When Money Means Nothing

Genesis 47:15 When the money of the people of Egypt and Canaan was gone, all Egypt came to Joseph and said, "Give us food. Why should we die before your eyes? Our money is all gone."

There are several events in the Bible where the money comes to mean nothing. This account in Genesis 47 is one of those. God sent Joseph on ahead of his family in a very unusual way so that he would be there for them in the future. He had to suffer for about 15 years to be in the right place at the right time.

The Egyptians were so hungry that they had spent all of their money to buy the bare necessities. But the funds were gone! But, they knew that their money was worthless, and they were willing to do anything to get what they needed. So, they gave all of their animals to Joseph, Pharoah, to provide food for their families. But, did you ever wonder why they didn't eat the cows? They must have been sacred.

I have never gone hungry in my 68 years that you can see by looking at my fat tummy. I have heard that hunger changes everything. You can come to the point of cannibalism if left too long. We see that in 2 Kings 6:28,29 where King Jehoram hears the pleas of a woman who had eaten her son just the day before in the sieged city. In that same account, dove's dung was sold to eat with donkey heads. Yummy.

Money means nothing when hunger hits. God brings hunger to punish a nation. How does one stop a famine? One doesn't. One can look to God and repent, or one can finger God and get hungry. We don't believe in famines, do we?

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