Bashan Ministries - Im Joseph

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When life is not going the way you think it should be going, God could be working to a plan...

Do you have a promise from God?

Are you waiting for it?

Does it seem like it will never come?

I guess that just about everyone can say a resounding yes to those questions, but I have to ask another.

Are you handling it properly?

I have often spoken on similar lines, but this time the story is based on Joseph.

It will be from a different perspective perhaps but I hope to share a few keys that may help you know what to do and how to go about it, so let’s start...

God was working to a plan!
Many years beforehand, He made a covenant with Abraham that he and Sarah would have an heir.
God is not a liar. Neither is He bound by time. If He said it, what He said is truth and it will happen.
The issue is not if but when and this is where you and I can get into trouble.

25 years after making that promise, when it seemed totally impossible, Abraham and Sarah (not Abraham and Hagar) had that son.

The promise was fulfilled.

This was around 1897 years before Christ.

Abraham’s heir, Jacob, was on the receiving end of that same promise and it applies to us also today.
148 years after God made that promise to Abraham, Joseph was born and we fuss and fret about time, even if only for a few years?

His birth was not under pleasant circumstances.
There was a lot of contention going on between Leah (she was the ugly cross-eyed one with the front tooth missing and a big wart on the end of her nose. Just joking folks) and the one Jacob really loved...Rachel

Sometimes the thing we really love, does not, or perhaps I should say cannot arrive immediately.
There could be other matters that take precedence...things that have to be done or things that must stop happening before that dream arrives.
One thing we can learn from this story is that despite the promise, it can be influenced by human activity. The human will (or won’t) is the issue here. We can have all the promises in the world but might have to deal with other people who can influence the outcome.

The other person can fail in fulfilling their part, do it differently, or only partially fulfill it. This is but one reason to keep quiet and be careful in what we share—how much we share—to whom we share and when, as we talk about our hopes, dreams and expectations and in particular, our ministry vision.

There are two good reasons for being quiet and it is not because we are being secretive. The first one is that we just might not yet see the full picture and acting prematurely can actually wreck God’s plan.

We could get sidetracked and go off onto a tangent that, although it seems great, is not going to get us to the right destination at the right time.
This is how Ismael was born and I am learning now more and more after 50 years with the Lord that there are far too many “Ishmael’s” in the church. There are people doing things that the Lord never asked them to do; churches that exist that He did not ordain and the like. We are rapidly coming to the day when people will tell Him, “We did this for you. We prophesied. We healed the sick. We started orphanages. We preached great sermons” and the like and He will tell them to get out of His sight. It sounds hard, but it is true. Jesus said so (see Luke 13:27).

We talk of the sorting of the sheep from the goats. That’s coming later. Right now, the Lord is sorting sheep from sheep!

I am often asked to visit churches in other countries and, although I would like to do so more than I do at present and the Lord says that I will do so, I do not know the timing. In essence, God has not yet given permission, but when I get the green light...I’m off and running, but until then we all must chafe at the bit and learn something everyone hates...exercise patience. If not, then we will do what He never asked us to do...yet.
As an example, when we visited Liberia, we did so only when the Lord said we could go. I had made all travel bookings, had my tickets, passport and visa. When we arrived at the Brisbane airport we were refused permission by the airline duty manager to board the aircraft! She asked us to wait as she telephoned her counterpart at Sydney and we watched our flight take off without us! We changed our schedule and departed from Sydney a few days later and the duty manager there gave us royal treatment and off we went.

At first such delays and disappointments will hit us all. The issue is how we handle such things. Sometimes we might not know why our plans do not seem to be working, or working as fast as we would like, but there is always a good reason. Father knows best! We later found out that if we had gone when we originally planned, we would have been killed in an Arab country and perhaps our bodies dumped in the desert, never to be found!

This is one reason why we need to exercise patience and listen to the voice of the Lord!

Another reason for keeping quiet is that we can telegraph our moves to the enemy. In WW2, many different kinds of posters like “Walls have ears” abounded. It helped prevent spies from finding out the Allies plans and setting traps.
On D-Day, the Allies went to great lengths to confuse the Nazis about the actual place on the invasion. Bombers flew at precise heights, on carefully planned courses, changing course on precise timetables as they dropped “window” that was strips of aluminum foil. The idea was to make it look like an invasion fleet appearing on German radar sailing to a totally different destination to the actual place—Normandy.

Similar things can happen in the realm of the spirit also. This stuff is real. It is no spiritual fantasy. Marjorie and I are constantly told to be silent about many of our plans. In my own exuberant, almost childish excitement, I am prone to blab too much, telling just about everyone what we are going to do and got hurt in the process, because of the negative treatment and opposition often received—by Christians. We sometimes get better treatment by non-believers.

One problem is that we think that most other people “think like us”. They don’t! They might not have had the same revelation. They might get a huge dose of spiritual jealousy and if they don’t have what you have, do not want you to have it too. Dream-killers are around! Sadly, many of them are fellow believers. Spiritual jealousy does exist.
A remedy for those of us in ministry is to be careful in who we appoint, avoid novices and not give them too much responsibility prematurely and so on. Paul told Timothy many things about qualifications for ministry, one of which was appointing novices to office. He said that someone who wanted to be in a responsible leadership role, such as a pastor, should “prove” themselves. No one with half a brain would give an infant a hand grenade to play with, but sometimes spiritual babies are playing with dynamite.

A pastor has a serious and accountable position, caring for the Lord’s sheep. We use the term “my church” or “my ministry” and understand why, but in reality they are the Lord’s sheep...not ours. It is His Church, not mine. When the Lord took me to hell for a 45 minute visit, I saw pastors there! I am fully aware that what I say and do has to thus be “right” before the Lord. He told Timothy to lay hands suddenly on no one. This relates to doing it too soon.

Never be in a hurry about appointing a church leader. Do not share in the sins of others. Keep yourself pure. 1 Timothy 5:22

Returning now to our main message, the passage of interest is-
And God remembered Rachel, and God hearkened to her, and opened her womb.
And she conceived, and bare a son; and said, God hath taken away my reproach:
And she called his name Joseph; and said, The LORD shall add to me another son. Genesis 30:22-24

It is not that God “forgets”. He never does that, but He has an appointed time for things and when that time arrives, it then happens and so it seems that He then “remembers”. I hope you see it.

Come now to Genesis 37. It is approximately 17 years later and Jacob showed partiality to Joseph. I know we can have “favorites”, but we really shouldn’t. Our love and affection should be impartial and equal to all. Although the firstborn was supposed to have the inheritance, Jacob did not treat all his children equally and it created the environment whereby the other children started to resent Joseph. I know what it is like to be on the receiving end of sibling rivalry. As the last child of my own parents, I was sometimes treated like a boy, even after leaving my parents’ home when I got married. Those of you who are parents need to “do it right” or risk problems in the family environment. One thing to avoid is doting on anyone.

Jacob doted on Joseph so much that he made him a “coat of many colors” and this really got up the others’ noses.

This coat of many colors, was more of a multi-layered shirt-like tunic and the reference to colors is not really what you think. It may have been multi colored, but the real significance is that it represented abundance or plenty and at times indicated that the wearer was to be the heir! Little wonder they got mad. They got so mad at Joseph (but Jacob was the culprit) that they started slandering him. That was their evil report.

Pastors and Christian workers, never get jealous over someone else’s calling and anointing. Do not slander anyone. What is sad is that it often has bad consequences, to the point that the person can become bitter and negative, continually looking for faults in others and the blessing can cease! Their life can dry up.
It happens!

It can get so bad that the perpetrators are actually doing the devil’s work, because he is the accuser of the brethren. I know that because I have been on the receiving end of such devilish junk. It got so bad once that I thought of taking legal action until the Lord told me to drop it, forget it, get on with my job and let Him handle it. He did! Please do not touch the anointing and please do not gossip.

Such things engender strife and contention and Joseph’s own brothers started hating him, simmering on it, hating him more, simmering on it more and more and the cycle goes on. Sad to say, sometimes fellow believers do this.

Genesis 37:5 tells us that Joseph had a dream. Now dreams can have no meaning whatsoever. Sometimes they can be plain crazy, but on occasions there is a meaning and they can often be interpreted.

Joseph’s dream was prophetic in nature, but it was for a future time. We want things “now”, but not “then” or "when".

It was all part of God’s plan and if you remember, God made a covenant with Abraham that includes us!

He told Abraham all about the blessing; all about the land; all about the good things (we want), but He also said that there would be a real issue; that they would have 400 years of dramas.

We know of course that Israel was in bondage in Egypt for 430 years, but God brought them out—and a key part of the plan included Joseph.

This lad was an important part of the plan of God and God revealed it to him in this dream...but!

Joseph blabbed! He should have kept his mouth shut, but, as we are prone to do, got all excited and started shooting his mouth off before getting the full picture.

He had another dream later in Genesis 37:9.

I wonder what would have happened if Joseph had exercised a little more wisdom and discretion instead of shooting from the hip.

As usual, I ask questions. God wants us to know, not to hide things from us. We can come to Him and ask Him how things happened, why they happened and so on. My own prayer life has radically changed because we tend to get into a “give me” approach in prayer and come with a shopping list. That’s OK, but He know what we are like and what is happening before we cry out. We do not need to yell out. He is not deaf. Although Jesus spoke on persistence in prayer, He also told us that the Father Always heard Him and always means just that. If we know that God hears us, we can receive the answers, so praying the way God wants and how Jesus prayed is the key. See 1 John 5:14-15.

If God dwells In us, we do not have to “bring Him down” and seek, seek, seek seek. He is not a billion miles up in deep space but closer than you think. If we learn how to pray like Jesus, our prayer life would radically change...and our prayers would really be answered. Isaiah said that God hears us before we ask and whilst we are speaking, He will hear. Isaiah 65:24.

I rarely pray now (in the traditional way of thinking). I tend to have a family discussion with the Lord, sometimes with Marjorie and the Lord together and we discuss matters.
I focus much now on asking Him what He wants; what would He like me to do; what we are going to do together and where are we going today? It is a two-way thing. Often times our “prayers are little other than blab, blab, blab and He rarely gets to talk because we are doing all the speaking! Think of it.

Anyhow, I’m getting sidetracked, (but am I really?). It seems to me that Joseph would have been better off seeking God in preference to shooting his mouth off to family, but God knew he would anyhow. Perhaps that was the only way God could get His plan to work.

The point I want to make is that, despite our weaknesses and frailties, immaturity and foolishness, God can turn things around, so if you have had a legitimate vision or dream from God in some manner, have enough common sense to sit on it and wait to see what comes next. Sometimes the things we are going through and the things that we really dislike and want to escape from, are the very things God wants to use to get the blessing to us; to get His plan to work.

Sometimes the dramas we face, are in a sense, self-inflicted. Job’s were. We focus on his problems, but they only lasted for 49 days. God never “allowed” the devil to inflict those things on him as we have been wrongly taught, but have to concede a legal truth as in a court of law in a court case and His hands were tied. Job finished up with twice what he lost!

Do you see what I am getting at? God could ask us to do a certain thing and we refuse to do it. He may ask us to stop doing a certain thing, but we continue in it. He could want us to go to a particular place, but we will not go there...or He may tell us not to go there, but we go anyhow and then, when the bottom falls out of everything, we start crying and complaining.

Is it remotely possible that God really wanted Joseph to simply move to Egypt voluntarily?

I really do not know, but he had to get there one way or another and probably had no intention of going anyhow. If so, then God may have had to “force the issue”. Never think that He will not take radical steps. He does. It is not all grace, grace, grace you know. We are still dealing with an unchanging God whose word never alters. Neither does His demands for holiness, righteousness, holiness, honesty, intregity and purity etc.

Jesus plainly told us that if we are not prepared to pay any price, including leaving your own home and family (if that is clearly what He wants), we are not worthy of being His true disciples. He did not say that He came only to bring peace. He said that He would also bring a sword.
Do not think that I have come to bring peace upon the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to part asunder a man from his father, and a daughter from her mother, and a newly married wife from her mother-in-law— And a man’s foes will be they of his own household.
He who loves [and takes more pleasure in] father or mother more than [in] Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves [and takes more pleasure in] son or daughter more than [in] Me is not worthy of Me;
And he who does not take up his cross and follow Me [cleave steadfastly to Me, conforming wholly to My example in living and, if need be, in dying also] is not worthy of Me. Matthew 10:34-38. See also Matthew 19:29; Psalm 55:12-14

Marjorie and I have experienced the traumas of having our own family turn against us, so we know what Jesus said is very real, but we also know that He is faithful and brings peace to the soul.
Is holding onto something, no matter what it is, so worth it that we will go to hell as a result?

The issue is, “who” and “what” comes first? This is radical perhaps, but it is true and it is often seen in the bible.

One key word that is very unpopular is Obedience. 1 Samuel 15:22 is a classic example. I did a quick search on obedience and got more than 200 references, but what has this to do with Joseph?

Although The Law had not yet been given, is may be possible that Joseph had “broken” this commandment-
Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee. Exodus 20:12

There is a spiritual principle at stake. Sure that (written) Law was not yet given, but in his immaturity and rashness, had he inadvertently broken it by talking too much? Let us see the full account of his dreams.
One night Joseph had a dream, and when he told his brothers about it, they hated him more than ever.
“Listen to this dream,” he said.
“We were out in the field, tying up bundles of grain. Suddenly my bundle stood up, and your bundles all gathered around and bowed low before mine!”
His brothers responded, “So you think you will be our king, do you? Do you actually think you will reign over us?” And they hated him all the more because of his dreams and the way he talked about them.
Soon Joseph had another dream, and again he told his brothers about it. “Listen, I have had another dream,” he said. “The sun, moon, and eleven stars bowed low before me!”
This time he told the dream to his father as well as to his brothers, but his father scolded him. “What kind of dream is that?” he asked. “Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow to the ground before you?” But while his brothers were jealous of Joseph, his father wondered what the dreams meant. Genesis 37:5-11 (emphasis mine)

What happened and what did he do wrong?

His brothers already hated him and were slandering him before he had his dreams. In a family circle like that, surely such simmering resentment and outspoken words would have been evident even if only in part. Did he deliberately add fuel to the fire? Was this an attempt to “get even”? Perhaps he would have been wiser in asking his father what it was all about first.
When he told his brothers about the first dream, their hatred increased
He dreamed another dream and this time, he again told it to his brethren. They had already told him their opinion, but he ignored it and told them about this one. “Hey! Listen to this!”
Jacob did at least ponder over them but his brothers had been provoked so much that they lost self control
This time he told this dream to his father also and Jacob scolded him for it. I agree with Jacob. He was the head of the family and the head of the tribe. He was “the elder”, so protocol should have dictated that he come before his father and ask his counsel. “Dad. I dreamed a dream and this is what I saw. What do you think it means?” His father had dreams also, so must have realized God was saying something

God had a plan and was trying to tell Joseph about it, but Joseph let the cat out of the bag and it’s hard to get the cat back in afterward. Let us bring this into our own lives now and see how it applies to us. When God has a plan and wants you to get involved, He can tell you in different ways such as-

In a dream or vision
A revelation in His word when He speaks to you and that thing seems to jump out of the page at you and you know that you know it is God talking
A word of prophecy. Please remember that a prophecy should confirm what you already know or suspect
A combination of the above

Check it out. Get confirmation to affirm that it is indeed God speaking.
Ask Him to show you a passage of scripture that applies, but do not go searching out in your favorite scriptures as many do for one that you like or suits what you want. Make sure it is “yours” and that you are not mimicking someone else and that often happens with sad consequences.
Make sure of the timing. Habakkuk spoke of a vision having “the appointed time”.
[OH, I know, I have been rash to talk out plainly this way to God!] I will [in my thinking] stand upon my post of observation and station myself on the tower or fortress, and will watch to see what He will say within me and what answer I will make [as His mouthpiece] to the perplexities of my complaint against Him.
And the Lord answered me and said, Write the vision and engrave it so plainly upon tablets that everyone who passes may [be able to] read [it easily and quickly] as he hastens by.
For the vision is yet for an appointed time and it hastens to the end [fulfillment]; it will not deceive or disappoint. Though it tarry, wait [earnestly] for it, because it will surely come; it will not be behindhand on its appointed day. Habakkuk 2:1-3. See also Genesis 18:14; Exodus 9:5, 23:15; Joshua 8:14; Job 7:1; Psalm 81:3: Jeremiah 8:7

Our problem is impatience, forgetting that the best wine is kept until last and that we are here as in Esther’s case, “for such a time as this”.
You and I could be the last generation here before Jesus returns and I believe it. If so, then God is working to that plan and we must of necessity find out what it is and work to that plan. I don’t want to blow it and I know that part of the process is quitting self generated works and programs and in plain language to sit down, shut up, watch and listen and then...obey.
Paul did. His first step was to obey the Lord’s directions and to wait for the next set of instructions.
He had just seen Jesus on the road to Damascus and I guess most of us would have been so excited and “motivated” that we would immediately race off and start “doing something”. Jesus told him to go into the city and wait for instructions! (See Acts 95-6).
If you follow his ministry, you will see that he went into the desert alone for a period of time, before launching out into his ministry. It took him 14 years before he took Barnabus and Titus with him to Jerusalem. Waiting is difficult and most of us hate it. I jokingly say that my name is Robert Waiting Carter. This stuff is hard, but the bible speaks volumes about faith AND patience. They go hand in hand.

The Lord once shared with me His thoughts on “witnessing”, “serving” and “working for Him, saying that He would prefer people to Be witnesses rather than “witnessing”.
The latter forces issues, but the former is an automatic result of the natural life within. We should be naturally supernatural and supernaturally natural.

God’s plan included Joseph, but the boy got into all kinds of problems and they all started off when he could not shut up and tried to make things happen. You know the story. His brothers wanted to kill him, but we forget that the literal act is no different to the attitude of the heart.

Jesus said-
“You have heard that our ancestors were told, ‘You must not murder. If you commit murder, you are subject to judgment.’
But I say, if you are even angry with someone, you are subject to judgment! If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the court. And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell.
“So if you are presenting a sacrifice at the altar in the Temple and you suddenly remember that someone has something against you, leave your sacrifice there at the altar. Go and be reconciled to that person. Then come and offer your sacrifice to God. Matthew 5:21-24

The outcome was that Joseph was sent to Egypt, but God knew what was going on and the lad had to get there somehow. We need to exercise wisdom, discretion and patience in the dealings of God in our lives.

I believe in healing. I’ve seen enough in 50 years to know that the healing ministry of Jesus is real and that He wants us to heal the sick too, but I never discount the sovereignty of God.