Welcome to the Illuminate Church podcast.
We hope today's message is encouraging to you.
Today we are in a series on the book of Genesis.
We've been in a series on the book of Genesis.
Hopefully you've been enjoying it and hearing things in a new
way. Genesis is the first book of the
Bible, and Genesis literally means creation or the beginning.
So now we're in the first book of the Bible, Genesis, and later
this year we're going to talk about the last book of the
Bible, Revelation. And the point of covering both
the 1st and the last book in the same year is for us all to
understand how the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation is 1
story, 1 big story. It's it's the meta narrative of
the Bible, the grand big overarching story from Genesis
to Revelation. One story about God's original
design and creation, his love and desire to have relationship
with humanity. Man's decision to disobey God.
Sin entered the world. God's plan to reconcile man back
to himself through Jesus and his plan one day for a new heaven
and a new earth that will come. One big story, Genesis to
Revelation. So the Bible is 1 big
overarching story made-up of many smaller stories written.
Let me think about this. Written over 1500 years, written
down by 40 different writers, but it has one author, and the
author is God. The Bible is God's word.
A few weeks ago we talked about the promise God made to a man
named Abraham. I don't know if you were here
for that series, but God made a promise to a man named Abraham
and God's promise to Abraham was God said, I will make you into a
great nation. Now at this time, Abraham was an
old man who had no children, but God said I will make you into a
great nation. I will bless you.
I will make your name great. Here we are talking about
Abraham. Millennium, Millennium,
millennia later, and all the peoples of the earth will be
blessed through you, including us.
When Abraham was 100 years old, his wife and his he and his wife
Sarah had a son named Isaac. Isaac had a son named Jacob.
We talked about Jacob's story last week and today we're going
to talk about Jacob's family. Jacob had twelve sons, 12 boys.
Can you imagine? You think you have a big grocery
bill? They didn't even have Costco.
Jacob's story is early. As a young man, before he had
children, he fell in love with a woman named Rachel.
Now follow this story. This is before children.
The Jacob's a young man and he meets this young lady named
Rachel. And he was smitten.
But Rachel's father Laban had two daughters.
His oldest daughter was named Leah, and his younger daughter
was Rachel. And Jacob wanted to marry
Rachel, the younger daughter. Are you with me so far?
So Laban made a deal with Jacob. He said work for me for seven
years, then you can marry Rachel.
And Jacob said deal. Jacob did that.
Seven years later, Jacob got married to Laban's daughter.
But Laban tricked Jacob into marrying his oldest daughter,
Leah. I guess maybe the veils were
really thick back then. I don't know exactly how that
happened, but Jacob got married not to Rachel, who he wanted to
marry, who he loved, but to her sister Leah.
Can you imagine how Jacob felt? It sounds like a reality TV
show. A lot of drama.
I would probably watch it, but Laban said.
Hey, hey, hey, Jacob, don't,
don't be mad. Don't be mad.
I'll make another deal for you. All you have to do is work for
me for another seven years, then you can marry Ray.
Then I'm. I'm serious this time.
So Jacob did work for him for another seven years, 14 years
total. And then he got to marry his
true love Rachel, finally. But the messy part was now he
had two wives, Rachel, who he loved, and her older sister
Leah. Kind of awkward.
And as you could expect to predict, the two wives became
rivals for Jacob's attention. But Leah was better at at least
one thing than Rachel, and that was having babies, baby boys.
And Leah gave Jacob six sons in the same time that Rachel had
none. Leah was probably keeping score.
And she's like, oh, Rachel, I'm at six, you're at zero.
I'm up 6 zip. But finally, after years of
torment and emotional pain, Rachel got pregnant and she had
a son. And they named Rachel's first
son Joseph. And because of Jacob's love for
Rachel, Joseph was his favorite child.
And he didn't do a very good job of hiding that fact.
Now parents, listen. Parenting one-on-one is if you
have a favorite child, don't let the other kids know.
Jacob didn't do that. He made it clear to everyone,
Joseph is my favorite. If you have your Bible, turn to
Genesis, first book of the Bible, chapter 37.
We're going to start with verse one.
If you need a Bible, raise your hand and Usher will bring one to
you and you can keep it if you'd like.
Anybody need a Bible, just raise your hand and Usher will be
happy to bring you one. Turn to Genesis chapter 37, and
this is from the ESV. Chapter 1 says Joseph, being 17
years old, was pastoring the flock with his brothers.
We're going to jump to verse 3 now.
Israel loved Joseph more than any of his other sons.
That's nice. We're closing as we close.
I don't know what that was, Squirrel.
Jump ahead again. And he made Joseph a robe of
many colors. But when his brothers saw that
their father loved father loved him more than all of his other
brothers, they hated him and could not speak peacefully them
to him. In those days, most clothing was
various shades of beige, and Jacob gave Joseph a colorful
coat, which meant it was very expensive and special.
And the brothers hated him because it was so obvious he was
daddy's favorite. So today we're going to talk
about the story of Joseph, the title of today's messages from
Pitt to prison to palace. And we're going to talk about
Joseph, who had a dream from God, a dream for for great
things. But over the next more than a
decade, his life fell apart. A lot went wrong for Joseph.
And yet God was always with him the whole time.
And God gave purpose to that time.
I love the story of Joseph. It's one of my favorite stories
in the Bible. It was a great Broadway play in
the 90s with Donny Osmond. Joseph and the Technicolor Green
Coat had some good music, and it's even better when you know
how the story ends. Now, today we're not going to
cover the whole story. We're just covering the first
half. Next week, Pastor Tim Ingram
going to cover the best part. So you have to come back to hear
how kind of how this story unfolds and ends next Sunday.
But it's a story of going through things, really hard
things, and remaining faithful. Joseph's story is a reminder
that sometimes we can't see God's plans and purposes for our
lives when we're in the middle of it, when we're in the middle
of what seems like a mess. We can't fully understand until
we get through it, until we can look back and see the whole
story. When we are through it and can
look back on a hard season, that's when we can say, now I
understand, now I get it. God, now it makes sense.
I remember the hardest, most confusing season for me in my
life, my my wife and I's life about 15 years ago.
Our family had lived and raised our kids in Minnesota from for
15 years from 1991 to 2006, and we lived in the same home.
It was really home, you know what I'm talking about.
But in 2006, we were doing well enough in our financial services
business that we thought we could buy a second house in
Florida. We thought we could have the
best of both worlds, keep our home in Minnesota and live in
Florida during during the winter.
That was our plan. We thought it was a good plan.
If you've ever spent a winter in Minnesota, you would agree with
me. In February 2006 we bought a 5
bedroom home near Disney and in May 2006 we went back to our
home in Minnesota, just like our plan.
But that summer in two, 2006, Heather and I both felt we heard
God saying we were supposed to leave Minnesota and make Florida
our permanent home year round. And it was July, so it wasn't
just because of the weather. We both heard God leading us and
encouraging us to Florida year round.
I heard God say your future is in Florida.
So we obeyed. We told our kids we're moving.
They were 8 to 16 years old then, away from their friends
selling our home. It was hard, but we chose to
obey God. That was 2006 and 2008.
It seemed to start making sense because the church we were
attending here in Florida, what it wasn't Illuminate, said to
me, we want you to quit your job, to quit your career and
join the church staff. I had never thought about
working at a church before. They couldn't pay me what I was
making already. In fact, it was about 25% of
what I was making. But that wasn't top priority to
us. We thought this was it.
This was the reason God LED us here.
This is why God has been calling us to Florida.
So we made the decision to change and leave my career.
That was providing a lot of income to our family to work
full time for that church in 2008.
In 2010, about a year and a half later, that church failed.
It didn't make it financially. Expenses were consistently
higher than revenue, and that's a problem.
The church had cut everything funny possible, and in fact,
they had already cut over half. Their staff had been let go.
And then eight people on staff turned into four people on
staff, and I was one of the four let go.
That was March 2010, and that year, 2010, I went through the
hardest season of my life. I was so confused.
I know I heard God say your future is in Florida and here I
am after obeying God, unemployed, starting over.
This was not how I was expecting things to go and I'll be honest,
I was upset with God. I was confused with God.
I love God. I became a born again, saved,
saved Christian in 1998. This is almost 12 years later
and I was like God, I don't know.
I don't understand. If you said move, why is this
happening? Why are we struggling?
That period of time, 2010 to 2011, our family survived
financially. We lived in survival mode for a
couple of years. I don't know if you've ever done
that. We used up all of our savings
and investments we had to our name.
But also in 2010, that remnant of a church that we were still
attending, what was left of it, just a handful of people, was
adopted by a much larger, healthier church out of Tampa
called the Crossing Church. And the Crossing Church sent
over a new campus pastor I had never heard of, I had never met
from Tampa to celebration, and his name was Pastor Tim Ingram.
We met each other in 2010. He seemed like a good guy.
I don't know. I don't care.
I was upset with God. I know we heard God and now our
lives were a mess. We were in a pit.
Fast forward two years to 2012 when Pastor Tim and Christine,
our family, and a few others decided to plant or start
Illuminate Church with Pastor Tim Ingram as the lead pastor.
Our family said we're in, we're with you.
I started serving as a volunteer and a board member and
volunteering. My role expanded.
I joined the staff. I became a pastor.
That little church that started in 2012 was able to buy this 20
acres of land in 2018 for $4 million.
Crazy. I was asked to be the owner Rep
on this building project. I had never done anything like
that before from 2022 to 2024 and now here we are.
Praise God, God is good. I love my work, I love my
church, Life is great. Now I can look back and see why
God was leading us here all along, but it didn't make sense
when I was in the middle of it. When I was in the middle of it,
it didn't make sense at all. When I was middle in the middle
of the mess, when Illuminate Church didn't even exist yet, I
didn't understand. In 2010, 2011, 2012, and in the
middle of the mess, all I had was this word that my future was
here. But today, years later, I get
it. Now I understand.
But when we're in it, when we can't see the end yet, it
requires faith and trust in God that he's working for our good,
that what we're going through he will use for our good.
And that's not always easy. But Romans 828 says, and we
know, we know means, we know that God causes all things to
work together for good to those who love God.
Joseph's story reminds me of a story I heard a few years ago
about a man who worked for the same company for over 20 years.
He was loyal. He worked hard.
He dedicated his life to his employer.
Then one day, new leadership came in.
He was pushed aside. His voice didn't matter anymore.
Eventually he was let go. He told his friends later, it
wasn't just losing my job that hurt so much.
It was feeling discarded, unvalued, like none of it
mattered, like I didn't matter, like the past 20 years were a
waste of time. And maybe you haven't lost a job
like that, but maybe you know that feeling.
Feeling overlooked or forgotten, Feeling betrayed or rejected.
Feeling like your life is unfair.
Feeling like you tried to do everything right and it still
went wrong. Feeling like you're stuck in a
season you didn't choose. Some of you came in this morning
and and and you're in that season right now.
You might be smiling on the outside, but inside you're
asking questions like God, where are you?
What is going on? I do not understand.
This does not seem fair. I'm hurting God and God, if you
love me, why is this happening to me?
If that's you, here's what I want you to hear today.
If you feel that way or if you I should say when you feel that
way, you are not alone. So today is about Jacob's
favorite son, Joseph. Joseph and his eleven brothers
who when you're, when you read your Bible, become the 12 tribes
of Israel. The story Joseph is such an
amazing story, ups and downs, twists and turns.
Incredible because it tells how God keeps his promises most of
the time in ways we could never expect.
As a 17 year old young man, Joseph was living with his
father Jacob, Jacob's two wives, and his eleven brothers who hate
him. And if that wasn't bad enough,
Joseph was already hated. Joseph himself made it worse by
choosing to tell his brothers about a dream he had about a
vision for his life that God had given to Joseph.
And he said, hey brothers of mine, come, come listen to this
story. You're going to love it.
Which brings us to point #1 if you're taking notes today, which
I always encourage you to do, I take notes every time.
Jot down notes, not point. Number one is choose wisely who
and when you share your dream with.
We should know or be aware that if God gives you a dream and
you're like, what's a dream? A vision, a plan, an idea, a
word you should know. Not everyone will encourage you.
Not even not everyone, even some of your friends or relatives,
some of the people closest to us will be excited for you.
This is Joseph's story, sharing it with his brothers.
This is Genesis 37, verse 5. So if you're still in Genesis
37, we're in verse 5. It says now Joseph had a dream
and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him even
more. They said, he said to them, hear
this dream that I have dreamed, Brothers, behold, we are binding
sheaves in the field. And behold, my sheaf arose and
stood upright, and behold, your sheaves gathered around it and
bowed down to my sheaf. Isn't that awesome?
His brother said, Are you indeed going to reign over us?
Are you indeed to rule over us? So they hated him even more for
his dreams and for his words. Joseph shared with his brothers.
Hey guys, you're going to love this.
You all are going to bow down to me.
Aren't you excited for me? And that mistake caused Joseph a
lot of pain that you hear about later.
But it reminds us that revelation still requires timing
and wisdom. Revelation, or what God says to
you, still requires timing, when you should share it, and wisdom,
who you should share it with. God may give you a dream or a
plan for your life or an idea or a word.
And if you share it at the wrong time or with the wrong people,
you will get doused with discouragement that might keep
you from pursuing the dream. It might tempt you to give up
before you even begin. You might say, they're my
friends, of course they want me to succeed.
But your growth exposes other people's insecurities.
Your vision threatens people who have no vision for their lives.
Your obedience or change convicts people living
differently, especially if that's how you used to live.
Sometimes the last thing some of the people in your life want for
you is for you to pursue your dreams, or for you to succeed,
or for you to change. And consciously or
subconsciously, some of the closest relationships will
discourage us or try to defeat us or stop us before we even
start, or when we just get started following a dream God
gives to us. The Holy Spirit might be
refining you, encouraging you to change some things.
It could be as simple as coming to church regularly or reading
your Bible at home. Doesn't have to be a big thing.
And some people will say things like you've changed.
And they don't mean it as a compliment.
I don't even know who you are anymore.
Who do you think you are? I know who you are.
Who do you think you are? And you'll have to choose to
allow the pessimists, naysayers, and discouragers that you will
encounter. Are they going to impact and
determine your future? Or are you going to follow God's
dream, even if it means pausing or even ending some of those
relationships? So Joseph chose to share his
dreams with his brothers, and they had an idea.
Let's kill him. That'll solve our problems.
But Reuben, one of the eleven brothers, saved Joseph's life by
saying this is paraphrasing. Hey, guys, calm down.
We're not going to do that. Let's not kill him.
Let's just throw him in the pit. He won't be able to get out of
it. So that's what they did.
But God's timing is perfect. A holy coincidence happened
right now. A group of travelers,
Ishmaelites, passed by the brothers on their way to Egypt.
And then the brothers thought up a better idea.
What good does it do to just let him die in the pit?
Let's sell them to these Ishmaelites and they'll just
take him away. Problem solved.
We don't have to kill him and we get some money.
Win, win. Problem solved.
Get some money. We are brilliant, Genesis 3728
says. And they drew Joseph up and
lifted him out of pit and sold him.
They sold their brother to the Ishmaelites for 20 shekels of
silver. They, the Ishmaelites took
Joseph to Egypt. So Joseph is now in Egypt.
Egypt is about 300 miles away from Joseph's home.
That sounds like, well, that's, that's not that far.
It was when you're traveling by foot and camel.
This was Joseph's new home, not by his choice, but because he
had been sold as property. And in Egypt, Joseph became a
servant in the House of a man named Potiphar.
And even by us as a slave, a servant in Potiphar's house,
Joseph stood out. The favor of God in his life was
evident even in this place. And something for us to remember
is that God's favor doesn't exempt us from hard seasons.
God never says, if you follow my plans, everything will be easy.
But God's favor does mean wherever you are, I will make
you shine. My favor will make you stand
out. Genesis 39 couple chapters or
couple chapters after 37. We were in verses 3 and 4.
His master saw that the Lord was with him, and that the Lord
calls all that He did to succeed in his hands.
So Joseph found favor in his sight and attended him, and they
made him overseer of the house and put him in charge of all
that he had. Which brings us to point number
two of five point #2 is God's favor matters more than your
current position? Even though Joseph was a slave,
he prospered because excellence honors God in any environment.
Excellence honors God wherever you are and whatever you're
doing where you are now, including your workplace or
whatever you're doing, can be your platform to give God glory
and honor God. Where you are now may not be
your goal or your final place, but it can still be a meaningful
place to give God glory and honor God.
Where you are now might be a training ground or a proving
ground or a growing ground or a growing season for greater
things God has planned for your life.
Because God often gives us a dream before He gives us a
process. And Joseph didn't wait for a
better place. He used where he was at to honor
God and give him glory. People could see it.
So don't think I can't give glory to God in this season of
my life. We can give God glory that
people will notice and see in any circumstance, any
environment, any season of life that we're in.
So if you don't know the full story of Joseph yet, you might
be thinking this is pretty bad. I mean, he was in with his
family. Now he's in Egypt.
He's a slave in Potiphar's house.
Things can't get worse than this, can it?
It does get worse. The next season of Joseph's life
goes downhill from there. To paraphrase Genesis chapter
39, Potiphar, Joseph's owner, had noticed Joseph.
This guy's sharp. I like him.
He's got the favor of God on his life.
But Potter for his wife, she noticed.
Joseph too, in a different way. She noticed.
Hey, this guy's young. Hey, this guy's good looking.
Hey, this guy's handsome. I'd like to get to know him, if
you know what I mean, she said in Genesis 39, Seven, lie with
me. Come cuddle with me.
Let's just take a nap together. We'll keep it at that.
You can figure it out. We're going to keep this G
rated. But Joseph, being a man of God,
refused. He said no, because it's not the
right thing to do. Joseph was about 20 years old.
Think of yourself at age 20. Joseph was about 20 years old.
But already his integrity mattered more than anything
else, More than short term pleasure, more than the
consequences of not obeying his master's wife.
Integrity mattered to Joseph then and impacted his future.
And integrity matters to our lives today.
Don't think it doesn't. Integrity is what you choose
when no one is watching. Integrity is making the right
choices, especially when no one else will know.
Integrity can be the little things, like returning a
shopping cart to the corral when no one else does and it's July
and it's raining. Integrity is correcting the
cashier who gave you back too much change.
Say no, no, no, you made a mistake.
You gave me too much. Integrity is choosing to do
worse on an exam than you could do if you cheated just a little
bit. Or on our taxes.
The other week my wife and I went camping.
We go camping now, before you're too impressed.
Like we lay under the stars in a pup tent.
We have a Airstream camper with air conditioning and a queen
pillow top mattress and a shower.
But it's our hobby. We love it.
And we made a reservation. We go out every month for
usually two or three nights. We made a reservation.
This is just like March, April, maybe, I don't know.
A couple months ago we made a two night reservation.
Thursday to Saturday. We plan to be back here at
church. That's how we do it.
And we got home Wednesday night from work.
It was like 5:30 and Heather's like just let's go now.
Let's just go. Let's see if let's see if we can
go a day early. So she called and the spot we
had reserved was open and we went a night early.
We went in there and set up. Everything was fine.
But when it was time to leave and check out, no one had said
anything to us yet about coming early.
And Heather said I'm going to go pay for the first night we were
here. And she went to the park manager
and paid for the first night. He said most people wouldn't
bother, I wouldn't have even known.
And she said to him, but that's not the right thing to do.
We would rather pay the cost of camping an extra night then lose
our integrity. It's not worth losing the favor
of God or His blessings for $50.00 or $1,000,000 or any
amount of money. Not easy.
God about God knows God will honor that.
That's honoring God. Potiphar's wife, a different day
said lie with me again, but this time she grabbed Joseph's
garment, his towel, and he ran away and upset, ticked off and
rejected, she called for her husband and said that Hebrew boy
you purchased tried to lie with me.
I'm a victim. He came on to me.
See, here's the clothes he left behind.
Potiphar got upset and he took Joseph straight to prison.
Just like Monopoly, go straight to jail.
Do not pass go, do not collect $200 straight to jail.
Genesis 3920. And Potiphar's master took him
and put him in prison, the place where the King's prisoners were
confined. And there he was there in
prison. Joseph's situation went from
bad, very bad, to much worse, from a servant, a slave in
Potiphar's house to being unfairly put in prison.
But even in prison, Joseph's time there wasn't a waste of
time. Joseph, Genesis 3921 says.
But the Lord was with Joseph in prison and showed him steadfast
love and gave him favor and sight in the sight of the keeper
of the prison. And the keeper of the prison put
Joseph in charge of all the prisoners because the Lord was
with him. And whatever He did, the Lord
made it succeed. If you're honest, be honest with
yourself. Just answer this question to
yourself. Have you ever thought this
wasn't how I was expecting my life to go?
This is a curveball. I didn't see this coming.
This wasn't part of my plan. Which brings us to point #3
delay of the dream doesn't mean denial.
Delay of the dream doesn't mean denial.
A plan not going as fast as you thought it would doesn't
necessarily mean God has given up on that plan.
To say Joseph's dream didn't go like he planned or preferred is
an understatement. But even though it wasn't his
plan or his time and didn't mean God had given up on the dream or
given up on Joseph. And while Joseph was in prison,
he was there for about 10 years. One day something happened.
A Baker and a cup bearer to Pharaoh were put in prison while
Joseph was there. And they met Joseph and Joseph,
who had been unfairly put in prison, they were probably put
there fairly, could have said to them, let me tell you my story.
Let me tell you how bad I've got it.
Let me tell you how unfair my life has been.
But that wasn't Joseph's heart. It wasn't his words, and it
wasn't what he did. What he did was care about and
care for others in the prison. And while the Baker and the cup
bearer were in prison, they had unusual dreams they couldn't
figure out They were upset. Genesis 46 through 8 says when
Joseph came to them, the Baker and the cup bearer, in the
morning, he saw they were troubled.
So he asked, why are your faces downcast today?
They said to him, we have had dreams and there's no one to
interpret. And Joseph said, do not
interpretations belong to God. Tell them to me, Joseph, who if
anyone had the right to complain or have a pity party, it was
him. But he didn't say, let me tell
you about my troubles. He said, tell me about your
troubles. Which brings us to point #4 we
can still serve others even while suffering ourselves.
Ask yourself, do we look for opportunities to bless others
when we're at our lowest or only when when things are going great
in our lives? Do we look to bless others when
we don't feel blessed ourselves? Joseph interpreted the dreams
for the Baker and the cupbearer. For one, it was good news, the
other one, not good news. He told them exactly what would
happen, but he asked the cupbearer for one favor, the one
that would be released soon. He said please don't forget me.
Don't forget me here. When you get out, you're going
to get out. He interpreted the dream to say,
you're going to be soon released, don't leave me here in
prison. Could you put in a good word for
me with the Pharaoh and Get Me Out of here?
But sadly, the cupbearer didn't remember or think of Joseph.
He forgot all about him as soon as his life got back to normal.
Genesis 40 verses 20 to 23 says on the third day, which was the
Pharaoh's birthday, happy birthday, he made a feast for
all his servants. He restored the chief cupbearer
to his position. Yay.
And he placed the cup in Pharaoh's hand.
Yet the cup bearer did not remember Joseph, but forgot him.
Thanks a lot. And how many times are we like
the cup bearer? When we're desperate, when we're
in an emergency, when we're in a crisis, we think of God, we
pray, we go to church, we're on our knees.
But as soon as our lives get back to normal, out of a crisis,
we forget. In Joseph's case, it took two
more years until something happened that jogged the
cupbearer's memory. Pharaoh had dreams he couldn't
interpret. 7 fat cows were followed by 7 skinny cows, and
the seven skinny cows ate the fat cows.
He's like, what's that mean? 7 great ears of corn were
followed by 7 bad ears, stalks of corn, and the seven bad ones
ate the good ones. What does that mean?
He couldn't interpret the dreams, and neither could his
magicians or Matt or or wise men.
But finally the cupbearer was thinking, Who do I know that
could interpret the Pharaoh's dreams?
Do I know anybody? And something clicked.
Oh yeah, I know this guy in jail.
He can interpret your dreams, he remembered.
Better late than never I guess. The cupbearer told Pharaoh about
Joseph. Pharaoh calls for Joseph.
Joseph interprets the dreams to mean that 7 great years of crops
would be followed by 7 years of famine.
And Joseph's advice to Pharaoh was stock up and save during the
good years. So you have enough during the
seven bad years. And Pharaoh chose Joseph to lead
Egypt through that plan. This is Genesis chapter 41,
verse 37. It said, This proposal pleased
Pharaoh and all his servants. And Pharaoh said to his
servants, can we find a man like this in whom is the spirit of
God? He could see it.
Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, since God has shown you all
this, and there is none so discerning, discerning and wise
as you are, you shall be over my house, and all my people shall
order themselves as you command. Only in its regards to the
throne will I be greater than you.
Verse 46 of Genesis 4146 says Joseph was 30 years old when he
entered the service of Pharaoh, king of Egypt.
Joseph, you will be #2 in all of Egypt, only behind Pharaoh.
I thought about titling this message today, the story of
Joseph the prodigy, to pariah, to Pitt, to Potiphar, to prison,
to prophet, the palace. But that was way too many peace.
But that is Joseph's journey, which brings us to our last
point #5 what we see as punishment might be preparation.
What we see as punishment might be preparation for our benefit.
The Bible tells us when Joseph was sold by his brothers, he was
17. When he was released from
prison, he was 30. Do the Mass.
That's 13 years. Thirteen of the best years of
our lives. But Joseph didn't waste that
time. He used that time to mature, to
change and prepare. And in our lives, when we go
through seasons we don't understand or that seem unfair
or that make us feel that God has given up on us or doesn't
care about us, we have a choice. We can get mad at God.
We can give up on God or we can ask God, God, what are you
developing me in me here right now through this season that I
would never get or never learn or never change anywhere else?
We don't like going through seasons like that.
We don't like going through hard seasons.
We can say God, thank you even for this season because I know
you are for me and have good plans for me.
We don't like the valleys in our lives.
We like the mountaintops, but things don't grow on
mountaintops. Things only grow in the valleys.
God's not absent when things in life seem unfair.
He's doing good work even then and there, if we let him,
because all things work together for the good of those who love
God. When we are in a pit, it's OK to
say God. I don't know what's going on.
I don't understand why this is happening.
But I do know you are good, and I do know you are for me and
with me. When it looks like God is absent
or God is doing nothing in our lives, God is doing something
and we know it's something good. Amen.
Thanks for joining us today. We hope God is speaking to your
heart through this message. If you'd like to connect with
us, you can text connect to 407-588-0115 or visit Illuminate
dot church. Have a great week.