02/18/24 - Kelly Baker - Delayed Dream

Genesis 37:3-11 Now Israel loved Joseph more than his other sons because Joseph was a son born to him in his old age, and he made a long-sleeved robe for him.  When his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not bring themselves to speak peaceably to him.  Then Joseph had a dream.  When he told it to his brothers, they hated him even more.  He said to them, “Listen to this dream I had:  There we were, binding sheaves of grain in the field.  Suddenly my sheaf stood up, and your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.”  “Are you really going to reign over us?” his brothers asked him.  “Are you really going to rule us?”  So they hated him even more because of his dream and what he had said.  Then he had another dream and told it to his brothers.  “Look,” he said, “I had another dream, and this time the sun, moon, and eleven stars were bowing down to me.”  He told his father and brothers, and his father rebuked him. “What kind of dream is this that you have had?” he said. “Am I and your mother and your brothers really going to come and bow down to the ground before you?”  His brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the matter in mind.

Joseph was a dreamer! 

A Delayed Dream

But be careful who you tell– 
because not all will encourage you or be happy for you. 

Joseph’s dreams were about God making Joseph a great leader one day.

A few of the things he endured were. 
● being betrayed by his brothers
● Thrown in a dry well to die. 
● Sold into slavery.
● brought to Egypt, where he was sold to Potiphar, one of King Pharaoh’s ministers.
● sent to prison for being wrongfully accused. 

Because sometimes when God puts a desire in our hearts it may look like circumstances are taking you in the exact opposite direction, and that’s when the panic and doubt set in, BUT God’s ways are better than our ways. 

If God had answered Joseph’s cries to be saved, he would have saved him from a lot of pain, but he also would have blocked his road to his destiny– the destiny to become a great ruler. 

Sometimes we become reliant on every other thing EXCEPT God. 
God wants us to be completely reliant on him. So sometimes he allows us to be in positions where we realize we need him more than anything else, we simply need him. 

Just when you think the dream is fulfilled… I am here, he says wait a minute, there’s more.