Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. I'm the pastor of Elevation
Speaker 1: Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank
Speaker 1: you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope
Speaker 1: it builds your faith. Hope it gives your perspective to
Speaker 1: see God as moving in your life.
Speaker 2: Enjoy the message.
Speaker 3: Our key passage today is going to be Genesis fifty twenty.
Speaker 3: Genesis fifty twenty says this you intended to harm me,
Speaker 3: but God intended it for good, to accomplish what is
Speaker 3: now being done, the saving of many lives.
Speaker 2: Thank you Lord for this word.
Speaker 3: Thank you that it can get down inside of us,
Speaker 3: rearrange some thoughts that we have, motivate us to trust
Speaker 3: you more. God, you are faithful, You are good. In
Speaker 3: your Holy name. We pray and everyone said Amen. When
Speaker 3: I read this verse, I am absolutely struck by this reality,
Speaker 3: this person, this group, this entity.
Speaker 2: You intended to harm me.
Speaker 3: At the same time, God also has an intention.
Speaker 2: And God's intention is.
Speaker 3: To take whatever has happened and to use it for good,
Speaker 3: for the saving of many lives. You see, with God,
Speaker 3: there's always two things happening at the same time. There
Speaker 3: is the physical reality of what we see, and there
Speaker 3: is the certainty of the good that God is eventually
Speaker 3: going to do no matter what we walk through.
Speaker 2: Amen. Amen, you guys can have a seat.
Speaker 3: I thought I would start off today by showing you
Speaker 3: some pictures of my family. My family has changed quite
Speaker 3: a bit, grown quite a bit, and so since you
Speaker 3: guys are such an important part, I wanted to go
Speaker 3: ahead and throw up some pictures here. Okay, So this
Speaker 3: picture is my whole family. And many of you know
Speaker 3: my story. I walked through a really, really devastating divorce
Speaker 3: many years ago, and in God's goodness and to my amazement,
Speaker 3: I learned.
Speaker 2: To trust again. And that was really hard.
Speaker 3: But God brought an incredible man into my life. And
Speaker 3: so in January of last year, we got married. And
Speaker 3: so there's my family. I know. Now I want to
Speaker 3: tell you something really fun. So this is my husband, Chaz.
Speaker 3: He's right here on the front row. Hey, babe. So
Speaker 3: when Chaz and I were getting together and learning about
Speaker 3: one another, I quickly learned he has two children. We
Speaker 3: have five children. Okay, So I just want you to
Speaker 3: help me do the math here. No, I have five children.
Speaker 3: His two children are younger than mine, and so at
Speaker 3: this point, it's just two children. I have five children
Speaker 3: who are a little bit older. Four of my five
Speaker 3: kids are married, one has a significant girlfriend. So when
Speaker 3: you add all of that up, now I'm bringing ten
Speaker 3: people to the table, right. I also had three grandkids
Speaker 3: at the time, so now I'm bringing how many thirteen
Speaker 3: people to the table?
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 3: And then in twenty twenty four, after we were married,
Speaker 3: but very shortly something miraculous and beautiful, beautiful.
Speaker 2: Started to happening.
Speaker 3: I had five grandchildren born last year alone.
Speaker 2: Okay, So now I'm bringing how.
Speaker 3: Many people to the table? Eighteen and et rings two,
Speaker 3: so between the two of us we have twenty people. Okay, great,
Speaker 3: all right, I want to show you a couple other
Speaker 3: pictures really quickly.
Speaker 2: Okay. So these are my three.
Speaker 3: Grandchildren I started off with at our wedding, and that's
Speaker 3: Susie Selena Unriiser precious, amazing gifts from God. And then
Speaker 3: my son had twins born in February. That's legend in
Speaker 3: London and today is their birthday, first birthday. Have your
Speaker 3: birthday legend London, okay. And then my daughter had sweet
Speaker 3: little windsor l who is in the middle. We call
Speaker 3: her Winnie and then my youngest or my oldest daughter
Speaker 3: and my middle daughter had little boys in November, and
Speaker 3: their names are River and Percy.
Speaker 2: So that's my clan, right.
Speaker 3: So it's very, very easy though to look at those
Speaker 3: pictures of us all smiling and just go, Wow, what
Speaker 3: a neat family, right, And I am so blessed. I
Speaker 3: think I do have a really neat family. But make
Speaker 3: no mistake, my family's been through a lot, a lot.
Speaker 3: I don't have to tell you that because I would
Speaker 3: imagine in your own way and different circumstances that have happened,
Speaker 3: your family has been through a lot too, because there's
Speaker 3: really no one that gets.
Speaker 2: Through this life unscathed, right.
Speaker 3: And part of a big part of my story was
Speaker 3: that I'd had my trust so broken, so shattered, that
Speaker 3: I started transferring the trust issues I had with another
Speaker 3: person and even other people. I started transferring those trust
Speaker 3: issues into my relationship with God. Trust is the oxygen
Speaker 3: of all human relationships. You starve a relationship of trust,
Speaker 3: and you starve at a vibrancy, You possibly even starve
Speaker 3: it to death. And what can so easily happen when
Speaker 3: we are struggling in trust with another human is it
Speaker 3: can start to feel like, God, if you are really good,
Speaker 3: why aren't you fixing that situation? Why aren't you showing
Speaker 3: that person that they shouldn't be doing this? Why why
Speaker 3: aren't you taking care of things that you could prevent?
Speaker 3: And I don't understand why you didn't prevent it, and
Speaker 3: it can really start to mess you up. You see,
Speaker 3: our brain is wired for the confidence of knowing. Our
Speaker 3: brain is always scanning what we see, and we are
Speaker 3: depending on our brain to say you're safe or you're
Speaker 3: not safe. Right, And so as my brain sometimes scans
Speaker 3: what I'm seeing, if I don't remember that what I'm
Speaker 3: seeing is not the full story, then I can start
Speaker 3: to judge whether or not God is faithful based on
Speaker 3: the circumstances that are right in front of me. Right,
Speaker 3: that's right. So we've got to find a different way
Speaker 3: to look at what we're facing. I want to know
Speaker 3: what's going to happen. I want to know how it's
Speaker 3: going to turn out, and I want to know that
Speaker 3: it will eventually be really good. God just wants me
Speaker 3: to know him. God wants me to know Him and
Speaker 3: his faithfulness and his goodness. Part of my morning prayer
Speaker 3: that I pray every morning. You've probably heard me say
Speaker 3: this before I intentionally verbalize out loud. God you are good.
Speaker 3: God you are good to me, and God you are
Speaker 3: good at being God. Even if people aren't good, circumstances
Speaker 3: aren't good, finances aren't good, situations aren't good. But God,
Speaker 3: I've got to approach every day, and I've got to
Speaker 3: make the lens through which I look at my day
Speaker 3: and all that i'll face today. God, you are good,
Speaker 3: You are good to me, and you are good at
Speaker 3: being God. But sometimes, right that's all true. We can
Speaker 3: celebrate that, yes, absolutely, but sometimes it's really really hard
Speaker 3: to trust that God really does have it all under
Speaker 3: control when suddenly situations go from hard to more hard,
Speaker 3: to even harder to more hard, to more heart to
Speaker 3: more hard. And I don't know if any of you
Speaker 3: guys have been in that place, or if you're in
Speaker 3: that place today, but I pray that this is a
Speaker 3: word for you. You see this verse Genesis fifty twenty.
Speaker 3: It's not where Joseph's life starts. Joseph is saying these
Speaker 3: words to his brother, but this is toward the very
Speaker 3: end of his story, or to a place of this
Speaker 3: story where things were more resolved than they are when
Speaker 3: we begin. And so Joseph has gone through a lot,
Speaker 3: and going through a lot has built a resilience in
Speaker 3: Joseph that has enabled him to say these words with
Speaker 3: absolute confidence. You intended to harm me, brothers, but God
Speaker 3: intends it for good, for the saving of many lives,
Speaker 3: to accomplish a purpose that is now being done.
Speaker 2: So let's turn back to.
Speaker 3: Earlier in Joseph's story, because I think when we turn
Speaker 3: back earlier in Joseph's story, we're going to get a
Speaker 3: better understanding of all that Joseph had to go through before.
Speaker 2: He said those amazing words.
Speaker 3: We go back to Genesis thirty seven, and in Genesis
Speaker 3: thirty seven, verse two, it says this, this is the
Speaker 3: account of Jacob's family line. Joseph, a young man of seventeen,
Speaker 3: was tending his flocks with his brothers, the sons of
Speaker 3: hard Word and the sons of another hard word, his
Speaker 3: father's wives, and he brought their father a bad report
Speaker 3: about them. Now, Israel, this is the father. Israel loved
Speaker 3: Joe Joseph more than any of his other sons because
Speaker 3: he'd been born to him in his old age, and
Speaker 3: he made an ornate robe for him. And when his
Speaker 3: brothers saw that their father loved Joseph more than any
Speaker 3: of them, they hated him and could not speak a
Speaker 3: kind word to him. Now, let me explain something here
Speaker 3: about this robe. This was not just a lavish gift.
Speaker 3: It was also an outward sign that Joseph was not
Speaker 3: going to have to work hard or as hard like
Speaker 3: his other brothers, because you don't put on an ornate
Speaker 3: robe and go out into the fields and do the
Speaker 3: kind of work that all of his brothers were doing.
Speaker 3: So when job would put on, when Joseph would put
Speaker 3: on this fancy robe, how do you think the brothers
Speaker 3: felt day after.
Speaker 2: Day after day.
Speaker 3: It wasn't just that they hated him the day that
Speaker 3: he got the gift. It's that they hated him every
Speaker 3: other day that they had to go out into the fields.
Speaker 3: And Joe Joseph is sitting at home just chilling in
Speaker 3: he fancy wrote right now. The other dynamic that's happening
Speaker 3: here is that the father, when he would send his
Speaker 3: sons out to work, sometimes he would send Joseph out
Speaker 3: to go and spy on the brothers. And so what's
Speaker 3: happened here is that he is going out and he
Speaker 3: is spying on their brothers, and he brings the father
Speaker 3: back a bad report, and so they hated him and
Speaker 3: literally could not speak a kind word to him. Now,
Speaker 3: the next thing we see here is that Joseph starts
Speaker 3: to have a dream, and basically he has two dreams,
Speaker 3: and these dreams that he has basically is kind of
Speaker 3: showing the brothers that Joseph believes the interpretation of this
Speaker 3: dream is that one day he's going to rise up
Speaker 3: and be their leader and they're all going to bow
Speaker 3: down to him. He's saying this to brothers who already
Speaker 3: hate him. So how do you think the brothers feel
Speaker 3: when Joseph says, eventually, I'm about to be the boss
Speaker 3: of all you people, right, they.
Speaker 2: Hate him even more. Then there comes a day that.
Speaker 3: The father sends the brothers out to go and work
Speaker 3: and again says to Joseph, go out and check on
Speaker 3: your brothers. So I just wants you to remember this
Speaker 3: is a human dynamic happening in a very divine story.
Speaker 2: Okay, these people.
Speaker 3: Have real feelings, they have real anks, they have real
Speaker 3: stuff that's happening all around them. So the brothers go
Speaker 3: out and they're out in the field working and from
Speaker 3: a distance they see Joseph coming.
Speaker 2: Wherein he fancy Rowe. I don't know what he'd been
Speaker 2: doing at home.
Speaker 3: Maybe he was playing Nintendo, eating cheetohs, looking his cheesy fingers.
Speaker 3: I don't know. But what I do know is the
Speaker 3: brothers were not doing that. The brothers were out there
Speaker 3: working and from a distance Genesis thirty seven eighteen. The
Speaker 3: brothers see Joseph, it says, but they saw him in
Speaker 3: the distance, and before he reached them, they plotted to
Speaker 3: kill him. There's never just a little bit of anger.
Speaker 3: There's never just a little bit of hatred. There's never
Speaker 3: just a little bit of bitterness. You see, Bitterness gets
Speaker 3: down inside of this and it doesn't want to just
Speaker 3: be a feeling. It wants to be our consuming feeling.
Speaker 3: Here comes that dreamer. They said to each other, Come now,
Speaker 3: let's kill him and throw him into one of these
Speaker 3: cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then
Speaker 3: we'll see what comes of his dreams. And then one
Speaker 3: of the other brothers speaks up and says, actually, what
Speaker 3: will it profit us if we kill him?
Speaker 2: Why don't we sell him and at least we'll get
Speaker 2: money and.
Speaker 3: So their plan was to throw Joseph in the cistern,
Speaker 3: which that absolutely happens, and then wait for the merchants
Speaker 3: to come by, and then they pull him out of
Speaker 3: the cistern. They sell him to merchants headed toward Egypt.
Speaker 2: And they go home and they.
Speaker 3: Tell their father that a ferocious animal has killed Joseph.
Speaker 3: They take that fancy robe they stripped off of Joseph
Speaker 3: before they sold him. They tear it into shreds, dip
Speaker 3: it in animal's blood, give it to the father. So
Speaker 3: the father has no clue that Joseph is still alive.
Speaker 3: So I want you to vert just a minute, put
Speaker 3: yourself in Joseph's shoes. When his brothers betray him in
Speaker 3: such a horrific way, This isn't just an event in
Speaker 3: his life. This is the event of his life that
Speaker 3: will change everything for Joseph.
Speaker 2: So here's Joseph. He's been sold.
Speaker 3: And I don't know the condition of these merchants, with
Speaker 3: the condition they put Joseph in. I don't know if
Speaker 3: his hands are bound. I don't know if there's a
Speaker 3: bag of her said, I don't know, But what I
Speaker 3: do know is that Joseph had to be terrified.
Speaker 2: Joseph had to be terrified.
Speaker 3: And also Joseph had to be thinking about those dreams
Speaker 3: that he had that he truly felt like were visions
Speaker 3: from God that one day he was going to rise
Speaker 3: up and be a leader.
Speaker 2: But now now.
Speaker 3: He's a slave, and he's headed to a foreign land
Speaker 3: with foreign people, things that he doesn't know. And if
Speaker 3: I were Joseph, I would surely be thinking, God, this
Speaker 3: sure doesn't look like that vision that you gave me
Speaker 3: for my life. How could a good God let this happen?
Speaker 3: Like if I were Joseph, I would assume I would
Speaker 3: be sent to some leadership academy, some big training. I
Speaker 3: would have had no idea that this awful circumstance would
Speaker 3: eventually prove to be the perfect training. But it doesn't
Speaker 3: start out looking that way at all. So there's two
Speaker 3: things happening simultaneous, slee right here. God has destined Joseph
Speaker 3: to be a leader, But in the circumstances that he
Speaker 3: was in with his brother and the hatred that his
Speaker 3: brothers had for him, do you think that anytime soon
Speaker 3: in that dynamic, that Joseph could really rise up and
Speaker 3: be a leader. Absolutely not. So God is going to
Speaker 3: take the rejection of those brothers and actually use it.
Speaker 3: God didn't cause it, but God is going to take it.
Speaker 3: He's going to take the rejection of the brothers and
Speaker 3: actually use it as a protection of the calling that
Speaker 3: he is absolutely placed on Joseph's life. But Joseph doesn't
Speaker 3: see that at all. All Joseph sees is what's awful
Speaker 3: around him, and of course that's all he sees. So
Speaker 3: then Joseph gets to Egypt and he's sold into Potiphar's house,
Speaker 3: the captain of the guard. And when he's sold into
Speaker 3: Potiphar's house house, things are not great because joseph life
Speaker 3: doesn't look anything like he thought it was going to look.
Speaker 3: But things aren't horrible either. If we look at Genesis
Speaker 3: thirty nine, I'll go ahead and read you starting in
Speaker 3: verse two.
Speaker 2: The Lord was with Joseph so that he.
Speaker 3: Prospered, and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master, Potiphar.
Speaker 2: And when his master saw.
Speaker 3: That the Lord was with him, and that the Lord
Speaker 3: gave him success in everything he did, Joseph found favor
Speaker 3: in his eyes and became his attendant. Potiphar put him
Speaker 3: in charge of his household and he entrusted to.
Speaker 2: His care, everything he owned.
Speaker 3: Is Joseph in the ideal situation that he assumed that
Speaker 3: he would be in when God give them the vision
Speaker 3: that he would be leader.
Speaker 2: Oh no, absolutely not.
Speaker 3: And I would imagine many of us are in this
Speaker 3: in between place right now too. It's like we had
Speaker 3: a hope, we had a dream, we have really trusted God.
Speaker 3: But then we're sitting there thinking, me, trusting God has
Speaker 3: gotten me to this place and I don't understand this place.
Speaker 2: But at the.
Speaker 3: Same time, we can see in Joseph's story that God
Speaker 3: is with him, that God is prospering him, that God
Speaker 3: is helping Potiphar to get a vision for Joseph that
Speaker 3: Joseph doesn't even have for himself.
Speaker 2: And so Joseph rises up.
Speaker 3: And now he is a leader, not leading the way
Speaker 3: he assumed he would be leading, but he is a
Speaker 3: leader in this small dynamic of Potiphar's house.
Speaker 2: Now there is this one.
Speaker 3: Complication that's sort of going to mess everything up for
Speaker 3: him in Potiphar's house.
Speaker 2: And you're not going to believe me when I say it.
Speaker 3: That's why I have my scripture prepared that I'm going
Speaker 3: to back it up okay, so are you ready for this?
Speaker 3: The complication was that Joseph was hot. I know, I know,
Speaker 3: I told you you were not going to believe me.
Speaker 3: But I'm going to read it straight from God's words
Speaker 3: Genesis thirty nine, halfway through verse six, and it says,
Speaker 3: now Joseph was well build and handsome. I do not
Speaker 3: have to take it back to the Hebrew to understand
Speaker 3: that that means Joseph was in fact, thank you.
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm just reading the Bible. Okay.
Speaker 3: So Joseph was well build and handsome. And after a
Speaker 3: while his master's wife took notice of Joseph and said,
Speaker 3: come to bed with me. I'm sorry, but what like
Speaker 3: if I ever had five words in the Bible, which
Speaker 3: I won't because God's word is complete. But if I
Speaker 3: ever did have five words in the Bible, I just
Speaker 3: probably don't ever want it to be those five words.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: So she starts making advances toward Joseph. Now this is
Speaker 3: Joseph's boss's wife, right, and she won't stop. Joseph says no,
Speaker 3: and she doesn't take kindly to being told no, and
Speaker 3: so she keeps trying and keeps trying, and one day
Speaker 3: she literally throws him herself onto Joseph. Joseph turns to
Speaker 3: flee away from her. She grabs his cloak, takes it
Speaker 3: to Potiphar and says, Joseph has been making advances toward me,
Speaker 3: and who is Potiphar going.
Speaker 2: To believe his wife? That's right.
Speaker 3: So now Joseph is about to get a promotion, but
Speaker 3: it is not going to look like any kind of
Speaker 3: promotion Joseph ever thought that he would ever have. He's
Speaker 3: about to get promoted to prison.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 3: Now, I want you to notice what's happening here. With God,
Speaker 3: there's always a meanwhile. With God, there is always a meanwhile.
Speaker 3: There is the physical reality of what we see and
Speaker 3: what we're experiencing. And at the same time, there is
Speaker 3: the reality of what God is doing, and God is arranging,
Speaker 3: and God is really taking care of what we cannot see.
Speaker 3: So it started off the rejection of Joseph's brother actually
Speaker 3: proved to be a protection of his calling. He gets
Speaker 3: into Potiphar's house and Potiphar promotes him to be a leader.
Speaker 3: Now he's leading, he's learning leadership strategies and all of
Speaker 3: that not at all the way he thought it would,
Speaker 3: but still it was a protection of his calling. Now
Speaker 3: Joseph's about to get a promotion to prison, but that
Speaker 3: is not what Joseph is seeing at all. Joseph is
Speaker 3: seeing an unfair accusation and God is going to use
Speaker 3: that unfair accusation to give.
Speaker 2: Him a promotion to prison.
Speaker 3: You see, once he gets to prison, the prison guard
Speaker 3: takes notice of Joseph, and the lord's favor was on Joseph.
Speaker 3: So now Joseph is in prison and he's in charge
Speaker 3: of leading a much larger group of people. He's learning
Speaker 3: leadership skills in a much larger way, and he's having
Speaker 3: developed systems and strategies and all things that leaders need
Speaker 3: to know. But at the same time, he's still going
Speaker 3: to bed in a dungeon every night. So what is
Speaker 3: Joseph seeing. Joseph is seeing those present circumstances, the hardship,
Speaker 3: and how unfair it is that he is there. But
Speaker 3: God is seeing a development, a preparation, a vision that
Speaker 3: he's going to carry out.
Speaker 2: And it's not just.
Speaker 3: Going to be for Joseph's good, It's going to be
Speaker 3: for the good of so many other people. So now
Speaker 3: Joseph is in prison, and while he's in prison, he
Speaker 3: meets two other prisoners, the cup Bear and the Baker.
Speaker 3: Now the cup Bear and the Baker there in prison.
Speaker 3: They used to work for Pharaoh, but something happened, and
Speaker 3: now they're in prison. And these two, the cup Bear
Speaker 3: and the Baker, they have a dream. And who can
Speaker 3: interpret dreams?
Speaker 2: Joseph.
Speaker 3: That's right, And so Joseph is able to interpret their dreams.
Speaker 2: Now things don't go so well for the Baker.
Speaker 3: It's actually kind of gross what happens, and terrible, but
Speaker 3: I'll let you read that on your own time. But
Speaker 3: I am going to tell you what happens with the Cupbear.
Speaker 3: The cup Bear has a dream, and Joseph interprets the
Speaker 3: dream and says, in three days, you're going.
Speaker 2: To get out.
Speaker 3: And I want you to listen to the words that
Speaker 3: Joseph says to the Cupbear, so that you can have
Speaker 3: a deep insight of exactly what Joseph was thinking at
Speaker 3: this time. Genesis forty, verse fourteen. Joseph says to the cupbear,
Speaker 3: when all goes well with you, remember me and show
Speaker 3: me kindness, Mention me to Pharaoh, and get me out
Speaker 3: of this prison. I was forcibly carried off from the
Speaker 3: lands of the Hebrews, and even here, I've done nothing
Speaker 3: to deserve being put in a dungeon. This is such
Speaker 3: a good snapshot where we can see is Joseph happy
Speaker 3: with his current circumstances.
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 3: Is Joseph thinking that his current circumstances are going to
Speaker 3: work an eventual good. Probably not right? Is Joseph does
Speaker 3: he have any clue of how God is going to
Speaker 3: use a circumstance to do something really good in the future.
Speaker 3: Probably not right, because his circumstances were so hard he
Speaker 3: was calling them a dungeon. Get me out of this dungeon.
Speaker 3: Joseph wants relief. Joseph wants relief. How many of you
Speaker 3: in here. You don't have to raise your hand, but
Speaker 3: are you in a season where you just need some relief?
Speaker 3: When I'm in that place, I love to think of
Speaker 3: this story and I literally will say to myself, I
Speaker 3: don't know the whole story of my life. That's why
Speaker 3: it builds my fate to get into God's word and
Speaker 3: read someone else's story who I can read from beginning
Speaker 3: to end. And I'm telling you, sometimes when I go
Speaker 3: through a hard time, can I just be absolutely human
Speaker 3: with you for a minute? Sometimes when I'm going through
Speaker 3: a hard time, the last thing I feel like doing
Speaker 3: picking up the Bible. The last thing I feel like
Speaker 3: doing is going to church. I don't know why, but
Speaker 3: I just get so physically exhausted that it becomes spiritually discouraged.
Speaker 3: And if I don't catch it, I'll become spiritually disillusioned.
Speaker 3: When we want to read the Bible the least is
Speaker 3: often when we absolutely need to read it.
Speaker 2: The most right. Amen. So here's what Joseph does.
Speaker 3: He asks the cup bearer to please mention to him
Speaker 3: when you'll get out of this prison, cup bear, and
Speaker 3: you're going to get out soon. When you get out,
Speaker 3: please go mention me to Pharaoh and get me out
Speaker 3: of this prison.
Speaker 2: I should not be here. Give Pharaoh a good word. Now.
Speaker 3: Again, I don't know for sure because I'm not Joseph,
Speaker 3: but I'm just going to tell you something based on
Speaker 3: my own human experience of what can happen to me.
Speaker 3: When I start assuming that I know what a good
Speaker 3: God should do, I start attaching my hope on what
Speaker 3: I assume a.
Speaker 2: Good God should do.
Speaker 3: But then if God does not follow my plan, I
Speaker 3: start to get super agitated, super frustrated, and even sometimes doubtful.
Speaker 3: Why isn't God doing what I assume a good God
Speaker 3: should do.
Speaker 2: I have a plan, and then.
Speaker 3: I'm trying to hold God accountable to the plan of
Speaker 3: my own making. When I get this situation, it is
Speaker 3: just like what Joseph was facing when I get when
Speaker 3: you get out of prison, cut bear, mention me to
Speaker 3: Pharaoh and get me out of prison. So if I'm Joseph,
Speaker 3: I have developed my plan and I just want to
Speaker 3: hold God accountable, like this is the plan.
Speaker 2: This is what the plan should be.
Speaker 3: Don't you see It'll make you look good, God, whole
Speaker 3: nine yards right, because what we we don't trust, we
Speaker 3: will try to control. What we don't trust, we will
Speaker 3: try to control. Surely God, this is the plan. So
Speaker 3: imagine being Joseph. Now Joseph is in prison and the
Speaker 3: cup bear gets out, And if I'm Joseph, I'm like, yes, ma'am,
Speaker 3: sam i am, he is going to get me out
Speaker 3: of this prison. And so the cup bear gets released.
Speaker 3: In day one, Joseph's like, yes, anytime now, Day two,
Speaker 3: day three, Day four, Maybe the paperwork's taken a little while.
Speaker 2: Day five, Day six, Day.
Speaker 3: Seven, Day one hundred, two hundred three hundred, four hundred,
Speaker 3: five hundred, six hundred. What do you think is happening
Speaker 3: inside of a human heart that is attached their outcome
Speaker 3: to something that they suggested to God rather than trusting God.
Speaker 2: What do you think happening in Joseph's heart? If it
Speaker 2: was me?
Speaker 3: If it was me, this is where that discouragement and
Speaker 3: disillusionment starts to happen.
Speaker 2: Right here.
Speaker 3: The scriptures say when two full years had passed Genesis
Speaker 3: forty one, two full years, you'all, two years is a
Speaker 3: really long time. It's a really long time when you're
Speaker 3: looking at your circumstances and your circumstances don't at all
Speaker 3: feel fair. Your circumstances at all don't look good. Your
Speaker 3: circumstances at all don't look like how could anything positive
Speaker 3: ever come out of so much negative? When two full
Speaker 3: years had passed, Pharaoh has a dream and suddenly the
Speaker 3: cup bear is like, should out of E eight? I
Speaker 3: know you young people don't understand that, but I'm just
Speaker 3: telling you if you know, you.
Speaker 2: Know, right?
Speaker 3: Okay, So the cup air is like, oh man, I
Speaker 3: totally forgot, I totally forgo God. There's this Hebrew man
Speaker 3: in prison that can interpret dreams. Nobody else was able
Speaker 3: to interpret Pharaoh's dreams. And so they go and Pharaoh
Speaker 3: calls for Joseph. Look at what it says in Genesis
Speaker 3: forty one fourteen. So Pharaoh sent for Joseph, and he
Speaker 3: was quickly brought up from that dungeon. Because when it
Speaker 3: is God's time, it's the right time. It becomes quick time, okay, Sophid.
Speaker 3: So Pharaoh sent for Joseph, and he was quickly brought
Speaker 3: from the dungeon. And when he shaved and changed his
Speaker 3: clothes and hopefully put on some of deodorant, he came
Speaker 3: before Pharaoh. And so here he is, right here, and
Speaker 3: this is his big moment. This is his big moment.
Speaker 3: This is the opportunity that Joseph has been waiting for.
Speaker 3: All he has to say is yes, Pharaoh, I can
Speaker 3: interpret your dreams. And then surely Pharaoh will let him go.
Speaker 3: But this is how I know that all throughout Joseph's story,
Speaker 3: God has been developing his character to match his calling.
Speaker 3: When we first read about Joseph and God gives him
Speaker 3: a vision, he couldn't wait to brag to his brothers.
Speaker 3: But now I want you to see the humility that
Speaker 3: Joseph puts on display. Pharah says to Joseph verse fifteen.
Speaker 3: I had a dream and no one can interpret it.
Speaker 3: But I've heard it said of you that you can
Speaker 3: interpret it, and Joseph says, I cannot do it.
Speaker 2: I cannot do.
Speaker 3: It, Joseph replied to Pharaoh, but God will give Pharaoh
Speaker 3: the answer he desires. I cannot interpret the dream, but
Speaker 3: my God surely can.
Speaker 4: Do.
Speaker 3: You see the difference of how Joseph's character had been
Speaker 3: developed to match his calling, And I'm telling you, God
Speaker 3: has had to do a lot of development in my
Speaker 3: character in order for me to be prepared and not
Speaker 3: be crushed by my calling. So then Joseph interprets the dream,
Speaker 3: and basically what he says to Pharaoh is there's going
Speaker 3: to be seven years of plenty, and during those seven
Speaker 3: years of plenty, you need to store up because behind
Speaker 3: those seven years is going to be seven years of famine.
Speaker 3: And if you don't want your people to starve, you've
Speaker 3: got to get some systems in place to save up
Speaker 3: the food. Farah replies back to Joseph verse thirty nine.
Speaker 3: Pharah says to Joseph, since God has made all this
Speaker 3: known to you.
Speaker 2: There is no one so discerning and wise as you.
Speaker 3: Where did Joseph get that wisdom from God? But also
Speaker 3: how did he develop the discernment to tap into the
Speaker 3: wisdom of God. It was when he had to go
Speaker 3: through the rejection of his brothers, and when he was
Speaker 3: in Potiphar's house and had the accusation of what Potiphar's
Speaker 3: wife accused him of, and when he got his promotion
Speaker 3: to prison. You see, with God, there's always a meanwhile.
Speaker 3: Joseph just sees hard stuff. God is seeing a preparation
Speaker 3: in play, and Pharaoh sees it and calls it out.
Speaker 3: Since God has made all this known to you, there
Speaker 3: is no one so descerning and wise as you. You
Speaker 3: shall be in charge of my palace, and all my
Speaker 3: people are to submit to your orders only with respect
Speaker 3: to the throne. Will I be greater than you been
Speaker 3: an instant, Joseph goes from being a forgotten prisoner going
Speaker 3: to sleep every night in a dungeon, just suddenly becoming
Speaker 3: the second most powerful man in Egypt, possibly all the world.
Speaker 2: But God, with God, there is always a meanwhile.
Speaker 3: There's always a meanwhile. There's a meanwhile in my life.
Speaker 3: There's the physical reality of what I see. And then
Speaker 3: there's simultaneously there is what God is doing in your life.
Speaker 3: There is the physical reality of what you see. Simultaneously
Speaker 3: there's also what God is doing. Now, look what happens,
Speaker 3: exactly as Joseph had interpreted. The famine eventually comes. There
Speaker 3: is seven years of plenty, there is seven years of famine,
Speaker 3: and eventually that famine reaches all the way to where
Speaker 3: the brothers are in their homeland with their father, and
Speaker 3: the father says, hey, here, Egypt has some food, so
Speaker 3: you need to go. So he sends some of the
Speaker 3: brothers to Egypt to get food. Who is in charge
Speaker 3: of the food storage Joseph. Now the brothers don't recognize Joseph.
Speaker 3: How could they? How could they? They could have never
Speaker 3: fathomed where Joseph was today. And at first Joseph doesn't
Speaker 3: recognize them, but eventually Joseph does, and then Joseph has
Speaker 3: to make the excruciating choice to forgive or to not forgive,
Speaker 3: And the story takes twists and turns, but it eventually
Speaker 3: lands at Genesis fifty twenty, where Joseph says to his brothers,
Speaker 3: you intended to harm me, but God intended it for
Speaker 3: good to accomplish what is.
Speaker 2: Now being done, the saving of many lives. Now, let
Speaker 2: me ask you this question.
Speaker 3: If Joseph had gotten out of prison when he begged
Speaker 3: God for relief, because that's what Joseph wanted, Remember the
Speaker 3: cup brier and all this stuff. Right, if God had
Speaker 3: listened to Joseph's plan and let him out of prison,
Speaker 3: he would have never had an audience with Pharaoh.
Speaker 2: But in God's timing, in God's way, eventually.
Speaker 3: Joseph has an audience with Pharaoh. And it was crucial
Speaker 3: for Joseph to have an audience with Pharaoh. Otherwise he
Speaker 3: would have been let out of prison and that would
Speaker 3: have been the end of the story. And think of
Speaker 3: the number of people who would have perished. I don't
Speaker 3: understand the dynamics of exactly how this is going to
Speaker 3: apply to your life, exactly how it applies to my life,
Speaker 3: But I'm telling you I have seen this at play.
Speaker 3: I think some of you probably know that in twenty
Speaker 3: and seventeen that was the first time that I really
Speaker 3: thought there's no way that my marriage at the time
Speaker 3: was going to make it. And we had been in
Speaker 3: counseling for eighteen months, and things were seemingly getting better,
Speaker 3: and I was finally starting to have hope that my
Speaker 3: family is going to be put back together. And then
Speaker 3: after eighteen months of all that work, the rug got
Speaker 3: ripped right out from underneath me, and I realized things
Speaker 3: were not at all like I thought they were.
Speaker 2: I was devastated.
Speaker 3: I was devastated beyond what I could probably even describe
Speaker 3: for you. And I just remember thinking, God, I don't understand.
Speaker 3: I really don't understand how we could be at this place.
Speaker 3: I thought I was at the finish line. I haven't
Speaker 3: even crossed the starting line. So during that summer that
Speaker 3: I took off in twenty seventeen, I couldn't I couldn't work,
Speaker 3: I couldn't do ministry. I was just having a hard
Speaker 3: time doing anything. But I decided to go and make
Speaker 3: all the appointments that I needed to make that normally
Speaker 3: I put off because I'm so busy all the time,
Speaker 3: and so, you know, I did the teeth cleaning thing,
Speaker 3: you know, all those but I.
Speaker 2: Also though it was not time yet.
Speaker 3: I also went ahead and went and had a mammogram done.
Speaker 2: It's not time. I went and they ran that test
Speaker 2: and then some more tests. I was diagnosed with breast cancer,
Speaker 2: and my first thought was, how could a good God
Speaker 2: let this happen to I was at a low place,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 3: But then as the diagnosis unfolded, the doctor told me
Speaker 3: something that arrested my thought spiral.
Speaker 2: God said, or the doctor said, it is it's.
Speaker 3: A miracle that you came in to have this mammogram early,
Speaker 3: because we've caught it early enough to where you can
Speaker 3: have a dullnessectomy and you're going to be okay.
Speaker 2: So let me ask you a question.
Speaker 3: Was my marriage falling part again the absolute worst thing
Speaker 3: that could have happened?
Speaker 2: Or was it the worst.
Speaker 3: Thing but also something God was using to create the
Speaker 3: best thing of saving my life? Right with God, there
Speaker 3: is always a Meanwhile, now let me say this loud
Speaker 3: and clear, especially after the tragedies that we have witnessed
Speaker 3: this week, I cannot wrap my brain around some of that.
Speaker 3: There are going to be some things that never ever
Speaker 3: make sense to us, and that's where we just have
Speaker 3: to leave room for the mystery of God.
Speaker 2: But there are other.
Speaker 3: Things that if we will trust God with the hardship
Speaker 3: we see and feel right.
Speaker 2: Now, over time.
Speaker 3: We will eventually with some things in our life be
Speaker 3: able to look back and say, my God, my God,
Speaker 3: look at what you did.
Speaker 2: I couldn't see it in the moment.
Speaker 3: But that's why God makes a big deal in the
Speaker 3: Bible about the practice of remembrance. Go back when you're
Speaker 3: in a situation right now and you cannot possibly see
Speaker 3: how God is going to work this out, go back
Speaker 3: and start tracing the hand of God's faithfulness in those
Speaker 3: times that you can look back now and you can see.
Speaker 3: I didn't say it at the time, but I see
Speaker 3: it now. I didn't sit it at the time, but
Speaker 3: I see it now.
Speaker 2: I didn't say it at the time.
Speaker 3: I see it now. I didn't sit at this time,
Speaker 3: but I see it now.
Speaker 2: With God, there is always a meanwhile. There is always
Speaker 2: a meanwhile.
Speaker 3: I want to show you one more thing in scripture,
Speaker 3: because wow, this really caught my attention. When God had
Speaker 3: arranged all of this for Joseph and Joseph interprets the
Speaker 3: dream for Fabro, before the years of famine came, scriptures
Speaker 3: say in Genesis forty one, verse fifty, before the years
Speaker 3: of famine came, two sons were born to Joseph by
Speaker 3: again hard word, another hard word. The priest of hard word, okay,
Speaker 3: all that stuff, okay. So basically, two sons were born
Speaker 3: to Joseph. Joseph named his first born Manassa, which means
Speaker 3: and he said, it is because God has made me
Speaker 3: forget all my trouble and my father's household. The second
Speaker 3: son he named Ephraim, and he said, it's because God
Speaker 3: made me fruitful in.
Speaker 2: The land of my suffering.
Speaker 3: Now, when I was first reading this, at first glance,
Speaker 3: I said, have mercy. Joseph named his two sons forgetful
Speaker 3: and fruitful. I mean, how'd that work out when they
Speaker 3: went to school? Like, Hi, I'm forgetful? Is my brother fruitful?
Speaker 2: You know, I don't know. This is what.
Speaker 3: Happens to me when I read the book sometimes, y'all.
Speaker 3: I just can't help myself. But as I took a
Speaker 3: step back, I started to realize Joseph wasn't just naming
Speaker 3: his sons. Joseph was making a declaration. A declaration. You
Speaker 3: see that first it says it is because God has
Speaker 3: made me forget my trouble and all my father's household.
Speaker 3: The word forget here is nashaw in the original language.
Speaker 3: That doesn't mean it didn't come to his memory. Like
Speaker 3: forgetting that way Nashaw means to make an intentional choice
Speaker 3: to leave some things behind. That's what he named his
Speaker 3: first son, and then his second son he named Ephroim
Speaker 3: because God has made me fruitful in the land of
Speaker 3: my suffering right here, right now, before I understand everything,
Speaker 3: I'm going to choose to plant my roots, trust my
Speaker 3: God and produce fruit right here. With God, there's truly
Speaker 3: always I. Meanwhile, if you're physically able, I'm going to
Speaker 3: ask you to please stand. I want to read something
Speaker 3: over to you. You know, when I was going through
Speaker 3: those years of having no clue how my future was
Speaker 3: going to work out, and honestly, there's still some things,
Speaker 3: like some things about my life are really awesome. And
Speaker 3: even just this week I got some more hard news that.
Speaker 2: Man, I just thought, am I really going to be
Speaker 2: able to get up and preach that message?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 2: How much do you believe this message? Lise? How much
Speaker 2: do you believe it?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 2: And I wrestled, and I truly.
Speaker 3: Thought about Colin chunks back and just saying like, I
Speaker 3: don't know if I can do this.
Speaker 2: But Jenesip fifty.
Speaker 4: Twenty says you intended to harm me. But God intended
Speaker 4: it for good to accomplish what is now being done,
Speaker 4: the saving of many lives. And if this message was
Speaker 4: for you today, God is already doing that. He's already
Speaker 4: taken what has been so confusing and hard for me
Speaker 4: to process, and he's using it for good right here,
Speaker 4: right now. If only I would choose to leave some
Speaker 4: things behind, I would choose to plant roots in the
Speaker 4: land of my suffering and produce fruit, and come and
Speaker 4: preach this message to you today. God is going to
Speaker 4: use it for good in the savings some lives, right amen.
Speaker 4: One night I was wrestling, and sometimes when I wrestle
Speaker 4: with my thoughts, it's usually at the two am hours,
Speaker 4: such a complicated time of night. Right two am is
Speaker 4: too late to call your late friends, too early to
Speaker 4: call your early friends.
Speaker 2: So what you're supposed to do?
Speaker 3: You know? And the Lord has certainly taught me to
Speaker 3: turn my thoughts to him. But I process life also
Speaker 3: through writing stuff out. So one night I was in
Speaker 3: my bed at two am, confused and hurting, and I
Speaker 3: picked up my journal and I put my pen to
Speaker 3: those pages and I wrote this. I wrote it as
Speaker 3: a declaration over myself at the time, but I pray.
Speaker 3: It's a sweet encouragement for you. Being brave is not
Speaker 3: always something you feel. It's something you do. You do
Speaker 3: it in the face of fear and unknown outcomes and
Speaker 3: risk you really don't want to take. You do it
Speaker 3: when your enemy is staring you down with taunting statements
Speaker 3: of defeat. You do it not to prove there's something
Speaker 3: great inside of you.
Speaker 2: You do it because if you.
Speaker 3: Don't, something will die inside of you. You do brave
Speaker 3: even when you definitely don't feel brave. You do brave
Speaker 3: things because it's time to rise up and speak up
Speaker 3: and let truth find us freedom with your voice.
Speaker 2: What happened was.
Speaker 3: Wrong, acknowledge it, speak it, cry over it, don't die
Speaker 3: over it. You've been hurt, but you don't have to
Speaker 3: live hurt. You do brave things because you were made
Speaker 3: to connect, not with all people, but with the right people.
Speaker 2: Take the right risk.
Speaker 3: Take it slow, but don't stop, don't withdraw, don't disappear.
Speaker 3: You do brave things, Lisa, because you are a woman
Speaker 3: who can kneel humbly and rise intentionally.
Speaker 2: You will find good.
Speaker 3: People, and good people will find you, and you'll do
Speaker 3: brave things until you become brave you'll know laughter again,
Speaker 3: and you'll know deep in your bones that you will
Speaker 3: not waste all that you've learned. Those spilled tears, every
Speaker 3: one of them helped you let go of the pain
Speaker 3: to make room for possibility.
Speaker 2: Your life is not a tragedy.
Speaker 3: It's a testimony that God is your rock and your redeemer.
Speaker 3: And if your hands are shaking, let it be only
Speaker 3: because you're pointing at the devil who picked the wrong
Speaker 3: girl to mess with this time. Don't wait, don't wait
Speaker 3: until you feel brave. Go be brave, because if God
Speaker 3: is with you, nothing, nothing, nothing, can stand against you.
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us. Special thanks to those of
Speaker 1: you who give generously to this ministry. Is because of
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Speaker 1: tag us at Elevation Church. Thanks again for listening.
Speaker 3: God bless you.