My husband has a saying when I say something like, “Lord why is this happening?” His explanation is always that if we believe God is good and that God is love then there is truly nothing wrong in what He does or what He allows. “The King can do no wrong.”

Examine this premise today because if that is true, it means that we trust God in the plenty and in the lean. It means that although we have free will, we give up our desire for what we consider the blessed life, for the life that he chooses no matter where that takes us or what sacrifices we have to make to follow Him. It means that we are no longer victims to circumstance but an essential part of something bigger than ourselves. It may even mean that we have to suffer some things so that others may learn or be provided for.

To think that I may have to endure something so that the bigger picture of life may be fulfilled seems on the outset unfair. When I look at the bible I see the life of Joseph. He spent 13 years learning total dependence on God. Joseph was tormented by his brothers, sold into slavery, thrown into prison for a crime he didn’t commit, forgotten by his friends and ultimately made the right hand man in Pharaoh’s court. All of these things happened in his young life so that when famine came to the land of Jospeh’s family, the 12 tribes of Israel, his brothers, would not starve. God’s plan for their future was more than they could see at the time. Those same brothers who threw him into a well, considered killing him and instead sold him to slavery for twenty shekels. Not a random amount as it’s the price of redemption to the Lord according to Leviticus 27:3. Genesis 37-45

All of these things happened to Joseph and yet, when Joseph’s brothers are out of food they go to Egypt for help, they are met by Joseph. Imagine their fear, dread and regret. Only here is what Joseph says to them:

Genesis 45:5 And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. 6 For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will not be plowing and reaping. 7 But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance. 8 “So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God. He made me father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt. 9 Now hurry back to my father and say to him, ‘This is what your son Joseph says: God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me; don’t delay.

The King can do no wrong.

In a culture that values self and promotes the need to be happy above anyone or anything else that may be going on in the world, this seems like an impossible concept. What is an insurmountable concept, it would seem, is that we are not here for ourselves, but for each other. That flies in the face of everything the “me generation” has been taught. It means that it challenges our ideal of right and wrong and good and evil because if Joseph’s life of false imprisonment was an act of God’s goodness and greater plan, then our concept of good is subjective at best.

There is great discomfort in this thought and yet, there is great peace. It becomes unsettling to us as we process through this concept. To think that even in the tragedies that life hands us, there can still be good, seems cruel to our human understanding. Yet, since we don’t see the end from the beginning we must learn to trust that what is happening is not without reason. It is actually for a bigger picture that we may not even be conscious of.