Author: Christine Wyrtzen

When the chief baker saw that the interpretation was favorable, he said to Joseph, “I also had a dream: there were three cake baskets on my head, and in the uppermost basket there were all sorts of baked food for Pharaoh, but the birds were eating it out of the basket on my head.” And Joseph answered and said, “This is its interpretation: the three baskets are three days. In three days Pharaoh will lift up your head—from you!—and hang you on a tree.” Genesis 40:16-19

I am one from whom others often seek advice. Questions like, “Why am I like this?” “What do you think the problem is?” “Why am I stuck and not progressing?” “Have I done something wrong?” “Is God punishing me?” I love to take someone’s life puzzle and seek God’s help to make divine sense of the pieces, but having said that, the hardest thing for anyone with a gift of mercy is to give a difficult word. If a prophetic gift accompanies a mercy gift, obedience is a challenge. God gives insight that can be difficult to speak. Mercy wants to cushion the blow.

Joseph’s obedience was tested so many times on his rise to blessing. Two cellmates, both former servants to the royal court, shared two different dreams. Joseph happily told the first that he would be blessed and reinstated to his former position. Upon that good news, the other man shared his dream. Joseph found himself at a difficult juncture. There was no good news about the 2^nd dream. This man would not be restored to honor; he would be hung. At that point, Joseph could have claimed ignorance, yet he gave the fateful interpretation.

God wants to count on me to speak the truth when the truth is unwanted, even if being honest threatens a relationship.  This is a struggle for me. I’d rather stay silent and just pray than speak up to inflict a potentially lifesaving wound. Infusions of holy boldness from the Holy Spirit are the only cure for timidity.

Make me Your prophet. Trembling but obedient. Amen

Then Joseph said to the cupbearer, “This is its interpretation; the three branches are three days. In three days Pharaoh will lift up your head and restore you to your office, and you shall place Pharaoh’s cup in his hand as formerly, when you were his cupbearer. Genesis 40:12-13

Have you ever been shamed? No matter the context, the experience is gut-wrenching. Your mind runs tapes of the accusations. Your face feels hot when you think about it.  Your body language turns inward.

Joseph told the cupbearer, the one who was falsely accused, that Pharaoh would lift his head in three days. The Hebrew idiom paints a beautiful picture. It is when the one shrunken in shame is restored to his position of power. It’s used other places in scripture that expand its beauty.

God speaks to His people and joyfully commands them to lift their heads. He has gone out to battle on their behalf and has come back victorious. Lift up your heads, O gates! And be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Psalm 24:7

King David, betrayed by his son Absalom, on the run with just the clothes on his back, turns to God for vindication. He climbs the Mount of Olives, covers his head, weeps, and says, “You, Lord, are a shield around me, my glory, the One who lifts my head high.” Psalm 3:3 As king, he could have formed an army, or at least a posse, to get back his throne but he abandoned all ideas of conniving, battling, and manipulating. He recognized that God was his rescuer.

Who has stripped you of your honor? Have you given up all hope of restoration? Perhaps you have even abandoned prayer.  If you’re a fighter, however, you may have vowed to take revenge. You intend to get back what you’ve lost no matter who must pay. Turning aside from God as your Redeemer, you’ve taken up your own cause.

David left the battle to God. So did Joseph. They did the thing that is the hardest for any of us ~ they waited on God to move. He always will. We just don’t know when. In the meantime, the waiting is never wasted. God draws near, comforts, teaches us what He suffered under the same circumstances, and pours out treasure upon treasure that is only found in the darkness. He is, and will be, the lifter of our heads.

Satan offered you a way out of waiting when he offered you the kingdoms of the world in exchange for worship. Thank you for not caving. Everything would have been lost. So teach me to wait! Amen

So the chief cupbearer told his dream to Joseph and said to him, “In my dream there was a vine before me, and on the vine there were three branches. As soon as it budded, its blossoms shot forth, and the clusters ripened into grapes. Genesis 40:9-10

I know one thing for sure – God communicates far more often than I know. I was told growing up that God only speaks through scripture. Any other claim of sensing or hearing God was heresy. And yet, the same people who policed what constituted a genuine word from God were the first to say that God had spoken to them in the night and called them to Peru as missionaries. The contradiction was confusing.

I grew up Independent Baptist, and I attend a Southern Baptist Church. However, I am much more progressive in my quest to experience God. Over a decade ago, I asked God to open my senses to hear Him in ways I had previously been closed. That began a new chapter for me. While I am conservative, and careful to sift everything through the grid of scripture, I have had many dreams. I share them when God nudges me.

The cupbearer dreamed about vines, branches, blossoms, and clusters of grapes. Had he been hallucinating? Joseph never suggested that. Dreams are sometimes literal, sometimes allegorical, and when they are from God, they are powerful and life-shaping.

Are all dreams from God?  No. Satan also gives dreams. Dreams can also be quirky and full of silliness, quickly forgotten in the morning. Not all people dream, either. God speaks differently to each child, according to how He wired them. But for each of you who do dream, I share some thoughts.

–I keep a journal by my bed. When I wake up with details that are fresh, I get them down on paper.

–If the dream fades by the time I have the pen in my hand, I know it wasn’t significant.

–If the dream was from the enemy, I know it because it was tormenting. At that point, I ask God to wipe the effects of it from my heart and mind and protect the rest of my night from Satan’s interference.

–If the dream was from God, it was vivid, almost always in color, unforgettable, instructive, intriguing, and came with an urgency to pray and seek clarification.

During a period in my life when I was in counseling, I was in denial about a few of the people in my life and their true nature. God used dreams to show me what was hidden to me. Night after night, in my dreams, they acted out, and I began to see that their behavior in my dream was quite consistent (though exaggerated) with how they behaved in real life.

The bottom line is this ~ none of us want to miss God’s speaking to us. He reveals things far more than we know. The Holy Spirit will help us discover the many layers of our as we share them with trusted Spirit partners, or through Scripture, or through unexpected sources. And most importantly, if a dream is from God, it will be completely consistent with the whole context of scripture. As soon as a dream deviates, I let it go, or I will be deceived. The Word of God is always the plumb line for truth.

For each person who has been afraid of Your voice, give them courage. Instruct, comfort, and enlarge their experience of You. Amen

When Joseph came to them in the morning, he saw that they were troubled. So he asked Pharaoh’s officers who were with him in custody in his master’s house, “Why are your faces downcast today?” They said to him, “We have had dreams, and there is no one to interpret them.” And Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to God? Please tell them to me.” Genesis 40:6-8

Many royal courts employed dream interpreters since, in the near East, dreams were a way of foretelling the future. The royal cupbearer and the baker, because they were in prison, had no access to Pharoah’s dream expert after waking up from troubling dreams. But Joseph was intuitive and read their body language the next morning. He asked them why they were downcast, and they admitted their need of an interpreter. This was a divine appointment and Joseph instantly recognized it. He ascribed the power of interpretation to God only and made himself available.

I’m sure I’ve missed many divine appointments.  I can be self-consumed.  Would I have lived in my own world if I had been Joseph? Would I have interacted with my two cellmates? Would I have seen their need as an opportunity for God’s power to be on full display? God knows who will be in proximity to me on any given day, and my part is to live prayerfully so that I recognize a strategic opportunity when it’s staring me in the face.

Who is downcast nearby? Who is sick? Who lives in chronic pain? Who was up all-night churning because they lack wisdom about a decision? Who has been crying alone? Who is afraid of the future?  Each of these is an opportunity. God’s kingdom begs to come to the people God puts in my path.

Fear keeps me from reaching out.  If I don’t apply God’s Word to my own situations, I won’t have it ready for others. If I live in crippling fear about the future, how can I comfort others with the promises of God?   I can’t give away what I don’t possess for myself.

The amazing thing about Joseph is that despite the multiple decades of slavery and imprisonment, he did not check out spiritually. He stayed engaged with his God. His spiritual skills were sharpened, not dulled. This prepared him to recognize, and then to act, when God brought opportunity.

Don’t let me live today by what is convenient. Give me the eyes to recognize what has been sent by you. Amen

Some time after this, the cupbearer of the king of Egypt and his baker committed an offense against their lord the king of Egypt. And Pharaoh was angry with his two officers, the chief cupbearer and the chief baker, and he put them in custody in the house of the captain of the guard, in the prison where Joseph was confined. Genesis 40:1-3

God does not redeem sin for an unbeliever. He is not their Father, and covenant promises don’t apply. But when someone sins against His children, God is active and the redemptive process is working for His glory.

Joseph is in prison, a place where it is easy for him to fear that God is inactive. His privacy is interrupted when he is given two cellmates, both strangers to him. They have sinned against Pharaoh, and while Joseph isn’t in a relationship with Pharoah, nor does he have a relationship with the cupbearer and baker, their sins will have a direct impact on his life. The sins of the baker and cupbearer will eventually result in Joseph gaining an audience with the Pharaoh. If Joseph could know that their sins would somehow be useful to him, he could never guess how.

Nor can I predict how the sins of those around me will impact my future. At the very least, they will afford me wisdom as I learn the patterns and progressions of sinful choices.  God is aware and working in every situation that has anything to do with me. I have met no one by mistake. I have worked for no one by mistake. I have not suffered at the hands of anyone by mistake. I have not been betrayed by mistake. The sins committed by all those in proximity to me are woven into my redemptive storyline.

It’s all emotionally complicated because I am grieved when I watch other people sin, whether in my family, my church or within my circle of friends. Because I have no control over them and their sin is hurting others, it can feel hopeless. In this web, however, are God’s hidden gifts. Someone who is sinning nearby me may be used by God to advance me, or to teach me, or to wound me so that I can experience the double fold blessing of God’s healing and redemption.  

Let faith well up in me at the announcement of such good news. My life is in Your good hands, Father. Amen

But the Lord was with Joseph and showed him steadfast love and gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the prison. Genesis 39:21

Favor in captivity? I thought the two were mutually exclusive. Another reminder that God turns a concept on its end and constantly surprises.

Joseph sat in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. He probably had moments when he felt utterly forsaken by God. And yet, he couldn’t know that his prison was the doorway to leadership. The story will take an amazing turn when Joseph shares a cell with two men that came from the royal court. Their crimes, and their time in Joseph’s company, will bring Joseph’s name before the Pharoah.

Has God blessed others in captivity? I was surprised to find direct proof. “And the Lord gave his people favor in the sight of the Egyptians.” Ex.11:3 Many generations after Joseph, the Hebrews will believe that their God has forgotten them too. For 400 years, they will doubt His goodness. Yet history will prove that God gave them favor during slavery.

Here are a few things I’ve learned firsthand about captivity. The one confined never feels favored. Pain obscures any vision of blessing. Time-bound perspectives limit a view of life. Expectations of what favor looks like is blinding to what’s happening behind the scenes.

If I’m in a prison from which I can’t escape, how do I surmount these challenges? Faith and trust in the character and promises of God. His reputation does not begin and end with what He is doing in my life. If I did nothing but read the story of Joseph to get to know the heart of God, I would cease to be tormented. Captivity is the narrow pathway to the gateway of advancement.

Every time I accused You, You were fashioning something beautiful. I’m sorry, and I will remember! Amen

And Joseph’s master took him and put him into the prison, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined, and he was there in prison. But the Lord was with Joseph and showed him steadfast love and gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the prison. Genesis 39:20-21

Finding evidence of God’s presence is difficult when life appears to have fallen apart. Joseph’s world was rocked to its core, but the writer of Genesis still said that the Lord was with Joseph and expressed steadfast love. Questions are on the tip of our tongues. ‘If the Lord was really with Joseph, why didn’t He spare him from prison? Why didn’t He expose the scheme of Potiphar’s wife?’ Then comes the question we go to next. ‘Why does God allow bad things to happen to me?’

The problem is that I expect to live a different life from Jesus. His birth was shadowed by a cross and so is mine. He said so. ‘You must pick up your cross and follow me.’  He faced Calvary because that was His calling.  I face the crosses of my own story because that is my calling.

Here are some ways God showed His hand of favor in Joseph’s story. Potiphar must have doubted his wife’s story because the punishment for rape was death, yet Joseph was sentenced to prison instead.  He was also assigned to the king’s prison, a less severe prison environment.  

I don’t care for the phrase ‘count your blessings’ because those who minimize or ignore suffering often recite it.  So let me re-phrase it. When it appears God has abandoned me, there are always pieces of evidence that the Lord is with me.  God to help me see them. If I remember that I take up a cross to follow Jesus, I don’t expect to avoid hardship. I know it is a means to glory being revealed. My life and Jesus’ life mirror each other. Because the cross was a means to His glorification, darkness never has the last word in my life, either.

In every valley, You give gifts of grace. Thank you. Amen

She {Potiphar’s wife} called to the men of her household and said to them, “See, he has brought among us a Hebrew to laugh at us. He came in to me to lie with me, and I cried out with a loud voice. And as soon as he heard that I lifted up my voice and cried out, he left his garment beside me and fled and got out of the house.” Genesis 39:14-15

Potiphar’s wife attempted to seduce Joseph, not once, but day after day. Her frustration grew. A woman spurned can be dangerous. And so she proved to be. When Joseph fled from her presence, she grabbed his tunic and the charade began. She concocted a convincing story where she was the victim and Joseph was a sexual predator. Her tears, coupled with artful storytelling, put Joseph in prison.

There will be a day when all people will be revealed for who they are. The exposure will shock some whom they once fooled, but it will comfort the victims. If you are being harassed by someone others admire, if you have been falsely accused and suffer a ruined reputation, you are not the first to suffer such things. God is with you just as He was with Joseph. No plot against you can thwart God’s plans.

Sometimes the exposure of someone who does evil can come early through the prayers of God’s people. If there is a wolf among the sheep, we can pray for the truth to be revealed.  We can ask God to prevent the deceiver from spinning his tales. We can also ask God to remove the demonic glitter that makes him convincing to the crowd so that he will be seen as he is.  I have seen this happen numerous times.

I can also pray that this person will tell on himself. He often needs to boast about his power to control and manipulate. He just can’t help himself.

God promises grace. It is this grace that enables me to soar on eagle’s wings while vendettas are being waged against me. I don’t need to wallow in the mire of bitterness. I am seated in heavenly places with Christ Jesus and am already vindicated in heaven’s court. Jesus is pleading my case and He never loses a case.

Come Holy Spirit, and reveal all things. While I travail in hopeful waiting, don’t let my spirit become jaded. Amen

            And after a time his master’s wife cast her eyes on Joseph and said, “Lie with me.” But he refused. Genesis 39:7-8

God has Satan on a leash. He can’t do more than God allows. Temptations surely test my faith. I’m required to dig deeply to use faith muscles that need strength training. Satan never tempts me just once, either. When I take hold of God’s grace and flee one kind of temptation, the enemy will come back with yet another variety. He is relentless and doesn’t play fair. He intends to concoct the perfect storm so that I will have no willpower. He’s driven to identify my kryptonite.

Satan tried to use pain to drive a wedge between Joseph and his God. It didn’t work, but it does with most Christians as a low pain threshold tempts us to fall into disbelief.  However, Joseph stood strong.  Day after day, Potiphar’s wife wooed Joseph. She was probably beautiful, and Joseph was, most likely, lonely. That he didn’t give in to her was nothing short of miraculous.

Satan is intuitive. He is also strategic, cunning, and patient. He spies, watching my life to assess where I am vulnerable. He knows my story and knows my wounding patterns. I can’t afford for him to know more about my weaknesses than I do. Perhaps this is why David was so intent on asking God to search his heart. Knowing himself as God knew him was critical to his spiritual victory.

Under what circumstances would you fall? Do you know? What are your unique longings, and if someone or something could fulfill them right now, would you succumb? It’s not a mistake that Paul defines sin as trading the glory of Christ for something else. For Joseph, it could have been a forbidden affair with Potiphar’s wife. What trinket holds allure for you over the value of treasuring Christ?

Deliver me from any evil that is being customized for my defeat. Amen