I’ve been doing a semi deep dive into the story of Joseph in Genesis 35-50. I know it’s a lot of chapters to read, but I would encourage you to read through these chapters this week and come back to this blog to review the thoughts and questions here.
As I was reading, I made a list of “events” that are mentioned in these chapters. We are introduced to Joseph when he has a dream which is interpreted as his brothers and family bowing down to him. They did not like this very much at all. Also, Joseph was his father’s favorite son, which made his brothers even more jealous towards him. In Genesis 37, we see Joseph coming to his brothers who were tending to flocks, as he was getting closer, the brothers began to discuss killing him. The oldest brother, Reuben, suggested that they only throw him into a pit so that he could later, secretly, go pull him out with little harm.
While I was reading Genesis 37, it was Tabaski here in Senegal. That is a celebration in the Muslim faith where they celebrate Abraham’s obedience in being willing to offer his son as a sacrifice to the Lord by sacrificing a sheep and having a large meal with family that day. However, they believe the son was Ishmael while the Bible tells us it was Isaac. What was significant to me as I read this chapter during this celebration was that the morning of Tabaski, people dig holes in the street or around their home to allow the sheep they sacrifice to bleed out and they put all of the entrails inside before covering it up. In Genesis 37, the Bible tells us that Josephs brothers found a pit in the wilderness and threw him in there. I do not believe this was some pristine, nicely dug, clean pit. It was a pit… in the wilderness… how long had it been there? What was inside? I don’t think I want to know. I imagined all the ..parts.. that are inside the pits during Tabaski along with whatever else there might be from all the shepherds and flocks that pass by.
Sometimes it is easy for us to forget all the life lived between the scriptures we read so neatly typed out in our Bibles. Imagine the scene when Josephs brothers were throwing him into the pit. Would you go quietly? Joseph was sent by his father to check on his brothers and wound up in a pit, then wound up sold into slavery. How frightening, how much shouting and fighting did he do? I also think of Daniel when he was thrown into a den of lions or the woman with the issue of blood who bled for 12 years. Each time the Lord allowed the enemy to have his way, whether through decrees from the government, pride and anger, or illness. But look at the lessons we learn from these testimonies today, for His glory. It’s easy to read these and forget there were real people behind the words on this page.
In these moments, Joseph being sold, then put into prison, then put in charge of everything under Pharoah, he couldn’t see the whole picture. Joseph couldn’t see the end of the story and all the inner workings that the Lord was doing through his story. It’s all laid out for us nicely; we also have commentary and people who have studied these cultures and histories who can give us context and applications. But what about Joseph? How do the moments he was living in apply to me? How does the uncertainty, change, fear, and the daily challenges apply to my life?
“But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive.”
Genesis 50:20
Through Joseph and the many “detours” he had to take, the Lord saved his family, his lineage, and Joseph had the most prominent place in the kingdom.
If my story was all laid out and I could see beginning to end, I could have a list where the Lord was working when I never realized it. But I don’t have the ability to see that far ahead. What I can do, is get in the Word and remind myself of the character of God, who He is and His power. He hasn’t changed. He was faithful before and in the story of Joseph, He is faithful now and, in my story, too. I can make an “up until now” list of how the Lord has been faithful in different situations of my life when I didn’t realize it in the moment.
“Unless the Lord had been my help, my soul would soon have settled in silence. If I say, “my foot slips”, Your mercy, O Lord, will hold me up. In the multitude of my anxieties within me, Your comforts delight my soul.”
Psalm 94:17-19
It’s not “simple” but it is necessary to walk and trust Him in our different seasons, whether that’s illness, suffering, grief, joy, loss, or change. Whatever it is, get alone with Him and let Him speak to your heart. Let that, let Him, be the first place you go. Let Him hear your frustrations, dump all that out, He has broad shoulders and can take it. But don’t stop there. Let Him refill you. Spend time in His presence. He doesn’t promise that our lives will be easy and carefree, in fact, He promises the opposite. What He does promise is to be with us.
“I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.”
Psalm 27:13
I encourage you to spend some time with the Lord. Remind yourself of how He has been faithful in the past. Ask the Lord to reveal ways He was working in your life that you never even realized. Get in the Word, friends. He is faithful.