When we teach children Sunday school lessons about Joseph in the Bible, we leave out the lurid tale of the interaction between Joseph and Potiphar’s wife in Genesis 39. And rightly so, because the “relationship” between Joseph and Potiphar’s wife was ugly, through no fault of Joseph. As adult Christians, however, there is so much we can glean from this episode in Joseph’s life, especially about his character and how that was woven by the sovereignty of God.
Joseph is one of the people I am looking most forward to meeting in heaven because he was such a model of faith and integrity (though God is clearly the hero of the story, as we see mentioned many times, “God was with Joseph”). Because Joseph could count on his loving father to always be with him, he could maintain his faith in the face of extreme hardship and heartbreak—all of which leads to many lessons for the rest of us.
Jacob was the grandson of the patriarch Abraham who settled in the land of Canaan (the land God had promised to Abraham and his descendants). Jacob had twelve sons, and Joseph was more favored than all of his brothers. As a result, he was spoiled by his father, making the 11 brothers very jealous. So jealous, in fact, that when Joseph was 17, they sold him into slavery (though they told their father that Joseph had been killed by a wild animal). Joseph traveled hundreds of miles with his new owners, the Ishmaelites, until he was sold to a man named Potiphar, the captain of Pharaoh’s guard in Egypt. (Genesis 37:12-36)
We would do well to take a moment to step into Joseph’s shoes and to know what it felt like to go through this experience. He went from favored son, to almost being killed by his brothers, to being sold (kidnapped) by a foreign people and taken hundreds of miles away to a country and a lifestyle with which he was completely unfamiliar. God allowed all of this to happen because He was going to do an amazing work in Joseph’s life–not just for his sake, but for the sake of his family and race.
According to Genesis 39:2, “The Lord was with Joseph and he prospered, and he lived in his master’s household.” This was certainly a step up from traveling with the Ishmaelites as their property. Genesis 39:3-6 goes on to show what a difference it made that God was in control over everything Joseph did, and how his faith in God and his desire to please him meant that he impressed others. Joseph “found favor” in the eyes of Potiphar, and he put him in charge of “his household and of all that he owned.” God blessed the household because of Joseph and even blessed Potiphar’s fields, likely meaning that his household and agricultural affairs went well because of Joseph. Because everything was going so well, Potiphar “left in Joseph’s care everything he had; with Joseph in charge, he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate.”
Joseph could have certainly done an “adequate” job that was enough to get by and keep him alive. But “God was with him,” filling him with integrity and encouragement to do his very best in every situation. God had great plans for Joseph despite the pain he had already experienced, and those plans would not be thwarted by anyone, including Potiphar’s wife.
Not only was Joseph a hard worker, he “was well-built and handsome, and after a while his master’s wife took notice…”(Genesis 39:6-7). After all that God was doing to prosper the household, it must have been quite a test when Potiphar’s wife (unnamed in the Bible) then said, “Come to bed with me.” There was no way that Joseph was going to give in and “do such a wicked thing and sin against God” (Genesis 39:9). That didn’t stop Mrs. Potiphar; she continued to seduce him on several occasions, but Joseph refused her at every turn. In her article, “What Do We Know About Potiphar’s Wife?”, Betty Dunn tells us, “Potiphar’s wife knows the ancient Egyptian punishment for a woman committing adultery was to have her nose cut off. Her lust overrules any fear of punishment or social stigma she might endure due to seducing Joseph.”
One day she caught Joseph by his cloak, and kept hold of it as Joseph ran out. She used this as a way to claim to her husband, “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.” (Genesis 39:17-18) Despite all that Joseph did for Potiphar and how much this captain of Pharaoh’s guard respected him, he believed his wife’s account.
Kristi Walker, in her article, “Joseph, Potiphar's Wife, and the Dangers of Sexual Sin," explained how Joseph could resist because he was resolved about four things:
“Joseph was convinced that his relationship with God mattered most.
Joseph was convinced that God’s standards existed for his good.
Joseph was convinced that sin’s pleasures are fleeting.
Joseph was convinced that a greater reward lay ahead of him.”
He would not abandon his God, especially after all that He had seen God do for him.
Potiphar “burned with anger," no doubt feeling betrayed by the man he had come to trust. He had Joseph taken to the prison, “the place where the king’s prisoners were confined.” (Genesis 39:20) Once again, Joseph found himself in a proverbial pit and his life turned upside down, just as it had when he was sold into slavery. Had God abandoned him? Why would God use an evil woman to affect his life in such a way?
Quite the contrary. Just like in many other instances in the Bible, God would use evil people to advance his plans. For example, in Exodus 4:21, 7:3, and 14:4 it says that God hardened the pharaoh's heart against Moses and Aaron. We often think that the enemy of our souls is in charge of any evil or anything bad that happens, but when things heat up in our lives, it is God’s hand that is on the thermostat–and He will only allow what is for our ultimate good and His glory.
Was God caught off guard when Joseph was thrown in prison? Not in the least. What Joseph saw as a setback in his life, God was using to advance him in ways he never could have imagined. Genesis 39:21-23 tells us that Joseph didn’t change his attitude at all towards his circumstances. “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, and 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.”
Once again, what was meant for evil, God meant to use for good. Through a series of events that happen in prison, Joseph one day gets an audience with pharaoh and ends up as second in command in Egypt. Perhaps no other character in the Old Testament went through such rollercoaster experiences as Joseph. And he never gave up on God.
I can honestly say that I’ve often read Joseph’s story and never really valued how the good and bad experiences in his life grew and changed him into the man God wanted him to be. And how comforting to be consistently reminded “God was with him." Since God is “no respecter of persons” (Romans 2:11), we can know that God is with us in the same way as He was with Joseph. Not only is He with us, He is for us. As followers of Christ, we never need to guess if we are loved and treasured by God–it is inherent in the relationship.
In Matthew Henry’s Commentary, he sums up Joseph’s life in this way: “And herein Joseph was a type of Christ, ‘who took upon him the form of a servant,’ and yet then did that which made it evident that ‘God was with him,’ who was tempted by Satan, but overcame the temptation, who was falsely accused and bound, and yet had all things committed to his hand.” Of course, he didn’t live a sinless life as Christ did, though we don’t read of examples of Joseph’s sin–except maybe pride that Jacob loved him best.
Looking at Joseph’s life, we can be inspired to:
Further Reading
Joseph, Potiphar’s Wife, and the Dangers of Sexual Sin
What Do We Know about Potiphar’s Wife?
Do You Have a Joseph Calling on Your Life?
Photo credit: ©Getty Images/BibleArtLibrary
Mary Oelerich-Meyer is a Chicago-area freelance writer and copy editor who prayed for years for a way to write about and for the Lord. She spent 20 years writing for area healthcare organizations, interviewing doctors and clinical professionals and writing more than 1,500 articles in addition to marketing collateral materials. Important work, but not what she felt called to do. She is grateful for any opportunity to share the Lord in her writing and editing, believing that life is too short to write about anything else. Previously she served as Marketing Communications Director for a large healthcare system. She holds a B.A. in International Business and Marketing from Cornell College (the original Cornell!) When not researching or writing, she loves to spend time with her writer daughter, granddaughter, rescue doggie and husband (not always in that order).