2009 - Day 7 - God's Strategy

January 7, 2009 … Swindoll’s Topic for Today: God’s Strategy

Passage of the Day: Genesis 39: 20b - 23 But while Joseph was there in the prison, 21 the LORD was with him; he showed him kindness and granted him favor in the eyes of the prison warden. 22 So the warden put Joseph in charge of all those held in the prison, and he was made responsible for all that was done there. 23 The warden paid no attention to anything under Joseph's care, because the LORD was with Joseph and gave him success in whatever he did.

My Journal for Today: Have you ever been in a place where you FEEL that God has taken a hike; … like your prayers are bouncing off the ceiling; … like you’ve been left out to dry by your Lord? Aw, common; I’ll bet you have. I certainly have.

Well, others in the Bible were certainly in that place. I think of Elijah (in 1st Kings 19: 4) where he was in that “woe is me” place, asking for God to take his life. Jonah certainly felt abandoned by God down in the belly of that great fish. The great and powerful Moses got to a place where he wanted to die rather than go on. In the NT, Paul has the “woe is me” syndrome in Romans 7. All of these great men of the faith, came to a low place in their lives where they felt impotent and alone, not being able to see God at work in their lives. But not Joseph.

And that’s why I believe that Joseph is a type of Christ in the OT. Joseph ALWAYS put the will of the Father first in his life, no matter what the circumstances were. And in today’s passage we see that he’s been unfairly put in the slammer due to the scheming of Potiphar’s wife; and yet, he looks for God to do business in his life in spite of a woeful set of circumstances. And though this took place centuries before Joseph’s Messiah would come onto the scene in this world, somehow Joseph, I believe led by the Holy Spirit, was able to fulfill the later command of His Lord to “… seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness.” [You probably have Matt. 6: 33 memorized; don’t you?]

Joseph always was able to have faith that God was there with him and would guide him and deliver him. And that’s exactly what happened in this prison experience. And not only did Joseph prevail; he prospered. The prison warden put Joseph in charge of the other prisoners; and trusted him enough to not even supervise his interactions in the prison. And I believe this speaks volumes about how God can - and will - use His servants when they are tested/tried in the fires of life and have an attitude like that of Christ in the midst of the testing.

When we respond to dire circumstance with humility and childlike faith, as did Joseph and as did Christ, I believe God pours His enabling grace and power into the life of the faithful one. That’s why we read of Romans 8 following the downer Paul, who disclaimed woe in Romans 7. That’s why we read Psalm 51 and 32 documenting David’s rise back to the favor and power of the Lord after the Bathsheba debacle. But Joseph didn’t have those downer times, because he just never relented to “woe is me” FEELINGS. I capitalize the word “feelings” here and “feel” above in my first paragraph, because our selfish human feelings can be tripping points into an attitude where God cannot pour His grace and power into our lives, giving us the power to prevail during ill begotten circumstances.

Joseph prospered in his dire set of circumstances because he just trusted that God was in control and that His Lord would be with him there in prison. It’s an example, as I’ve written before, of whether we can truly believe such truths as Romans 8: 28 or 1st Cor. 10: 13 (which I hope you have in your heart by now). If we believed and surrendered our will and feelings to God, it gives our Lord the signal of obedience to pour all the enabling grace we need to prevail and even to prosper as Joseph did.

Right now, as I type this, 2nd Peter 1: 2 – 4 bubbles into my consciousness, which states …

2 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, 3 as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, 4 by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, ...

That’s God’s truth, which was spoken hundreds of after Joseph; but he still believed it and lived it in his day. The question is, "WILL I?”

My Prayer Today: Lord, help me to be humble so that you can pour Your grace into my life and I can prevail, … even in the worst of circumstances. Amen