God sees and designs the season we are in. In a particular season our preference and necessity shouldn’t be to know the reasons, which God is silent about, but to perceive and mold ourselves according to the lessons it teaches us. Most Christians are well versed about Joseph and his life away from Jacob’s house and about his experiences aftermath. Time after time, he faced unwelcome circumstances for reasons that were obscure to him. Still in all these seasons—God had a divine plan, the proof is in Genesis 39, which says ‘the LORD was with Joseph’—whether during the enslavement period to the Ishmaelites or in Potiphar’s house or prison.
At seventeen, Joseph was sold as a slave by his own brothers and at thirty he was the prime minister of Egypt. This long thirteen years were enough to teach and equip him with a faith and a character that could stand every apparent disappointment and any weary delay. Pharaoh made Joseph his second in command – An unconventional promotion – from a prisoner to a Prime Minister! It’s when we come across Genesis 41, we realize that Joseph was being prepared for the administration of a kingdom, his character was matured by his trials. To fight every temptation, to be faithful and trustworthy in whatever work God intends for him and in everything that comes into his hands, be content even in being in-charge of all those prisoners in jail though he have dreamt of sun and moon bowing down to him.
Remember higher the dreams, harder the training duration and bigger the vision, tougher the tasks. Through the turn of events from Joseph’s life, we learn a lesson of patience, faith, self-control and discipline; a lesson of doing of the work and accepting the circumstances of the moment even if it does make zero sense to us. When we stop comparing the present season to the promised one and stop being a grumbler looking at the current trial and instead choose to live- to give or learn or do that someone else may not, our season becomes worthwhile.
These unprecedented transitions from possessing extraordinary percipience about the dreams and being a prized possession of Jacob to being pushed into a Pit, then sold as a slave in a Public market, later to Potiphar’s house, subsequently to Prison and then to Palace as Prime Minister- this wasn’t a customary maneuver but a divine Project. The Scripture mentions clearly in Ecclesiastes 3:1 that, “To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.” So when we try to fix this current battle our way according to our standard of time, it may feel nonsensical and hence make us woeful and doubtful, but when we perceive this God’s way, it makes us hopeful.
Most of us have heard of ‘Giant sequoias.’ A spectacular fact about them is that they only reproduce by seeds, which sometimes remain in the cone for ‘𝟮𝟬 𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿𝘀’ unlike any other tree we might come across. Forest fires help open the cones which then grow from the burnt, bare soil. A bigger delay period or a longer list of disappointment doesn’t mean it is time to quit and you aren’t fruitful, it just proves that you would be sequoia.
It is not the reason, but the lessons discerned in a season that can cause growth.
When we are meant to live and grow like a Sequoia then why settle for anything less than that.
Have a great day!
