Not-God
Joseph Said to them, “Don’t be afraid. Am I in the place of God?” Genesis 50:19
Most of us are familiar with the scene in which this conversation took place. Joseph’s brothers are fearing their young brother’s appropriate retaliation for the evil they perpetuated against him many years earlier-one of the first accounts we have in the Bible of human trafficking. And most of us will remember Joseph’s amazing response, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives” (Gen. 50:20). We don’t have time in a few paragraphs to explore the mystery of providence in that one sentence, but we do have time to note what made such a response possible.
When Joseph asked his brothers, “Am I in the place of God?”, for him it was a rhetorical question. At some point, maybe in his 14-17 year “sabbatical” in an Egyptian hoosegow, Joseph gave up being god, it was just too big of a job to handle. Most of my paralyzing fears, toxic reactions, regrettable moments, gangrenous words, and disastrous choices originate when I do put myself in the place of God. Note to self, Scotty, “God is God and you are not.”
Actually it’s because God put himself in the place of man, in your place and my place, that we can join Joseph in turning in all deity pretenses. God made him (Jesus) who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Cor. 5:21). Because the gospel is true, because Jesus lived in our place and died in our place, we can trust and love in exceedingly broken places. God has committed himself to the saving of many lives-indeed, a pan-national family. And, in time, he will redeem our most horrific stories.