“So you’re planning to leave?”

“Yeah, I’m clearing out. It’ll be good for me to get away from everything and learn to fend for myself and stand on my own two feet. I want to make a few fast bucks, pay off a few debts and buy some things. Then I’ll come back and settle down. Even Joseph in Genesis ended up far away from home. It didn’t look so great at the start but then he turned a corner. Everything eventually worked out for him and he got a good job.”

Be careful when you’re reading the Bible not to twist the Scriptures to justify what you want to do. Yes, Joseph ended up far away from home. But it wasn’t a personal goal he had for himself. He wasn’t chomping-at-the-bit to get away from it all; nor was it a get-rich-in-Egypt scheme he devised for himself. It was an entirely different set of circumstances.

Joseph didn’t push himself away from the shelter of Hebron. He was dragged away with many tears. He arrived in Egypt surrounded by people he did not know and a godless culture of which he wanted no part.

But what could he do about it? He chose to walk closely with his God despite everything all around him. Rather than exploring, with new-found freedom, the entertainments of Egypt and being googly-eyed over urban excitement, he focused on how to live for God, surrounded by the ungodly, so far away from home.

His mission in Egypt was to honor God despite the free-wheeling lifestyles of a godless culture. So when the big temptation came – how did this young, single man respond?

 Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance.
And after a time his master’s wife cast her eyes on Joseph and said, “Lie with me.”

But he refused and said to his master’s wife,
“Behold, because of me my master has no concern about anything in the house, and he has put everything that he has in my charge…except yourself, because you are his wife.

How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God?”
And when she grabbed him, he “fled and got out of the house.”
(Genesis 39:6-9,12)

Although he wasn’t living under the watchful eye of Jacob his father – he very carefully lived each day under the watchful eye of the God he loved and wanted to please.

When Joseph realized that people from home weren’t looking over his shoulder, what do you think he did? Did he blow his first month’s paycheck on an $8000 screen-machine so he could really get into some serious viewing of things that would be detrimental to him spiritually? Do you think, as the sun set, Joseph stepped out to explore the city’s night-life and slipped anonymously into a nightclub for his first beer?

Other teens from Egypt would do stuff like that – but Joseph was living under the scrutiny of God’s all seeing eyes and enjoying His protection. He was very aware that any wrong he did was first and foremost sin against God.

What makes you think it is the Lord’s will for you to go far away? Is He leading you there or are you just going? When you’re there, will you use the new location as a fresh start in your life to really get serious about living for Christ? Or do you expect to loosen up a bit?

You only have one life. Consciously live each day under the all-seeing eye of God, with a sensitivity to pleasing Christ in every choice you make.

Walk carefully and closely with the Lord today.
Warmly in Christ,

 

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