In our study of the Personal Sense of Destiny last time we saw the personal sense of destiny of Abraham and Sarah that was parlayed from the promises of God. Next we will look at Joseph and his personal sense of destiny.
Gen 50:24-26, "Now Joseph said to his brethren, `I am about to die, but God will surely concern Himself about you, so that He will take you up out of this land to the land which He has promised by an oath to Abraham (Gen 13:14-15), to Isaac (Gen 26:3) and to Jacob (Gen 35:12).'
v25 Therefore Joseph made the sons of Israel take a solemn oath, saying, `God will surely come to your rescue, therefore you will carry my bones up out from this place.'
v26 So Joseph died at the age of one hundred and ten years; and he was embalmed and placed in a coffin in Egypt."
Heb 11:22, "By faith Joseph, when he was dying, made mention of the exodus of the sons of Israel, and gave orders concerning his bones."
Joseph's coffin would remain unburied for 400 years as a testimony to God's faithfulness. For 400 years Joseph's coffin was visible evidence to the children of Israel in Egypt of God's promise that he would deliver them in His perfect timing.
Joseph's coffin continued to be a testimony of the faithfulness of God and the certainty of resurrection as the Israelites carried it for forty years in the desert on their way to the promised land.
When Joshua led the second generation of Israel into the Land, they had a testimony recorded in Josh 24:31-32; "And Israel served the Lord all the days of Joshua and all the days of the elders who survived Joshua, and had known all the deeds of the Lord which He had done for Israel.
v32 Then they buried the bones of Joseph, which the sons of Israel brought up from Egypt, at Shechem, in the piece of ground which Jacob bought from the sons of Hamor the father of Shechem for one hundred pieces of money; and they became the inheritance of Joseph's sons."
Joseph understood that physical death of the believer is a matter of grace orientation and doctrinal cognition. While Joseph had control over his life while living, he had no control over the time, the manner, or the place of his death. The death of Joseph was a matter of the sovereign wisdom and integrity of God.
Joseph was not buried until 475 years after his death as a testimony to the faithfulness of God, God's timing and a memorial to the certainty of resurrection.
Just as believers have no control over the time, the manner, or the place of their death, they also have no control over the time, the manner, or the place of their resurrection.
Resurrection is God's victory because it is totally the work of God for every believer. Just as the grace policy of God has provided everything the believer needs for time, so the grace policy of God has provided everything the believer needs for resurrection and eternity. Joseph's personal sense of destiny is a witness to God's integrity.
Moses is another example of an OT visible Hero with a personal sense of destiny.
There are many men of genius who have had a personal sense of destiny. A personal sense of destiny is very fragile in someone who is a genius because there are great frustrations in life when one is a genius.
Many people of genius are the object of hatred, vindictiveness, and vilification because they are so much smarter than others. Moses was the greatest genius recorded in the Old Testament.
Moses was a multi genius. He was a genius in music, in the military, in engineering, and in public speaking. But most important of all, he had a personal sense of destiny.
Moses grew up as the adopted son of the queen of Egypt in the most advanced country on the earth at that time. There were two other children who resided in the palace at the time, the son of pharaoh Thutmose II, who would one day be crowned Thutmose III, the greatest ruler in the history of Egypt, and Neferari, the daughter of queen Hatshepsut, who loved Moses.
Thutmose II married Hatshepsut and lived until 1508 BC, leaving Hatshepsut as the queen regent after his death. Moses was the crown prince and heir apparent to the throne. Moses loved Neferari and was about to be named Pharaoh, but before that happened he made a dramatic decision to identify himself with Israel because of his personal sense of destiny.
Acts 7:22-29; "And Moses was educated in all the academics of the Egyptians, furthermore he was dynamic in his words and deeds.
v23 But when he was approaching the age of forty, it entered into his mind to visit his brethren, the sons of Israel.
v24 And when he saw one of them being treated unjustly, he defended him and took vengeance on the oppressor by striking down the Egyptian.
v25 He then assumed that his brethren understood that God was giving them deliverance through him; but they did not understand.
Acts 7:26; Then on the following day he appeared to them as they (the Israelites) were fighting together, and he tried to reconcile them for the purpose of peace, saying, `Men, you are brethren, why do you injure one another?'
v27 But the one who was injuring his neighbor pushed him away, saying, `Who made you a ruler and judge over us?
v28 You, you do not mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian yesterday, do you?'
v29 When Moses heard this he ran away and became an alien in the land of Midian, where he became the father of two sons."
What Moses did was better than anything anyone had done before him. Moses built the treasure cities of Egypt. He had a phenomenal knowledge of academics, but more importantly he learned doctrine. He was the number one man in the Egyptian empire at its peak.
As a believer it was time for him to identify himself with Israel, because God had revealed to him that he would be the founder of the Israelite nation in fulfillment of the Abrahamic covenant. He was already planning how he would deliver them from slavery. And had committed murder to deliver a fellow Israelite.
The fact that Moses concluded that God was giving the Israel deliverance through him was a personal sense of destiny in a born again believer. Moses had a personal sense of destiny but he had a dilemma because the Israelites did not understand he was the one who was going to deliver them. Moses had the right personal sense of destiny but the wrong timing. God's timing must always supersede man's timing.
Moses ran away because things did not work out the way he thought they would. Moses, on Moses' timing, had failed to deliver Israel because his timing was wrong. but there was nothing wrong with his personal sense of destiny.
In the forty years that God was preparing Moses in Midian, God was also preparing the Israelites for deliverance. Moses had to learn that human power and human dynamics cannot fulfill the plan of God. For forty years Moses had to go to the college of Bible doctrine in the desert while tending sheep and become occupied with Christ before he was ready to be sent back to Egypt.
Forty years later, before Moses could take his family back into Egypt, his personal sense of destiny demanded that he circumcise his two sons. As we have seen in, circumcision was the ritual sign of a personal sense of destiny.
Moses could not present the message to Pharaoh to let the Israelites go or all the first born males in Egypt would be slain by God until Moses had first circumcised his own firstborn son.
Because Moses had failed to obey God's command to circumcise his son he was put under the sin unto death. Exod 4:24-25; His wife circumcised his son to save his life. Moses had learned the lesson that when God makes a promise, it does not depend on man or upon the power of man. It always has to be God's timing and God's power.
Every believer must learn this lesson of dependence on God. Every believer must understand the essence of God and realize that God will provide the power for the believer to fulfill their personal sense of destiny. It took Moses forty years to learn this lesson.
Heb 11:24-27, "By means of doctrine, when Moses had become great, he refused to be proclaimed the Pharaoh;
v25 he chose to endure maltreatment with the people of God, rather than enjoy the temporary pleasures of sin;
v26 he concluded that reproach for the sake of Christ greater value than the treasures of Egypt; for he was looking ahead to his reward.
v27 By means of doctrine he left Egypt behind, not being afraid of the king's anger; for he persevered, because he kept on seeing the invisible One."
Moses understood the fantastic blessings that God had in store for eternity. A personal sense of destiny establishes true spiritual values related to the spiritual life in time. A personal sense of destiny applies of the divine initiative of eschatological grace to the eternal state. This is what Moses did.
Moses made his decision to give up the throne of Egypt when he was the greatest celebrity in Egypt and Egypt was the greatest nation on the earth. At the same time having been enslaved, Israel was at the lowest point in their history. There was nothing visible that he would gain by this decision.
Moses made the decision when he was fully aware of the pleasures he would have if he remained in Egypt. Moses also had to choose between God's plan for his life and the woman he loved. When he chose God's plan over the woman, he chose the opposite of what Adam had chosen.
The decision of Moses was made with three legitimate motivations: metabolized doctrine circulating in his stream of consciousness, cognition of his future blessings in eternity, and occupation with the person of Christ.
Moses wrote in Psa 90:12; "So teach us to organize our days, That we may attain a heart of wisdom."
A personal sense of destiny must be related always to divine power, not human genius or human dynamics. A personal sense of destiny can be destroyed through arrogance.
While Moses had a personal sense of destiny, he was not yet ready to be promoted to the leadership of Israel. A personal sense of destiny must be reinforced with all of the problem solving devices deployed on the perimeter of the soul.
The arrogance skills have no place in the fulfillment of God's plan and are a distraction to the personal sense of destiny. Moses had made a great decision that required great sacrifice on his part. He must now learn to use divine power and never look back.
A personal sense of destiny is related to the dynamics of spiritual leadership. When God led Israel into the trap at the Red Sea, Moses had been there in his personal life before so understood the solution and he told the children of Israel in Exod 14:13-14; "Do not fear! Take your stand and watch the deliverance of the Lord which He will accomplish for you today; for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you will never see them again forever. The Lord will fight for you while you keep silent."
Fear is incompatible with a personal sense of destiny. The only mandates for fear in God's word are in the sense of respect or fellowship with God. A fully developed personal sense of destiny eliminates fear from the believer's life. Where fear dominates it eliminates the spiritual skills including the personal sense of destiny.
Believers who do not advance in Bible Doctrine cannot conquer fear in a crisis because they have no personal sense of destiny. The Israelites of the Exodus generation never developed a personal sense of destiny and could not learn anything from Moses because they were afraid. Their fear was the result of their unbelief. Fear and the doctrine that develops a personal sense of destiny are mutually exclusive.
God's objective is for every believer to have a personal sense of destiny not just those who are in leadership. It is imperative that those who listen to the teaching of the word of God develop their own personal sense of destiny.
Fear of death will never prevent dying but it will prevent living properly. You take your stand when you stop being afraid. Fear sees the problem; a personal sense of destiny sees the solution. Taking your stand means deploying the faith-rest drill.
At that point you have the privilege of watching the Lord's deliverance. No one ever succeeds in the spiritual life by trying to help God. A personal sense of destiny understands this and stands still and watches the deliverance of the Lord.
A personal sense of destiny is living by principle. It provides leadership for the crisis. The Lord through Moses delivered the Israelites. One mature believer with a personal sense of destiny delivered the entire nation of over two million people.