Are you at a point in your life where you feel forgotten, abandoned, or alone?

Do you feel hopeless to the point where you can’t find the light in life again? 

Do you feel incapable of crawling your way out? 

There is an answer to this sorrow, it might not be an easy answer, but the end of the road leads to peace and contentment despite present longsuffering. 

If you feel like this, completely deserted and like no one is on your side, please find courage today through the next part in Joseph’s story. 

As a recap – Joseph has been sold into slavery by his family, thrown into prison due to a spiteful lie, and had a rough adolescence. However, through every trial, God has been with him and shown him faithful love which has caused him to work hard, find favor, and succeed. 

In Genesis chapter 40, we find him overseeing and taking care of all the other prisoners as “chief” jailbird. He’s been there for maybe a decade, and one week both the cupbearer and the baker to Pharoah did something wrong, made the king of the land angry, and were sent to a cell to learn a lesson or two. 

Joseph, being in a “management” role in the prison, attended the two employees of Pharoah. And one night, both the baker and the cupbearer had troubling dreams they were puzzling over when Joseph brought them their breakfast. 

Joseph realized they looked distraught and asked them, “Why do you look so sad today?”

“We had dreams,” they said to him, “but there is no one to interpret them.”

Then Joseph replied, “Don’t interpretations belong to God? Tell me your dreams.”

So the chief cupbearer told his dream to Joseph: “In my dream, there was a vine in front of me. On the vine were three branches. As soon as it budded, its blossoms came out and its clusters ripened into grapes. Pharaoh’s cup was in my hand, and I took the grapes, squeezed them into Pharaoh’s cup, and placed the cup in Pharaoh’s hand.”

“This is its interpretation,” Joseph said to him. “The three branches are three days. In just three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore you to your position. You will put Pharaoh’s cup in his hand the way you used to when you were his cupbearer. But when all goes well for you, remember that I was with you. Please show kindness to me by mentioning me to Pharaoh and get me out of this prison. For I was kidnapped from the land of the Hebrews, and even here I have done nothing that they should put me in the dungeon.”

When the chief baker saw that his fellow employees’ interpretation was positive, he said to Joseph, “I also had a dream. Three baskets of white bread were on my head. In the top basket were all sorts of baked goods for Pharaoh, but the birds were eating them out of the basket on my head.”

Tremulously, Joseph gave this interpretation: “The three baskets are three days. In just three days Pharaoh will lift up your head—from off you—and hang you on a tree. Then the birds will eat the flesh from your body.”

Well, I bet the cupbearer slept well that night… and the Baker either dismissed Joseph’s interpretation or was probably afraid for his life. 

But just as Joseph had interpreted, a few days later Pharaoh’s birthday, he threw a party for his servants. At this event, he restored his cupbearer back to his previous position (good and trustworthy cupbearers – the ones who make sure Pharoah’s drink isn’t poisoned; were probably hard to come by!). Sadly, for the baker, his crime was bad enough to send him to the gallows. 

Perhaps Joseph was hopeful that night. Perhaps, maybe – FINALLY, he’d get out of prison. 

To no avail. 

As the cupbearer forgot Joseph… and he faded into memory. 

So, Joseph remained in prison for two more years. 

Two more years!! For a crime he did not commit. 

I don’t think I would have had the patience Joseph had. That was his chance to get out! And it must have felt like it slipped through his fingers. 

He had to trust in God’s perfect timing. Even if it means sleeping in a dank prison cell for another 730 nights. 

Do you feel like you are waiting on God to do something in your life? To change something in your life? To release you from whatever seems to be holding you down? 

Sometimes it might feel like we are completely abandoned. But we are not. YOU are not. God doesn’t forget us, though people might. 

God sent his own son down from heaven to die on the cross for you and me to prove that he is with us, he has always been with us, and he will always be with us. 

Therefore, it was prophesied that the Messiah would be called Immanuel which transliterates as God with us. 

The God of the universe is with you. Please believe that. And wherever you are, God’s got a plan for your life! In two short years, Joseph went from sleeping in a cell to achieving one of the top positions in all of Egypt – second only to Pharoah himself (but I’m getting ahead of myself). 

Don’t give up on God, because he doesn’t give up on you. You are never alone. 

God said these words to Joshua, and I exhort them over you: “Be strong and courageous; do not be frightened or dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:9). 

In love and truth,
Melody

Copyright © 2021 by Melody Turner
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