Discovering God's Dream for Your Life | Megan Marshman Message

Powerful. Yes. Can you imagine standing against evil like that and being personally threatened, yourself, your family? I appreciate that video, as it just provides for us a glimpse into his life. It even opens up his fears and how he had the courage to keep on fighting. Here's my takeaways: one, he knew he couldn't do it on his own; and number two, he kept going because his dream wasn't his; it would continue. It has continued because God is working to restore what's broken, and that includes how people interact with one another. And he does this by giving Divine dreams to Ordinary People as a part of his Sovereign plan.

My husband used to—every year we would celebrate Martin Luther King. We would sit on couches after we put kids to bed, and we'd listen to the speeches. And I love listening to the "I Have a Dream," and my husband would always point out—we'd invite someone new every single year—and he'd always point out, "Listen very carefully; you're going to notice he's giving a speech, and then you're going to hear this voice saying, 'Tell them about the dream.'" Martin did you know that the dream portion of that speech wasn't in his original notes for that speech? A gospel singer, Mahalia Jackson, shouts it twice. You can hear it in YouTube recordings: "Tell them about the dream. Tell them what God gave you." And then he does, and it becomes one of the most iconic speeches. We also would always listen to the "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech. If you hadn't heard it, give it a listen. Honor God's movement tomorrow. Tomorrow, yes, because God gives Divine dreams. I'm excited about this series. How timely. It's almost like we did that on purpose. Of course we did. We're going to look at the life of Joseph—not Jesus's dad, the other one—Old Testament, Genesis chapter 37. If you have your Bibles, we're going to see another dreamer, and I'm excited because I believe God wants to give us dreams too, throughout this series, and I hope you're ready.

Here's the word of the Lord, beginning in Genesis chap 37; it reads this: "Jacob lived in the land where his father had stayed, the land of Canaan. This is the account of Jacob's family line. Joseph, a young man of 17, was tending the flocks with his brothers, the sons of Bilha and the sons of Zilpa, his father's wives, and he brought their father a bad report about them. Now Israel—God had given—remember Jacob a new name, Israel—loved Joseph his son more than any of his other Sons, because he had been born to him in his old age, and he had made an ornate robe for him. When his brothers saw that their Father loved him more than any of them, they hated him and could not speak a kind word to him. Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him all the more. He said to them, 'Listen to this dream I had: We were binding sheaves out in the field when suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright while all your sheaves gathered around mine and bowed down to it.' How do you think that was received? His brother said to him, 'Do you intend to Reign Over Us? Will you actually rule us?' And they hated him all the more because of his dream and what he had said. Then he had another dream. Let's see what he does with this one. Oh, and he told it to his brothers. 'Listen,' he said, 'I had another dream, and this time the sun and moon and 11 stars were bowing down to me.' Wow. When he told his father as well as his brothers, his father rebuked him and said, 'What is this dream you had? Will your mother and I and your brothers actually come and bow down to the ground before you?' His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the matter in mind. Remember his father had a dream too. In fact, we have 21 dreams recorded in scripture, 10 of which are in the Book of Genesis, two of which are in this chapter. Joseph, the dreamer—he, as we just read—is the favored son of Jacob, and his brother's response—do you remember verse four? They hated him. Verse 5? They hated him. Verse eight? They hated him. But the problem doesn't, of course, start with the brothers. The favoritism goes back Generations. Their great grandfather, father Abraham—remember that guy—he too favored one son over another. Abraham favored Isaac; Isaac favored Esau, not Jacob. So Jacob, whose lack of Love drives him to obsess over his wife Rachel—one of multiple wives—now Rachel has two sons; those are Jo Jacob's youngest sons. So you got Joseph and you got Benjamin. She dies giving birth to Benjamin, and Joseph then becomes the center of Jacob's life, and this poison the family. Joseph is not just though affected by other people's sins. Did you hear it in the story? His pride is growing too, because all of our lives are shaped by our past, from our family of origin, and as we actually find throughout scripture, it's not just affected by our parents; it's actually affected by their parents and their parents to the third and fourth generation—stuff that is not dealt with doesn't just affect us. George Santana was the guy who said this phrase: 'Those who cannot learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.' You've heard it, which compels us to do a lot of different things with our lives. The first one is take them seriously, because our lives, our choices, do not just affect us, and I don't have to convince you of this: our lives have been affected by others, and our choices affect other people. Family of Origins are a mess. If you're from a messy background, welcome to church. Thankfully, family Brokenness doesn't thwart God's plans, does it? Praise be to God. Let's go to him in prayer and see what he might have for us.

So Heavenly Father, Here We Are, God. I pray that as we listen to the story of Joseph, that we would be open to trust you more with our own stories. But God, I know that as a communicator, I know what I desire, but God, I know that you desire something for each of us that's bigger and better. And so God, I pray right now that we'd all be open to it. In fact, between us and you, I pray that we would ask you for it—to give us insight into what you might have for us specifically today. Hear our prayers, Lord. I anticipate God, calm, trust by the end of this message, so would you do it? So be it. And All God's Children said amen. For you note takers, here's the outline: we're going to see who is God, number two, where is God, and number three, what is he up to there? Who is God? Where is God? And what is he up to there? Because who God was is who God is for us still today. So Point number one: God is Sovereign. Sovereign meaning in control, the one who can choose, the one who is divinely orchestrating all things to end up for his purposes and his plans. And can I just tell you at the onset what this message has done for me? It's calmed me. So if you see a more mellow version of me, that's why. And I wonder if many of us just need to walk into 2024 with more peace and confidence—not in ourselves, not in our ability to figure everything out—but a deeper faith and trust that there is a God who has everything figured out, and he's guiding us to the plans and purposes that he has already prepared in advance for us to do. Yes. And friends, that calms us. That calms us. It's that moment that I walk past my friend in the hallway—my friend who, remember, he's going for his big dream job—and I'm walking past him, and I'm nervous for him because he's literally is one day away from—is he gonna get the job or not?—and here's his final interview, and I walk up and I say, "Eric, how you feeling?" He says, "Fine." I'm like, "Cool. How are you just fine?" And his response—I will forever think of anytime I I talk about God's sovereignty—this is his response: "Oh, I'm fine because God is Sovereign. Even I can't screw it up." God is Sovereign. You haven't screwed it up. See, if my friend Eric crushes the job interview and gets the job, God is Sovereign. If he crushes it and doesn't get the job, guess what? God is Sovereign. If he fails it completely, doesn't get the job, God is Sovereign. If he fails it completely and somehow gets the job, God is Sovereign. Friends, realize that that can put you at rest. To—I literally woke up this morning at 2:00 in the morning with this deep-seated sense: He has you. It's wild. It feels so simple. I'm like, "God, I'm going to say it, but I'm going trust that your spirit's going to work, because that may not even make sense to me, but I have a feeling it makes sense to you." He has you. He has you. He has your story, and somehow he's using all of your choices and all the choices of the people around you from your past and all the people around you at your present and all the future people that you're going—he has prepared absolutely everything. That's what his sovereignty means, and what that can do for us is it can actually compel us to relax. God is Sovereign. Even we can't screw it up. I like the way R.C. Sproul puts it. He said this: "God's sovereignty is the pillow upon which the Christian rests his head at night, giving assurance that even in the chaos of life there's an eternal plan unfolding." As we grow in believing that God is the one in control, I'll tell you this: he'll relieve you from the burden of trying to be—how does it feel even now listening to this? How are you? What's going on in you? Pay attention. He wants to use absolutely everything and everyone, even the annoying people in our lives. You know what that brings up in us? They're so annoy—Pride. Guess what God wants to do? He wants actually use that pride, and guess how he's going to use that pride and deal with that Pride? That annoying person—they're part of God's plan too. See, the account of God giving Joseph this dream right at the beginning makes God—not Joseph—the actual hero of his entire story and the hero of this entire series, as I mentioned. Dreams are all throughout the Bible; majority all but one are in the Old Testament. If you hear best from God when you're quiet and when you make yourself available, think about it in your life: when have you actually heard from him, sensed his presence? It's often times when we find ourselves available and quiet, and all the chaos of Our Lives slowly Fades, which makes sense why it's sometimes easiest, and there's so many—there's so many testimonies of people hearing from God when they're asleep. As I began studying this, I even prayed, "God, would you give me and my boys some dreams? I want to pay attention." And I've gotten into so many discussions with different people where some people say, "No, no, God doesn't speak to dreams anymore. The majority is in the new—the Old Testament," and I say, "No, no, no, no." Romans 11:36 says this: "For from him and through him and for him are all things." Whether or not God is directly trying to speak through your dream, I'll tell you this: if you open it up, he'll reveal something for his glory. He may reveal the very thing that you're terrified of—that he says you don't have to do alone. Bring it to me. And I've been praying, "God, would you give—give us literal dreams at night," and the day after I said that, my oldest son comes to me and says, "Mom, I had a dream last [Music] night." Yeah, he totally did. He said, "Tell me about it." He goes, "I felt like—I felt like the enemy was whispering to me." He goes, "But God was there. It was okay." That was it. I felt like—what a profound word. Listen to this: sometimes the W—the enemy wants to whisper to you. Do you hear those Whispers? And some of you, it's become far more than a whisper, hasn't it? It's become very loud—that belief that you have about yourself: you're unlovable. That was the point of life. We've heard The Whispers, but it's okay. Let me tell you why: God's there. Two nights ago, my youngest—has never said this before—we wake up in the morning, he goes, "Mom, I had a dream." I'm like, "Give it to me, buddy. Give it to me, buddy," because I actually prayed for that. He goes, "I don't remember." So I'm—unfortunately, we don't have his—we just really don't. He doesn't—and in his words, it's so cute—"I don't remember. I don't—I don't remember." But have you ever noticed that our dreams—the ones that we remember—are really intense with emotion, whether that's like extreme joy? I remember having a really intense dream when I was younger, running away from winning the lottery, and I was so mad and happy at the same time. Just—did you know that our memories are tied to our emotions? The reason that we actually—the ones that you remember of their dreams are the ones that are tied to the greatest emotion. That's why memories are tied to emotion, and that's not just in dreams; that's in all of our life now. Whether or not God is directly communicating to you through your dreams, I'll just tell you this: pay attention. "For from him and through him and to him are all things." Pay attention. I want to bless you into a dream life where God allow—where God actually reveals things to you, and you can go to him with a form of intimacy—maybe things you could deal with on your own while you sleep—and I'll tell you this: he doesn't want you to deal with them alone. Maybe that's why you remember them. And if you haven't been reading the news, dreams are still even making the news. I mean, have you heard about the Muslim nations and the things that are happening with Jesus literally showing up in people's dreams and Muslims coming to Faith in Jesus Christ because—to their testimony—"Jesus showed up in my dream and revealed himself to me." I mean, I literally have a friend who I was talking with this past Thursday, and she said, "My life would look totally different if I didn't start paying attention to my dream." She said, "We had no dream or intention of getting into foster care until my son had three reoccurring dreams about it." She felt like she had to open up her life's plans because God was sending dreams for her too. And I'll tell you this: if God is in control, if "for from him and through him are all things," I going to tell you this: our part is simply to make oursel available to hear from him. And I'll also say this about literal dreams, and then we'll move into other types: is this—it's impossible to dream if you're unwilling to rest. And there's a theme to this when it comes to dreams. I mean, literally dreams happen when—when you're asleep. Dreams—now, of course, there's the other dreams, and we're going to talk about this for the rest of the season—when God gives us a vision or a thought of what our life might be about and how it can coincide with what God is literally doing in all of the world. Our dreams can coincide with that as we submit our plans and—and therefore want to join in with him on his. But before I jump into—to that, I just want to say this: I wonder if the first part of this message is not dreaming toward the future but paying attention and allowing oursel to be made available to hear from him. If we rest—and this—this sparked a moment in my own mind because as I'm coming into 2024, as I was praying through 2023, asking God to reveal different moments and relationships that have had an impact on my life, and then I wanted to pray into 2024, the word that I kept getting was rest, and I felt kind of great about it. I was hoping it would meant a little bit more lazy—CU—I kind of want to be a little bit—there's part of me—I get so driven on things. I'm like, "Oh, rest sounds really good," but I got to tell you: when I say resting in the Lord, when I say wanting to find God's dreams, make yourself available to them; therefore, you have to rest. I'm not talking about the lazy kind. I'm talking about the resting and trusting in his promises that makes you available more for his than on your own plans. That's what I'm talking—that's what I'm talking about. And I believe that's what this series is leading us toward because God is the one in control, and therefore our part becomes making oursel available to hear from him, even in the messiness of Our Lives. Because what we'll come to find out is Joseph's life is a mess, which tells me that the Bible is not just a story of how to live a good life, but it's full of real stories when life doesn't go right. This book is not just a script on what you should do; it actually gives us real-life stories about what happens when life goes incredibly wrong. If you're someone that's looked to God even this past year and God—like, "God, why? How could this happen to me?" You're in good company because what we're meant to find is God in the story—the main character of it—and to grow in trusting in his sovereignty. So let me ask you: number two, if God is Sovereign, where is he? I was handed Genesis chapter 37. Something really unique about this chapter is this: God is not mentioned in chapter 37. You know that he's not mentioned; he doesn't speak; he's not even referred to. It's almost as if he seems absent. Can you relate? But here's what you can find: to—where is he? God is in the D—details of his plans. Read with me. Let's pick up the story. See if you can find what the world may call coincidences God uses for his purposes. Verse 12: We pick up the story now. His brothers—this is Joseph's brothers—had gone to graze their father's flocks near Shechem. So that's the plan. And Israel said to his son Joseph, "As you know, your brothers are grazing the flocks near Shechem. Come, I'm going to send you to them." "Very well," he replied. Notice the IM—immediate obedience. So he said to him, "Go and see if all is well with your brothers, with the flocks, and bring word back to me." Then he sent him off from the valley of Hebron. When Joseph arrived at Shechem, a man found him wandering around the fields and asked him, "What are you looking for?" He replied, "I'm looking for my brothers. Can you tell me where they are grazing their flocks?" "They have moved on from here," the man answered. "I heard them say, 'Let's go to Dothan.'" So Joseph went after his brothers and found them near Dothan. But they saw him in the distance. How do you think they noticed him, by the way? Probably that coat of many colors. And before he reached them, they plotted to kill him. Here comes that dreamer. They say to each other, "Come now, let's kill him and throw him into one of these cisterns and say that a ferocious animal devoured him. Then we see what comes of his dreams." When Reuben—that's the oldest son—heard this, he tried to rescue him from their hands. "Uh, let's not take his life." A little context to Reuben: at this point, Reuben's actually in—in conflict with his dad, and he's trying to win back his approval. That's why he's saying, "Let's not take his life." He said, "Don't shed any blood. Throw him into this cistern here in the wilderness, but don't lay a hand on him." Reuben said this to rescue him from them and take him back to his father again—to make him—him more pleased. So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe—the ornate robe he was wearing—and they took him and threw him into the cistern. The cistern was empty; there was no water in it. As they sat down to eat their meal, they looked up and saw a caravan of Israelites coming from Gilead. Their camels were loaded with spices, balm, and myrrh, and they were on their way to take them down to Egypt. Judah said to his brothers, "What will we gain if we kill our brother and cover up his blood? Come, let's sell him to the Is—Ismaelites and not lay our hands on him. After all, I mean, he's our brother, our own flesh and blood." His brothers agree. So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for 20 shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt. When Reuben returned to the cistern and saw that Joseph was not there, he tore his clothes. Listen to the details. There's an ill-conceived Aaron from—from

Jacob, the father, to send Joseph to see his brothers in Shechem. Some random guy overheard the brothers' plans. That random guy happened to run into Joseph. That stranger, Reuben, who's in conflict with his dad, saves Joseph from being killed, but wasn't there to keep him from being sold.

Just the right time, by the way. If they had actually found themselves where they originally planned on being, in Shechem, they wouldn't have seen those Ishmaelites going through. If they had not gone this way; if Joseph had been killed, or if he hadn't been sold, everyone dies because of his coming. Are you catching it? How about in your own story? How'd you get here?

I want to say something that's hard to swallow and true: God's sovereign plan is compatible with terrible things happening in the lives of those he loves. God's sovereign plan is compatible with the trials you've gone through. His sovereign plan is compatible with the disappointments you feel. It's compatible with the anger you've experienced, with the unfairness. Why? Because God is in the details of all of it and allows us to choose our 15,000 choices a day, and yet he's somehow, in his sovereignty, miraculously orchestrating all of it.

And I know this because I'm literally standing in front of you today. One time after a service, a gal came up to me. She's like, "How did you even end up here? Like, what's your background?" I was like, "I've like never really shared that, huh." So here it goes. You want to know how I got here? You gotta pay attention to the details, because a lot of them aren't going to make a lot of sense. You're going to find yourself bored. I found myself bored in a lot of jobs, too. Are you guys ready for this background? Okay, here's what it is, basically.

When I was in college, I was studying to become a videographer. That was my plan. I went to college to make videos, to tell stories. That is what I wanted to do; that is what I went to college for. At the time, I played basketball; that paid for college. Works out really well. So I played basketball, did videography, and I volunteered at a high school ministry. That was my only form of ministry that I was doing; was volunteering every summer while I was going to college.

Now, while I was volunteering in that high school ministry, at one point I was standing on stage running games, standing on stage getting all the high schoolers to run a bunch of games. My sister walks up to me afterwards and says, "I want to write a book about you, like a kid's book." And I was like, "Really?" She's like, "Yeah, I want to write a kid's book about you, 'cause, you know, we... I..." She goes, "I grew up with Barbies, and Barbies always arrived, but," she goes, "I like what I like about you is you haven't really arrived, but you're always like kind of willing to go for it." I'm like, "Is that a compliment?"

So she writes a kid's book, a kid's book about me. But in order to do it, she goes, "We have to start a publishing company. You want to start one with me?" I'm like, "Sounds fun." My sister and I start a publishing company. Her name's Kim; my name's Megan. We called it Keegan Fate Publishing, long time ago. We do this; we go around; we have a tour of all the local Girl Scouts, literally across the US. We go on tour to teach these young girls that it's about who you're becoming today; what you do today matters. 'Cause basically it's just creating a plan for the rest of your life, because if you want to do something with your entire life, it matters what you do today, because you're creating a pattern. So we started a publishing house.

What you don't know is my senior year of college I was given an opportunity and an offer to play professional basketball. Little-known fact. So my plan after college—it's a really cool answer when you're a senior in college and someone says, "What are you doing after this?"—I'm going to go play professional basketball. So that was my plan after I graduated. I worked as a waitress; in fact, I was a waitress, all the way to 26 years old, 7 years of waitressing. If you're 25 years old and wondering what God's doing with your life, pay attention; he's in the details. For me, he was teaching me how to serve people. Comes in really handy now, because I gotta tell you, my primary role here is not just to be over, in any way, shape, or form. I know the stage is a little bit high, but it's this: it's literally to serve you, for the primary ministry that you're doing in the world. I'm not doing the primary ministry here on the stage; I'm equipping you for the primary ministry that happens outside this building.

So I was a waitress; I had this job offer; I thought it was really cool. My sister comes back to me—she's a really significant part of my life—and she says, "You've prayed about the whole basketball thing, right?" I'm like, "For sure." So the next morning I got up and prayed. I was opening a restaurant at 5:30 in the morning; I got up at 4:30 and got on my hands and knees, and I just opened up the decision to the Lord. God, this is my plan; I'm leaving in August; I know that it's... I know that it's July, and I felt this deep-seated lack of peace about the decision. I go to work; after work I go back to my parents; I say, "This is so weird; I just feel like I'm not supposed to go play basketball." They're like, "What? Why?" I'm like, "I think because that's a life all about me, and I don't want to do that anymore. I've spent a majority of my life making it about me, but I feel like God just telling me not to do it, so I'm not going to do it." They're like, "Uh, okay. What's your plan?" I'm like, "There isn't one."

Conveniently, the very next day I get a call from a camp that I had volunteered at and said, "Hey, this is really weird; we know you have plans to do something else, but is there any chance you want to volunteer for the next three weeks to finish out the summer as a camp counselor?" I said, "I'm in." During those three weeks, what I... what comes to find out is my... my no to that basketball ends up getting to a friend of mine's dad who coaches at a Christian university. He says, "Hey, um, I heard that you're not actually going to go play basketball; any chance you want to coach during the year?" I said, "That sounds really great." So I started to coach during the year at Azusa Pacific University. When I was at Azusa Pacific University, they offered me an opportunity to teach some PE classes. I really liked it; turns out I was a decent teacher. So they ended up having me teach other classes at the university. So now I'm teaching at the university. Problem is, they couldn't pay me for the basketball, but they gave me free education. So I took my education; I got a little bit of education—gospel-centered education—was able to therefore coach and teach and do all these things. I'm discovering a little bit about myself, but it all feels so random.

And then suddenly, once I got my master's, it didn't really make much sense to coach anymore, or really to teach, because I was basically paying—as or living my life as a waitress to pay for me to do ministry. So I left there. Conveniently, my sister was leaving a different job, working for the Small Business Development Center, based in Long Beach, California. What that is is it's basically a small business development. What I do is you meet with other businesses in order to equip them to do their businesses in the world. And the problem was, I said, "Kimmy, I have no training to be a small business advisor; that makes no sense." She goes, "Oh, you only need two things for the job. Number one, you have to have a master's." I'm like, "Crazy; I just got one." She goes, "Number two, you have to own a company." She goes, "Remember our publishing company?" Oh my gosh. She goes, "It counts." And I get this random job working for the City of Long Beach, literally coming alongside small businesses where I literally got to sit with people and go, "Tell me about your passion; tell me about your passion; why'd you open this restaurant in the first place?" The problem was I needed to advise them on something, but conveniently social media was becoming a thing at the time, but no one had any training for it. People went to business school, but no one understood social media; they just needed a willing 20-something. Guess what? Ding ding ding! I'm that willing 20-something. They send me to Google to get trained in order to be a social media advisor, so I could teach all these businesses...

Trust me, God's in the details, because it continues on. I work one final summer after getting married at that Christian camp. I meet a woman for the very first time; a woman stands on the stage; it was the first time I ever saw a woman preach. I was 27 years old, and I watched her, and I was in awe. We met up afterwards; she says, "I want to hire you to work for my publishing company." I said, "I'm in." She goes, "This is..." She goes, "I may not work right now, 'cause only job that I have is running Media Services, literally running social media and and running and managing all the videos that our company produces." I said, "I have a little bit of a background in that." She hires me to work at a publishing house that happens to have a branch out of a church in Costa Mesa, California, called Rock Harbor. That same church went to the camp that I worked at, so they knew I could speak. It gets word to the lead pastor; he hires me to communicate on Sunday evenings. And that's where I met a guy named Nick Benois and Steve Carter. Nick Benois was the creative director here for a number of years; Steve Carter was a teaching pastor. Steve was the one that invited me on Wednesdays, and Nick was the one that invited me on Sundays.

Friends, if I hadn't volunteered in high school ministry, there would have never been a publishing company. If there was never a publishing company, I couldn't have gotten the SBDC job. If I didn't work for the SBDC, I wouldn't have been trained in Media Services to actually get the job for the publishing house. If I hadn't gotten the job for the publishing house, I would have never ended up at Rock Harbor Church. And friends, none of it made sense at the time, but God's in the details of our lives. I tell you that little vocational journey; I could tell you a lot of other journeys. Or how about this one: the fact that my story is not without flaws. I could tell you that story, too. I could tell you about the choices I made, and I've told you some of them in this church, about the choice that I made that landed me literally in a waiting cell at a jail, to walk out and see my mom with her hands wide open, and me to experience the grace that I had proclaimed my entire life, but not had experienced in a moment quite like that. I could tell you a story of my failures; I could tell you a story about coincidences; and I could tell you a lot of different stories with a lot of different things. But here's what I want to tell you: God is sovereign, and he really is in the details of our lives.

I have no business standing before you except to say that God really is sovereign and has a plan for our lives. And I'm saying this not just to say he has a plan for mine; he has a plan for yours, too. Jeremiah 29:11: God says, "For I know the plans..." But unfortunately the rest of that verse doesn't say, "And I'm planning on telling them to you." He's just inviting you to go, "Hey, I'm in the details; I'm going to send a stranger to overhear a conversation so that Joseph goes to the right place, and when he goes to that right place, Reuben will be there to save him from death, but he won't be there conveniently to save him from... from going into slavery." And if you know the end of the story, which we're not going to get to—we have the next few weeks to go through it—if you know the end of the story, you know that the last verse in Genesis chapter 37 is actually one of the greatest verses of hope. Yet in the present moment, it looks like disaster to Joseph. Verse 36 says this: "Meanwhile, the Midianites sold Joseph in Egypt to Potiphar, one of Pharaoh's officials, the captain of the Guard." You can read ahead; spoiler alert: the dreams come true. But I tell you all this to let you know God is in the details.

This opening message surprised me. The journey God took me on as I was reading the story, it didn't compel me forward to dream dreams; it actually compelled me to reflect back on how God's been a part of the story, so that I could trust him and his sovereignty in the present, so that I could be open to receive the dreams that he might have for me in the future. And I believe he's doing the same for you. God is sovereign; where is he? He's in the details. What is he doing there? God's sovereign plan is for salvation, and it's bigger than we think. In this story, the brothers are eventually, yes, saved from famine, but Joseph is also saved, too. Again, if you know the end of the story, what looks like a trial is actually a glimmer of hope, because it's only because Joseph will be rejected, sold into slavery, unjustly punished, will Joseph finally be humbled and saved from the pride that would have ruined him in the first place. You see, if we're saved from all the things that we want to be saved from, like the trials in our lives, we, too, could be lost in far more profound ways. Joseph had to be lost in order to be saved. But I want to save the rest of the story for future weeks and simply stop at chapter 37, when nothing is figured out for Joseph, because I wonder if you can relate to that, and I wonder if the journey God is taking you on is not helping you to figure absolutely everything out; it's rather giving you faith to trust a God who already has a... a God who is sovereign, that even you can't screw it up, that you could have and developed faith that even as we make choices, God weaves it all together for good. We can know this—well, we may not know what the plan is—here's what we can know: Paul writes about it in Romans 8:28, when he says this: "And we know that in..." Look at this phrase: "all things..." And friends, what's included in "all things"? What was that? Everything. So before we move on, let me ask you: What's your thing this morning? What's your thing? Bring it to church, because you can know this about all things: if God is sovereign, if he's truly in the detail, then bring him anything this morning, because here's what you can know: that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

Now we have to be very careful when we read a verse like that, because we come into it with our American eyes, with the definition of good that America teaches us, and the definition of good based on America is this: comfortable, easy, and successful. And I'll tell you, God's dream for our lives, the divine dreams he's giving us, is not a life of comfort; it's a life in which we live into the purposes he has created us for, that he may get the glory for. From him and to him and for him are all things. Thankfully, Paul keeps writing, because in verse 29 he actually defines the good, and it's different than comfort, when he says this: "For those God foreknew he also predestined..." Don't get tripped up there; it just means predestined. Here we go; here's the definition: "to be conformed to the image of his Son." Here's what you can know about every detail of your life: that God is going to use all things, including your anxiety, your annoyance, your pride, your mistake, your anger—all things—for good. Here's the definition: to form you more into the likeness of Jesus. So let me ask you: How might God be wanting to use your thing to form you more into his likeness? He didn't just do it for Joseph; he wants to do it for us. See, Joseph goes on a journey, and he was humbled circumstantially for his salvation, but we can know someone who humbled himself willingly for ours. I have to attribute Arthur Pink, who does a great job outlining and pointing out how we can see a type of Christ. In fact, when Jesus in John chapter 4 says that Moses wrote about him, one of the clearest pictures we see of Moses's writings of Christ Jesus is how Joseph is a type. Pay attention to the details and see how we see Christ first. You see a beloved Son who has the favor of his father; do you see it? He is sent on a journey; he is hated for his words; he is... he prophesies his coming exaltation, and people's response is they're mad. He is a son who was sent forth by his father, and when he comes he is rejected by the people he will eventually come to save, because they didn't believe in him. He is stripped, and he is sold for silver. Just as Joseph goes into prison unfairly, Jesus Christ goes to the cross on our behalf, so that all who believe on him might be saved. He is just a picture. God is sovereign over all; he is in the details of your life for salvation, that you might become more like him, because this world needs Jesus, and God's plan for the world—it's you. So let me ask you: How might God be wanting to use the very things you're going through to form you more into the likeness of Jesus? He may be using your mistakes to bring you finally back to church, finally. He's that good. He may use your pride; he may use your pain. But I'll just tell you this: he's sovereign over it all; he's in every detail, and he's using it all for good—his definition, not ours. Will you pray with me?

Father, I thank you for the life of Joseph, not because his life was perfect, but because in it we can find you, God, in your sovereign plan. And so right now I bet there's a lot of questions, but, God, what are you doing about this? But God, what are you... how are you in this? God, I pray that we wouldn't just wonder alone, that even now in prayer we'd bring it—we'd bring our goals for our life, we'd bring our plans, we'd bring our pain, and we'd even bring our mistakes, even here and now. God, I pray the same prayer that I prayed at the very beginning. God, I pray that you would grow our faith to trust you more here, not before anything's figured out. Give us faith to trust you here. We pray here our prayers. [Music] Lord, oh Lord, how we need you. Reveal yourself, we pray. And all God's children said, "Amen."