Benjamin Generation (3 page)

He decided that he would do what the other brother had done. So he picked up some of my audio tapes with the messages he wanted to hear. Every Friday night, he would listen to my tapes, especially the one where I shared the other brother’s testimony.

Because he was still bound to the bottle, he would buy six cans of beer and down them one by one as he listened to my tapes. As he listened and drank, he would confess the portion of scripture which brought the other brother deliverance from alcohol addiction. He would declare, “I am the righteousness of God in Christ!” (2 Corinthians 5:21) I find this brother’s testimony really interesting because another characteristic that will mark the Benjamin Generation is the righteousness of God.

Why? Remember that Benjamin means “son of my right hand”? Well, Isaiah 41:10 says, “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.”

Notice that the right hand symbolizes God’s righteousness. So the Benjamin Generation, the sons of the right hand, will be marked by His righteousness.

But don’t confuse righteousness with right behavior.

Righteousness is a gift. Paul said that “those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ”. (Romans 5:17)

Like David, this brother understood “the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works”. (Romans 4:6) He knew that he could not do anything to achieve righteousness. It is a gift that Jesus died for him to receive.

Every Friday night, that brother just kept believing that he had been made righteous because of what Jesus did on the cross, not because of anything he had or had not done. He kept seeing himself righteous in Christ. He kept believing that he had been justified (which means made righteous) by faith and not works. He kept believing that he was righteous and that he could not lose this righteousness, even though he was still drinking.

This continued for about eight to nine months.

Despite repeatedly downing cans of beer, those nights of listening to the Word and confessing his righteousness strangely caused his desire for alcohol and cigarettes to grow weaker and weaker. At the same time, his love for Jesus grew stronger and stronger.

The consciousness of his righteousness became so overwhelming that he smoked his last cigarette and drank his last drop of alcohol at the end of 2000.

Since then, he has not drunk a drop or smoked another cigarette.

Around that time, he sensed God telling him to leave the food and beverage industry, so he quit without having another job lined up. Within months, he was offered another job. His salary is now more than double the salary he received as a manager in the food and beverage industry.

In 2002, he met and fell in love with a beautiful sister in the church and they tied the knot in 2004. Today, he serves in the church choir and you would never guess his past addictions! God’s grace and goodness, and this brother’s revelation of how righteous he is in Christ, have brought about a 180-degree change in his life. He is now more prosperous financially, no longer addicted to alcohol and cigarettes, married, and his current job allows him so much more free time for his family!

Grace Produces True Holiness
Can you now see why God loves grace and not the law? The law can only produce outward and temporal change, but grace produces inward and permanent change. Grace produces true holiness.

Only the grace of God has the power to make a drunk desire Jesus more than the bottle.

Grace not only makes you avoid sin, it will make you fall in love with Jesus and with His righteousness. Do you know why some men don’t commit adultery? It is not because they love holiness. Some just don’t have the money to do it. Some don’t have the opportunity to do it. Some are afraid their wives will find out. Some fear punishment because there are strict laws in some countries against adultery. But these are not good reasons for not committing adultery.

God’s grace will make you love your wife so much

that you won’t want to commit adultery.

God wants us to stay faithful to our wives because we love them. You can actually keep the law — “Thou shall not commit adultery” — and still not love your wife. But the way you stay in love with your wife, the way you live a holy life, is to have grace in your life.

Only God’s grace can produce true holiness. God’s grace will make you love your wife so much that you won’t want to commit adultery.

Grace May Not Produce Immediate Results
Sometimes, grace does not produce immediate results. Just look at Rachel, a picture of grace. She bore her first son Joseph only after Leah and the bondmaids had given Jacob 10 sons!

To some people, the law appears to be very attractive. For instance, the law can seem very productive. It produced 10 sons for Leah and the bondmaids. The law seems to bring about immediate results. That’s why some people don’t like to talk about grace. They want things to happen now. They aren’t prepared to wait for grace to work in their lives. But you must understand that instant change is seldom lasting change.

People who want immediate results resort to self-effort, to using the flesh. Rachel wanted to bear children just like Leah who had four boys — Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Judah. So Rachel gave her bondmaid Bilhah to Jacob. And guess what, ladies?

Jacob didn’t seem to complain! So Bilhah bore two sons for Jacob — Dan and Naphtali. Rachel was impatient. Since God didn’t seem to be doing anything, she felt that she needed to help God.

Friends, this is not God’s way.

Some church leaders are like that. They will tell young converts to do this and that, to behave this way and that way, to give up this and that. They want to see instant changes in these babes in Christ.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not saying that we should allow new believers to continue in their old sinful ways. What I am saying is why not allow these new converts to first grow in the love of God, to first experience His grace? Paul said, “For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.” (Romans 6:14) When we allow people to experience grace, sin will not have dominion over them. Those evil habits will fall away as a result of God’s grace in their lives.

Now, I didn’t say that. The Apostle Paul did. He also said that it is the goodness of God that leads us to repentance. (Romans 2:4)

When we are patient with new believers, when we let them experience God’s goodness, true and lasting change will come. When we let them know that God does not condemn them, I believe that they will have the strength to “go and sin no more”. Isn’t that what Jesus told the woman who was caught in adultery?

(John 8:11)

Grace Is Free But It Is Not Cheap —
It Cost God His Son!

When we preach grace this way, when we say that today, God deals with His people based on undeserved favor, based on grace, some people call this “sloppy agape”. You see, some people mistakenly think grace is a license to sin. That’s why some people think this is “crazy grace”.

Such people will ask me, “So Pastor Prince, does that mean that I can go and kill someone now, and God will still be gracious to me?” These people seem to get the idea that grace means God has gone soft on sin.

My friend, grace does not mean that God has gone soft on sin. He is not looking down from heaven, shaking his head and saying, “Boys will be boys!” He is not saying, “Never mind, it’s okay to sin a little.” As a righteous God, He hates sin and He has to punish sin, every single sin. In fact, He has punished your sins and my sins, and He has done this in the body of His Son. Today, you and I are forgiven because another was punished.

That is why Paul said in Hebrews 10:17 that our sins and our lawless deeds He remembers no more. This is because at the cross, God remembered all our sins in the body of His Son. So today, He no longer counts our sins against us. (2 Corinthians 5:18–19) This, my friends, is grace.

Grace may be free for you, but it cost God

everything. It cost God His Son.

Paul describes it this way: “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (2 Corinthians 5:21) And for people who have truly experienced grace, sin will have no dominion over them. Such people do not think of going around and killing others. God’s grace causes them to not want to sin.

They love God and don’t want to do that. God’s grace transforms them inwardly and permanently.

So don’t ever call grace “cheap”. It is not cheap! It may be free for you, but it is not cheap. It cost God His Son. It cost God the precious blood of His beloved Son. Grace is free for us today because Jesus paid the price for us to have it. It is now possible for us to experience undeserved favor, but only because of Jesus. That’s why when you experience His grace, you fall in love with Him and out of love with sin!

Jesus Is The Reason For Our Blessing
Do you realize that Benjamin, his brothers and their father Jacob were all blessed because of Joseph? The slave who became the saviour of the world fed the world in a time of famine.

Through His Holy Spirit, God is opening our eyes to see that in these last days, the Benjamin Generation will be blessed because of Jesus. You see, Jesus is our heavenly Joseph. Like Joseph, this undeserved favor that God has for us comes only because of Jesus. He took our place of condemnation and we take His place of blessing. He is the reason why God is gracious to us.

Grace Came By Jesus

In fact, Jesus is not just the reason why God showers His grace on us. Jesus is grace. Grace is not a doctrine. Grace is a person. Grace is Jesus Christ.

Let me explain. The Apostle John said, “For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” (John 1:17) Notice that the law was given. That is impersonal. Grace came. Grace is personal and came in the person of Jesus.

Why go only for the gift? Why not

go for the giver?

When you have Jesus in your life, you have grace in your life and you have God’s unmerited favor This favor is unearned and undeserved. And when you have Him living on the inside of you, you have the power for true holiness living inside you. You have the power to prosper living inside you. You have the wisdom of God living inside you. When you have Jesus, you have everything.

Some Christians go to Jesus just for the blessings.

Then, they go their own merry way and when the provisions run out, they run back to Him. Do you know that when such people come back, Jesus will still feed them? That is how good He is. He says that those who come to Him, He will in no wise cast out.

(John 6:37)

But it doesn’t have to be like that. Why go to Jesus only for the gift? Why not go for the giver? When you have Him, you have everything. I don’t just want His hand of blessing, I want Him. I want Him every day. I want my heart to be full of Him.

Jesus Is Our Heavenly Joseph
If you are wondering why I am comparing Joseph to Jesus, why I am calling Jesus our heavenly Joseph, it is because Joseph is a type of Jesus. When I use the word “type”, I mean a picture or a symbol. So Joseph in the Old Testament is a picture of what our Saviour Jesus is like. Joseph symbolizes Jesus. How? For a start, Joseph tended flocks. So did our Lord Jesus — He is the Good Shepherd.

Joseph’s brothers hated and rejected him. Likewise, Jesus came to His own brothers in the flesh, the Jews, and they too rejected Him. John said that He came to His own, but His own did not receive Him. (John 1:11). Israel rejected Him. That is why they are in darkness. That is why they have been suffering since.

The devil could attack them through the Holocaust because they rejected the covering of their Saviour.

But we must be careful when we talk about this. We must not become anti-Semitic. Some people think that the Jews killed Jesus. On the contrary, it was all of our sins that put Him on the cross. Jesus was not murdered. He laid down His life willingly. (John 10:17–18) And He did it because of our sins.

So don’t blame the Jewish people. God has not rejected them and replaced them with the church.

He loves the church. But He also loves the Jewish people. We are both seeds of Abraham. (Hebrews 11:12) The Jews are the natural seed, we are the spiritual seed. They are the sand on the seashore, we are the stars in heaven.

Another similarity between Joseph and Jesus is that Joseph’s brothers did not recognize him the first time round. He was only recognized at his second appearance. It will be the same for Jesus. And during His second coming, all Israel will be saved.

Another parallel between Joseph and Jesus can be seen in how they both ministered to two criminals.

In the dungeon, two prisoners came to Joseph for help. One lived, the other died. During the crucifixion, Jesus also had two criminals beside Him.

One received eternal life, the other did not.

And by the way, of all his sons, whom did Jacob love the most? Joseph, of course! Likewise, God loves His Son the most.

As we have seen, Joseph was given the name Zaphnath-Paaneah, which means “saviour of the world”. Jesus is the true Saviour. Joseph was raised to save the people from famine. He was able to feed Egypt, which is a picture of the Gentiles. Jesus is the bread of life. (John 6:35) Today, He feeds His church, which is predominantly Gentile. He is our spiritual as well as our physical sustenance.

You don’t have to worry about an economic famine when you have the heavenly Joseph in your life. I don’t care how bad the world’s economy gets. When the famine was severe, Joseph had enough food for Egypt as well as for his brothers. Jesus has enough sustenance for all of us. We simply have to go to Him.

He wants to pour His unmerited favor and blessings on us. Our heavenly Joseph wants to bless us, the Benjamin Generation.

Our Heavenly Joseph Loves Benjamin
Have you ever noticed that Joseph loved Benjamin the most? You will find that the first time Joseph wept when he saw his brothers was when Benjamin appeared. (Genesis 43:30) Why is that? Because though all the brothers shared the same father, they didn’t have the same mother.