“The Lord was with Joseph and he prospered.”
Genesis 39:2a
In 1930, two young brothers named Dick and Maurice McDonald moved from New Hampshire to California to pursue the American dream of being successful. After a few failed ventures, they struck gold when they opened a small drive-in restaurant. By the mid-1950’s, their annual revenue was $350,000, and the brothers split $100,000 in profits.
You might think, yes, the rest is history. But you may be surprised to know the rest of the story. In 1954, a man by the name of Ray Kroc came into the picture. Ray Kroc saw potential that the brothers did not see. In 1961, Kroc bought the exclusive rights to McDonald’s for the sum of $2.7 million – now with 21,000+ restaurants worldwide, the rest of the story is history indeed.
The lessons learned from this story are:
Don’t pull up short of your God-given dream.
Don’t allow someone to out-dream you.
Don’t allow someone else to finish your dream.
Christians look to Joseph as the role model for dreaming big. Genesis 39 holds important lessons for all dreamers. Some lessons in this chapter that can keep us from stopping short of our dreams are:
Know that God is with us (verses 2, 21, & 23).
Know that God is aware of our actions (verse 9).
Know that God can make the bitter things in life sweet (verses 21-23).
Prayer Focus: Pray that Grace will pursue our God-given dream to the fullest potential. Pray that through the achievement of this dream will come more and better Christ followers for the kingdom of God. Ask God to show you ways in which you have stopped short of His best for you.
