Genesis 45:7-8 ( NKJV )
And God sent me before you to preserve a posterity for you in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So now it was not you who sent me here, but God; and He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.
As we have discussed the idea of a life surrendered to God, we have looked at two major biblical Characters. The first was Abraham. He was required to leave his homeland even though he did not know where he was going. He had to follow the leading of God until God got him where he needed to be. If he obeyed God he was promised an inheritance, but he had no guarantee and he had to abandon himself to the will of God in order to obtain it. He had to surrender control of his future to God.
We then looked at the greatest example of surrender any Christian can have and that is Jesus himself. His whole life was surrender. He was born for one purpose and that was to die for our sins. The greatest point of surrender for Him was the garden of Gethsemane. Throughout his life he had been in mortal combat with the devil. He always triumphed, but now he would have to triumph without action. He would have to surrender to the devil and to the will of God. He cried out to God asking to be able to bypass this terrible thing. However he spoke 7 words that changed eternity. “Not my will but yours be done.” This settled the issue and closed all the back doors that the devil might have used to bring temptation. It was a total surrender to the plan and purpose of God.
Today I want to introduce another character who was surrendered to God. In his case it was not his choice initially. He had to learn to surrender through some very difficult circumstances. His name was Joseph.
Joseph was the favored son of a father with 11 sons. His father’s favoritism caused him to be resented by his 10 older brothers. Adding to the problem was the fact that God had also chosen Joseph and given him two dreams. In these dreams his brothers as well as his father and mother were bowing down to him. His brothers were not amused, but these dreams really were from God.
Joseph did not understand the dreams at this point. Like many of us, he was taken by the parts that seemed to indicate he was better than others. He his father had indicated as much and the dream seemed to confirm it. He would rule over his brothers. In the end the fact that his brothers would bow down to him was not the point at all. Joseph didn’t know that yet and his attitude stirred his brothers to action. They took hold of him, bound him and threw him into a pit. They sold him to a passing Egyptian caravan and told his father he was dead.
At this point it seems that Joseph’s dream will never come to pass. He is a slave. He has no control over anything in his life at this point. He has no idea how he could ever get out of this situation. He has no one to buy him out of bondage. He has two choices. He can fight against his situation in the flesh and make matters worse or he can surrender to God and trust Him to bring about the changes.
For most of us we find ourselves in Joseph’s position at some point in life. We are forced into situations by circumstances we cannot control. It may be financial lack that puts us in a pit. Maybe our marriage is bad and we don’t see any way to change it. It might be sickness, sin or some other thing over which we have no real control. In any event we find ourselves in a pit that we can’t climb out of or a slave to something we can’t overcome.
The natural tendency in such situations is to try to fight against it. We feel we need to do something. Indeed there may be some action that we can and should take. We don’t throw away natural wisdom. On the other hand, many times these efforts are ineffective. The second possible response in these times is to throw up our hands and say, “There’s nothing I can do about it.” We give up and accept that this is just my life. Neither is the best choice.
Whether there is something natural we can do or not, the most important thing in impossible, out of our control situations is to surrender. Not surrender to the devil or the circumstances, but to God. That’s what Joseph did. In the next 2 days we will explain how and why that is true, but for the moment we just need to know that it is true.
In impossible circumstances surrender to God does not mean giving up. It means surrendering control to Him. It means trusting that His love for us is greater than any impossibility. It means believing that He can work the circumstance out for my good no matter what. As long as I am holding onto the thought that I can solve the problem on my own, God cannot really help. If I just quit and give up I give God nothing to work with. When I choose to look at the impossibility and say, “I can’t do anything about this but God can.”, I am giving Him faith that he can work with to help me overcome.
Look at your life today. Is it out of control? Is it a pit you can’t get out of? Don’t give up, but do surrender to God’s will, God’s care and His wonderful love for you. In the end that will make the difference both during the trial and in obtaining the victory.
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