“Now Joseph was well-built and handsome. Sometime later, his master’s wife became attracted to Joseph and said, “Sleep with me.” Genesis 39:6b-7
Let me just say this: Soap Opera’s have nothing on the Bible. It is filled with sex, scandal, and messy relationships. Joseph, our hero of this particular story is in a very difficult situation. He can remain true to himself and God, or he can have sex with his master’s wife. Either way he will lose. He is at an impasse.
An impasse is a position or situation from which there is no escape: it is a deadlock with no way out according to dictionary.com. These are hard spaces to be in and unless something changes, that is where things will remain. Because that is the very nature of an impasse: the only way change can occur, and forward movement can happen is through a death or a letting go of something. Everything will remain at a standstill until that ending happens. And since we are not comfortable with endings, we tend to remain in our own impasses. Living out an existence that is less than until someone is willing to move or let what the impasse is all about die. It isn’t fun.
But…here’s the thing: when we let what has us stalled die, we open our lives to great opportunity. The impasses we experience in life are doing nothing more than holding us hostage to the very thing or things we are holding on to so tightly and that are keeping us in the impasse and away from what will be life giving. Let that sink in for a minute. I’ll wait.
In the meantime, let’s take another look at Joseph. He had several impasses in his life. And in each he remained faithful to God’s will. Even though it took quite some time for God’s will to work out the impasses in Joseph’s life, Joe remained patient. His brother’s sold him into slavery, and he became the slave to an Egyptian…but in time his owner, began to realize his worth and put him in charge of his household. Joseph proved himself over and over until finally his owner saw him as more than just a slave. His perception changed and Joseph was given a lot of responsibility. But he was easy on the eyes and Potiphar’s wife noticed and tried to seduce him. When he remained true to God and the ethics God requires of us…Potiphar’s wife trumped up charges against him and he was at another impasse in his life. Thrown into an Egyptian prison, innocent of all charges, where he will stay unless something changes. The quickest change would be that Potiphar’s wife would admit she lied…but that would not go well for her, and so she remains silent. With her silence, Joseph remains in prison, for a long time, until things change. I encourage you to read his story. It encompasses Genesis chapters 37 through 50. It is worth the time.
But while there are lots of lessons to learn from his story, we should take note of a couple points:
First, is Joseph’s faithfulness. It is not easy to be faithful to what God wants from us during times of impasse. We just want those difficulties to go away. We also tend to act in ways that are not in line with God’s will for our lives which tends to make the impasse worse. Being faithful to who God created us to be is our best choice. Like Joseph, he didn’t know when he would be rescued, freed, or redeemed from the unjust situations that others inflicted on him, but he did know that whether he was rescued or not, living a life that was in line with God’s will was better than not living a life in line with God’s will.
Second, Joseph still did what was right. He was in dire circumstances with no end in sight and yet when the change occurred Joseph stepped up and into those changes. He didn’t fight them. He didn’t say this isn’t the change I want, or this isn’t fair…I mean he was rescued if you will from Potiphar’s wife by being sent to prison…And Joseph made the best of that bad situation. He could have complained about how unfair it was. He could have gotten mad at God. But instead…he just stepped into the change and waited faithfully to see what God would do as God broke the impasses in his life.
Finally, when we let God use our circumstances, God will redeem them for the good. We will find reconciliation with the past hurts and traumas. It will take a lot of patience on our part and continued faithfulness to God’s will in our lives. But…it will be worth it. This is not some Pollyanna, feel good advice. This is advice that has been borne out of my personal experiences. God will redeem the impasses. God will redeem the traumas. God will.
In letting go of what we are trying to control, trying to make things go our way, we open our lives up to new possibilities and potentials we might not have realized by staying in the impasse or forcing our will to happen. I think that is the tragedy of impasses in general, they keep us from what is better. They keep us from new, as yet unseen possibilities and we settle for less than because we dig in and hold on to what needs to be let go.
Letting go is hard but it is also necessary for forward movement. Every ending has in it a new beginning…we just need to be willing to embrace the ending.
Peace,
Pastor Beth
Beth's Blog 