I wrote last week about my son Mark winning the US National Championship for TowerRunning. I did not write about what happened (or did not happen) afterward. I left that to Mark, who wrote his account of the race on FaceBook a few days ago. Here is the relevant section:

[Winning the US National Championship] has been a goal for me since 2019. From early 2020 through late 2022, my fitness (and commitment) weren’t there. However, I’ve really been pushing hard the last several months, and have been writing it out with my goals: “I am the US National Champion.” Still, this wasn’t at all how I wanted to win it. God gave me a victory that only He can be credited with, and a nice little humility lesson on the side. My official time of 8:42, while actually the best I’ve ever done at this race, was fully 32 seconds slower than any US Champion has run it (that I know of). While it’s not uncommon for an international elite athlete to actually win the race, the US winners are typically under eight minutes. The slowest prior winner, who ran an 8:10, at least actually won the race.

To further ensure my ego was not excessively inflated, my parents and KC waited half the day for the awards ceremony, at which I received zero awards or recognition for being the TowerRunning USA Champion. The race organizers also failed to properly at least give me what would have been my third age group winner award, and there was no mention whatsoever of the US championship. TowerRunning USA also normally hands out awards for the prior year – that was not happening this year, for some reason, though I was casually informed that I’d finished first on that list as well.

How am I supposed to fill this trophy-shaped hole in my heart if I don’t get a trophy? – from Mark Ewell’s FaceBook post, reflecting on the lack of recognition

Mark started and ended his post with a riddle: What do you call the guy who finishes last in his class at medical school? Answer: “Doctor.”

What do you call the first American finisher of the TowerRunning USA Championship race? [Regardless of the time compared to races in years past or the lack of a trophy.] Answer: “US National Champion.” And he adds: “Grateful and humble.”

We’re still proud of Mark’s race and proud of the way he handled the aftermath.

And seekest thou great things for thyself? Seek them not (Jeremiah 45.5, KJV)

We got through the exciting parts of Genesis when Joseph reconciled with his brothers. I wrote three blogs, starting here. Chapters 46 – 50 are mostly denouement, but let’s pick up some highlights.

• Jacob takes the whole family to Egypt and God confirms the promise:

And God spoke to Israel in visions of the night and said, “Jacob, Jacob.” And he said, “Here I am.” And He said, “I am God, the God of your father; do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for I will make you a great nation there. I Myself will go down with you to Egypt, and I Myself will also bring you up again; and Joseph will close your eyes with his hand.” (Genesis 46.2 – 4, LSB)

It’s an important promise and the reason they went to Egypt: 70+ nomadic people going in; a couple million (600,000 men) coming out. (See Exodus 12.37.) And it echoes what God told Abram:

Then the LORD said to Abram, “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. (Genesis 15.13, 14, ESV)

• They settle in Goshen, and Jacob blesses Pharaoh even while poor-mouthing his life:

Then Joseph brought in his father, Jacob, and presented him to Pharaoh. And Jacob blessed Pharaoh. “How old are you?” Pharaoh asked him. Jacob replied, “I have traveled this earth for 130 hard years. But my life has been short compared to the lives of my ancestors.” Then Jacob blessed Pharaoh again before leaving his court. (Genesis 47.7 – 10, NLT)

• Jacob lives 17 years in Egypt. (Genesis 47.28) Jacob blesses Joseph’s sons, putting Ephraim before Manasseh (Genesis 48). (In listings of the tribes of Israel, there is no “tribe of Joseph,” but there “half-tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh.” For example, Numbers 32.33)

• Jacob blesses and prophesies over his sons, Genesis 49.
  • Firstborn Reuben doesn’t come out well. See Genesis 35.22. Uncontrolled as water, you shall not have preeminence, Because you went up to your father’s bed; Then you defiled it—he went up to my couch. (Genesis 49.4, LSB)
  • Simeon and Levi don’t do well either. See the end of Genesis 34 for the reason why. Simeon and Levi are brothers; their swords are implements of violence. Let my soul not enter into their council; Let not my glory be united with their assembly; Because in their anger they killed men, And in their self-will they hamstrung oxen. Cursed be their anger, for it is strong; And their wrath, for it is cruel. I will divide them amongst Jacob, And scatter them in Israel. (Genesis 49.5 – 7, LSB)
  • Then Judah, who failed miserably in chapters 37 and 38 but recovers in chapter 44, is the top dog, the one through whom Messiah comes: The scepter shall not depart from Judah, Nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, Until Shiloh comes, And to him shall be the obedience of the peoples. (Genesis 49.10, LSB)
  • There are eight more brothers, including a long blessing for Joseph, and the passage ends: All these are the twelve tribes of Israel, and this is what their father spoke to them. So he blessed them. He blessed them, every one with the blessing appropriate to him. (Genesis 49.28, LSB) That’s a lesson: “…with the blessing appropriate to [each one]”

• Jacob dies and is buried in the family burial plot. (Genesis 50.1 – 14)

• Joseph reassures his brothers as he did in Genesis 45.6.

As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today. (Genesis 50.20, ESV)

• Joseph makes his brothers promise that he, too, shall be buried in the promised land.

And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones from here.” (Genesis 50.24 – 25, ESV)

This request was explicitly mentioned at the Exodus:

Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for Joseph had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones with you from here.” (Exodus 13.19, ESV)

Then Joseph dies:

So Joseph died, being 110 years old. They embalmed him, and he was put in a coffin in Egypt. (Genesis 50.26, ESV)

There’s a lot of sin in Genesis, beginning in chapter 3, and it is pointed out often that Genesis begins and ends this way:

In the beginning God…in a coffin in Egypt

And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (Genesis 2.16, 17, ESV)

For the wages of sin is death… (Romans 6.23)

Do you have kids or grandkids who always have their noses in their phones, even when they’re supposed to be talking with you? We have a 17-year-old granddaughter who is like that. Always has been. She always has a screen in her hand, and she is (pick one) playing a game, reading a book, or texting with her friends.

June had an epiphany the other day. You probably had it a long time ago, but for us it’s new. June was following up with the granddaughter by text on something that had come up the last time they were together. They exchanged three or four text messages – the semblance of an actual conversation! Then it hit us:

If you want to reach someone who texts all the time…text them!

Duh.

We’re not the first. Paul wrote about it a long time ago:

…I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view… (1 Corinthians 9.22, MSG)

The He Gets Us campaign has drawn a lot of attention. If you’re missing it, it’s a series of 1-minute advertisements funded by a largely unknown group of people that just wants to reintroduce people to Jesus. Naturally, like Jesus himself, they’ve been criticized by believers and unbelievers alike. I have been asked frequently what my opinion is.

To answer that question, I can’t do better than refer you to my friend Rob Webster, whom I quoted last May. I give you his Facebook post of February 12, the night of the Super Bowl:

There’s a story in John 9. Jesus heals a blind man. What a miracle! It’s an amazing thing, and it changed the man’s life. Who could find fault in this?

The Pharisees, that’s who. They call on the man to come explain what has happened. You see, Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, and that was a problem. Maybe because healing was considered “work”? I don’t know what the real issue was. But the Pharisees put the man through the wringer with their questions and suggested that Jesus was a sinner.

Exasperated, the formerly blind man gave one of the shortest testimonies you can imagine. “Whether he is a sinner or not, I don’t know. One thing I do know. I was blind but now I see!”

Tonight during the Super Bowl, two ads aired from a campaign about Jesus called “He Gets Us”. They’re powerful ads. You probably saw them.

Also tonight, my Facebook feed has been littered with conversations and links to news articles, not about the ads, or who Jesus is, but wondering what the motives are of the people who funded them. Because such-and-such group gave money, and they also did this and this and this… and one of the directors also directed campaigns for this group I don’t like… and this other backer supported this legislation…

But friends… listen to me.

My church has been partnering with He Gets Us for a few months now. I don’t know who all is behind it. But as people have seen ads, they’ve contacted the website and filled out a form. And when their zip code is near our church, I’m one of the people who gets an email, and a chance to follow up with them.

You wouldn’t believe the pain. In a sentence or two, people pour out their hearts about children who have died. Broken relationships. Hating themselves. Loneliness. Hopelessness. Fear. Insecurity. My biggest problem is that I feel under-equipped to adequately respond. So I don’t over-promise, and I let them know I’m not a counselor. But I can be a friend. I can listen. I can pray with them.

I guess suspicion is natural. But if anyone wants to know about how this ad campaign is working itself out on a granular level, reach out to me. Because it’s not He Gets Us that is following up the people near our church. It’s me. – Rob Webster, Facebook, February 12, 2023

Rob’s post links to this ad, which ran during the Super Bowl:

Paul wrote about the motives of people preaching the gospel in his day:

So how am I to respond? I’ve decided that I really don’t care about their motives, whether mixed, bad, or indifferent. Every time one of them opens his mouth, Christ is proclaimed, so I just cheer them on! (Philippians 1.18, MSG)

We often talk about “blessed to be a blessing,” but what would that look like? Here’s a story that’s too good not to share, told by Navigator Brad Jonswold who traveled abroad in search of what Navigators are calling “local laboring communities.” (The “laboring” comes from Jesus’ lament that “the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few.”) Back to the story:

“I will tutor your kids in chemistry on one condition,” said the believing chemist in Kuala Lumpur to his local laboring community. “Have them bring all their non-believing friends who are also struggling with chemistry, and we’ll make it a tutoring party.” Soon the entire group got together so the students could study. Somehow Jesus came up in the conversation, and some of the non-believing students went home and told their parents about it. Then something amazing happened. Several parents called believing parents in the group and asked, “Next time the kids get together to study chemistry, can we also come and study the Bible with you?” The group has been meeting in a home on a regular basis with one table of students studying chemistry and another table of adults reading the Bible. 

We often talk about Christian community, but here’s a community with a purpose. Not just people who gather in a church on Sunday but who do life together “out there” in the world. Communities which are, in Brad’s words:

• Communal
• Transformational (changed lives is the objective)
• Missional (not just a Bible study for the in-crowd, as helpful as those might be)
• Generational (nothing stops one group from spinning off another group to do the same thing)

As another example, we have friends who read this blog who didn’t just watch The Chosen at home by themselves but invited their neighbors to watch it with them. This sort of practice is not something I’m good at, but I’d like to be.

Now the LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (Genesis 12.1 – 3, ESV)

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1.8, ESV)

Let’s wrap up this part of the reunion of Joseph and his brothers with a surprising observation of what did NOT happen. There were multiple major offenses committed, but there is no record of forgiveness because there is no record of condemnation. For example, Jesus didn’t forgive the woman caught in adultery in John 8:

And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.” (John 8.11, ESV)

We’ve already observed that Joseph did not hold his brothers accountable for selling him into slavery:

And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. (Genesis 45.5, ESV)

What other potential offenses were not called into account?

• Jacob could have been angry with the 10 brothers who sold Joseph and pretended he was dead. “What?! You sold your brother into slavery and essentially lied to me about it for 13 years?! What kind of men are you???”
• The brothers could have been angry with Joseph for deceiving them and scaring them half to death.
• The brothers could have taken issue with their father for making them feel like second-class members of the family. I have friends whose adult children have made them apologize for all the hurt they caused by not raising them “properly.”

There’s no record that any of these offenses were mentioned again.

Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offense. (Proverbs 19.11, ESV)

PS I could have practiced overlooking an offense a few days ago when a restaurant didn’t have my takeout order ready when promised. But I didn’t…

Yesterday we began to look at the story of Joseph’s reunion with his family, the part where he treats his brothers badly (even though he did return their money!). On the second visit, he hosts a dinner party. Then what happens and why? And what doesn’t happen?

Joseph orchestrates a test:

Then he commanded the steward of his house, “Fill the men’s sacks with food, as much as they can carry, and put each man’s money in the mouth of his sack, and put my cup, the silver cup, in the mouth of the sack of the youngest, with his money for the grain.” And he did as Joseph told him. As soon as the morning was light, the men were sent away with their donkeys. They had gone only a short distance from the city. Now Joseph said to his steward, “Up, follow after the men, and when you overtake them, say to them, ‘Why have you repaid evil for good? Is it not from this that my lord drinks, and by this that he practices divination? You have done evil in doing this.’” (Genesis 44.1 – 5, ESV)

It’s not often in life that we get a do-over, a second chance. But Judah, who instigated selling Joseph into slavery, gets a second chance.

But [Joseph] said, “…Only the man in whose hand the cup was found shall be my servant. But as for you, go up in peace to your father.” Then Judah went up to him and said, “Oh, my lord, please let your servant speak a word in my lord’s ears, and let not your anger burn against your servant, for you are like Pharaoh himself…For your servant became a pledge of safety for the boy to my father, saying, ‘If I do not bring him back to you, then I shall bear the blame before my father all my life.’ Now therefore, please let your servant remain instead of the boy as a servant to my lord, and let the boy go back with his brothers. (Genesis 44.17, 18, 32, 33, ESV)

Judah comes through with flying colors! Then Joseph reveals himself to his brothers:

Then Joseph could not control himself before all those who stood by him. He cried, “Make everyone go out from me.” So no one stayed with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers. And he wept aloud, so that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard it. And Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still alive?” But his brothers could not answer him, for they were dismayed at his presence. (Genesis 45.1 – 3, ESV)

I’ve always been taught that Joseph’s strange behavior (kind of a “gotcha” to the brothers) was really Joseph’s giving Judah that second chance to do the right thing. It’s a good lesson, and it’s not new. Joseph also recognizes that God is the one who sent him to Egypt:

And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God. (Genesis 45.5 – 8, ESV)

I think there is one more lesson, which I shall save until tomorrow. It’s a lesson of omission, of what doesn’t happen in this story.

We left Joseph, elevated to the #2 position in Egypt, 13 years after he was sold into slavery. The famine comes and Jacob sends 10 of his sons to Egypt to buy food:

The seven years of plenty that occurred in the land of Egypt came to an end, and the seven years of famine began to come, as Joseph had said. There was famine in all lands, but in all the land of Egypt there was bread… When Jacob learned that there was grain for sale in Egypt, he said to his sons, “Why do you look at one another?” And he said, “Behold, I have heard that there is grain for sale in Egypt. Go down and buy grain for us there, that we may live and not die.” So ten of Joseph’s brothers went down to buy grain in Egypt. (Genesis 41.53 – 42.3, ESV)

We then enter the cat-and-mouse game he plays with his brothers, as recorded in Genesis 42 – 45. If you’re not familiar with the story, please take the time to read it. We have to ask ourselves why Joseph behaved as he did:

Now Joseph was governor over the land. He was the one who sold to all the people of the land. And Joseph’s brothers came and bowed themselves before him with their faces to the ground. Joseph saw his brothers and recognized them, but he treated them like strangers and spoke roughly to them. “Where do you come from?” he said. They said, “From the land of Canaan, to buy food.” And Joseph recognized his brothers, but they did not recognize him. And Joseph remembered the dreams that he had dreamed of them. And he said to them, “You are spies; you have come to see the nakedness of the land.” (Genesis 42.6 – 9, ESV)

He finds out his father and younger brother are alive and well and then throws them all into prison for three days. Then he releases all but Simeon (why Simeon?) and tells them to come back with their youngest brother. The brothers are beginning to catch on that they are being punished for what they did to Joseph:

Then they said to one another, “In truth we are guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the distress of his soul, when he begged us and we did not listen. That is why this distress has come upon us.” And Reuben answered them, “Did I not tell you not to sin against the boy? But you did not listen. So now there comes a reckoning for his blood.” (Genesis 42.21 – 22, ESV)

The brothers return to tell their father, Jacob, what happened, and we get interesting insights into his mindset:

And Jacob their father said to them, “You have bereaved me of my children: Joseph is no more, and Simeon is no more, and now you would take Benjamin. All this has come against me…My son shall not go down with you, for his brother is dead, and he is the only one left. If harm should happen to him on the journey that you are to make, you would bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to Sheol…Why did you treat me so badly as to tell the man that you had another brother? (Genesis 42.36 – 38, 43.6, ESV)

• Jacob still takes everything personally: “all this has come against me…why did you treat me so badly…”
• Jacob still shows gross favoritism: “He is the only one left.” The only one? You have 11 sons, but only one of them counts?

Finally, the brothers prevail, and off they go back to Egypt with Benjamin. Joseph still doesn’t reveal himself, even when he gives a dinner party.

…he said, “Serve the food.” They served him by himself, and them by themselves, and the Egyptians who ate with him by themselves, because the Egyptians could not eat with the Hebrews, for that is an abomination to the Egyptians. (Genesis 43.31 – 32, ESV)

By the way, racial prejudice isn’t new! There are other lessons in all of this, which we’ll discuss when we finish the story tomorrow. What do you think is going on here?

Yesterday I wrote about watching our son Mark “Scale the Strat” in Las Vegas, becoming the US National Champion stair racer. Pretty exciting! We rounded out our visit with a trip to the mind-boggling Hoover Dam, two fantastic shows, and a nice dinner.

The only tough part was watching people gamble. As I walked through casinos many times in four days, I was reminded of something I read in National Geographic as a young boy. The caption under a picture of people playing slot machines in Monaco was:

Gamblers, win or lose, are seldom happy.

It remains true. I saw no smiles among the people sitting at the machines. We saw one lady crying. June and I wish we had had time to check on her.

A mathematician friend of mine, when he learned we were in Las Vegas, wrote:

Don’t gamble. It doesn’t pay in the long run.

He’s right. The house is going to take 5 – 10% of all money wagered. The rest of it is spread randomly around those gambling. Mathematically, your expected return on a $100 wager is $95.

Make no mistake: it’s Gambling, even though the industry likes to drop the “bl” and calling “Gaming,” and it’s not good for you no matter how much our culture likes to normalize it. 

A recent article on BreakPoint said that some research indicates that 50% of the money wagered comes from people with a gambling problem. But, not to worry because there is a National Gambling Problem Hot Line (funded by the gambling industry – what could go wrong?). Breakpoint, February 28, 2023

I wrote about sports betting at the beginning of the football season. At the time, Alabama was a lock to win the national championship, favored to win all their games by double-digits. Guess what? They lost two of those games and didn’t even make the final-four playoffs.

But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. (1 Timothy 6.9, 10, ESV)

Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” (Hebrews 13.5, ESV)

We just returned from a 4-day trip to Las Vegas, courtesy of our son Mark who went there to “Scale the Strat”. Mark is a stair racer, and the annual race up the Strat’s 108 floors is the Towerrunning USA Championship. As volunteers to assist the official timekeeper, June and I were at the top, watching all 600+ runners finish.

The Strat Tower from the outside (it’s the second tallest tower in the western hemisphere); June and I at the top of the stairwell, two steps before the finish (we look fresh because we didn’t run it!).

Mark finished second to his stair racing friend and World #1 stair climber Soh Wai Ching of Malaysia, whom we had met before.

I’ll never forget when Mark stopped by my timekeeper’s table several hours into the race. (People enter the stairwell individually 15 – 30 seconds apart, so the whole race takes well over four hours.) I congratulated him for finishing second. He corrected me: “I prefer ‘US National Champion.’” Recall he finished second to a guy from Malaysia, making Mark the first US finisher – hence, US Champion. Pretty cool.

Here’s part of a news report:

Soh Wai Ching, 28, of Malaysia, took 6 minutes and 45.6 seconds to win Scale the Strat on Sunday. He also won in 2022 with a time of 6:57...

The female winner, Maria Elisa Lopez from Mexico, beat longtime U.S. number one and former world number one Cindy Harris, by a second.

This race was also the Towerrunning USA Championship race, so the top male and female U.S. runners are recognized as national champions, Harris and Mark Ewell. – Marvin Clemons, Las Vegas Review-Journal, February 26, 2023

Mark turns 50 next week. As another of his stair-racing friends told me, “Mark gets older, and he keeps getting faster.”

But it’s not by accident. He trains daily. At least once a week he runs the Manitou Incline, a “hike” on railroad ties, 2,744 steps, with a 2,000-foot elevation gain in less than one mile. Another day he trains for an hour in a stairwell in downtown Colorado Springs. We’re proud of him!

Don’t you realize that in a race everyone runs, but only one person gets the prize? So run to win! All athletes are disciplined in their training. They do it to win a prize that will fade away, but we do it for an eternal prize. (1 Corinthians 9.24, 25, NLT)

Do not waste time arguing over godless ideas… Instead, train yourself to be godly. Physical training is good, but training for godliness is much better, promising benefits in this life and in the life to come. (1 Timothy 4.7, 8, NLT)

For the kingdom of God does not consist in talk but in power. (1 Corinthians 4.20, ESV)