Way, way, back many centuries ago, not long after the Bible began, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice wrote a musical. This musical, the story of Joseph, has been responsible for saving the career of ageing Australian soap stars, advancing the career of children’s TV presenters to daytime TV, launching a reality TV show and heralding in a national arena tour. Up and down the land, children in primary schools regularly perform the story of Joseph to starry-eyed parents. So what do we make of this very public Bible story?
The story of Joseph is a gift to children’s ministry: colourful characters (and coats), dreams and drama (and camels). It is one of ‘those stories’ that we might rely on for a couple of weeks’ worth of activities. While it is always a good principle to help children learn key Bible stories, I wonder if we can see beyond the coats and the camels to have our understanding of God, and of ourselves, transformed by this story.
The story of Joseph (Jacob and the brothers) covers the last 11 chapters of Genesis, and Genesis, as we know, is about beginnings. The story of Joseph is in the Bible not only because it is part of the history of Israel as God’s people, but also because this story is part of them becoming God’s people. So, close your eyes and draw back the curtain…
The story of Joseph has one central theme: ‘God is with Joseph, committed to upholding him and always seeking to work through him’. Whereas Abraham required radical trust and obedience and Jacob is at the heart of conflict over land, love and loyalty, the story of Joseph has a more subtle tone of providence – God is there, God is with you, God will use you. According to Walter Brueggemann this makes Joseph’s story perfect for an age where seeing God at work is hard. Given this, we should encourage children to engage with the story of Joseph with questions in mind. How do we understand that ‘God is with us’, ‘God will uphold us’ and ‘God wants to use us’? The Bible is meant to be God’s living word and coming to it with our ‘live’ questions can help. We need to make space for children to identify with, challenge, question, respect, celebrate, and see beyond the characters we read about.
I wonder if we can see beyond the coats and the camels to have our understanding of God transformed by this story
Joseph’s dreams frame both the beginning and the end of the story, as it is only by the end of the story that we see them come to fruition. Three things are interesting when we think about the dreams that Joseph has. The first is that they immediately bring conflict in his family. Joseph already had favour and honour. He didn’t need to be given a dream to drive this. In fact the dream seems to bring him nothing but trouble. The dreamer is a threat. The dreamer needs to be silenced. How the dreamer will fair is the question that the story keeps pressing. Joseph is taken into exile. In exile he remains faithful and demonstrates personal integrity, but this does him no good and he finds himself in prison. In exile, alone in prison, is where the dream takes shape as a reality. What is at work here is a rescue plan that goes beyond Joseph. A rescue plan to a mighty nation about to face ruin. A rescue plan to a divided, disloyal and destitute family.
Reading and resources:
• Interpretation Commentary on Genesis by Walter Brueggemann
• Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (with pictures by Quentin Blake)
If you were reading this story as a Jew in exile in Babylon, that very question would be in your mind: what happened to the dream? Has God abandoned us? As the story progresses we see this to be far from being the case. God has not abandoned the dream, or his people. This is just scratching the surface of the drama. Whether you draw, act out or sing the story of Joseph, the point is that it ought to provoke questions about where God is in our lives and where our lives will be taken by God. It ought to provoke feelings of wanting to be involved in a bigger story, despite the fact that our family might think little of us when we want to change the world. I wonder if we can let the story do that for us – not just any dream will do.
