This part of the story reminds me of one of the names for God…
Jehovah Jireh. It means “God the provider”
In this passage, God is providing for his people; not just Joseph, but all of them. God’s “end game” here is to cultivate the family from which the Savior will emerge. He selects the Nile basin as a “greenhouse” where they can grow, and in order to make them welcome there, He places Joseph in prison under Pharaoh’s nose…and gives him a gift of interpreting dreams.
Then, He gives Pharaoh a dream that he doesn’t understand…and there you have it.
Would there have been a famine in Egypt if God didn’t want Joseph in a position to provide for Jacob’s family? Probably not. So, that means that thousands, perhaps millions of people were hungry….some may have starved, and many lost their fortunes so that God could have His way?
Yup.
That’s what it is to be God. He’s in control. Don’t forget this point however: God provides grain for all the people, so they don’t have to starve. God gives a dream that allows the people to prepare for the upcoming famine. God provides. What seems cruel from one perspective is wonderful from another. God is orchestrating these events so that His Son can be born into the world. The backstory of Salvation is being acted out right in front of us. But no one saw that yet.
It probably seemed like tragedy to poor Jacob. Here he is, an old man, and now two of his sons have been taken from him. As far as he knows they could be dead, and he has no real prospect of seeing either of them again. From his perspective, life is treating him very unfairly. I wonder if Jacob fell to his knees and asked God to stop these terrible things that were happening to him. I wonder if he asked God to avenge Joseph’s death (he didn’t know Joseph was alive). Maybe he was asking God to forgive him for whatever he had done that had brought about these terrible events.
Except….they weren’t terrible events at all. They were wonderful. They were the labor pains preceding the birth of a nation. The nursery has been prepared, and heaven awaits Israel and his sons to be placed inside it.
Within weeks or months everything will be more clear. The family will be rejoicing and Jacob will be praising God loudly for all the good that He has done. But God was always doing good, Jacob just couldn’t see it yet.
Having said that, I wonder if there are times when it seems like something terrible is happening to us when it’s really God working out His perfect will? I wonder what the response was in heaven when Jacob asked God to “stop whatever He was doing to his (Jacob’s) family”? And, I wonder if God smiles, or even laughs when we ask Him to stop what He is doing, because we think it’s terrible…even though it’s good.
It’s all a matter of perspective, I guess. And God’s is better than ours. The Lord can be trusted, and The Lord Provides.
Faithfully,
PR