Today’s Reading: Genesis 50:15-21
Daily Lectionary: Exodus 2:23-3:22; Mark 14:53-72
But Joseph said to them, “Do not fear for am I in the place of God? As for you, you intended it for evil against me, but God intended it for good to bring about this day for many people.” (Genesis 50:19-20)
Merry Lent! In the Name + of Jesus. Amen. Joseph had them! His brothers were in his grasp! They had sinned against him. They had left him for dead in a well. All sorts of evil had come from what they did to him: He was sold into slavery in Egypt, falsely accused of messing around with Potiphar’s wife, and thrown into jail. Now that he had worked his way out of jail by interpreting dreams, the very people who caused the whole thing were standing before him in need. Joseph could finally stick it to the people who had stuck it to him!
Joseph doesn’t. He can’t! How could he? That’s not who God is, and so that’s not who Joseph is to his brothers. God forgives. How could Joseph do to his brothers what God wouldn’t do to them?
Joseph believes that God doesn’t hold evil against His people. He doesn’t do His evil for the sake of evil. He doesn’t pay back people for what they do. No, Joseph put His hope in God’s promise that He would send Adam’s seed to crush the serpent’s head and save His people from the evil they have done.
That faith, that truth, made Joseph invincible. Everything that the devil, the world, even his brothers threw at him would be worked out by God for good for Joseph. But more than that, God worked out good from the evils done to Joseph for others. God used all that happened to Joseph to save his family and the people in Egypt.
God turns evil into good. That’s what He does. He takes the evil the devil does and He turns it and uses it for good. If you doubt this, just look at Calvary. There’s nothing more evil than the suffering of Jesus on the Cross, and God uses that to save all of us from our sins.
God grant us such faith! For if we believed this, if we knew that God is so good that He makes all things work out for our good, we, too, would be invincible. No evil, no bad thing, no sickness, not even death itself would take the wind out of our sails. Nothing would ruin our day. Nothing would disappoint us! We would see everything that happens to us and for us as an opportunity for God to work good in our midst.
God is good! Good is what God does for you. He makes all things new. He takes evil and makes it work out as a blessing for you and those around you. He forgives you and mercies you to teach you to forgive and mercy others. Joseph shows us this! Merry Lent! In the Name + of Jesus. Amen. –Rev. George Borghardt
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