The Lord can use even the unjust actions of evil people to accomplish His purposes in our lives. I believe that whole-heartedly, but living it out can be such a challenge. My natural response when someone takes advantage of me, or when they accuse me unfairly, or when they fail to keep the promise to me is to rise up in self-defense. If the situation is critical enough I might even start to grumble about what seems like the Lord’s failure to ‘take care of me.’
Many years ago, an egotistical, power hungry man I’ll just call Will entered the congregation I was pastoring. He challenged my teaching, worked hard to gather a following, and created all kinds of problems in the church. I prayed earnestly about how to preserve the flock from his harm. Finally the Lord spoke into my heart about some repentance that needed to happen in my own life with the promise that when I obeyed, He would take care of Will! I did, and He did!
Was God the author of Will’s sinfulness? Not at all, but He was using him to reveal a flaw in me. Once I was aligned to His plan, I could see clearly how to proceed and saw His provision for my situation at the time.
Joseph, the patriarch whose story is told in the latter part of Genesis, was cruelly treated by his brothers, rejected because he was prideful and favored by their father, Jacob. When they found an opportunity to be rid of their little brother, they sold him into slavery and he was carried off to Egypt. Years later, Joseph had become the Prime Minister of the empire and his brothers found themselves in his court. When they finally realized that the powerful man standing before them was the brother they sent to a living death, they trembled, waiting for retaliation. Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Come close to me.” When they had done so, he said, “I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt! And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will not be plowing and reaping." (Genesis 45:4-6, NIV) God was working, all the time, in every situation.
Have others broken your heart, blocked your way, sinned against God and harmed you?
Are you ready to respond with hatred?
Are you tempted to abandon the Lord’s will and do your own thing to even the score?
Don’t do it!
Take a lesson from Joseph and do the right thing even in the most trying of circumstances. "Open up before God, keep nothing back; he’ll do whatever needs to be done: He’ll validate your life in the clear light of day and stamp you with approval at high noon." (Psalm 37:5-6, The Message) That’s not fatalism. That is true faith that waits on the Lord.
In time, you will see, like Joseph (though he waited two decades!) that God is greater, that His purposes prevail, that He is Lord of all.
Here’s a word from the Word. Pray it today! Learn it, own it, live it.
"I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry.
He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire;
he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand.
He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear and put their trust in the Lord.
Blessed is the man who makes the Lord his trust,
who does not look to the proud, to those who turn aside to false gods.
Many, O Lord my God, are the wonders you have done.
The things you planned for us no one can recount to you;
were I to speak and tell of them,
they would be too many to declare." (Psalm 40:1-5, NIV)
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