SCRIPTURE:

Philippians 2:3-4
3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, 4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

Matthew 5:43-44
43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 

DEVO:

After I lost my late wife, Amanda, I saw a counselor in Florida for an intense week of processing. One of the things he said to me was, “Davey, God is perfecting you in love.” I didn’t like hearing that, so I asked him what he meant. He shared with me that perhaps I had been really good at loving people in the past, but that through this God wanted to teach me how to love people even better.

“You see,” he said, “anyone can love people when things are going well, and anyone can love people who are easy to love. It’s when you come face-to-face with people who are difficult to love and—in your case—‘enemies' who have stolen so much from you. The greatest test of love is what you’re going to do when someone hurts you. Will you continue to love like you’ve never been hurt? True love is standing in the midst of what you’ve gone through and continuing to love people rather than letting your heart get calloused for fear that you’ll get hurt again.”

I think about that when it comes to Joseph and his life. Before he is sold into slavery by his brothers, and before he undergoes tremendous adversity, we see a picture of Joseph who is a proud, probably obnoxious, self-centered boy. He must have been somewhat self-absorbed to have received the reaction he did when he told his family his first dream, and then continued to tell them his second! He was in the least very immature and lacking empathy toward people.

Even so, Joseph seems to be an ambitious, goal-oriented fellow. While he worked in Potiphar’s house, we see someone who applied himself diligently, strove to earn trust and responsibility, and stewarded what was given to him well. However, many goal-oriented, success-driven people can be very unaware of how their decisions, actions, and words affect others. If I can be permitted to read between the lines a little, God needed to instill in Joe a bit of empathy for others’ pain if the Lord was going to eventually use him to enter into other’s pain and help them.

As the story goes, Joseph finds himself in prison, falsely accused, probably wondering why God has allowed all of this, when one day, as he’s distributing rations to all the other inmates, he comes across a cup-bearer and a baker. Both look perplexed and even a little forlorn. Scripture tells us in Genesis 40:6-7 that he “saw that they were troubled” and asked them,  “why are your faces so downcast?”

I’m not sure the Joseph from chapter 37 would have demonstrated the same empathy toward another person’s pain as the Joseph in chapter 40. Something had happened to Joe. Something had changed in him and given him a sensitivity to others’ pain. Perhaps it was the crucible of his own pain. Something happens when you endure a deep pain in your own life—you begin to see and understand other people’s pain more. You can relate to them. You can understand their thought processes. You can even see why they may make some of the self-destructive decisions they are making. You move along the spectrum from just having sympathy toward someone to experiencing empathy for them. 

In this prison cell, God was perfecting Joseph in love. Joseph knew that he was loved by his earthly father, and he probably had a sense that his Heavenly Father loved him too, but he didn’t know how to love others with that same kind of love. He didn’t know what it looked like to put others’ needs and hurts above his own. That is what my counselor was telling me that day --  that maybe one thing God wanted to teach me out of this was how to love people even better. Maybe God wanted to grow my capacity to empathize with them more, so I could enter into their pain with them and help bring them through it. I believe that in all you’re going through, God wants to do the same for you.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND JOURNALING:

1. Why is it so difficult to open up and love again after you’ve lost or been hurt?

2. Have you ever considered that God may be trying to teach you empathy during your trial?

3. In what ways have you noticed your ability to empathize with people increase through your trial?

4. Can you think of people in your life who may be difficult to love, but that God is asking you to love anyways? Perhaps by entering into their pain with them, you’ll be able to guide them to a place where they are whole and healed as well.

PRAYER:

Lord, I see how you are using this deep pain to shape how I love people with an even deeper, more ferocious, unconditional love. Help me to empathize with others. Help me to understand their pain. Open my eyes to hurting people around me. Show me how you may be using my pain to equip me to step into other people’s pain as well.