Full Textual Sermon...
"Not everything that God asks us to do is convenient, but everything God asks us to do, He does give us the grace to do it. I always say that God gives you the grace for the place, even if you're raising a special needs child. I believe that God will give you the grace to do that. I know a young woman who has two special needs children, they're twins, and then she has two other boys. It's amazing what it takes for her to take care of all these kids. You just look at people and think, 'I don't know how you do it.' Well, people do whatever God wants them to do by the grace of God, which means He gives us the ability to do it.
Maybe right now, you're in a difficult marriage, but you believe God wants you to stick it out. You know what? You don't have to be miserable and unhappy the whole time you're in that situation. If you're in the place God wants you to be in, then He'll give you the grace to be in that place, and that means you can be in an uncomfortable place and still have joy.
Yeah, well, I'm not perfect at it either. Remember, I got the revelation a few weeks ago that I don't like being uncomfortable. So, if you don't need this message, I'll preach to myself.
Let's talk about Joseph for a minute because I find this to be very interesting. How many of you are someplace in life right now that just doesn't make any sense to you at all? Better than half of the people here. Well, you know, you live life forward, but you understand it backward. When you're going through stuff, you just don't get it, but later on, you can look back. So many of the things that were so hard for me, I look back now and I realize how God had to let that happen.
You know, sometimes God will even use people's weaknesses to help us grow spiritually. How can we ever learn to love the unlovely if everybody we're around is nice to us? That's not unconditional love. Don't expect every day of your life to be perfect. Now, I'm not saying you got to go around and believe for trouble all the time, but don't be shocked when things are inconvenient.
So, Joseph went from living a nice little life – he was the youngest, daddy's favorite (you know, the babies are always the favorite) – to slavery, to prison, to being put in a position to save a nation. You notice he had to leave comfort, go into misery, to be in a position where he could save a nation. Let's do it again: he went from comfort to unjust, unfair treatment, very uncomfortable. He had to go through that stage to grow him up enough to get him to the point where he could save a nation.
When God called me into ministry, well, first of all, I was not doing anything special. I was making my bed, and I had three teenagers at the time, and basically was just trying to survive life. You know, I loved God, and we went to church every week, but I didn't look much like a Christian. I mean, I was very immature and always mad and upset about something. I would have been your least likely candidate probably to be called to preach, but God knows things about us. He not only sees where we're at but He sees where we will be.
And you know, let me just throw in here, that we need to be willing to look at more people that way, not just look at where they're at right now, but what their potential is if somebody will love them unconditionally, pray for them, and stick with them through some stuff. Amen.
You know, Dave was dating three girls when he met me, and he was praying for a wife. I always say that Dave definitely believed that faith without works is dead. So, he was believing for a wife, but he was dating everything that moved. [Applause] So, when he met me, we had five dates and got married. I don't recommend it, but I always say that he had to marry me before he found out what he was really getting or it would have never worked.
So, I mean, I was hard to deal with. I'd been abused and divorced and didn't trust anybody. And I mean, I can actually tell you when I married Dave, I could never remember ever being really happy in my life or ever feeling safe. And so, I just had a lot of wounds and a lot of hurts. And man, if he would have done things like so many people do today, if you're uncomfortable, it's inconvenient, you're incompatible... I mean, who is compatible?
I mean, who marries somebody and says, 'Oh, I just like everything you do.' You know, I mean, that's just fantasy. And so, you know, you get along because you choose to get along, and you get along because you decide that you don't have to have your way all the time, and that you're going to do what God wants you to do, not what you feel like doing. And so, if Dave would have been more concerned about his comfort than doing what he felt like God wanted him to do, I probably wouldn't be here today doing what I'm doing because somebody had to not just tell me about Jesus; somebody had to be Jesus in my life.
And I'll tell you, I didn't change overnight. It took some time. And so many things, when God called me into ministry, there were so many hard things that I went through. I mean, we lost all of our friends, we got asked to leave our church, we had to find different schools for our kids because they went to school at church, and people that I loved and trusted turned against me and talked about me. And man, I didn't understand all that. I was just trying to be a good girl and do what I felt like God wanted me to do.
You ever feel like that? 'Well, I'm just trying to do what I think is right, and I feel like all hell's broken loose on me.' Come on, do you ever feel that way? It's like, well, see, we expect that if we do what's right, that we should get rewarded right away. But that doesn't always happen that way. Those who diligently seek God will receive a reward in due time. In due time.
Well, now I look back. I didn't understand. I mean, I did not understand. I mean, family members turned against us. It was a tough time. I tell Dave sometimes, I don't really even, other than the grace of God, I don't know how I even had the ability to keep saying yes to God with everything that I was losing.
You have to understand, back when I started doing this, I mean, women in ministry were just like very unpopular. There just wasn't that many people. But I look back now, and I was so dependent on people and what they thought of me, and I got my worth and my significance from people. And I'm telling you what, God had to kick every prop out from under me and teach me how to get rooted and grounded in Him.
So maybe you're someplace right now where you don't... It's
not convenient, it's not comfortable, you don't want to be there. Well, let me make a new suggestion to you. Instead of begging God to get you out of there, why don't you just say, 'God, when you're ready to move me to another place, I trust that you will. But in the meantime, teach me whatever it is I need to learn while I'm here, and use me for Your glory while I'm in this place.'
You know how much more you would enjoy... You can enjoy being in hard places if you have the right attitude. How many of you need to hear what I'm saying this morning? [All right, 'cause I'll quit if you don't want to hear it.] Well, probably I won't, but okay.
So now, Joseph has gone through all this stuff, and it's been really hard. He's in prison for 13 years for something that he did not do. He helped the baker and the butler get out of prison, asked them to remember him. They, of course, they forgot all about him. He stayed in prison. But you know, when God has a plan for your life, no matter what people don't do for you... Come on now, when God is ready to make a move, nobody will stop Him.
And listen, part of Satan's plan is to get us all messed up with bitterness and unforgiveness. So he arranges for people to hurt us, hoping we'll get all messed up inside. So then we never end up getting what God wants us to have because now we're out of sorts with God. But if you can just continue doing what God tells you today to do, when your time... Listen to me, when your time for promotion comes, no man on Earth and no devil in hell can keep you from what God has for you.
[Applause] So we just need to stop blaming people and just secretly look at them and say, 'Be...,' under your breath, 'No matter what you do to me, you cannot keep God from blessing me. God's got a plan for you.'
So it's the end of the whole thing now. Joseph has gotten out of prison. He's gotten favor with Pharaoh because he interpreted a dream for him. And Pharaoh trusts him so much that he's put him in charge of all the food, and they were facing... They'd already had two years of famine and were facing five more. And so if anybody wanted anything to eat, they had to get it from Joseph.
So his father and his brothers, the brothers who sold him into slavery, they're living somewhere else now, not in Egypt, and they're hungry. And they hear that there's food there. So they went, got an appointment with Joseph, not knowing that he was the brother whom they had mistreated.
So, starting in Genesis 45:1, it says, 'Then Joseph could not control himself before all those who stood by him, and he cried, "Make everyone go out from me." So no one stayed with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers. And he wept aloud so that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard it. And Joseph said to his brothers, "I am Joseph. Is my father still alive?" And his brothers could not even answer him, for they were dismayed, or you might say afraid, at his presence. They thought, 'Well, now we're going to get what's coming to us.'
So Joseph said to his brothers, 'Come near to me, please.' And they came near. And he said, 'I am your brother Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. But now, do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me here before you to preserve life.'
So he's basically saying, 'You thought you were sending me here, but the only reason you sent me here was because God wanted me here, and He had a purpose.'
So let me tell you something, even in some of the things that happen that seem so unbelievably unfair and unjust, God can still have a purpose, and we need to remember, 'God is in control of my life, not you.'
Verse 6: 'For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors.'
So it was not you who sent me here, but God. And He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and ruler over all the land of Egypt.
You know, I don't have time to do this, so I won't get into it, but I can go back to my own story. I mean, I prayed for God to get me out of that situation, and He didn't. Now, I don't think God's an abuser, and I don't think He arranged for my father to abuse me, but He could have gotten me out of the situation much sooner than what He did. And God had a plan all along.
He wanted to use me to expose what was going on behind closed doors in so many places. As far as I know, I was one of the first people to start really talking about incest and sexual abuse. And, you know, I've got this... And I believe it is a gift from God. I mean, I am extremely open about my life, and usually anybody else's life that has anything to do with me. And, uh, so people always say, 'You just need to know if you're going to hang out with Joyce, you're probably going to get talked about in the pulpit.'
And so, because I have this gift of being so honest, I was able to tell that story and tell it in a way that sets so many people free. So the devil thought... Come on, the devil may think that he's got you somewhere where he's ruining you and destroying you, but little does he know it's the springboard for your promotion in life.
Amen. Now, there are so many examples. There's two things that we all have. One of them is one of these. [Applause] We wear that because we don't want to be bothered. You know, 'Don't bother me.' And then we all have an excuse bag. We've all got one of these. So if somebody gets past that 'don't bother me,' we've got an excuse ready for God. Let's see, I mean, we have just got so many... 'Well, God, I don't know how to do that.' That's the first thing I said when He called me to teach. 'I don't know how to teach.' He said, 'I know, but I do.'
If you just had any idea how dumb I was when I started this, you would spend the rest of the day rolling around the floor, laughing. I mean, I have no idea how I got from where I was to where I am, but here we are.
'Well, God, this is not... That's not what I had planned.' 'I can't do that.' 'I'm not ready for this yet.' 'Maybe another time.' 'I have too many personal problems of my own.'
Boy, that is a big one. 'I... You know, well, God, I'll increase my giving next time I get a raise.'
No, God doesn't want you to wait for a time where you can give it and not miss it. Maybe He wants your vacation money. 'Well, I've been saving that for three years. I... I've got a plan.'
Why? God's not mean. Why would He take my vacation money? Come on, if you're believing for something big, you might as well get ready to sow big. And you might as well get ready to sow sacrificially.
My gosh, do I admire people who will do what God tells them to do, even when it makes no sense at all to them. And what if you never, ever, while you're breathing, make any sense out of it? It still is just good to obey God.
I don't know anybody who's ever done this before. This is the favorite. 'Well, it's just too hard.' 'I have no experience.' 'I have nobody to help me.' 'I don't have any money.' 'I'm afraid.' 'I don't feel like it.'
Come on, you got one of these. Maybe it's not like mine. I mean, you may not see it like you see mine, but how many of you know we've got excuses? God uses your journey to prepare you for the assignment that He's given you.
Stop making excuses. That's the message today. Stop making excuses and just do what God tells you to do."