Discovering Destiny (Part 45): Your Next Door Opens Through Someone Else
Today, we continue our focus on THE YEAR OF DISCOVERY, as we learn to maintain our posture of faith after God has revealed His plans for our future.
Key scriptures for this year:
2 Peter 3:18 GNT"But continue to grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Savior, Jesus Christ. To Him be glory now and forever."
Luke 10:20 Mirror"It's time for you to rediscover who you are from Heaven's perspective."
1 John 3:10 Mirror"There is a very visible and vast difference between living one's life from your God identity or from a fallen man's mindset."
Proverbs 25:2 NKJV"It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the glory of kings is to search out a matter."
Jeremiah 29:13 NIV"You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart."
Scripture(s) we will study today:
Genesis 40:5-8 TPT"Then one night, they both dreamed, the steward and the baker, officials of the king of Egypt. They each had a prophetic dream with different interpretations. When Joseph came to them in the morning, he saw they looked miserable, so he asked Pharaoh's two officials who were under his custody, 'What's wrong? Why the sad faces?' 'We had dreams last night,' they answered, 'and we have no one to interpret them.' And Joseph said to them, 'God can interpret your dreams! Please, tell them to me.'"
Supporting scriptures:
Genesis 40:12-15 NLT"'This is what the dream means,' Joseph said. 'The three branches represent three days. Within three days Pharaoh will lift you up and restore you to your position as his chief cup-bearer. And please remember me and do me a favor when things go well for you. Mention me to Pharaoh, so he might let me out of this place. For I was kidnapped from my homeland, the land of the Hebrews, and now I'm here in prison, but I did nothing to deserve it.'"
Genesis 40:20-23 NLT"Pharaoh's birthday came three days later, and he prepared a banquet for all his officials and staff. He summoned his chief cup-bearer and chief baker to join the other officials. He then restored the chief cup-bearer to his former position, so he could again hand Pharaoh his cup. But Pharaoh impaled the chief baker, just as Joseph had predicted when he interpreted his dream. Pharaoh's chief cup-bearer, however, forgot all about Joseph, never giving him another thought."
Philippians 2:4 TPT"Abandon every display of selfishness. Possess a greater concern for what matters to others instead of your own interests."
Romans 8:28 TPT"So we are convinced that every detail of our lives is continually woven together for good, for we are his lovers who have been called to fulfill his designed purpose."
Proverbs 19:21 TPT"A person may have many ideas concerning God's plan for his life, but only the designs of God's purpose will succeed in the end."
Galatians 6:9 NLT"So let's not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don't give up."
Psalm 75:6-7 NLT"For no one on earth, from east or west, or even from the wilderness, should raise a defiant fist. It is God alone who judges; he decides who will rise and who will fall."
1 Corinthians 3:6-7 NIV"I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow."
Jeremiah 17:5,7 NIV"Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who draws strength from mere flesh and whose heart turns away from the Lord... But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him."
Setting the Stage:
Yesterday, we left Joseph with two new prisoners in his care: Pharaoh's chief cup-bearer (the butler) and chief baker. Today, we find out why God sent them. Picture the morning. Joseph is making his rounds the way he does every day, because the warden had handed him everything that happened in that prison. He comes to the two officials from the palace, and something is wrong. He "saw they looked miserable." These were not ordinary prisoners. They had served the king with their own hands, and now they were sitting on a prison floor with faces that told the whole story. Joseph stopped. He looked at them. And he asked, "What's wrong? Why the sad faces?"
Think about who is asking that question. Joseph is the man who was sold by his brothers, lied on by his master's wife, and dragged into this prison in shackles. He has been carrying a dream for over a decade with nothing to show for it. If anybody in that building had a right to a sad face, it was him. Yet the text does not say the two officials noticed Joseph's face. It says Joseph noticed theirs. They told him, "We had dreams last night, and we have no one to interpret them." And Joseph, who had never interpreted a dream in his life, answered, "God can interpret your dreams! Please, tell them to me."
The cup-bearer went first. Joseph told him the three branches were three days, and in three days he would be standing in the palace again with the king's cup in his hand. Then Joseph did something he had never done in this story. He asked for help. "Please remember me and do me a favor when things go well for you. Mention me to Pharaoh." The baker heard the good news and jumped in with his own dream. Joseph gave him the truth. In three days, Pharaoh would take his head. Three days later, it was Pharaoh's birthday, and both men were called out of the prison. The cup-bearer got his job back. The baker was executed. Everything happened exactly as Joseph said.
And then the Bible says, "Pharaoh's chief cup-bearer, however, forgot all about Joseph, never giving him another thought." Joseph had served another man's dream while his own was on hold, and the man walked out and forgot him. Here is what I want you to see today. Joseph's road to the palace did not run through his own dream. It ran through the butler’s dream. Your way out runs through someone else, and the person God uses to open your door may not even remember your name. That is why we have to get this balance right: God uses people to bless you, so you honor the people, but you never make them your source. Tomorrow, we will deal with the two years of silence that followed. Today, we deal with the morning Joseph looked up from his own pain and noticed somebody else's.
So, what does this mean for you today? A few things.
1. Joseph Noticed Their Faces While He Was Carrying His Own Pain.
The first thing Joseph did that morning was look. He was in the same prison, wearing the same chains, holding the same unfulfilled dream, and he still noticed two men who looked miserable. Paul told the Philippians, "Possess a greater concern for what matters to others instead of your own interests" (Philippians 2:4 TPT). Joseph did that in a prison. The question "Why the sad faces?" is the question of a man whose heart was still open, and an open heart is the only heart God can use.
How this applies to you:
-- You can be in a prison without letting the prison get in you.
-- When you walk with God, your internal state should not be contingent upon external circumstances.
-- Joseph did not have to look like what he had been through. He got up that morning with his heart open and his eyes up, and that is why he saw what everybody else missed. Some of you have been so consumed by your own wait that you have stopped noticing the people God placed next to you. You can't stop noticing because sometimes your blessing will come through what you notice.
-- Noticing somebody else's pain while you carry your own is one of the most Christlike things you can do.
-- A sad face in your path is not an interruption; it may be an assignment.
-- Look up, because somebody near you is waiting on what God put in you. This is why you must remain OPEN, no matter how difficult your path has been.
2. Joseph Used A Gift He Had Never Used Before.
Joseph told them plainly, "God can interpret your dreams!" Joseph had received dreams as a teenager, but he had never interpreted one for anybody. This was brand new. And notice where he put the credit before he ever heard the dream. Not "I can do this." But God can.
How this applies to you:
-- The gift that gets you out is often one you have never used yet. This is why you have to remain open to something new.
-- Joseph put God's name on it before he opened his mouth. When you are asked to do something beyond your ability, do what Joseph did: give God the credit first, and then step into it. The pressure to perform disappears when you are totally relying on God.
-- Do not save your gift for the season after the wait. Use it while you are waiting.
-- Joseph had no résumé for this. He had never interpreted a dream, and God gave him supernatural understanding the first time he tried. Grace is God's super on your natural, and it shows up the moment you open your heart to it.
-- The gift Joseph used in the prison was the same gift that would usher him into the palace, and God tested it on two prisoners before He trusted it in front of a king. What you do in obscurity is a rehearsal for the moment your purpose will be on public display.
-- If God is asking you to do it, He has already graced you to do it.
3. His Way Out Ran Through Another Man's Dream.
Here is the part that will set you free today. Joseph had been holding his own dream for over ten years, and the door to that dream did not open when he interpreted his own dream. It opened when he interpreted somebody else's. In Part 37, I told you your destiny was never just about you. Paul wrote, "Every detail of our lives is continually woven together for good" (Romans 8:28 TPT).
How this applies to you:
-- Often, your way out runs through someone else.
-- Some of you are waiting for God to move on your thing, and God is waiting for you to serve somebody else's thing.
-- The person you help today may be the person God uses tomorrow.
-- Joseph also asked for help, and there is no shame in that. "Please remember me," he said. Faith does not mean you never ask; It just means that when you ask, your confidence is not in the person. Your confidence is in God. People may let you down, but God never will.
-- God wrote the story of the butler into Joseph's story before Joseph was born. Destinies are interwoven on purpose. In THE YEAR OF DISCOVERY, understand that the plan God made for you has other people's dreams in it, and serving them is how you walk toward yours.
4. Honor The Vessel, But Rely On The Source.
I have to slow down here, because this is where a lot of believers get out of balance. I have taught you for years to be a God-pleaser and not a man-pleaser. That has not changed. But being a God-pleaser does not mean you ignore the people God sends. When God blesses you, the blessing almost always shows up with a face on it. The warden had a face. The butler. Pharaoh had a face. Somebody hired you. Somebody recommended you. Somebody opened a door you could not open yourself. Here is the balance: honor the vessel, but always rely on the Source.
How this applies to you:
-- God uses people, so honor the people. But God is your Source, so trust only in Him.
-- Somebody carried favor to you at some point in your life. A boss, a mentor, a pastor, a friend who spoke your name in a room you were not in. Do not get so spiritual that you cannot THANK a human being. Paul told the Romans to "give respect and honor to those who are in authority" (Romans 13:7 NLT). When God uses a person to bless you, honoring that person is honoring God's choice of vessel.
-- Being a God-pleaser has never meant being ungrateful to man.
-- Here is the line you cannot cross. Honor becomes idolatry the moment you start looking to the person for what only God can give. Jeremiah said, "Cursed is the one who trusts in man... but blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord" (Jeremiah 17:5,7 NIV).
-- If your peace rises and falls with whether a person remembers you, you have made that person your source.
-- Watch what this balance did for Joseph. He could ask a man for help and still sleep at night when the man did not come through, because his hope was never in the man.
-- The Bible says, "it is God alone who judges; he decides who will rise and who will fall" (Psalm 75:7 NLT).
5. The Cup-Bearer Forgot, But God Did Not.
Verse 23 is one of the hardest verses in the Joseph story: "Pharaoh's chief cup-bearer, however, forgot all about Joseph, never giving him another thought." I have preached this for years, and I still feel it. I can see Joseph in that cell, watching the door, waiting for the cavalry, and the cavalry never came. He had opened his heart all the way, and the man forgot. But look at what did not happen. The dream did not die. The plan did not change.
How this applies to you:
-- People will forget you, but God never will.
-- Joseph did everything right and was still forgotten. Doing right does not guarantee people will remember; it guarantees that God is keeping the record.
-- The butler’s forgetfulness did not delay God's plan by one day. God had already scheduled the moment Pharaoh would need a dream interpreted, and that moment was two years away. Joseph was not forgotten by God; he was on God's calendar.
-- When the person you helped walks away, keep serving anyway.
-- Paul said, "At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don't give up" (Galatians 6:9 NLT).
-- The plan God made for you does not depend on people keeping their word. It depends on God keeping His, and God will never fail!
That's enough for today.
Declaration of Faith:
Father, thank You that You never forget me, even when people do!
I will not let the prison get in me!
I look up today, and I notice the people You have placed in front of me!
The gift You gave me is for the wait, not just for after it!
I will serve someone else's dream while mine is on hold!
My way out runs through someone else, and I will not miss them!
I honor every person You use to bless me, but You alone are my Source!
My hope is not in the vessel; my hope is in You!
You have already scheduled the moment my door will open!
Your plan for me does not depend on anyone's memory!
At just the right time, I will reap if I do not give up!
What You showed me will surely come, right on time!
In THE YEAR OF DISCOVERY, GREATER IS COMING FOR ME!
I declare this by faith. In Jesus' name. Amen!
This is Today's Word. Apply it and prosper!
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