Saturday, May 26, 2018

A Brother's Forgiveness

It's fortunate that the General Conference talk I just reviewed has so much to do with repentance and forgiveness, because the next lesson my class will learn in Primary is about Joseph forgiving his brothers for selling him into Egypt. That is an awful lot of forgiveness. Joseph served as a slave for years, including at least two years that he was locked up in jail for a crime he didn't commit. Granted, things turned out pretty well for Joseph in the end, but things easily could have turned out a lot worse. When Joseph's brothers sold him into slavery, they had no idea what sort of situation they were throwing him into.

Yet, he forgave them. Yeah, he pranked them pretty hard first, but he ultimately forgave them for what they put him through, and he lets them live with him in the splendor and prosperity of Egypt. All told, those guys were pretty darn lucky that they had such a forgiving brother, and so are we.

Despite Joseph's heroic feat of forgiveness, he is not the most forgiving person spoken of in the Bible; Jesus is. While Joseph forgave his brothers for a horrendous and unjustifiable act, Jesus regularly forgives acts as bad and worse. There is no limit to Jesus' forgiveness, so long as the condition of sincere repentance is met.

I think I'll bring that up if I get the chance during the lesson tomorrow. Joseph's forgiveness is a good reminder of Jesus' forgiveness, but placing them side-by-side, there is no comparison.

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