As we saw in yesterday’s reading, God had given Joseph the gift of dreams and their interpretation. But Joseph saw this gift as a way he could gloat over his brothers (Genesis 37:5-8). You might think that God would take away that gift, when Joseph used it so selfishly; but as Paul would point out, about 17 centuries later, “the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable” (Romans 11:29).

And so that gift was still there, during the long twelve years Joseph spent in prison: and over those years he had learned to credit his gift to God and not to himself: “Do not interpretations belong to God?” (Genesis 40:8). In prison he interpreted the dreams of Pharoah’s chief cupbearer and chief baker: and his interpretations proved true. Joseph pleaded with the cupbearer to remember his case before Pharoah, when he was restored to his position (40:14-15). But once the cupbearer got out of prison, he forgot all about Joseph (40:23).

Two years later Pharoah himself had a troubling dream, of seven fat cows eaten up by seven thin and starving cows, who nevertheless remained as scrawny and ugly as before (41:2-3, 41:17-21); and that dream was echoed by another one, this time with seven full and healthy ears of grain consumed by seven thin and blighted ones (41:5-7, 41:22-24).

Then the chief cupbearer remembered Joseph, and they called him in to explain what Pharoah’s dreams meant. Pharoah said to Joseph, “I have heard it said of you that when you hear a dream you can interpret it” (41:15). And again, Joseph insisted that the credit must not go to him: “It is not I; God will give Pharoah a favorable answer” (41:16).

It’s a hard lesson to learn. Every good gift we have comes from God (James 1:17). “What do you have that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast as if it were not a gift?” (I Corinthians 4:7). Yet whenever things go well, we are tempted to claim the honor for ourselves, on the assumption that if things went so well it must be because we are so great.

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It is all from you, O Lord: every gift, every blessing, ever capability. Every bit of what we have, you have given to us, to fulfill your good purpose for your kingdom in your world. Teach me to use my gifts humbly for your glory, and not for my own.