Rescued?

Acts 7:9-10 “Because the patriarchs were jealous of Joseph, they sold him as a slave into Egypt. But God was with him ¹⁰ and rescued him from all his troubles. He gave Joseph wisdom and enabled him to gain the goodwill of Pharaoh king of Egypt. So Pharaoh made him ruler over Egypt and all his palace.

What does it mean to be rescued? I know we have the image of Tom Hanks on the deserted island looking at his volleyball friend in our minds. Or maybe a TV series by that name. To be rescued implies that someone must be in trouble first. You don’t get rescued from a beach vacation in the south of France!

But so many of us, even as Jesus followers, think that the Lord will rescue us from all trouble. To put it in simple words, if we are a Jesus follower, we will never face any difficulty. The Lord will always shield us from trouble. We will love in paradise starting now!

Now we would never say those kinds of words, since we know them to not be true. But when we get in a tough situation, our prayers and our desires speak volumes. We want out of the pressure. We want rescue!

Even our text could give us the wrong impression if we didn’t know Joseph’s story. He was rescued, but he was still sold by his brothers to slave traders. He was rescued, but he still spent two years in jail on trumped up charges. He lived in a foreign land, with strange customs, without any citizen rights for years. He would much rather have stayed at home in his own bed with his father and siblings, well maybe not his brothers!

And yet our text tells us that Joseph was rescued from all his troubles. I think we might interpret this this way. The troubles through which Joseph endured did not take him down. He was not defeated by them. They did not overcome him. He made it through the other side of them.

That sounds very different, doesn’t it. There is no magic “escape” waiting for the Christian in this life. We will suffer. We will face hard times. And we can be right in the center of God’s will in those moments.

How is this possible? It is possible because God’s will is not about place or circumstance, but about connection to the person of God. When we are in close proximity to the Creator of the Universe, to the Savior who died and rose to life again, then these “light and momentary trials” fade into the background. The difficulties are simply something to be used to work out His will in this world.

So next time you face difficulties ask yourself this. “How can this be used by the Lord to further His Kingdom?” Pray for relief, but more importantly, pray that His will would be done in the midst of your difficulty. Seek Him more than you seek rescue!