'Restoration Matters to God'

Sunday Reflection

2nd August 2020

'he chose not to contact them'

Jacob said to his sons...

"Indeed I have heard that there is grain in Egypt;
 go down to that place and buy for us there,
 that we may live and not die."
    Genesis 42:2

By the time Joseph saw his brothers again,
he had been prime minister for nearly a decade...
He could travel anywhere he wanted,
yet he chose not to return to Canaan..
He knew where to find his family,
but he chose not to contact them.
Joseph was content to leave his past in the past.
But God was not.

Joseph heard them before he saw them.
He turned and looked. There they stood.
These Hebrews stuck out in sophisticated Egypt
like hillbillies at Times Square.
When their time came to ask Joseph for grain,
they didn't recognize him.
The language he spoke was Egyptian.
It never occurred to them that they were standing before their baby brother.

They pointed at the stalks of grain and then at their mouths.
They motioned to the brother who carried the money,
and he stumbled forward and spilled the coins on the table.

The last time Joseph saw coins in the hands of Jacob's older boys,
they were laughing, and he was whimpering.
And now they dared bring silver to him?

Joseph called for a Hebrew-speaking servant to translate.
from - Genesis 42:7

"Who are you? Where do you come from?"
The brothers fell face-first in the dirt.
"Uh, well, we're from up the road in Canaan.
Maybe you've heard of it?"

This was the first report on his family he had heard in twenty years.
Jacob was alive. Benjamin was alive. And they thought he was dead.
"Tell you what," he snapped.
"I'll let one of you go back and get your brother
and bring him here. The rest of you I'll throw in jail."

I think he was trying to get his bearings.
This was the toughest challenge of his life.
Joseph didn't know what to do.

Maybe you don't either.
Maybe your family failed you.
Your early years were hard ones?
The people who should have cared for you. didn't.
But, you made the best of it.
You've made a life for yourself.
Even started your own family.
You are happy to leave 'Canaan' in the rear-view mirror.

But God isn't.
He gives us more than we request by going deeper than we ask.

He wants not only your whole heart; he wants your heart whole.

Why?
Hurt people hurt people. Think about it.
Why do you fly off the handle? Why do you avoid conflict?
Why do you seek to please everyone?
Might your tendencies have something to do with
an unhealed hurt in your heart?
God wants to help you for your sake.

Pause for a moment to sit with God,
with your emotions and thoughts about those relationships,
and ask for His guidance and help.

'While the cat is away....'
Reg