caused every man to go out from him"; and then in the silence he spoke in his own Hebrew tongue, with no interpreter then, and made himself known to his brethren. What is this most plainly and evidently but a parable of God and the soul? What is prayer but a speaking to God in silence? Silence is the height of worship. Conversing is silencing the world, silencing the tumult of sin, silencing the clamour of the passions. Growth in grace and holiness is but silencing human interests, human love, human pleasures. What is God's purpose in sickness but to create a silence in the soul in which He may make Himself known? So with sorrows, losses, deaths, calumny, persecution: they make a solitude round the soul; "there stands no man with us," but God stands with us, and it is far better. And what are all these things but preparations for, rehearsals before that great last reality — death? At that hour the soul is alone, and a great silence reigns; one by one all persons and things have been severed from the soul; one by one the senses fail, and all communion with the world and with creatures is eat off; most familiar things, most necessary things, faces, sounds, acts, all are not; the soul lives, but lives in silence; the silence deepens and deepens till it becomes absolutely perfect, and then death has come, and the soul finds itself sensibly face to face with God. This is the end of all human life. (F. C. Woodhouse, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: Then Joseph could not refrain himself before all them that stood by him; and he cried, Cause every man to go out from me. And there stood no man with him, while Joseph made himself known unto his brethren. |
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