What We Know When We Don't Know

                  Profit (Sonnet 18)
It’s hard to face the tests by God decreed;
They often leave me puzzled and in pain.
Yet they’re acceptable and meet a need;
Beyond okay, they’re good and give great gain.
My eyes are dim, my knowledge incomplete.
Though I can’t fully understand or know,
I still can worship thankful at His feet
For skillful work that He’s designed just so.
I cannot grasp the profit just for me;
In growth and trust, there’s so much I have gained.
Beyond my “now,” there’s much that I can’t see;
To me alone His work is not restrained.
Aware or not, I’ll thank Him all my days,
And for His glorious work give Him much praise.

I’ve been reading lately about Joseph. As we trace the story of his life, we see him obeying his father, being diligent in his employment, resisting temptation, showing kindness to others, making the best of bad situations, and trusting patiently in God. His upright actions were “rewarded” with hatred, betrayal, false accusation, imprisonment, and neglect.

Joseph must have wondered what was going on. He could not have known what God had in store for him or that all of these trials were necessary to bring about an amazing plan. It would have been easy to ask, “Why removal from family? Why slavery? Why prison? Why forgotten when it seemed justice was finally in sight?”

If Joseph asked these questions, they are not recorded in Scripture. Instead of questions about what he did not understand, we see Joseph making wonderful statements about what he did understand. (Granted, he made these statements after seeing some of the purpose revealed, but he had lived faithfully through the preceding years because of his trust in God, a trust based in the knowledge that God was at work in his life. In these verses he says with his words what he had previously said with his life.)

 
Gen. 45:5 “God sent me before you to preserve life.”
Gen. 45:7 “God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant in the earth, and to keep you alive by a great deliverance.”
Gen. 50:20 “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive.” (NASB)

Did Joseph know all of this when he was in the pit? When he was being carried away as a slave? When he was cast into disfavor by an outright lie? When he was living in the darkness of the prison? No. Many years passed before he saw what God was doing.

Can you imagine the light of understanding that dawned when Joseph saw his brothers appear at the great storehouses he had constructed, desperate for food in the midst of the great famine? Can you see his mind putting two and two together, thinking, “So this is why God has me in this position”? Knowing that five years of famine remained, he understood that the difficult and distasteful events of his life were purposefully arranged by God in order to preserve the nation of Israel, which otherwise would have starved into extinction.

We don’t see the outcomes in our lives either. Weeks, months, years, and even decades may pass, with each one bringing additional confusion and hardship. We wonder why God is doing such things. In time, we may come to see the individually bizarre pieces fitting together in a rapturous masterpiece of God’s design. Then again, maybe we won’t. But God knows. Whether we see it or not, and no matter how long it takes for us to understand, God knows exactly what He is doing. He crafts each event to fit perfectly into His master plan. While we don’t know what God is doing, we do know that He is doing, and for that we can praise Him.