Finding God’s Divine Purpose through Glory or Agony.

As Joseph waited in prison, God still had not brought to pass the dream He gave Joseph when he was 17 years old (Gen. 37). Joseph was now 30 years old and had spent over half of his life waiting for God to fulfill His promise that he would rule over his brothers. Meanwhile, he has been faithful with what God has given him, both position and promises. From his youth, Joseph was faithful to God’s Word, even when it got him in trouble. And in His own timing, God would exalt him.

Communion with God alone is enough to help us all combat discouragement.

According to statistics, about 5% of people across the globe suffer from depression, and over 10% of Americans are depressed. Sometimes depression has a physical cause; sometimes it is caused by circumstances. When our circumstances threaten to discourage us, God’s remedy is spiritual. Though you might not guess on the first read, Joseph’s story in Genesis 40 tells us how to avoid depression and discouragement in our Christian walk.

Having Nothing But Having Everything.

At the start of Genesis 39, Joseph’s resume isn’t likely to earn him an audience with anyone in power. He was the least popular child in his home, constantly bullied, but lived for truth and was not known as a liar. His resume would tell the story of being a victim of child trafficking, purchased as a slave but maintaining his responsibility before the Lord, before having everything taken away because he resisted temptation to be immoral. Joseph was viewed as a commodity by everyone around him, but hand of the Lord was with him wherever he went.

God provides generational protection when we offer our full obedience.

Psalm 63 describes a saint who needs refreshment. Jacob receives spiritual refreshment from the Lord in Genesis 35 as he gets right with God and continues to make progress.

Have you ever cried out to the Lord hoping he would hear you? Have you ever wondered does God really hear? Psalm 25 indicates that there are those who are confident that the Lord hears them. You can know this assurance.

The Difference Between Godly and Cultural Stability

Genesis 33 ended with Jacob’s family worshipping together. They were in God’s will living at Shechem on their way to Bethel where God had called them. The next chapter shows how quickly things can change. Jacob’s family got comfortable and settled down in the culture around them. Their hearts were no longer inclined toward Bethel. They became under-whelmed with God’s will, and the results were tragic.

Our spiritual strength comes from our surrender to God.

Along the path of Christian growth, sometimes we can feel like we’re stuck in a traffic jam on a one-lane highway. The pace slows sometimes with trials and afflictions, and other times it speeds up. The Lord determines the pace.

As Genesis 32 begins, Jacob’s pace is picking up. He’s reminded that divine help always goes with him along the way. Likewise, Christians have angelic forces that minister to us, always working to help us be more like Christ.

Of all things we experience in life, our relationships reveal the most about our character.

All Scripture is God’s Word, and is “profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16). It’s our natural tendency to apply principles that we know from the New Testament to Old Testament stories. But remember, a text taken out of context leaves just a con. So don’t judge Jacob too harshly. His family did not have the written Bible, but they did have the oral Word of God which they were responsible for.

Once saved, we never graduate from the School of Christ while on earth.

You’ve probably of someone “cramming 4 years of college into 10.” In Genesis 29, Jacob spends 20 years in the school of spiritual hard knocks. The first events are glorious, but they are soon followed by tragedy and consequences.

Please be patient: God is not finished with Jacob yet!

God can still use saints that have failed and help them make right choices again, even in their last years. Isaac and Rebekah are an example that it’s never too late to do right. True saints experience guilt and conviction that leads to repentance, forsaking sin, and prospering again. Now governed by the Spirit, Isaac comes to his senses and sends Jacob on a journey to continue in God’s will.

God’s Strength and Sovereignty Remain as Our Faith Struggles.

Our study of the Regeneration section of Genesis continues with the second and third of the patriarchs, Isaac and Jacob. Isaac demonstrated his faith throughout his life by being a submissive perpetuator of the faith. He made mistakes, but he won more spiritual battles than he lost. Lest we read this account from the end of his life and assume he was a failure, remember that Isaac is included in the Great Hall of Faith (see Hebrews 11:20).

God’s Enduring Faithfulness in Times of our Periodic Impatience.

Our culture has an obsession with greatness that often leaves us normal people asking, if I can’t be great, is my life really worth anything? Yet there is greatness in spiritual simplicity. The greatest thing we could do is to know Jesus Christ, walk with Him, and serve in His local church for the Gospel’s sake. Let God be great through your obedience.

Isaac was a simple man, mostly known for being the son of Abraham and the father of Jacob – yet God used him to perpetuate an eternal seed.

A life lived for God will be a life abundantly blessed by God.

Genesis 25 records the end of Abraham’s life and shows two the contrasting lives of his sons, Ishmael and Isaac.

God’s grace is seen through our relationships and in our futures.

Though Genesis 24 is about the marriage of Isaac and Rebekah on the surface, that is not the primary focus of the chapter. There are many spiritual principles for us to learn from these 67 verses.

The mourning of the faithful.

Genesis 23 shows Abraham going through the most extreme trial of an aged Christian’s life. He loses his wife Sarah, whom he had been married to for 100 years or more! How Abraham endures this agony is a great lesson to us.

The enduring faith and compelling sacrifice of a father.

In God’s providence, the next chapter of Genesis fits perfectly with a Father’s Day theme. The Lord provides for every need of His people’s hearts when preaching through the whole Word of God.

The American evangelical culture can view God as an activity director on a cruise ship. We expect Him to be blessing us every moment, or He is not doing His job. This passage corrects that understanding. Faith is cultivated through trials.

A genuine walk of faith rejoices in God’s will, clears obstacles to one’s walk, and evangelizes in one’s world.

There are no more happy people on earth than those who know and do the will of God! God’s will is found as we study His Word. We are responsible to what we know of the Scriptures.

Supreme faith waits for God in crisis and the commonplace.

The narrative of Genesis 20 might look familiar, because we saw a similar story in Genesis 12. This is Abram’s second failure to trust God with his wife and his personal safety. Whenever God’s Word repeats itself, there is something for us to learn.

Those who have sacrificed for our freedom know that refuge is a fragile thing.

Psalm 16 gives us a glimpse into the warrior King David’s heart and shows us where he took refuge. David didn’t trust in his army, his people, his power, or his wealth. He knew that God alone is the source of refuge and soul security.

When God’s People Live Like the World.

Genesis 19 is a hard chapter to understand. It is often misunderstood and misinterpreted as judgment on one particular sin, but it is not. Rather, it should be read as a sub-narrative in Abraham’s story about how God’s people can slip into living like the world.