WHEN JOSEPH AND HIS BROTHERS met in Egypt (Genesis 41-45), their family fight defined them, and whose fault was that? Remembering his brothers’ boyhood jealousy, their plot to get rid of him, and their selling him to traders who took him away to Egypt, Joseph would probably say that his brothers were guilty. On the other hand, I imagine the brothers being peeved with Joseph. A famine had been going on for years, and Joseph’s family was starving to death. Why hadn’t Joseph reached out to help them? Was he carrying a grudge? Or was Joseph anxious and defensive, turned into a hoarder because he believed Pharaoh’s myth that food would run out?

 

When Joseph saw his brothers begging for food, he recognized the longing they all shared for a family reunion. Hugging, kissing, crying, they gave themselves to one another. They realized they did not have to look out for self-interest, that they could risk loving one another because God’s abundant grace would be enough for them, even enough to free them from their guilt. The hungry brothers wanted to be rid of their guilt about the family squabble. Joseph wanted to be rid of his guilt for not sending for his brothers in their crisis, wanted to be released from the isolation created by Pharaoh’s nightmare of scarcity. Joseph and his brothers needed one another. In giving themselves to one another, their hungers were fed and their longings were met. Isn’t this what happens for us through the grace given to us in baptism? We are brought into the family where we renounce evil, where we become part of God’s story of reconciliation, where our relationships are redefined, where God’s blessings are sustained for all, where we give ourselves to one another. Then as we gather at the Lord’s Table, we receive from one another the Bread of Life and the Cup of Salvation. Forgiveness is offered and forgiveness is received. It is a family reunion. Our sacraments define us as God’s family. Let us celebrate and rejoice!

 

LAURA MENDENHALL