Run!!!

RUN!!!--Genesis 39:12

"She caught him by his garment, saying, 'Lie with me!' and he left his garment in her hand and had fled outside."--Genesis 39:12.  In this account, Joseph is in Egypt and working for Potiphar, who works under Pharaoh. Given that Joseph "was handsome in form and appearance" (Genesis 39:6), Potiphar's wife kept on trying to seduce him.  Joseph's response? Genesis 39:9--"How then could I do this great evil and sin against God?"  This leads up to the event that we see in verse 12. Potiphar's wife demands that Joseph lie with her and what does Joseph do at this point? Run.

Run.  The unfortunate thing about the incident with Potiphar's wife is that Potiphar's wife would accuse Joseph of "making sport of her" (v. 17) which essentially means he tried to rape her. Even though this could not be further from the truth, Joseph is still imprisoned.

Run.  But what can we learn from the Genesis account of Joseph and Potiphar's wife? Well we see in verse 12 that Joseph fled from this temptation.

Run.  Joseph was being tempted day after day.  Men, Joseph was a man just like you and me and no doubt that the more Potiphar's wife seduced him, it got a little more tempting to give in. But Joseph first asked in Genesis 39:9 "How then could I do this great evil and sin against God?" This is the attitude that would prompt him to run.

Run.  This needs to be our attitude with sin.  Temptation is not the sin.  Yielding to that temptation is to sin. So when faced with temptation what we need to do is ask "How then could I do this great evil and sin against God?" and RUN!!!

Run.  Running is sometimes easier said than done.  Running from sin can sometimes mean others will look down on us for doing the right thing or falsely accuse us of doing something wrong like Potiphar's wife did with Joseph.

Run.  We have to remember Joseph when we are tempted. We need to maintain the attitude that while we have our earthly masters, our real master is God.  We can see from Genesis 39:9 that Joseph realized that if he gave in to Potiphar's wife, he was not only sinning against his earthly master but he was also sinning against God.

Run.  So my encouragement to you is this.  Practically, what we can gather from this account is that if Joseph would have given in, he would be sinning against not just his master but God. Realize that if you are ever tempted to cheat on a test at school, or at work, you are tempted to break a policy or worse case scenario for guys, lie with another man's wife or cheat on your own wife, my encouragement is simply to RUN!!! We do not need to only resist temptation, we need to RUN from it.  How do we do this? Well I believe James 4:7 illustrates perfectly what Joseph did when he fled from Potiphar's wife.  I leave you with James 4:7 "Submit therefore to God.  Resist the devil and he will flee from you."

Thanks for reading everyone! DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! PRAY ABOUT IT! LOVE Y'ALL! GOD BLESS!