DREAM ON Part 4: The Prison – Character

 

 

 

Dream ———— Destiny

How do we travel from the dream to the destiny?

The way you hold the dreams God gives you determines if and when they come to pass.

God is faithful to the promised outcome, not the easy journey.

To overcome temptation:
Realize and Run.

Genesis 39:20-21 
20 Joseph’s master took him and put him in prison, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined.But while Joseph was there in the prison, 21 the Lord was with him; he showed him kindness and granted him favor in the eyes of the prison warden.

Matthew 28:20 
20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Genesis 40:1-8 
1 Some time later, the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt offended their master, the king of Egypt. 2 Pharaoh was angry with his two officials, the chief cupbearer and the chief baker, 3 and put them in custody in the house of the captain of the guard, in the same prison where Joseph was confined. 4 The captain of the guard assigned them to Joseph, and he attended them. After they had been in custody for some time, 5 each of the two men—the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt, who were being held in prison—had a dream the same night, and each dream had a meaning of its own. 6 When Joseph came to them the next morning, he saw that they were dejected. 7 So he asked Pharaoh’s officials who were in custody with him in his master’s house, “Why do you look so sad today?” 8 “We both had dreams,” they answered, “but there is no one to interpret them. ”Then Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to God? Tell me your dreams.”

Your circumstances must be interpreted through God’s lens, not our limited perspective.

Isaiah 55:8-9 
8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, ”declares the Lord. 9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

God is much more interested in developing our character than our comfort.

Training for great things always takes place in lesser things.

How you respond with “lesser things” is a test of how you’ll do with “greater things.”

Luke 16:10 
10 “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.

Prison will always reveal your character. But a prison won’t always develop your character.

Hardship often prepares an ordinary person for an extraordinary destiny.
C.S. LEWIS

Genesis 41:1 
1 When two full years had passed, Pharaoh had a dream: He was standing by the Nile,

Genesis 41:16 
16 “I cannot do it,” Joseph replied to Pharaoh, “but God will give Pharaoh the answer he desires.”

Don’t give up on your Dream

Habakkuk 2:3 
3 For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it; it will certainly come and will not delay.

Galatians 6:9 
9 Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

When something is happening to you, God wants to do something in you.

1 Peter 1:6-7 
6 In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. 7 These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.

James 1:2-4 
2 Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3 because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. 4 Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.