This morning I was reading in Acts 7, where Stephen was giving his defense in religious court. But instead of defending himself against the false accusations as everyone expected, he used his uncomfortable position as a bully pulpit to give a history lesson and preach a sermon. Hahahah! Anyway, as part of his history lesson to all the religious jerks, he talked about Joseph in Egypt. In Acts 7:11-12 (reading from The Message), it says:
"Later a famine descended on that entire region, stretching from Egypt to Canaan, bringing terrific hardship. Our hungry fathers looked high and low for food, but the cupboard was bare. Jacob heard that there was bread in Egypt and sent our fathers to scout it out..."
We probably all know the rest of the story. Eventually Joseph revealed himself to his idiot brothers and his father Jacob moved the whole clan to Egypt where they were saved from the famine due to Joseph's influence. Good story, but I want to focus on Joseph for a minute. At age 17 (Genesis 37:2), God gave Joseph two dreams about his parents and brothers bowing down to him. So he immediately told them. Because-- of course he did, the little punk. (Incidentally, not everything God shows you should be shared. Make a note.) Predictably, these prophetic dreams were not well received and his brothers soon faked his death and sold him into slavery. Problem solved. He spent the next thirteen MISERABLE years in Egypt, first as a slave and then in Pharaoh's prison. Eventually, he interpreted Pharaoh's dreams and was appointed prime minister, but it was another 7 years before the famine hit and Joseph's brothers came looking for food.
Joseph had to go through 20 years of hardship and estrangement from his family, because God was setting him up for something. Something huge-- saving the world, and his own family with it. But how many times did he ask God why?
"Why, God, did you show me those dreams and then send me off to prison in exile? It's not fair!"
Have you ever cried to God about something being unfair, silently accusing God in your heart, that God was being unfair? I have. Have years passed since promises were given, and they still are not fulfilled? I think about Naomi's story in the book of Ruth. She had followed her husband to another country to escape a famine, but he died there. Her two boys married local girls, and THEY died there. She eventually hears that there is food again in Bethlehem (the "House of Bread") and returns with her daughter-in-law Ruth. Her old friends come around and ask, "Is it really Naomi, after all these years?" But the name Naomi means "Pleasant," and Naomi makes a point to tell people that her life basically sucks, that it is so unfair, and that it is pretty much all God's fault. We find her rant in Ruth 1:20-21, reading from The Message:
But she said, "Don't call me Naomi; call me Bitter. The Strong One has dealt me a bitter blow. I left here full of life, and GOD has brought me back with nothing but the clothes on my back. Why would you call me Naomi? God certainly doesn't. The Strong One ruined me."
What she didn't realize was that this was a divine set-up. God put her through all this to bring her daughter-in-law Ruth to Bethlehem right at the time of the barley-harvest, so she could meet Boaz and re-marry. Ruth and her husband had a baby and Naomi finally became a grandmother. Ruth 4:16-17 tells us the future importance of this child:
Naomi took the baby and held him in her arms, cuddling him, cooing over him, waiting on him hand and foot. The neighborhood women stated calling him "Naomi's baby boy!" But his real name was Obed. Obed was the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David.
There are many other men and women in scripture who had reason to feel life was unfair-- that God was unfair. Moses went from being a prince of Egypt to being nothing but a shepherd out in the desert-- for 40 years. Then God spoke to him out of a burning bush and everything was changed. Esther was ripped from her family and forced against her will to be one of the many, many contestants on the spend-a-night-with-the-king contest, with being crowned queen as the grand prize. I'm pretty sure she would have passed on THAT opportunity to be famous, had it been allowed. But she didn't have a say in the matter. I'll bet many tears were shed, but she didn't realize it was a divine set-up. God was setting her up to be queen and to save her people. David went from being anointed as king in front of his whole family to being chased through the mountains by his father-in-law Saul, who was trying to kill him.
So here's a thought. Could God have made David king directly and immediately? Could God have placed Moses in leadership of the Hebrews at age 40? Certainly. But neither would have had the character to do the job properly. Why? Because character and spiritual maturity comes through walking with God through hard times. Through persevering, even when it seems unfair-- even when it seems God is unfair.
What if Stephen's whole life was a set-up to bring him to that religious courtroom, so he could give those religious leaders and their entourage a holy earful before they executed him? (We know the future apostle Paul was among those listening.) What about the seventy Christians beheaded in their church in the Congo by an ISIS affiliate this past week? Did they pull a Stephen and preach Jesus to their captors before getting the knife? I think you can count on it. Then there is death-row in the Tennessee prison system, where there is a prisoner-led church where God is worshiped and glorified-- there on death-row among those appointed to die for their crimes.
So maybe your life sucks right now. Maybe your job is stupid, you are estranged from family, you are unappreciated at work, or you can't see a future beyond diapers and dirty dishes. Maybe you have felt stuck like this for YEARS. But what if it's a divine set-up? What if God has set you in this place-- this specific (unfair?) place in life-- because he is setting you up for something? (Or maybe God has a MIGHTY destiny planned for your child or grandchild-- and your most important God-given mission in this life is to love and raise that child so they will become who God created them to be?)
May we each trust God in the process, especially when our circumstances feel unfair.
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