Hard Time

Here I sit, Wednesday night as I type this. It is four days before Christmas. I have really been at a loss of things to blog about these days, as work
and the strain of everyday life drag me down and inspiration does not flow as freely as I used to. So I will tell you about life.
This is the sixth day that my little girl has had a fever. She has been to the emergency room two times, had every test possible to determine the cause, and I have even made a special trip back to the hospital to deliver a stool sample. That's right, I have literally hand-delivered poop. My life has gone to crap. I would like to thank my wife from shoveling it from the diaper to the container. At least there wasn't a fan for it to hit. Take a second to come up with your own pun before going to the next paragraph.
The hardest thing I had to do was on Saturday night. We were desperate to get this temperature down. So my mother-in-law and I tag-teamed to take ice-cold washcloths and place them on different parts of her body to try to lower her temperature. To say she did not like this is mildly understating it. For the next eternity (or so it felt) she screamed, cried, and told us "NO! NO THANK YOU! I DON"T!" All this time I held her, trying to assure her it was for her good.
See the instant correlation?
In my own reading of the Bible I have come across the story of Joseph for the second time this year. Think of all he went through: being dumped into a pit by his brothers because of their jealousy (and Joseph's need to tell his dreams to them); Being sold into slavery; being falsely accused of rape and imprisoned; and being forgotten in prison.
On the other end, think of his father Jacob. He was named by God Israel and told he would be a great nation. Yet for years he carried around the grief of a favorite son he thought was lost and dealt with the agony.
In this situation God held both of them in His hand. I am confident that neither were happy about their situation, and that Joseph probably let out a few screams of terror when being thrown in the pit.
But just like the cold compresses had a purpose to lower my daughter's temperature and give her comfort in spite of the temporary discomfort, the struggle of Joseph was to save Jacob and the family that turned on him. Of course, after his imprisonment Joseph goes on to become governor of Egypt and devises the plan to save people from a coming famine and provide for his family in the process. Of course Jacob's pain subsides when he sees his son again and is sustained by him.
No, we don't understand the hard time that we deal with right now. But whenever we go through them I can rest assured that there is a greater purpose that is being intended for us in them.
Think of Mary last of all. It is December, of course. She had to deal with the ridicule and shame of being an unwed mother, the possibility of being shunned by her Joseph, and the impending pain of childbirth. Her Father found favor in her, and had a greater purpose for her pain: the redemption of the world through the coming of His Son.