With all this doom and gloom filling the airways, we thought we’d look at something a little more uplifting than our usual admonishments toward savings, moderation, and personal responsibility. After all, when you’re down and out, the last thing you feel like hearing are all those “I-told-you-so’s”. In that spirit, let’s think about what you’re doing right, and inspire hope that we will stay afloat and even transcend this crazy time eventually. (But like any roller coaster ride, you’ll only be able to get off at the end.)

In Genesis 39, after his brothers sold him, Joseph was taken to Egypt where he ended up a slave to Potiphar, captain of Pharaoh’s guard. Because God was with Joseph, Potiphar — whose house he resided in — became a prosperous man. Recognizing his slave’s special gift, Potiphar appointed him overseer of his estate. During all the time of Joseph’s tenure, God blessed the Egyptian’s house, not only his house but his fields too.

Potiphar understood God was with Joseph and therefore appointed him to this trusted and powerful position. When Joseph was later sent to prison the guard also treated him well, also recognizing God was with him.

In our own lives rewards for our faith are not always as obvious as in these biblical passages. They might not even be monetary. They might be as trivial as a meal with friends, a good book, a Sabbath visit to our congregation – little respites from the money anxiety.

You’ll see in a post coming soon that despite his destitute predicament – far from his family and land, a slave, for a time in prison — there was a reason Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery [Hint: a Divine reason].