Pain

God blessed Abraham’s grandson Jacob with a large family, and in time, his twelve sons became the fathers of the twelve tribes of Israel. God kept His promise to Abraham, and His blessing was on this extended family that would one day become a great nation.

The family was not without its problems. Tensions among the brothers focused on Joseph. God had given him a dream that seemed to indicate Joseph would be given a position of prominence over his brothers. The brothers were not impressed, and they decided that it was time to teach Joseph a lesson in humility.

One day, when they were out in the fields, Joseph’s brothers attacked him. They threw him in a pit and left him there until some traveling traders came by. They sold Joseph to the travelers, who took him to Egypt, and the brothers returned home to tell their father, Jacob, that Joseph had been killed by a wild animal. Jacob was inconsolable in his grief (Genesis 37).

This story takes us down into the second valley, where we discover the suffering of the family God had chosen to bless. Because God promised His blessing to all nations through the line of Abraham’s descendants, the hope of the world was tied to the future of this troubled family.

Cruel Rewards for Integrity

When the travelers arrived in Egypt, they sold Joseph to Potiphar, a distinguished official in Pharaoh’s government (Genesis 39:1). God gave Joseph success in everything he did, and eventually Potiphar put Joseph in charge of his household (39:3–4). But things got complicated when Potiphar’s wife tried to seduce him and Joseph ran from the house. Seeking revenge, Potiphar’s wife claimed that he had tried to rape her. By the end of the day, Joseph found himself incarcerated alongside the king’s prisoners. It was harsh treatment for a man who had acted with integrity.

God was with Joseph in prison and gave him the ability to accurately predict the future by interpreting dreams. Pharaoh had been troubled by dreams in which he had seen seven fat cows eaten by seven thin cows, and so when he heard about Joseph, he sent for him. Joseph told Pharaoh that God was showing him what the future held. Seven years of abundant harvests would be followed by seven years of famine (41:28–30).

Pharaoh recognized that God had revealed this to Joseph and put him in charge of building reserves of grain that would sustain the population during the coming years of famine. Joseph became the fastest rising star in political history, and next to Pharaoh, he became the most powerful man in Egypt (41:39–40).

God Meant It for Good

Meanwhile back in Canaan, Joseph’s father and brothers knew nothing of the coming famine and did nothing to prepare for it. When the famine came, they were desperate. Hearing news that there was grain in Egypt, Joseph’s brothers traveled there in the hope of finding food.

They knew nothing of what God had done for Joseph. At first they did not recognize him, and when he eventually revealed his identity, they were terrified (Genesis 45:3). But Joseph forgave them. He saw that God had been at work even in the painful experiences of his life. Through an extraordinary chain of cruel events involving the brothers, the slave traders, and Potiphar’s wife, God had put Joseph in a position to save the family He had chosen to bless from being wiped out by the famine. “It was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you,” he said. “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good” (Genesis 45:5; 50:20).

The First Holocaust

The family God had chosen to bless settled in Egypt. There were seventy-five of them when they arrived (Acts 7:14), and in the years that followed, the family prospered. But things changed quickly when a new ruler came to power in Egypt (Exodus 1:8). He was troubled by the rapid growth of the Israelites, so he launched a fierce persecution against them, forcing them to work in fields and on building sites for long hours in dreadful conditions (Exodus 1:9, 14).

God’s people continued to thrive even under oppression, and so Pharaoh introduced his final solution: state-sponsored infanticide. He ordered that every newborn male child should be drowned in the River Nile (Exodus 1:22). Pharaoh’s racial prejudice blinded him to the unique dignity and value of every human life. It was the first holocaust.

The new pharaoh knew nothing about Joseph and nothing about the God of the Bible who had saved His nation from disaster in the famine. Where God is not known, human life is not valued; and where human life is not valued, evil will soon be unleashed.

God had protected His people from the famine in Egypt, but it was never His purpose that they should stay there. And it was through this fierce and prolonged persecution that the Hebrews who had once been comfortably settled in Egypt began to cry out to God for rescue.

After four hundred years in which there had been no significant progress in God’s plan to bring blessing to the human race, God was about to step into the course of history again and bring His people into the land He had promised.

A View from the Second Valley

In the second valley, we are confronted with the reality of evil and the mystery of suffering. Why did God allow the people He had blessed to experience so much pain? God has not chosen to answer that question fully. But the second valley of the Bible story shows us that even our most painful suffering will find its place in the ultimate purpose of God.