Genesis 44:3

Joseph's wisdom now shows itself in a way that leads his brothers to repentance without accusing them. He told his steward to fill the brothers' sacks with food and again put their money back in their sacks (v. 1). But besides this he tells him to put his own silver cup in the mouth of Benjamin's sack. The next morning they were on their way, no doubt rejoicing that this time everything had gone so well.

God's moral government required that the brothers be searched even more deeply. Joseph is His instrument, and he plans a still harder test. It was not only to carry their self-judgment through to the very end. It was also to prove that their love for their father and their brother was now real and warm, after their deep guilt toward both of them long ago. Love joined righteousness in working this way for their best good.

The trial was severe, but love chose it in the fear of God. Still, we may feel that the method he used was in no way what the New Testament would suggest to a Christian… Joseph acted according to his own measure of light, weakened no doubt by the Egyptian life around him. Scripture tells us the facts as they were, without approving them and without excusing them.

Joseph's cup is put in Benjamin's sack… and they set out on their journey. Simple as it seems, this is the crisis. Their own lips will now have to give the verdict, for the question is about to be put to them: are they what they once were, or have they received a heart of flesh? Will Benjamin's sorrows move them, when Joseph's cries once failed to? Will the grief of their old father at home plead with their hearts, as it once did not? This place, this moment, was the field of Dothan again. In the field of Dothan they had to answer whether they would sacrifice their innocent brother Joseph to their lusts, their envy and their malice.

Joseph speaks kindly to them. He longs in love over his younger brother. He weeps in love in secret. But he holds himself back in love, because love's time to show itself has not yet come… While they enjoy all this favour, "they drank and were merry with him." Yet they must learn other lessons before he can be merry with them. They are rejoicing in his gifts, but they have yet to rejoice in him… Before Joseph can be revealed to them, they must first stand exposed before Joseph. That is why Joseph's cup is placed in Benjamin's sack.

No doubt the shock of finding it there troubled the brothers sharply. But it had to be so, where sin of the deepest kind lay behind everything. This was only a way to make that sin truly felt and judged. And the pain of the method was very short — no more than a few hours, next to what Joseph drank so deeply for years — and that same day ended in forgiveness, joy and tender love.