When I was in the eighth grade, our family home burned to the ground. It was one of those times that shook me to the core of my being. As a result of the pain of that event, I ended up walking away from the church for about four years. During those years, I tried to explore what I believed. That time of questioning eventually led me back to the church, equipped me to seek answers to deep theological questions (especially when those answers were not the ones I wanted to find), and prepared me for my journey to seminary.
Many of us have faced those moments when it seems our world is falling apart around us. I have always been the kind of person who likes to go back and reexamine those times. Looking back on them, I have been able to see that God had been at work. He took those valleys that I thought would never have a positive ending and turned them into something much greater than anything I could ever have imagined. I could see that His plan for my life is always better than my own.
When we look at the life of Joseph, we see a young man who was sold into slavery by his brothers and later imprisoned for a crime he did not commit. During all of those years, God was at work putting Joseph in the right place so that he would be able to provide food for many people, including his own family, during a seven-year famine. In a moment when Joseph could have sought revenge on his brothers, he was able to see the ways in which God had shaped those places where others had intended him harm in order to accomplish something great.