And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. Genesis 45:5 (NIV)
Joe was, well Joe. He had lots of brothers and sisters. They argued just like any normal family. But overall things were good. His mom had died when he was young but he was very close to his father. One day, through circumstances beyond his control, Joe found himself in a foreign city working as a slave for someone else. I can’t imagine the emotions you would go through if you were in that situation.
But Joe, knowing God, did his best to serve the man who owned him. As life would have it, not everyone had the same morals as Joe. The man’s wife was more about her own pleasure and kept trying to get Joe to sleep with her. Joe refused because….well, he knew God and he didn’t want to offend the man of the house. That could result in a bad situation.
Even though Joe did everything right, he ended up in prison because the wife lied. I wonder where his mind went with that? I mean, you do everything right and everything keeps going wrong. But God has his eye on Joe. And Joe, true to his character, continued to do the best he could where he was.
While he was in prison, he helped out some guys who worked for a very important politician. When one of them was released, Joe asked him to remember him. Did he do that? Nope. I wonder if that made Joe bitter? Here he helped this guy and the guy forgot him.
Finally, one day the guy did remember Joe. The very important politician got him out of prison to utilize his unique skills. And Joe did such a great job! He became very, very important. He had lots of money; he controlled everything. The only person who had more power than he did was the politician.
A few years had passed and Joe was working his new job. By now, he had a wife and some children. He still missed his father but God had really blessed him. Suddenly, the men who had caused him to end up in the foreign land showed up. They needed help. Now Joe knew who they were right away. If I were him, I may have thrown them in the same prison I ended up in. What goes around comes around! But not Joe.
You see, Joe knew God. And he realized that all that he went through was for a reason. Because of him, many people’s lives were changed. Many people were better off because of the different path he was forced to walk. Joe knew this was a God thing, not a Joe thing.
As we walk our broken road, our twisted path today, maybe we could be more like Joe. We may not necessarily understand why everything is happening but we can know the God that is in charge and trust in his plan.