Can't Catch a Break

In my daily devotionals I’ve been reading through the Joseph saga.  This is a tough story about a boy who finds himself at the lowest of lows and the highest of highs.  He is elevated in his status at his home by his father and proclaimed the favorite son.  Then he is made low by being thrown into a pit and sold into slavery by his brothers.  Next he is elevated to the administrator of the house of his master in Egypt.  Nothing was kept from his hand and then suddenly he is thrown into prison for a crime he didn’t commit. This brother can’t catch a break.

How many of you feel like that?  Here lately that's what life feels like to me.  I feel I have everything moving in the right direction and them some kind of obstacle or circumstance brings me down. In particular my health.  Life is funny in an ironic or odd since sometimes.  Grace and I have never had to go to the hospital, doctors office, or emergency room, so we decided to take a calculated risk and decrease our insurance to save some money.  Exactly one month after switching to a lower coverage I had to go to the ER because I was having stroke like symptoms.  Our high of what we thought was going to be some extra cash turned into a low of more cash out and worse off a huge scare for Grace and I concerning my health and our future in the ministry we are currently in.  

Next as we began pursuing a healthier lifestyle by eating better and exercising, I fell out of my van and damaged my knee.  Now that again is more money out (this lowering my insurance coverage ended up not being the best idea) and a hindrance to the physical changes I was pursing in my goal of healthier living.  I just couldn’t believe it.  Life had me so low.  I cried out to God in lament and wondered why these things were happening.  

Some would chalk it up to Satan.  They would say it was the deceiver and first liar who is attacking me.  This may be true.  He or his minions could be working harder to destroy the relationship that I was cultivating with God through ceasing sin and increasing service and devotion.  

Others would say it is me.  That there is some sort of sin in my life that I have not yet cast down or am actively pursuing that I am secretly or even overtly holding.  

But this is where the story of Joseph encourages me. You see even though it was Joseph who got the ball rolling (or maybe Jacob did with his favoritism?) on the hatred of his brothers towards him (pride and condescension maybe in the telling of his dreams?), it was God’s sovereign hand in his travel to Egypt.  And even though it was a women actively scheming against him to cause his downfall in the house of slavery, it was God who sovereignly placed him in prison.  If Joseph would not have been sent to Egypt and then thrown in jail, he wouldn’t have met the man who would help him get free and then rise to power above all others save Pharoah so that he might save his family, the nation, and the land.  Joseph said “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Gen 50:20)

I know and am confident that for me, these events that are bringing me low are to serve a greater purpose. Now I do not know yet (and may never know this side of eternity) what that purpose is, but God is working it out to bring ultimate glory to his name.  And if this is how I am to colabor to achieve it.  May it be so. 

When you look at your circumstances may you see that God is working in them to bring you good and to proclaim his glory no matter how they come or where they come from. Trust him and stay faithful.