God’s Not Done With You: Encouragement From the Bible's Greatest Comeback StoriesSample

Day 2: Joseph

The story of Joseph is, to me, the most encouraging story in the Bible. If you’ve read the 14 chapters of Genesis 37-50, you know what I mean.

The things he experienced make the story relatable to just about every person I know.

• He was rejected by the very people who should have loved him the most.
• He was hated and abandoned by his brothers—who really wanted to kill him.
• He was enslaved and removed from everything that was familiar or dear to him.
• He was slandered and falsely accused when he did everything right!
• He was isolated and forgotten and left to rot in prison.

But God wasn’t done with Joseph!

One of the wild things about this story (and about our lives sometimes) is that Joseph didn’t do anything to deserve this poor treatment. He was treated with so much injustice and never deserved what he experienced but—again—rose above all that with the help of God. How does that work?

Here’s how it works. Through every experience, Joseph was assured that God was with him, and he learned that God could use all of those painful things in his life.

In fact, it’s the very awareness that God was with him that helped him get through the tough times. We see that truth several times, especially in the “prison chapter.” It says, “But the LORD was with Joseph” (Genesis 39:21).

I think this is the primary application of these 14 chapters of the life of Joseph.

• If I can believe by faith that God will take every situation and cause it to work for good…
• If I can believe he is with me, even when I can’t see or hear him…
• If I can see how he has consistently been faithful in the lives of others…

Then I can wait through to the end, fully trusting that God will do the same in my life.

I’d remind you—if you’re a follower of Christ—that he is with you, just as he was with Joseph. In fact, I’d go much further than that. God is more with you than he was with Joseph. He is in you, fulfilling the promise of Jesus to give you the Holy Spirit. He will never leave you or abandon you. Believe that.