![]() ![]() He has entailed upon His estate of Providence a perpetual charge of a daily portion for us, and He has promised that one day we shall clearly perceive that the estate itself has been well-farmed on our behalf and has always been ours. Christ is our Joseph, who has granaries full of wheat but He does not treat us as Joseph did the Egyptians, for He opens the door of His storehouse and bids us call all the good therein our own. “The boundless stores of Providence are engaged for the support of the believer. He is plotting the course and managing the troubles with far-reaching purposes for our good and for the glory of Jesus Christ.” ― John Piper, A Sweet and Bitter Providence: Sex, Race, and the Sovereignty of God God is not just showing up after the trouble and cleaning it up. And the point of biblical stories like Joseph and Job and Esther and Ruth is to help us feel in our bones (not just know in our heads) that God is for us in all these strange turns. “Life is not a straight line leading from one blessing to the next and then finally to heaven. Here are some quotes from others about providence: God’s providence did not hinder their will, only its result. They are still held responsible for their actions. At the same time, how significant that the brothers are not kept from making their choice. How deep is God’s wisdom that he knows how to do this! What craftsmanship and skill. God took the same fabric and, without undoing the brother’s handiwork, wove together a new piece out of the old piece which brought good to Joseph and his brothers. Joseph’s brothers wove together a scheme in which they planned, purposed, and intended to harm him. When Joseph says they “meant” it, he is using a word that originally described weaving something together, and which grew to mean thinking, planning, and intending something. “As for you, you meant evil against me but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.” Genesis 50:20 Look at Joseph’s words to his brothers after they asked for his forgiveness: In fact, the same word is used to describe the action of God and Joseph’s brothers which led to his captivity and slavery. But what interests me most about this episode is the way God’s action is interwoven with the actions of men. In fact, today’s reading is one of the best examples of God intervening to help his creatures. Now, I’m not saying there is no such thing as God’s providential care. The dictionary defines providence as God’s foreseeing care and guidance over the creatures of earth. The closest we come to the actual word in the Bible is in Acts 24:2 where the Greek pronoia (translated providence) is applied to a Roman governor named Felix. ![]() ![]() We talk about it a lot, but that word is never used in the Bible to describe God’s actions. ![]()
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