Genesis 45:7

7 God sent me before you to preserve you as a remnant on the earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance. ^[a]

Genesis 45:7 Meaning and Commentary

Genesis 45:7

And God sent me before you
This he repeats to impress the minds of his brethren with a sense of the good providence of God in bringing him to Egypt before them, to make provision for their future welfare, and to alleviate their grief, and prevent an excessive sorrow for their selling him into Egypt, when by the overruling hand of God it proved so salutary to them: to preserve you a posterity in the earth;
that they and theirs might not perish, which otherwise, in all human probability, must have been the case; and that the promise of the multiplication of Abraham's seed might not be made of none effect, but continue to take place, from whence the Messiah was to spring: and to save your lives by a great deliverance;
from the extreme danger they were exposed unto, through the terrible famine, and in which deliverance were to be observed the great wisdom, goodness, power, and providence of God.

Genesis 45:7 In-Context

5 And now, do not be distressed or angry with yourselves that you sold me into this place, because it was to save lives that God sent me before you.

6 For the famine has covered the land these two years, and there will be five more years without plowing or harvesting.

7 God sent me before you to preserve you as a remnant on the earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance.

8 Therefore it was not you who sent me here, but God, who has made me a father to Pharaoh—lord of all his household and ruler over all the land of Egypt.

9 Now return quickly to my father and tell him, ‘This is what your son Joseph says: God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me without delay.

Footnotes

• [a]. Or and to keep you alive as a great band of survivors