CHAPTER 1

you'll getthrough this

She had a tremble to her, the inner tremble you could feel withjust a hand on her shoulder. I saw her in a grocery store. Hadnot seen her in some months. I asked about her kids and husband,and when I did, her eyes watered, her chin quivered, and thestory spilled out. He'd left her. After twenty years of marriage, threekids, and a dozen moves, gone. Traded her in for a younger model.She did her best to maintain her composure but couldn't. The grocerystore produce section became a sanctuary of sorts. Right therebetween the tomatoes and the heads of lettuce, she wept. We prayed.Then I said, "You'll get through this. It won't be painless. It won't bequick. But God will use this mess for good. In the meantime don't befoolish or naive. But don't despair either. With God's help you willget through this."

Two days later a friend called. He'd just been fired. The dismissalwas his fault. He'd made stupid, inappropriate remarks atwork. Crude, offensive statements. His boss kicked him out. Nowhe's a fifty-seven-year-old unemployed manager in a rotten economy.He feels terrible and sounds worse. Wife angry. Kids confused. Heneeded assurance, so I gave it: "You'll get through this. It won't bepainless. It won't be quick. But God will use this mess for good. Inthe meantime don't be foolish or naive. But don't despair either. WithGod's help you will get through this."

Then there is the teenager I met at the café where she works.She's fresh out of high school, hoping to get into college next month.Her life, as it turns out, hasn't been easy. When she was six yearsold, her parents divorced. When she was fifteen, they remarried, onlyto divorce again a few months ago. Recently her parents told her tochoose: live with Mom or live with Dad. She got misty-eyed as shedescribed their announcement. I didn't have a chance to tell her this,but if I see her again, you can bet your sweet September I am going tolook her square in the eyes and say, "You'll get through this. It won'tbe painless. It won't be quick. But God will use this mess for good. Inthe meantime don't be foolish or naive. But don't despair either. WithGod's help you will get through this."

Audacious of me, right? How dare I say such words? Where did Iget the nerve to speak such a promise into tragedy? In a pit, actually.A deep, dark pit. So steep, the boy could not climb out. Had he beenable to, his brothers would have shoved him back down. They werethe ones who had thrown him in.

So it came to pass, when Joseph had come to his brothers, that theystripped Joseph of his tunic, the tunic of many colors that was onhim. Then they took him and cast him into a pit. And the pit wasempty; there was no water in it.

And they sat down to eat a meal. (Gen. 37:23–25)

It was an abandoned cistern. Jagged rocks and roots extendedfrom its sides. The seventeen-year-old boy lay at the bottom. Downybeard, spindly arms and legs. His hands were bound, ankles tied.He lay on his side, knees to chest, cramped in the small space. Thesand was wet with spittle, where he had drooled. His eyes were widewith fear. His voice was hoarse from screaming. It wasn't that hisbrothers didn't hear him. Twenty-two years later, when a famine hadtamed their swagger and guilt had dampened their pride, they wouldconfess, "We saw the anguish of his soul when he pleaded with us,and we would not hear" (42:21).

These are the great-grandsons of Abraham. The sons of Jacob.Couriers of God's covenant to a galaxy of people. Tribes will beartheir banners. The name of Jesus Christ will appear on their familytree. They are the Scriptures' equivalent of royalty. Yet on this day theywere the Bronze Age version of a dysfunctional family. They couldhave had their own reality TV show. In the shadow of a sycamore,in earshot of Joseph's appeals, they chewed on venison and passedthe wineskin. Cruel and oafish. Hearts as hard as the Canaanite desert.Lunch mattered more than their brother. They despised the boy."They hated him and could not speak peaceably to him ... theyhated him even more ... they hated him ... his brothers envied him"(37:4–5, 8, 11).

Here's why. Their father pampered Joseph like a prized calf. Jacobhad two wives, Leah and Rachel, but one love, Rachel. When Racheldied, Jacob kept her memory alive by fawning over their first son.The brothers worked all day. Joseph played all day. They wore clothesfrom a secondhand store. Jacob gave Joseph a hand-stitched, multicoloredcloak with embroidered sleeves. They slept in the bunkhouse.He had a queen-sized bed in his own room. While they ran the familyherd, Joseph, Daddy's little darling, stayed home. Jacob treated theeleventh-born like a firstborn. The brothers spat at the sight of Joseph.

To say the family was in crisis would be like saying a grass hutmight be unstable in a hurricane.

The brothers caught Joseph far from home, sixty miles away fromDaddy's protection, and went nuclear on him. "They stripped Josephof his tunic ... they took him and cast him into a pit" (vv. 23–24).Defiant verbs. They wanted not only to kill Joseph but also hide hisbody. This was a murderous cover-up from the get-go. "We shall say,'Some wild beast has devoured him'" (v. 20).

Joseph didn't see this assault coming. He didn't climb out of bedthat morning and think, I'd better dress in padded clothing becausethis is the day I get tossed into a hole. The attack caught him off guard.

So did yours. Joseph's pit came in the form of a cistern....