Read with Me
Genesis 41:8-13 (HCSB)
When morning came, he was troubled, so he summoned all the magicians of Egypt and all its wise men. Pharaoh told them his dreams, but no one could interpret them for him.
Then the chief cupbearer said to Pharaoh, “Today I remember my faults. Pharaoh had been angry with his servants, and he put me and the chief baker in the custody of the captain of the guard. He and I had dreams on the same night; each dream had its own meaning. Now a young Hebrew, a slave of the captain of the guards, was with us there. We told him our dreams, he interpreted our dreams for us, and each had its own interpretation. It turned out just the way he interpreted them to us: I was restored to my position, and the other man was hanged.”
Listen with Me
The stage was now set for the next phase to God’s plan, the step that would motivate Jacob and his whole family to move from the Promised Land to Egypt where He would grow them from a small tribe of seventy or so people into a great nation of two million. But God had to begin this phase by getting Joseph out of prison and into a high position in the government where he would have the authority to settle foreigners in the land of Egypt and then protect them while they took root.
Pharaoh’s two interrelated dreams proved to be impossible for the priests who normally did that work to interpret them. That was because those priests were not divinely inspired, worshiping only false gods who did not exist. They had to rely on books of dream symbols that had been compiled over several generations, and the symbols in Pharaoh’s dream did not appear in those books.
Pharaoh’s chief cupbearer, one of his trusted advisors, was present for these discussions. And when the professional interpreters came up dry, God brought to his mind memories of Joseph, and how he had effortlessly and accurately interpreted both his dream and that of the chief baker two years earlier. He also remembered Joseph’s plea to bring his case before Pharaoh when the interpretations proved to be accurate.
So, the cupbearer spoke up, giving the facts. It all happened when both he and the chief baker had been imprisoned in the house of the captain of the guard. Both had had significant dreams in a single night, and a young Hebrew man who was a servant of the captain of the guard, Potiphar, had interpreted the dream for them. And that interpretation had proven trustworthy and accurate in every detail.
This was enough to persuade Pharaoh to bring this young servant in to see if he could interpret his own dream. The plot was now afoot!
Pray with Me
Father, I continue to be impressed with how powerfully and effectively You were at work behind the scenes, controlling both events and the minds and hearts of people, working to bring Your plan to fruition. And I know, and can sometimes see, that You are doing the same things today. You are not a deistic god, simply programming the universe and then letting it run on its own until it runs down. You are the living God, powerfully involved in every aspect of our world in order to bring Your plan to completion. Lord, help me to continue to trust You in every way. Amen.