Living In The Light

Welcome to Living in the Light. Whatever your if-onlys are, whatever affliction you're in right now, you trust God that He's got you on a path and a plan and be willing to see that because He's faithful to us in the middle of our suffering. But not only in the middle of our affliction is He faithful to us, we have to be faithful to Him in our attitude. We're so glad you've joined us for Living in the Light, the Bible teaching ministry of Anne Grahamblots. Today her daughter Rachel Ruth has a very important message.

She takes us back to the book of Genesis with insights into the amazing story in the life of Joseph. The point is, like Joseph, you don't want to give in to the temptation of complaining. You also don't want to feel sorry for yourself when things turn bad. Actually, you need to stay focused on the Lord even in the midst of betrayal and hardship because God is showcasing His glory through you. Here now is Rachel Ruth with Living for God in a Wicked World.

My mom and I just recently finished writing a book on Joseph, and it is so much on my heart, and that's where these two messages are going to be from on the life of Joseph. But I'm excited to share with y'all, and I kept thinking of how to introduce this, and it's on suffering, and I feel like the Lord. Put me through a lot of suffering, and maybe it was in preparation of writing a book on it. I've been through a lot in life, some things I can't share, some things I can, but. 10 years ago, my dad, who I was so close with, I felt like I was his son.

I have a brother, but I feel like I was the son. And he was from New York. He was so great. Love the Lord. Just an athlete.

Very dear and special to me. But he suffered from diabetes, and it just kind of took control and really hurt him physically because we needed money. I mean, my husband's a high school football coach, and I would clean my parents' house once a week. I went over to their house and I saw dad and I was vacuuming and doing stuff. Talk to dad, he was so sweet.

Just talked to him for a minute that morning and didn't know that was the last time I would talk to him because my mom found him in their pool later that afternoon, and he had fallen in, somehow, he probably passed out and couldn't get out. And so, my dad passed away, and that was a difficult day for me, difficult time. And then, two years later, my grandfather, you all know him as Billy Graham, I know him as Daddy Bill. He was very special to me, and he passed away. And six months after that, my mom got diagnosed with breast cancer, had to go through all that with my mom.

My brother got COVID, almost died, went to the hospital. And then I had the two heart attacks and Been had to go because of the blood clots and the stroke, and been to the hospital 12 times. I mean, it's just been. Wild and the attacks on my health have just been so brutal. And I'm telling you what, I know what it is because I know it is an assignment from the enemy.

It's almost like I had a hitman on me, you know, a demonic hitman trying to take me out. And every time I would get hit with something in suffering, I would go to God's word and just ask the Lord, okay, Lord, what do I do? And he would give me a promise. And after the heart attacks, he promised in a verse that said, You will not go that way again. And I knew God was telling me, You're not going to have SCAD again.

And then when I had the blood clots, and I was just like, Lord, you know, it's so painful. And I don't know, they didn't ever figure out where they were coming from. And the Lord kept giving me verses probably seven times in one week that He would preserve my life. And so I was like, All right, I'm gonna keep going. You know, I'm not gonna worry about this anymore.

And God just continues to walk me through suffering. But suffering is a very real thing, and the Lord also has healed me from it. I got major PTSD after those heart attacks. Every pain was like, oh, it's happening again, you know, and then it just, I didn't know there were panic attacks, but after that, I started having those, and God's healed me from all that. Suffering is part of the Christian life.

Just because we love Jesus, we're following him, we're doing work for the Lord doesn't mean we get a free pass. We will be hit with suffering, and it's what God brings in our lives to teach us to be dependent on Him. It's what God allows us to go through to give us character and strength. And so, I don't know what you're going through, and I don't know what suffering it is. You know, maybe it is.

Panic attacks or dealing with fear and anxiety, maybe it's health diagnosis or difficulties in marriage or your family. There's so many ways we suffer as women. God is faithful to us, and I think that's the big thing. Faithfulness is not a passive word. To be faithful, there's an action that has to come from it, you know.

And so God faithfully watches over us. He watches over us and takes care of us and walks us through these difficulties. And never catch him off guard. He knows what's coming in your life. He knows what you've been through.

He sees it, and there's always a plan. There is always a plan and a purpose for your suffering. And we're going to see that played out in Joseph's life. Just to give you a little background from where Joseph started and to this point in chapter 39 that I'm gonna talk about today, I'll just give you a little background. And I'm sure many of y'all are familiar with Joseph, but.

Oh, he is near and dear to my heart, and I cannot wait to meet him in heaven. And he's just, I can't even believe he was human. He was so amazing in the way that he handled suffering. But Joseph, if you remember, he was the favorite son of Jacob.

So there was Abraham, then there was Isaac, then there was Jacob, and then Jacob had the 12 sons with, you know, four different women. That's a whole other story. But Joseph was the favorite son of Jacob, which is not right. You know, you should have favorites. But Joseph was that, and his dad loved him.

And Joseph was an obedient kid. He loved his dad. And when he was out working with his brothers, you know, and they were tending the sheep, and his brothers were shirking their duties or being mean to the sheep or not doing something right, Joseph would go back and tell his father. And he did it because, you know, already you can see those manager skills coming out in him. And just wanting to do the right thing.

And so his dad loved him. And because of that, his dad gave him a coat of many colors. And I'm kind of like, Joseph, why did you put that on? But anyhow, he put on this coat of many colors and his brothers hated him for it. His brothers became so jealous of him and hated that his dad loved him the most and gave him this beautiful coat.

And then to make matters worse, Joseph had two dreams and he decides to share with his brothers. And the dreams showed him reigning over his brothers and all of his brothers were bowing down to him. And his brothers were like, what are you talking about? We're not going to bow down to you, Joseph. And then he has another dream that not only were his brothers bowing down to him, but his parents.

And even his dad was like, hold up, you know, you're going a little too far with this. That's not going to happen. Whatever. It just fueled this hatred. Inside of his brothers, but God has a plan in that.

And so Joseph can't help the family he's born in, can't help the attitude of his brothers. God had a plan in all that. And so, One day, one fateful day, Joseph comes to his dad and Jacob says to Joseph, I want you to go check on your brothers. They're down in check them with the sheep. Just go check on them and report back to me.

Joseph, as the dutiful son, he goes out to check on his brothers. And just to imagine, I like to picture everything in Scripture.

So I just have a wild imagination. But anyhow, Joseph, maybe he picks up a pomegranate off the counter, or something, you know, just starts eating it, walks down the path. It's a beautiful day. He's got everything going for him, and he's this favorite son, and he's got these plans for his future. Maybe he's already picked out a plot of land that he wants to have a family and wants to have his own sheep and all this stuff.

And maybe he's got a crush on a girl down the path. I mean, who knows? You know, he's 17 and he's just walking down on a normal, possibly beautiful day. He had no idea. His life was about to change dramatically.

And he walks down this path, and he gets to Shechem, to this field where his brothers are supposed to be. And he doesn't see them, and he's walking around and he's looking, and they're not there. And as the Lord would have it, a man walks up to him. And a man says, You know, what are you looking for? And he said, Well, I was supposed to find my brothers here.

They were supposed to be tending sheep. And the man said, Well, I actually think I overheard them say that they're going to Dothan. Joseph's like, Oh, you know, thank you so much. And so he turns and heads to Dothan. And right there, you know, you just want to shout, Don't do it, go home, please just go back home.

And he went that way because God had him on a path that he needed to go on. And sometimes that path leads you into destruction, sometimes that path leads you into. Hard, hard suffering, but it's the right path, it's the path that God wants you on. And Joseph heads down this path, and as he gets closer to Jothan, he sees his brothers ahead, and he's like, Oh, you know, in his mind, you know, he's just walking along, oh, there they are. Here, oh, perfect, I'll go find out how they're doing.

And as he got closer, did he see their expressions? Did he see the anger and rage on their faces? And was he taken aback a little bit? Like, you know, hey, hey, guys, what's going on? And when he sees him run towards him, and they seized him.

It says they grabbed him and they probably beat him up. And he's probably struggling. But what's going on? What are y'all doing? And then they grab him and they throw him into a pit.

They were going to kill him, but Reuben said, Hey, let's just throw him into this pit, this cistern. And they throw him into this cistern, this dark cistern. He falls onto the bottom. You know, that hurt. I mean, just think about that.

Throwing into this rocky cistern. You know, he got cut up and bruised, and he's screaming and crying. And it even says further on in Genesis, when the brothers come back, you know, anyhow, it's an unbelievable story, but they recall what happened. And they said, You remember when our brother was pleading with us to free him from that cistern? And Joseph must have been crying out, you know, Reuben, Simeon, leave.

Levi, Issachar, what are you doing? Let me out.

Okay, guys, I get it. I get it. I'm sorry. Just tell me what's going on and we can work this out. And nothing, didn't hear anything, and he just sat in the bottom of that pit and wondered what is going on.

And can you imagine the if-onlys that were going through his head? The if-onlys, if only I turned around and check them, if only I'd just gone back, and my dad would have said, That's all right, that's all right, we'll wait and hear from them later. And if only I hadn't worn that coat of many colors that they had stripped off, and it If only I hadn't shared those dreams with my brothers and all the if-only we could have. And I just wonder what if-onlys you have. If you think, if only I hadn't gotten into that car, if only I hadn't taken the first sip of that alcohol, if only I hadn't been born in that family, if only I hadn't married the man I married.

All the if-onlys we struggle with as women, and we can go back and we beat ourselves up and we think about all these things, but did you ever stop to think? God had you on a path. He had you on a path. And He still has you on one. And He's got a reason for that.

He's got a reason for the things you've gone through in life. And it's a different experience than everybody else. It's your story. It's what you've gone through. And God's going to use it.

And He wants to use it for His glory. And so, what is our heart posture like? Are we willing to be used of the Lord in our suffering, in the things that we've gone through? And so, what are those if-onlys that you've faced? I think about these heart attacks that I had and there's so many times I had these if-only.

It's like if only I hadn't gone to the stress test and if only I just stood up to that technician and said, no, I'm not doing this and I just walked out and all these things. But God had me on a path and it is a path that's taught me to trust him, to trust him when everything else is pointing against me. All the doctors are telling me another thing and I just have to trust in God's word and it's been a path where he has taken me deep with him. And what is God wanting to take you deep in? And are you fighting Him?

Are you frustrated? Are you angry? Just trust the path that He has you on in your affliction. Think of Charlie Kirk's family, the if-only that they have. You know, they could have thought if we just put up that protective glass and if He had just not gone to Utah Valley that day, and if He had just turned His head like Trump had, and all the if-onlys they could have had.

But God had a greater purpose. And oh, absolutely, Jesus loved Charlie Kirk and never would have wanted him to die for a million years, except there was a greater purpose. And in the death of Charlie Kirk, look at the millions of people that have marched all over the world shouting Christ is king, and atheists buying Bibles for the first time, and people going to church, and the harvest in this young generation of kids coming to Christ and people talking about Jesus being bold. And it's unbelievable. You can see.

The purpose in it. You can see the glory that's coming through such tremendous suffering. And so, Whatever your if-onlys are, whatever affliction you're in right now, you trust God that He's got you on a path and a plan and be willing to see that because He's faithful to us in the middle of our suffering. But not only in the middle of our affliction is He faithful to us, we have to be faithful to Him in our attitude. And in verse 2, so Joseph gets to Egypt.

So can you imagine him? He, oh, and so his brothers sell him into slavery.

So he's sitting there, and all of a sudden, these Ishmaelites come up. Do you realize that the Ishmaelites were their cousins, distant cousins? Because you remember Abraham had Isaac and Ishmael. And so these were distant cousins of Joseph. And they sell and they're slave traders.

And so they sell their brother Joseph. And you wonder if Joseph, mile after miles, 300 miles to Egypt, if he just kept turning around, you know, while he's bound to the cart or whatever and he's walking and kept turning around thinking, oh, my brother's going to come back. Was this just a cruel joke? And I've learned my lesson. And, you know, is my dad going to come?

And mile after mile after mile went by and he laid out under the stars at night. And all that time. When you've been through what he's been through, when your life just changed just like that, and suffering hit, what is our attitude? And he could have begun to be bitter and angry towards God and turned against God. Where are you, God?

Why is this happening to me? And I can't believe you've allowed this in my life. And he could have turned on God. But Joseph never did. And he gets to Egypt, and it says they put him, they sold him into slavery.

And so he probably was on an auction block. And can you imagine him standing there, probably in a cage, or maybe he's just chained up on this thing? And these men come through to try and buy different slaves. And they poke him and prod him and whatever. And Joseph, right there, could have screamed and shouted, Do you know who I am?

I'm the princely son of a wealthy man in Canaan, and I was sent here against my will. Let me free. Don't you dare touch me. I'm not going to serve you. I'm not going to be a slave to you.

He could have shouted and gotten angry and bitter and rageful. And he stood there. He accepted it from the Lord. He gets bought by Potiphar. And there we see God's mercy and affliction.

Like I said, always, always, always in your suffering, look for it. You can see God's mercy and affliction where it could be way worse than it is. And God just allows this mercy and affliction. And so Joseph was bought by Potiphar. And Potiphar was the captain of Pharaoh's guard.

And so he was an important man. And he bought Joseph. Joseph could have gotten bought by a guy that would have beat him every day and didn't give him food, and it could have been a terrible situation.

So it was a terrible situation, but it was better than it could have been. And so He goes into Potiphar's house and begins to serve Potiphar. And it's amazing his attitude because think about it: if you all were in that situation, if we were in that situation, and you would be so angry. I mean, I would. Like, what is going on?

I can't do this, Lord. This is the bottom of the bottle. Are you even here? Do you even see what I'm going through? And been so upset, and then you would get to Potiphar's house.

And I think I'm amazed that Joseph didn't just say, I'm not doing a thing, I'm not gonna lift a finger. In fact, I'm gonna sabotage Potiphar's house. And I can't believe this has happened, and just given up on God. But instead, Joseph's attitude was amazing. And so, look what happens in verse two.

Of chapter 39, it says, The Lord was with Joseph and he prospered. He lived in the house of his Egyptian master. When his master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord gave him success in everything he did, Joseph found favor in his eyes and became his attendant. Potiphar put him in charge of his household and he entrusted to his care everything he owned. From the time he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the Lord blessed the household of the Egyptian because of Joseph.

The blessing of the Lord was on everything Potiphar had, both in the house and in the field.

So he left in Joseph's care everything he had. With Joseph in charge, he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate. Joseph went from being a 17-year-old boy in his father's house with everything he could ever want and loved by his father to now he's a slave in Potiphar's house and he had an incredible attitude. He was, I mean, he literally just took it on like, okay, Lord, this is where you have me. I'm going to serve you to the best of my ability.

And he didn't get bitter. He didn't get angry. He wasn't mean. He wasn't angry towards Potiphar or the people in his house or, you know, wanting, you serve me. I'm not going to serve you.

I deserve better than this. All the things that we can do when we're in this situation that we're in, when we're suffering, and What is our attitude like in the middle of our suffering? What is our attitude like when we've got a pile of laundry? You know, when we've got dishes in the sink, or we've got kids that maybe driving you nuts, or maybe you because you don't feel well, maybe you suffer from migraines. My sister suffers from horrible migraines all the time, and that can be so crippling, and it's hard to have a great attitude.

And my sister does. I mean, she's amazing through her suffering, just staying so positive. And what is your attitude like with the doctors, you know, with the girl putting the IV in for the seventh time because it never took? You know, it's like, oh, it's okay, no, no, it's okay. You know, that happens so many times.

But what is our response to people? You know, is it just you're hurting, so you just want to hurt everybody else? And we need to have an attitude that, even in the midst of it, that's what God's wanting to do. Part of what He's wanting to do in the midst of your suffering is to teach you to just let go of yourself, die to yourself. And Lord, how can I glorify you in this hospital room?

How can I glorify you in this marriage? How can I glorify you raising kids that are difficult? How can I glorify you in a job where there's no other believers? You know, how can I glorify you when I've just lost all my money? All these things that hit us, and God's just watching.

He's just watching and just waiting for us to bring Him glory through our attitude. And it is not an easy thing. And so, I don't know what situation you're in. Just think about that. You know, what is our attitude in the midst of it?

And we have a woman that works at our office, and Mrs. Sandy, she was my girl, two of my girls' third grade teachers. She's just so wonderful. And I asked her one time, I was like, Would you be willing to come? She was talking about retiring.

I was like, Well, do you want to come work at our office? We love it. And she answered phones, and she came and had worked for us for, I don't know how long it's been, maybe eight years. And then just recently in the spring got diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She has to, she's been going through chemotherapy and she's just teeny tiny, lost so much weight, just so small and has lost all of her hair and And would you believe she's not like, I've been serving you, Lord, I've been working in ministry and I've had joy.

And then, why does this have to hit me? And I've got four daughters and all my grandkids. And instead, she has had the most beautiful attitude. And even though she can't work anymore, she still comes to the office and she's helped train the girl that's taken over a job. And she comes to the prayer time and prays for all of us and smiles.

And that's the kind of attitude in the middle of suffering. I have another friend, dear friend, Mitch Mason, and they just actually, which is crazy, I was going to talk about him today. And the News and Observer, our local newspaper in Raleigh, just wrote an article on him. And he's the chaplain for the University of North Carolina football team. And he's been there through several coaching staffs.

And Belichick actually kept him, if y'all keep up with all that. But anyhow. Mitch played football in college, and he's just this strong, wonderful guy that I just adore. And he and his wife have just been good friends. And he had come, spoke, my daughter asked him to come share his testimony.

He has a raw, rough testimony of growing up in South Florida and just what God did and took over his life. And then he's become this chaplain at Carolina. And about five years ago, he got hit with something. He was walking on the field, you know, praying for the football team as they're practicing, and his legs gave out and he fell down.

So they rushed him to the hospital. And for five years, he is in constant When I mean constant, I'm talking constant, extreme pain. Nothing is helping. His body is shutting down, but it's shutting down in very painful ways. His whole body his brain is migraines and His joints, his muscles, and the doctors can't figure it out.

He keeps getting one thing on top of another.

So, one diagnosis, and they're all rare. And so, I keep praying against the enemy, against his life, but Mitch. You can follow him. It's called Tarheel Chaplain at Tarheel Chaplain on Instagram. But anyhow, he puts stuff on his social media all the time about praising the Lord.

He'll be in the hospital. He's hooked up and he said, y'all, I'm just praising the Lord today. God is faithful. You know, we're in this fight together. We can glorify the Lord.

And what a testimony. That's it. What's your attitude? Suffering. It stinks.

It's awful to suffer. It's hard. It's not going to be easy. None of us want to go through it, but if you're chosen to go through it, it is for a purpose and a plan, just like Mrs. Sandy brought him glory, is bringing him glory, just like Mitch is bringing him glory.

You can bring him glory through your suffering, whatever it is. What's our attitude in the middle of it? It's something that it's not just like, okay, I'm going to have a good attitude. It's really something we daily have to think about almost hour by hour. You know, what's my attitude right now?

Okay, I'm heading into this situation. I'm going into this meeting and.

So-and-so is coming back to the house. What is my attitude gonna be? And we've gotta be faithful in these last days to bring God glory in our suffering because people watch. They watch you. When they know you're going through stuff, they wanna see how you handle it.

Now, I know she's talked about Jesus before. Let's see how she handles this. You want to showcase God's glory and know that He's going to bring you through and it's going to be awesome. And not only choose to be faithful, but then we want to choose to be firm. And everybody knows what the word firm means, but I looked up the definition just because sometimes it helps.

Firm is not soft or yielding when pressed, solid, hard, stiff, or rigid, securely fixed in place, not shaking or trembling, steadfast, unwavering.

So Joseph was firm and he was firm in his conviction. Uh Be sure to take advantage of all that's available for you at AngramLots.org. From Anne's blog, her messages, Bible studies, books, and videos, all will give you a deeper, richer relationship with Jesus through God's Word. And thanks for joining us today for Living in the Light.