This is evident, when we take a view of the conduct of Joseph’s brethren, and the over-ruling their malice and cruelty, to answer the appointed end. Ah! little did those persons know what God intended to do, when they maliciously combined to destroy him; but, being restrained from their diabolical purpose, they were directed, or rather impelled, by an unseen power, to sell him for a slave. But God meant to honour Joseph, to make his own name glorious in an idolatrous land; to save many nations from ruin, to preserve their very lives who had designed to take away their brother’s; to the family of Israel, till they should become a great nation; to fulfil his own promises to Abraham, through whom the Messiah was to spring. Thus God meant it unto good. I proceed to illustrate this truth, by a variety of important circumstances.—The dreadful fall of man effected by the malice of Satan, who hated the image of God, and envied the felicity of our first parents—who meant to destroy them, and eternally ruin all whom they represented. Satan, alas! succeeded, in a measure; but God, who had decreed to permit that wretch to manifest his malice against him, decreed also to over-rule it: he meant it unto good, even to magnify his grace, display his power, testify his hatred to sin, glorify his justice, manifest his wisdom, and shew his amazing love, in the gift of his dear Son, for their redemption from sin, the worst of evils, and from hell, the worst of miseries. Thus God meant it unto good. This fact may be clearly seen in the amazing history of our dear Lord. God permitted Satan to go out of his limitted bounds, and to use his utmost influence to destroy the Prince of Life. He urged that blood-hound, Herod, to murder the Babes of Bethlehem, in hopes of destroying the Saviour of guilty man. While he preached the gospel, wrought miracles, and was working out a righteousness for his dear people, Satan stirred up the Scribes and Pharisees, the Jews and Priests, to vent all the malice of their hearts against him, and so hold him up to public contempt; and in his last conflicts, we may see the malice of men and devils, by all the calumny and reproach, with a load of inconceivable sorrow with which they loaded the immaculate Lamb of God. The malice of the Priests and Doctors of the Law, the weakness of Pilate, and the rage of an easy persuaded populace—herein we see the malice of Satan: he thought evil against the Saviour, but God meant it for good, and effected only what he had before determined to bring about. The intentions of the enemy, and the designs of Jehovah, were infinitely remote; the God of all grace meant to glorify all his sublime perfections, by the obedience, sufferings, and conquests of the Saviour—the magnifying his holy law, the satisfying his own justice, and the redemption of his Church; the overthrow of Satan’s empire, and the downfal of sin and death—Thus God meant it unto good.