Joseph: Not Your Ordinary Joe

An Overnight Success Genesis 41:1-14 Early one Egyptian morning, Joseph rose, like cream, to the top. An overnight success! If anyone had a rags to riches story to tell, it was Joseph. No bragging on his part, no Facebook posts to like here, but a success like his was remarkable. How do we account for this achievement?

“Reverence for the Lord is the foundation of true wisdom. The rewards of wisdom come to all who obey him,” (Psalm 111:10). Wisdom was Joseph’s key to success, wisdom birthed in his awe of God even in the dungeon. God blessed Joseph with an understanding of Pharaoh’s dreams and insight into how Egypt could survive the coming famine. Joseph thrived on wisdom while a servant to Potiphar, while serving the captain of the guard in the palace dungeon, and then on this amazing morning!

Imagine yourself in such a morning transition. One minute, you hear the screams of tortured prisoners down the hall; the next, you smell Pharaoh’s cologne as he tells you his dream. That lifetime-ago minute seems like a dream, but you know it was all too real. This, this gold-necklaced moment, is too much to fathom—that is, if you were trying to make sense of it.

Joseph focused on the dream, on instructing Pharaoh to hear the voice of God through his dream. The God who was with Joseph—Emmanuel—through his darkest days would also be with Egypt in theirs. God’s withness even extends to those in the company of God-lovers. And God is with us, with all who love him as Joseph did. So night turned to day for our hero—only his overnight success was thirteen years in the making.

Pharaoh knew extraordinary wisdom when he saw it. Joseph recommended that a key person oversee the collection of grains during years of abundance to prepare for the years of famine. Pharaoh loved Joseph’s plan for famine survival. He was so taken with the plan that he put Joseph in that key role. Second in command. Prime Minister. Call it what you will; Joseph’s name tag no longer read, “Prisoner.” Joseph had a parade to attend, and he was the star attraction.

Joseph’s plan worked, and barns were bursting with grains before the famine began. Within seven years—post prison—Joseph was a daddy to two boys who helped him forget the years of his troubled past and remember the God who made him fruitful in wisdom.

God is with us in our darkest days, however hard we may find that to believe! We may not have a dramatic, overnight success story to tell (or awaiting us), but we can be very sure that the God who was with Joseph is with us. We can be certain that God knows our darkness and is providing a bright dawn for us. We can know with confidence that God’s plan for success will blow our socks off, and the wake of success will extend farther than we can imagine. Bottom line? Joseph’s God, in whom Pharaoh learned to trust, is worthy of our trust, too. He is the God of success, the God who grants wisdom birthed in our darkest hours.