Joseph and Job – A Look Behind the Scenes

One of the greatest lessons that I have learned in my Christian walk is that God is always fair (even when it doesn’t seem humanly fair) and in His sovereignty He works all things together for good (Romans 8:28). I really like what Philip Yancey shared on this point: “Not until history has run its course will we understand how ‘all things work together for good.’ Faith means believing in advance what will only make sense in reverse.”1

For you see we live in a very fallen and sinful world where so much suffering and seemingly unfairness exists, that if we can’t trust God to work everything out for good, then we will never find true meaning, peace, and joy, but instead only sorrow, hopelessness, and despair. People and sometimes even Christians make the huge mistake of equating life with God. What I mean by this is that God is always fair but life isn’t.

As humans we are wired to feel emotional pain when we go through trials and tragedies. I know in my own life when I went through 18 months of severe clinical depression almost 17 years ago, my emotions went through an amazing amount of severe lows. I prayed for healing but for months and months it was as if God was totally silent to my pleas for healing. Never once did I blame God for my depression but I must admit there were times when I told God that if I didn’t recover He might want to take me to be with Him.

One of the great lessons God taught me during my depression was not to confuse life with God. While life often isn’t fair God always is. I felt free to curse the inequities of life, like my depression, but not God, because I knew that He felt my emotional pain right alongside of me because His very Holy Spirit lives inside of me. So, when I was grieving I knew that Christ was grieving with me. So, where is God in our emotional pain – He is right there with me. Over the years since I received my healing through the right medications, I have been able to counsel many people with depression. Once again God taught me valuable lessons through this very dark time in my life.

Joseph

Joseph went through an amazing journey of suffering and disappointments on his way to becoming the prime minister of Egypt. From being sold into slavery by his brothers to being falsely accused of rape by his slave master’s wife, and then thrown into jail, it’s hard to imagine how he held onto his faith in God. But in God’s sovereignty Joseph’s gift for interpreting dreams proved his ticket out of jail and his ascendancy to prime minister. For the full story of Joseph please read my devotion on him from May 19, 2022.

Fortunately for Joseph, he did hold on to his faith in God, and was wonderfully rewarded, not only by his being promoted from slave to prime minister of Egypt, but by being given the wise theological understanding that God orchestrated his entire life for saving the lives of millions during the seven years of severe famine. For we read Joseph’s classic statement on the supreme sovereignty of God over the affairs of men in (Genesis 50:20): “But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive.”

Job

But while Joseph in retrospect understood why he had to go through his many trials, Job, who went through even worse sufferings, even though he too held onto his faith, never found out why God allowed him to see so much tragedy during his life. While we, as the readers of the book of Job, knew about the cosmic battle between God and Satan, God chose not to reveal the cause of Job’s suffering to him. We get a sneak peek behind the scenes again to the sovereignty of God in the book of Job while Job, near the end of his book, only got a lesson in the all-powerful nature of the sovereign Lord – but that was enough for Job. Seeing God’s full power on display was the lesson Job needed to see to prompt him to repent and humble himself before God for the allegations of unfairness that Job had brought against the Lord.

So, what lesson can we learn from the stories of Joseph and Job? My main takeaway is that even when we can’t make sense of why we are going through trials and suffering we need to leave room for God to work out His perfect will and plan. We need to trust in (Romans 8:28) and believe that: “…all things work together for good to those who love God…” And when God is silent in providing us with an explanation as to why, we just need to trust Him and lean on His everlasting love and faithfulness!

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1 Inspirational Quotes by Philip Yancey – page 31 (bibleportal.com)