Acts 7:9-17
New International
Version (NIV)
9 “Because the patriarchs
were jealous of Joseph, they sold him as a slave into Egypt. But God was with
him 10 and rescued him from all
his troubles. He gave Joseph wisdom and enabled him to gain the goodwill of
Pharaoh king of Egypt. So Pharaoh made him ruler over Egypt and all his palace.
11 “Then a famine struck
all Egypt and Canaan, bringing great suffering, and our ancestors could not
find food. 12 When Jacob heard that
there was grain in Egypt, he sent our forefathers on their first visit. 13 On their second visit,
Joseph told his brothers who he was, and Pharaoh learned about Joseph’s family.
14 After this, Joseph sent for his father Jacob and his whole
family, seventy-five in all. 15 Then Jacob went down to
Egypt, where he and our ancestors died. 16 Their bodies were
brought back to Shechem and placed in the tomb that Abraham had bought from the
sons of Hamor at Shechem for a certain sum of money.
17 “As the time drew near
for God to fulfill his promise to Abraham, the number of our people in Egypt
had greatly increased.
I
have struggled a lot lately with the question, “Why?” Many people struggle with this question and I
am pretty confident that Abraham must have struggled with it too. Maybe I should say that I would have
struggled with it if I would have been in Abraham’s shoes. First he is told that his descendants will
outnumber the stars in the sky, yet his wife cannot seem to bare a child. Then he has a child but is told this is not
the one that will fulfill the promise.
Then, he has a son and God ask that he sacrifice him. Abraham’s faith was so strong that he knew
that God would provide a sacrifice and that it would not be his son. To top all of that off, God promised Abraham
that his descendants would be given the land that Abraham was only allowed to
occupy but not own. What’s up with all
of that? Faith in God is what that is
called.
Abraham’s
own grandson is not allowed to see this promise fulfilled yet he is a part of
God’s plan in the fulfilling of it. His
grandson, Jacob is now a father of 12 boys.
Jacob’s favorite son, Joseph, is betrayed by his own brothers as they
also betrayed their father. I am pretty
confident that Jacob, questioned, why.
Yet,
Joseph, the great grandson of Abraham has the faith of his grandfather and
endures much tribulation both from his people and the foreign land in which is
has been taken. He had his good times,
only to be beaten down and put in prison for a crime he did not commit. He was then forgotten about for many years
before he was once again restored into power.
Yet, like all rulers, they came and went and Joseph was forgotten
about. His father was returned to his
homeland only after his death but the rest remained for many years to
come. Again, I wonder how many times God
was asked the question, “why?” Because
of jealousy Joseph was taken from the Promised Land into a land where he and
his people had to endure much pain and suffering.
The
last verse today, “as the promise drew near”.
What? How long ago had this
promise been given? What all had they
endured during that time? What took God
so long? These are all questions that I
am sure they may have asked; I even ask them today. What did God want His people to learn before
He granted them His promise. Why did
Abraham, a man of faith, not get to see the promise fulfilled in his day? The only answer that I can come up with is
that God wanted us to see that He is faithful even when we do not think that He
is being faithful. It all works out in
the end, if we put our trust in Him.
Yes,
I have struggled, I have wondered if I have missed the mark on what God has
planned for me. Did Abraham think maybe
he had missed the mark too? Yes, indeed,
he even tried to force the promise to come into being. I can check that one off my list too. I have tried to force other things into paly
in order to fulfill my purpose for being here.
They didn’t work out so well and here I am, still wondering, “why”. Yet, God remained faithful to Abraham, Isaac,
Jacob and Joseph and He remains faithful to us.
We may not understand what is going on but we can be assured that God is
in control of it. We can know that He
has our backs and we can trust in Him. When we doubt, we need to go back into our
Bibles and see the mighty ways in which He works. No, it is not man’s way but it is even
better, it is God’s way. Stephen, the
one telling this story, has found himself in a predicament. God could reach down and stricken them all
down like he did Ananias and Sapphira.
He could have freed Stephen like He freed Peter and John. Yet, God was at work and Stephen placed his
faith and trust in Him in the midst of the chaos around him.
Seek
Him and know that He has all things in control even when it seems to us as
chaotic.
Seeking
Him with all my heart,
Sheila
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