I have been thinking about God's consistent servant, Joseph. He was a man who just kept on serving God no matter what the circumstances in his life were. Unlike many of us, he didn't depend on what was going on around him to motivate him to serve. Many times we encounter difficulties and those situations often sidetrack us from effectively serving the Lord. Satan loves to deter us from God's plan in our lives. If he can't steal our soul, he will steal our service to Christ.
The best example of how to live consistently for the Lord that I have found in scripture is Joseph. He was the favored child of his father and a dreamer. A couple of prophetic dreams that Joseph experienced and he shared with his family led to some jealousy and sent him down a path that looked like the destruction of his future.
His brothers stripped him of his colorful coat his father had given him and threw him into a pit planning to kill him. Just when they were about to kill him, some Egyptian slave traders happened by and they sold him into slavery instead of killing him. After arriving in Egypt, Joseph was sold into the house of Potiphar and quickly rose to a place of prominent service to his master. Everything in the master's estate except Potiphar's wife was accessible to him. When Potiphar's wife decided she wanted Joseph to have sex with her, he did the right thing and refused. In a rage she grabbed his cloak as he ran away and falsely accused him of trying to rape her. As a result, he was thrown into prison where God gave him the interpretation to dreams the other prisoners were having. One of these prisoners promised to remember Joseph when he left the prison and returned to work for Pharaoh. But for a while the cup bearer to Pharaoh did not remember the man who had predicted his reinstatement to his position.
After being troubled by dreams that his advisors could not interpret for Pharaoh, the cupbearer told him of the man in prison that interpreted his dreams. Joseph was brought before Pharaoh and quickly told the leader that there would be seven years of plenty and seven years of absolute famine.
Joseph saved the land of Egypt and was second only to Pharaoh.
The very brothers who had come against Joseph to kill him are forced to flee to Egypt to beg for some of the food that Joseph had stored away for Egypt's survival.
What a perfect set up for revenge!!! Most of us would take this advantage and exact a painful justice upon the ones who had so unmercifully plotted against us...not Joseph. He told his brothers that what they had meant for evil, God had used for their salvation. He was the Old Testament equivalent of Romans 8:28 "We are assured and know that [[a]God being a partner in their labor] all things work together and are [fitting into a plan] for good to and for those who love God and are called according to [His] design and purpose."
In all that Joseph had been through, he just kept doing the right thing...kept serving his God...and being promoted and blessed everywhere he went. He did not allow his circumstances to derail his life in Yahweh. He had a relationship with God that superseded his situations and the blessings of God were hunting him down. Not so he could use his position and relationship for his own gain....but for God's purpose and plan.
