Genesis 39:12

God's way for us always makes us realize our own weakness. Our prayer can never be, "Lead us into temptation," and therefore we are never to act as if this were our prayer. Whenever we can escape without being disloyal, we should run rather than stand and face it. "Flee also youthful lusts." "Abstain (hold off) from fleshly lusts." Flee, as Joseph fled; and there was, perhaps, no bolder man.

If you do not want temptation to defeat you, do not argue with Satan. When Eve began to argue her case with the serpent, the serpent was too clever for her. The devil used his reasoning to argue her right out of Paradise. If you sit down to talk terms with him, you give him half the victory.

The devil has completely failed to break Joseph through the world's hostility and hard circumstances, so he changes tactics and tries to defeat him with the pleasures of sin. Joseph escapes the trap by holding on to his faithfulness to his master and his fear of God. "Behold," says Joseph, "my master … has put everything he has into my hands … how then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?" (vv. 8, 9). Here is the secret of Joseph's consistent life before his master. He served people faithfully because he lived every day in God's presence. And because he walked in the fear of God, God kept him in the hour of temptation. It is good for each of us if fierce temptation finds us walking so close to God that we ask at once, "Can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?" To ask that question is to escape the snare. The only thing we really need to fear is fearing anything, or anyone, more than God.

The temptation came "day by day" (v. 10), and the attacks grew more persistent, until Joseph "flees" from the temptation and the devil's plan fails. But having failed as the tempter, he now becomes the persecutor (vv. 13-18). The woman who once looked at Joseph with evil desire now gives lying testimony against him. As an older writer said, "Those who have broken the bonds of modesty will never be held by the bonds of truth. It is nothing new for the worst of criminals to accuse the best of men of the worst crimes." So Joseph escapes a wicked woman and keeps a good conscience. But to retain a good conscience may cost much. Joseph has to exchange the comfort of Potiphar's house for the hardships of Pharaoh's prison.

She then saw an opportunity of getting revenge on Joseph because he would not join her in evil. She called out for other men, no doubt servants of the household, and told them Joseph had come in to rape her. She said she cried out, and he left without his garment. So from the moment it happened, she had testimony against Joseph that looked convincing.

This is just how the world works. People will first do all they can to lure a Christian away from faithfulness to Christ. If he resists and stands firm, they turn around and start to persecute him and spread lies about him.

So here we see the holy young man resisting the tempter, bearing grief, suffering though he had done no wrong. And this is grace in the day of trial. … Joseph could be no real picture of the atonement. But of Christ suffering unjustly and in grace he was a wonderful foreshadowing.