Parenting The Heart

Some parents instantly acquire a connection with their children at birth that grows as their children grow. For me, it wasn’t so much of a connection as it was an instant need to get them to behave the way I wanted. From the minute they were born I felt the need to manipulate behavior. However, this approach to parenting would quickly prove itself to be problematic if this was the only method of parenting my children ever saw. There is a need in parenting to switch from parenting behavior, to parenting the heart. In order to parent the heart of a child, it needs to come from a place of love and relationship, from a place of vulnerability, something that I am not good at, but by God's grace I pray that this is an area I will grow and prosper in.

Small rant 
Yes, I am openly admitting this fact to you. Why? Because like every other parent, I have not arrived. I do not know it all. In fact, there is a whole lot more that I don’t know then I actually know. So, this is why I share this part of me with you all today. I get the feeling that when we read blogs, we somehow think that the person writing has figured it all out and that is why they are writing. The truth is, we all miss it. We all have things we need to get better at, change, fix, and tweak in our parenting as well as in our lives. There is no one who has arrived on the other side of this screen. Sorry, for the short little tangent there. I just wanted you all to remember that I am just an ordinary person writing about the things God has been teaching me. My hope is that you will glean from the things I share and the Lord will teach you some things in the process.

A need for change

I have a tendency to  find myself feeling inconvenienced and frustrated at times with my children. Sadly, my children are to the age that they can see my frustration and they will often apologize for it, when it is not them at all, it is me. I am the one with the skewed perception of how I think this parenting thing needs to work. I am finding the need to start enjoying my children more and to parent from my heart to their hearts. There is a need for me to become a little more vulnerable in my parenting and not so rigid. I can not always be right and my children wrong. Truly, I am not perfect, so what makes me think they must always do as I say no questions asked? I miss it sometimes and it is important for my kids to know what I do and how I handle myself when I mess up. It is important that I teach their hearts and not just their outward behaviors. It has been hard to make a 180 degree shift in my thinking. How about you? Do you find yourself parenting solely the behavior of your children rather than the heart? Controlling behavior is one thing when they are young.  But if we expect our children to be responsible, independent adults, than it is our responsibility as parents to show them how to work through their own problems, how to be critical thinkers and problem solvers, rather than merely correcting wrong behavior all of the time. Our children need to know why something is wrong, how to make it right, and what they can do to guard their hearts from wanting to do that same thing again. Along with this, our children need to know that we have their backs, that we love them even in the moments that they mess up. Why? Because this is how God operates. God has our backs. He loves us even when we mess up, miss the mark and disappoint. He loves us! We need to make sure we are training our children to be secure in making good choices. There will come a day when we as parents will not be around to be able to tell them what to do and how to do it. So, have we prepared their hearts to stand on their own two feet and choose righteousness? One thing I have recently been asking my older two children is “well, what do you think you should do?” I want them to openly communicate their thoughts so that they learn how to work through their problems instead of being told how to do things all of the time. I want them to be able to critically think about the situation that they face and be able to come up with a solution for themselves. I am not raising robots here. I am raising up soldiers in the army of the Lord! They need to learn to recognize the battle that lies before them and know how to fight the good fight of faith.

Our world is not getting any easier for anyone to navigate. If we send our under prepared children out into the world to fend for themselves, we are sure to see them struggle unnecessarily.  Even the most prepared individuals have struggles in life, but the difference is that they have the tools to work through the the tough times without falling apart. Those who are under prepared lack the problem solving skills to work through the times of adversity. So when these times come, it will leave them overcome rather than walking in the victory of being an overcomer.

Parenting like the Lord

One of my new parenting goals is to convert my parenting style from parenting more out of authority to parenting more out of relationship. As my children enter into the transition years I want them to know that mom is not just a disciplinarian, but a trusting friend they can turn to and talk things out with. I am not looking to be my children's best friends, but I do however, want my children to be comfortable enough with our relationship that they are not afraid to come to me with anything that they are struggling with, no matter what. When I really stop and think about it, this is how our heavenly Father desires our relationship to be with Him. He desires for us to go to Him with the things we are struggling with. He doesn’t want us to be so afraid that He is going to discipline us with a heavy hand that we are too scared to come to Him with our hurting hearts. On the contrary, our Lord longs for us to open up our hearts to Him. He longs for us to share our deepest hurts and let Him into our most vulnerable places. However, the Lord is not going to force His way into the overprotected areas of our hearts. He will patiently wait on us to lay ourselves at His feet and share those things with Him.

As I enter into this new phase of parenting I need to be sure to take some lessons from the way the Lord handles my heart. Just as the Lord is patient and not forceful, I must be sure not to force my children to share their hearts with me. I must wait patiently and pray for those opportunities to present themselves. I want my children to come to me because they are willing and ready, not because they have no other choice. The other hitch to this is being ready for those times whenever they may come. I have a sneaky suspicion that they will probably happen in moments when it is least expected. The true test will come in those moments. Will I brush off those moments, or will I allow my heart to be open and ready to listen to what my children have to share? Will I respond rightly, or will I be ready to jump back into my previous role of authoritarian and be ready with the rod of correction? I am sure that as our family embarks on this transition that there will be a whole lot of seeking the Lord going on in this house! I am quite sure that we will be in dire need for His guidance for the situations that will present themselves in the coming years.

How about you? Do you find yourself in a time of transitioning your parenting style?    

Lord, I thank you that you show us a beautiful example of parenting from the heart in our relationship with you each and every day. Help us as we to parent our children from the heart just as you parent us from your heart. Help us to be ready in those moments when our children open up their most private places of their hearts. Help us to handle their hearts with the utmost of care! Give us a heart of compassion for their precious hearts and ears to hear what they are saying. Help us to shut off our judgmental thinking and open up our ears so we can speak what you want us to speak into their hearts in those vulnerable moments. Give us your wisdom Lord!

For more on parenting visit: The Mirror Concept, Lessons From Our Children, Parent Communication, Parenting Goals, Consistency In Parenting, The Growing Pains Of Motherhood, A Mother's Commission and Precious Moments

Challenge # 7 Gratitude Journal

I have mentioned before that I use a gratitude journal to record things I am so grateful to the Lord for doing in my life and ways in which He has provided for me (I mentioned this in the post entitled: “Fireproof Christians" under the section "giving thanks in the midst of the fire"). I use the journal to reflect upon the goodness of the Lord. It stands as a reminder to me of His faithfulness in my times of hardships. It truly has been a blessing and encouragement in times I have been struggling. I have also since introduced this concept to my children as a part of our daily devotional time. I try to have them record entries in them a couple of times a week. And when they are having a stinky attitude we try to pull them out and have them read through the entries that they have already written. This helps to change what they are focusing on and in turn helps their attitudes to change.

This month’s challenge is for each of us to create a gratitude journal and make at least three entries in it each week. As always you are always welcome to do more, but try to at least do the minimum of three things you are thankful for each week. Ideally, you would do this on three separate days, but I do realize that things can slip through the cracks sometimes. So if it happens that all three entries are on one day that is fine. The point is to just write down the things you are grateful for.  The other part of this challenge is to go back each week and read through the entries you had made in the previous weeks. Rehearsing the goodness of God goes a long way in encouraging ourselves in the faith! It is my prayer that this gratitude journal becomes part of your precious time spent with the Lord each day not just this month, but for many many months to come!

Please know that your gratitude journal does not have to be the traditional paper and pencil, although there is nothing wrong with that at all! But some of us are so accustomed to having our phones, tablets, and/or laptops within reach most of the time that we find it much easier and faster to have an electronic gratitude journal. Honestly, I have used both the paper pencil method and the electronic version and I find that I am most consistent with the electronic version. Find what is going to work best for you. Maybe you want to start out with a sheet of paper in your Bible, so that when you spend time in the word you just record it there. Maybe you would prefer actually having a notebook or journal. Or maybe you like the convenience of having it saved on your phone and when you are walking down the aisle of Walmart and realize you are thankful you have enough money for groceries then you can record it right then and there rather than waiting until you get home and risk the possibility of forgetting to write it down. All of these are perfectly great options. Just find a method that is going to work best for you and the way you operate.

I wanted to let you know that I personally created this challenge because I have not been real faithful in recording the goodness of God lately and I wanted some accountability in this area. So, this is the reason for this month’s challenge. I wanted to make this a part of my daily time spent with God once again. So thank you in advance for helping me to stay accountable in the gratitude department. Your support is so greatly appreciated!

Please feel free to let me know some of the things you are thankful for as you go about this month’s challenge. I would love to hear from you. May the Lord encourage and bless your heart as you remember the goodness of our Lord and Savior. Blessings!

A Ritualistic Place

I don’t know about you, but there have been times in my years of walking with the Lord that I have simply gone through the motions. There have been times that I have put my spiritual walk on “auto pilot” instead of actively seeking out what God desired for me to be doing and allowing the Holy Spirit to lead and to guide. It was in these times that my walk was more of a ritualistic thing rather than a heart thing. In these times it became a walk of obligation and routine rather than a walk of love and joy. Please don’t get me wrong here, there is a place for routine. It truly is a beautiful thing for us to be so deeply disciplined in our walks with the Lord that our daily time spent with the Him is very routine. But when it becomes just that, routine and nothing more, when it gets to the point of just putting the check in the box of Bible reading and prayer for the day, then we need to be very cautions. When our routine turns into obligation, or the check in the box mentality, then complacency can start to set in, and when this happens, this is a gateway for discontentment to enter. As these things start to enter into our walks, they will slowly drive a wedge between us and the Lord. Jesus Himself warns us of the effects when the routines and rituals of men are not kept in check by us keeping our eyes and heart turned toward the Father.

Jesus’ Thoughts About Rituals

“He replied, Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules. You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.” Mark 7:6-8

Jesus was addressing the Pharacies here, but I truly believe that we can apply this directly to our lives as well. Besides, we are no less sinners than the Pharacies were. Jesus reminds us that we can get so caught up in routine and traditions that we miss what is really going on. He sternly corrected the Pharacies on numerous occasions because they stuck so wholeheartedly to the traditions and rituals of men that they refused to change their hearts. Yes, it is completely possible for us to become so comfortable in our place of routine that we refuse Christ when He is desiring a change to occur in our hearts and lives. And just like the Pharacies we can easily replace God with our rituals, traditions and routines. This should come as no surprise, but this is actually quite an easy trap to fall into. We should not allow ourselves to get so comfortable in our routines that we refuse to change when the Lord is convicting our hearts to do so. As I stated earlier, I am in no way trying to bash routine. I think it is very important that we all have routine in our walks with the Lord, but when we rely so heavily on routine and not on the leading of the Holy Spirit we can miss some of these very precious workings of the Lord in our hearts. Our routines should never trump the spontaneous leading of the Holy Spirit! Our routines should be flexible enough to always allow room for the Lord to take us in a total different direction if he desires to do so. Flexibility and teachability are two key things the Pharacies lacked. They refused to change when change was so desperately needed. They hardened their hearts to some of the most precious workings that the Lord ever will offer anyone in their lifetime, the workings of Jesus Christ!

Making Time To Fellowship With God

God likes spending time with us each and every day. He wants that time to be a treasured and precious time, a time set aside for Him to do some amazing things in our lives. It takes work to keep ourselves from flipping the switch to “autopilot.” Let’s face it, it is much easier to read a quick couple of verses and say a quick little prayer then it is to truly sit at the Lord’s feet to have some deep meaningful fellowship with Him. Sometimes it requires us to clear our schedules so that we have no other pressing matters to draw us away from doing just that! Now, I realize that we can not necessarily clear our schedules everyday so we can spend countless hours with the Lord, but we do need to make a conscious effort to make our time with Him to be just Him and Him alone, with no distractions. When we make the Lord our priority, He will be sure to make our hearts a priority. Our Lord is looking for a rich meaningful relationship with us, not just a check in the box for each day. Let’s work hard to stay out of a ritualistic place and stay in a place of deep companionship with the Lord each and every day!

Lord, I thank you for showing us in your word that we can easily fall into a place of routine and rituals and walk away from your desire to speak into our lives. You do not desire for us to stay in the same place. You desire for us to change and grow in the things of you. I pray that you help us to use our routines to be consistent in reading your word, but help us not to fall into a place of thinking that this is enough. Lord, we need you to speak into our lives. Keep us from being in a place where serving you becomes a ritual, a place where we are serving you out of routine only. We don't want to be in a place where we serving out of obligation, but we want to find ourselves in a place where we are serving you out of the love and joy flowing from our inner most being!

Reflection Of The Light

Rjukan, Norway is a small town that for six months of the year does not receive any sunlight due its location between mountains. So instead of living in total darkness throughout the fall and winter months, this town decided to get innovative and construct rotating mirrors to reflect the sun’s rays directly into the little town. The mirrors make life in this little town much more pleasant for its residents during the darkest part of the year.

Mirrors in Rjukan, Norway

“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden.Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.” Matthew 5:14-16

“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” John 1:5

Reflecting The Son of God

Our lives as Christians work much the same way as the mirrors do in Rjukan, Norway. We are called to be a light in the darkness. We must bear in mind however, that the light is not coming from us, it is being reflected through us so that others may see Christ rather than seeing us. When the people of Rjukan look at the mirrors during the day, they can not see the actual mirror because the reflection of the sun is so bright. This a perfect example of how our lives should be. When people look at us, all they should see is Christ Himself.

Looking up at the mirrors in Rjukan, Norway

The other thing I want to make note of here is simply the obvious. The mirrors would have nothing to reflect if it were not for the sun. The same applies with us as Christians. Without Christ’s light in our lives we would have no light to share.

“When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world.Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” John 8:12

We live in a world where there seems to be more darkness than light and at times it feels as though we are not making any progress for the kingdom. Just like the mirrors on the side of the mountain had to be strategically placed, God has placed each one of us strategically so that our light will be seen by those around us. And while it may not seem like anything is happening be assured that the Lord will use the simplest things to bring people to their knees. Remember that God’s kingdom is build one person and one heart at a time. So while we may feel like nothing is happening, our light is making a difference in the lives of those around us. Let’s not get discouraged by the things going on around us. The things we see going on should draw us closer to the Father rather than farther away. The time we spend drawing closer to the Lord only does one thing, it allows our lights to get brighter. The brighter our lights, the more people we have the opportunity to influence for eternity. What a blessing that is! We should be excited about the light of God changing the hearts of those around us. Ultimately, this is the very purpose for our existence, so that we can let our lights shine so that others can see our good deeds and in turn see our Father in heaven (Matthew 5:16).

Lord, help us to be the lights that you have called us to be. Help our lights to get brighter with each passing day. Not only is it your heart’s desire, but it is ours as well to see others entering into your kingdom. We know that by letting our lights shine with ever increasing intensity that we will see just that very thing happen, and happen by the masses. Help us not to grow weary in well doing, but to wait patiently and in doing so we will reap a harvest at the proper time. Thank you Lord that you have a heart for the lost. Thank you that you use us to bring others to your saving grace.

For related posts visit: "Our Great Commission" and "Our Calling In Christ"

*Please Note: Some of the content for this particular post stemmed from "Our Daily Bread Devotional" on November 18, 2015. That particular devotional was written by Lawrence Darmani. - I just want to give credit where credit is due.

 

Our Defense Mechanism

I recently had a conversation with a someone about how hurt can cause a person to act harshly, and this very topic was reinforced the very next morning in my devotional time with my children. I have learned over the years that when God wants to teach me something, He will often reveal it in multiple ways. I love this about our God! He knows that being the humans that we are, repetition is invaluable to the learning process, and I for one desperately need repetition in this process of training. I have spent some time thinking about this particular concept and I wanted to share with you my thought process on the subject.

I want us to think about a time when someone has said something or done something that has hurt us. Typically, we will put up our defense mechanism. For some of us this defense mechanism comes in the form of boxing gloves. For others of us this defense mechanism is to retreat, flee and to avoid any form of conflict. Neither method resolves the situation in which we have found ourselves, but they are both very common responses when someone hurts us. Scripture makes it very clear the response we should have toward those who hurt us.

“But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Matthew 5:44-48

“Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord. On the contrary:If your enemy is hungry, feed him;  if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” Romans 12:14-21

How To Treat Those Who Hurt Us

• love them
• pray for them
• bless them
• do not curse them
• rejoice and mourn with them
• live in harmony and peace with them
• do not be proud or conceited
• associate with people in “low” positions
• do not repay evil for evil, do not take revenge
• do what is right
• give your enemy food and drink
• repay evil with good
• be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect

Wow, what a list! As I stated earlier, scripture is very clear on how we should treat those who hurt us. We would have no problem treating our best friends according to the things on this list, but the Lord is not talking about our best friends here. He is talking about our enemies, He is talking about those who have hurt us, cut us to the deep and then turned around and laughed about it with others. Our natural response to those who hurt us is often to hurt right back, but according to scripture that is the complete opposite of what we are supposed to be doing. If we treat those who hurt us with all the respect and kindness found on this list then we do not have to worry about the outcome. This section of scripture states “It is mine to avenge. I will repay says the Lord.” In other words, the Lord will handle the hearts of those who hurt us if we handle them with love and mercy. Please keep in mind that God’s “avenging” and “repaying” will probably not look like what we have in mind. We serve a God who desires that all come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. He does not desire for anyone to perish (2 Peter 3:9). So knowing this, His ultimate goal is to change the hearts and minds of those who hurt us. He does not desire to “make them pay” for what they have done to us. He is patient with them, just as He was patient with us in waiting for us to come to repentance. This is not to say that hardships and stumbling blocks may not come their way, but God will use those hardships and those stumbling blocks as a means to open the eyes of their hearts so they will turn their hearts toward Him. As Christians, it is our responsibility to act according to God's word. It is God's responsibility to take care of their heart. We do not have the ability to change the hearts or minds of others. We must let that in the hands of our heavenly Father, for He always knows what is best in all situations. His word tells us that He will work all things together for good for those that love God (Romans 8:28.) We must trust that as we do our part, God will do His part.

Our Spiritual Defense Mechanism

I want to encourage each of us to take this list, copy it down somewhere in a place that we  can access it quickly and easily so that we can rehearse it often. We are all going to face times when we are hurt or even frustrated by the words or actions of others. When we find ourselves in this situation we will be able to pull out this list and know exactly how to treat those who mistreat us. As stated earlier, repetition is a wonderful thing to help us learn some valuable lessons in the Lord. Let’s rehearse this list often and use it to help guide our words and actions so others can see Jesus in us! Half the battle will be rehearsing this list, the other half of the battle will be remembering not to pull out the boxing gloves but rather respond with love and mercy. That’s a tough one, but not impossible with the Lord!

Lord, help us in those moments when others hurt and frustrate us to remember what your word tells us about the right way to respond. Help us to pull this list out frequently and rehearse it so that when we are faced with a situation we already have a plan of action in place. Help us to remember not to take matters into our own hands but to act according to your word and to leave the outcome in your hands. You know what is best for us and for the ones who have hurt us. Help us to treat them with all the love and kindness that you would bestow upon them yourself. Help us to be the the evidence of Christ to those who bring hurt and frustration to our hearts.  

*For more information on this topic please visit my post entitled "Hurts."

Joseph's Journey

I love the story of Joseph because it is such an inspiring story of God’s faithfulness to a young man who remained steadfast in the midst of his life being turned upside down. The story of Joseph begins in Genesis 37 and continues in chapters 39-45. If you would like to read the entire account of Joseph, please feel free to do so, it is truly heart stirring story. For our post today, we will largely be focusing on his life up to the time of him being placed in a position of authority in Egypt (Genesis chapters 37- 41.) I want to retell the story of Joseph bringing out some highlights and some thoughts to ponder upon as we examine this touching story.

The Story of Joseph
Let’s set the stage here at the beginning in Genesis 37. Here we have this 17 year old kid of whom his father absolutely adores. This adoration stems from the fact that Joseph was the son of Jacob’s beloved wife Rachel. However, Rachel was not his only wife. Jacob was tricked into marrying his first wife, Leah, and out of obligation he stayed married her, but he did not love her. Rachel had been barren for many years until the blessing of Joseph came along. As Joseph grew, he became his father’s “spy” so to speak. He would check in on his brothers and report back to his father about them. Can you see how just this alone would build animosity and tension between Joseph and his brothers? However, this was not the only thing that seemed to drive a wedge into this relationship of brothers. The “wedge” that more of us are familiar with is the coat that Jacob bestowed upon Joseph. This was no ordinary coat. This was an exquisitely colored coat, one similar to those worn by kings of that time period. This coat was not only beautiful in appearance it was extremely expensive. It probably cost his father a rather large amount of money. Quite possibly part of his older brothers' inheritance. I’m sure that by this point Joseph’s brothers were outraged at the fact that the favoritism had just gone from hearsay to outwardly obvious to anyone and everyone. This coat became a symbolic representation of Jacob’s favoritism toward Joseph. This fueled the the fire that was already burning inside his brothers even farther.  

The fuel to the fire didn’t stop there. In Joseph’s excitement for what God was revealing to him, he failed to realize that maybe sharing everything, was not necessarily the best of ideas. As he began to share his dreams, his brothers' ability to hold in their enraged feelings any longer failed and those outraged feelings let loose with unstoppable force. The actions Joseph’s brothers took that day hurled Joseph onto a path of revealing God’s faithfulness in epic proportions! 

Joseph then found himself on the road to a life of slavery. He now faced a long hard 30 day walk to Egypt. This was no ordinary journey either. This was the journey of a slave. This means Joseph would have been chained hand and foot making every step even more painstaking. Slavery was a violent business. The slaves were treated worse than animals. Slave traders showed no mercy. Joseph was no exception to this treatment. Chances were he was probably whipped and beaten, not given much food and barely enough water to cross the desert alive. Once he finally reached Egypt he was sold just like merchandise to the highest bidder. Let’s pause for a moment and try to wrap our minds around this situation Joseph has been catapulted into. One day Joseph was in the comfort of his own home and the next day he found himself chained as a slave on his way to Egypt. Talk about a bad nightmare!

Life in Egypt
When Joseph arrived in Egypt Potiphar, one of Pharaoh’s officials, bought him as a slave. Potiphar was an extremely wealthy man. As Joseph served, he began to prove himself faithful to Potiphar and his household. Potiphar began to take notice that Joseph was a man full of  integrity and one who was trustworthy. With these qualities out in the open for all to see, Potiphar began to place more and more responsibility in Joseph’s hands and eventually turned over his entire estate into Joseph’s care. With the vast wealth that Potiphar had, it proved itself to be a wonderful training grounds for the responsibilities that were yet to come for Joseph. God has a beautiful way of working all things out for the good for those who love the Him, even though it may seem far from the good in the moment.  Potiphar’s wife however, had other plans in mind for Joseph. When her attempts to seduce him failed she accused him of something he did not do. Naturally, Potiphar believed his wife and had Joseph thrown into jail for his “crime.” So now we can add criminal to Joseph’s spotless resume.

Prisons did not even resemble the type of prisons that we know of today. Prisons were dismal places where many people ended up dying due to the foul conditions. People were not innocent until proven guilty. They were thrown into prison until their trial and there was no guarantee if or when that trial would even take place. Many people died innocently just waiting for their case to be called to trial. I tend to think Joseph had to have been in that prison for quite some time because he was noticed by the warden who in turn promoted him to prison administrator. This is not something that would have happened overnight. Just like Potiphar's house, he would have had to prove himself to be different than the others around him. Proving ourselves trustworthy is truly a matter of time. During this time spent in prison Joseph’s childhood gifting of dreams came back around. Only this time instead of being the one having the dreams, he was the one giving the interpretations of those dreams. It was this very thing that drew him out of the clutches of the prison cell and into the posh palace life that he had caught a glimpse of in his dreams. This time it was Pharaoh who called him to interpret his dream. It was this dream that launched him on the path that ultimately allowed his childhood dream to be fulfilled.  

As we look back on Joseph’s life up to this point it truly is astounding! Joseph had been cut off  from everything he held dear: his family, his precious possessions, his home, his life as he knew it and his pride. He was stripped of his coat, thrown into a pit, sold into slavery, accused for a crime he did not commit, then thrown into jail for that very crime and lastly placed into a position of major authority in the land. His life was a roller coaster of ups and downs. His life was characterized by chaos and instability. After each major “plummet” in Joseph’s life events he faced a choice. He could have easily chosen to get angry and frustrated with the Lord and say “God, you gave me these dreams. I have been faithful to you so why am I here?” But Joseph never asked the question why. He never questioned God’s reasons. He never showed frustration or discouragement. In fact he did just the opposite. He exhibited his trust in the Lord. He trusted in God’s faithfulness.

Honoring and Blessing in the trials
Joseph chose to honor God in the face of his own adversity. I find it interesting that even though Joseph choose to respond rightly in action and attitude God did not immediately deliver him from his problems. In fact in many instances the problems appeared, at least from the outside, to be getting worse. Joseph had to honor God in the midst of the hardships before he could ever be entrusted to honor God in the midst of the blessing. Just like Joseph we need to make a conscious choice to give God honor and glory in the midst of our hardships. We need to recognize that it’s the hard times that build our faith not the times of blessing.

Lord, I thank you for this beautiful example of Joseph. What a perfect example of what honoring you in the midst of our hardships should look like. Help us in those moments when things are hard to remember that you are building us for a much greater purpose than we have sight of right now. Help us to approach our struggles with a spiritual perspective. Help us not to get hung up on the struggle only to lose sight of the bigger things you are trying to do in our hearts and lives. You have such amazing plans and purposes for us. Help us to remember that promise in the times when the challenges of life seem to be more than we can handle. Help us to keep our focus on you and not to ask the question “why?” You are trustworthy. You have plans to prosper us and not to harm us. You have plans to give us a hope and a future (Jeremiah 29:11). We do not always understand those verses, but you are in control of it all. Thank you Lord!   

For more mention of Joseph, see my blog post entitled: "Worthy To Be Praised." This post discusses the topic of praising God in the midst of our hardships because it ushers in the character of God to be built in our hearts.

For more reading on specific Bible characters, please visit posts entitled: "The Example Of Esther", "Touching The Hem Of His Garment", "Seeking The Value In God's Reward", and "Blind Faith."