Where Is God?
"Here comes this dreamer. Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits."
GENESIS 37:19-20
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Where Is God?
Jacob and Joseph are submitted to a very hard trial in a manner plainly different from and contrary to the promise. Nothing at all can be seen of God's care and concern. He does not send an angel and, to be sure, not even the leaf of a tree by which the devil is checked, but He even opens the window for him that he may rage against the father and the son. Jacob indeed has a very ample promise and also its fulfillment in living experience in the blessing implemented through 12 sons. But he comes into conflict with difficulties which are put in his way as if he had neither God nor any promise. However, we should not conclude that he is wholly forsaken. For the promise of Isaiah 49: [16] remains immovable: . . . "Behold, I have graven you on the palms of My hands, etc." Why, then, are such awful experiences thrown in our path at the hands of our flesh, sons, and offspring? My reply is that this is the manner of God's government, and such is the life of the saints in this world. Therefore there is need of wisdom and doctrine exceeding the whole grasp of human reason, by which I am able to say: "I have been baptized; I have been absolved from my sins; I have eaten the body and drunk the blood of Christ; I have the most certain Word of God; He will not lie and not deceive me, however much all things seem to be carried in a contrary direction."
GENESIS 37:19-20
+
Where Is God?
Jacob and Joseph are submitted to a very hard trial in a manner plainly different from and contrary to the promise. Nothing at all can be seen of God's care and concern. He does not send an angel and, to be sure, not even the leaf of a tree by which the devil is checked, but He even opens the window for him that he may rage against the father and the son. Jacob indeed has a very ample promise and also its fulfillment in living experience in the blessing implemented through 12 sons. But he comes into conflict with difficulties which are put in his way as if he had neither God nor any promise. However, we should not conclude that he is wholly forsaken. For the promise of Isaiah 49: [16] remains immovable: . . . "Behold, I have graven you on the palms of My hands, etc." Why, then, are such awful experiences thrown in our path at the hands of our flesh, sons, and offspring? My reply is that this is the manner of God's government, and such is the life of the saints in this world. Therefore there is need of wisdom and doctrine exceeding the whole grasp of human reason, by which I am able to say: "I have been baptized; I have been absolved from my sins; I have eaten the body and drunk the blood of Christ; I have the most certain Word of God; He will not lie and not deceive me, however much all things seem to be carried in a contrary direction."
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2026
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