Dear Missionary Lady,
Greetings in the name of the God who reigns above all others.
Abraham’s great-grandson, Joseph, also experienced a trial of faith. I don’t relate quite as easily to Joseph because I don’t see his struggle as openly as I see Abraham's. Joseph seems like a super-believer who never struggled. I am nonetheless inspired, challenged, and instructed by Joseph’s story.
We have a tendency to glamorize people – “always smiling,” “never discouraged.” Those statements are probably neither accurate nor logical. Yes, thankfully there are mature Christians with deep faith who struggle less than others and who more quickly find victory, but they are still human. Missionary stories and other biographies often leave out the struggle, although many (most? all?) of those whom we see as great heroes undoubtedly had times of struggle. We saw Abraham’s. Paul’s struggle is not majored on, but it is openly acknowledged. In Job’s story, we see the depths of it; Joseph is at the other extreme, and we don’t see it.
Joseph’s apparent stability and victory can’t be because he never had difficult moments. It’s not that Joseph never struggled, but that God didn’t choose to include his struggles in the biblical record. God’s message in Joseph’s story is not the same as it was in Abraham’s, so the details shared are different. There is something else God wants us to see.
Joseph’s story also starts with a divine revelation. Joseph had dreams from God that indicated his family would bow down to him. These foreshadowed Joseph’s rise to an unexpected position, but at the age of 17, Joseph could not have fully understood what that would be. Like Abraham, Joseph apparently clung to a long-term view, knowing that eventually God’s plans for him would be worked out.
Joseph’s trial of faith lasted 22 years from the time he had his dreams until he was reunited with his family and saw the fulfillment. (In a larger trial of faith, he lived away from the promised land for the last 93 years of his life, but he continued believing that the nation would return there and would carry his bones.)
Joseph’s trial was varied and progressive. Joseph was hated by his brothers, so much that they physically assaulted him and intended to leave him for dead until they saw the opportunity to sell him as a slave. He was falsely accused and thrown into prison, losing the favored position he had acquired over time. In prison the person who could have helped to release him forgot him instead. Joseph’s time as a slave and a prisoner added up to thirteen years. Even after his release and exaltation, he remained subject to Pharaoh in terms of where he lived, whom he married, and what his duties were. Joseph was not free to return home or to choose his own life.
We don’t see any major actions or statements from Joseph that cry out about the difficulty. There are some indications, however, that Joseph knew things were tough. The names of his sons gave praise to God by recognizing God’s blessing within his trial. His explanation for Manasseh’s name is that God had made him forget all his trouble, and for Ephraim, it is that God made him fruitful in the land of his affliction (41:51-52). The other biggest indicator from Joseph is the great emotion he showed at the reunions with his brothers and father (43:30, 45:2, 46:29).
Like Abraham, Joseph continued following God during the years of his trial. It is noteworthy that he was consistently a diligent and trustworthy worker - to his father (37:13), to Potiphar (39:4,6), in the prison (39:22-23), and to Pharaoh (41:41,44). He was always looking out for the good of others. He took care of Potiphar and of the other prisoners. He had concern for his father. He restrained his punishments toward his brothers and was generous to them. He intervened on behalf of the entire nation of Egypt and beyond.
Joseph made it clear that his admirable reputation was not merely his own good character. As possibly the only God-follower in Egypt, he boldly and consistently identified with God no matter to whom he was speaking; God’s name was readily on his lips because it was firmly in his heart. He told Potiphar’s wife that God was the reason for his resistance (39:9). He told his fellow prisoners that God was the reason he could help them (40:8). He told Pharaoh that his abilities were from God (41:16) and that God controls the events of life (41:25,32). He told his brothers that his curtailed judgment was because of God (42:18). He acknowledged God as the source of blessing to his brothers (43:23,29). He told his father that God had given him his children (48:9). He told his brothers (and descendants?) that God would take care of them in Egypt and later rescue them from it (50:24-25).
It is no surprise then that Joseph’s anchor through his trial was grounded in what He believed about God. Joseph saw God’s hand everywhere; in his own life, he firmly believed that not only was God’s hand involved, but that God was the author and orchestrator of all that happened.
This was not a passing or shallow belief. Joseph believed it so firmly that he repeated it often. “Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither: for God did send me before you to preserve life” (45:5). “And God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt. Haste ye, and go up to my father, and say unto him, Thus saith thy son Joseph, God hath made me lord of all Egypt” (45:7-9). “But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive” (50:20).
Is there any doubt to whom Joseph attributed even the most difficult aspects of his life? It was God! Joseph was able to survive his trial of faith so well because his relationship with God saturated his life. Acknowledgement of God poured forth at every moment. Even in the worst, Joseph knew that God was at work, rising over every act of man and nature. Oh, that God would give us such eyes to see Him everywhere!
Love in Christ,
Peggy Holt
member at Open Door Baptist Church in Lebanon, PA
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