Rewriting the Script

Introduction (5m)

What is your life script?

What is your life script? What is it about your past, particularly your life with your family, that influences what you think about life today? Psychologists believe our life scripts are usually created in childhood. A life script is what we use to give meaning to the events that happen around us.

Life Script 1 - People always leave me

You may have a life script that says, ‘People always leave me’. If you wait for people to invite you to events, in order to prove to yourself that they love you and want you to be with them, or if you get jealous very easily, then it may be that you have a fear that you will always be abandoned by the people you love. That may be connected by a loss you felt in your childhood: a divorce where one parent abandons the family, or death of a parent or other loved one early in life. This may cause you to act defensively, and to push people away, before you think they are going to desert you.

Life Script 2 - I'm not good enough

Maybe your life script is ‘I’m not good enough’. The belief that you are inferior to other people. That there’s something wrong with you. And that one day, people will suddenly recognise this. Do you find yourself saying, I can’t do this, I’m no good at it? Do you avoid competitive situations, even stuff like playing board games — because you fear coming last? Maybe your parents pushed you too hard. Maybe they had unrealistic expectations about what you could achieve, and then scolded you when you didn’t reach the expected level. If you live by this life script, then it’s likely you’ll become over sensitive to criticism or comparison. And any perceived rejection of what you achieve will simply be taken as confirmation that you are a failure.

Life Script 3 - Bad things happen to me more than others

Or your life script might be, ‘Bad things happen to me more than they do to other people’. You may find it very easy to imagine the worst case scenario in everything. You may worry excessively. You may feel helpless in certain situation. It might be that a childhood trauma has left you feeling like this. And you end up with an exaggerated fear of disaster just around the corner.

Going back to move forward

Rooting out these life scripts, dealing with the deeply ingrained messages we have picked up from our past, changing our habits, transforming our ways of behaving, turning around the way that we think, is complex and difficult. But it can be done. It has to be done. As we learned last week, we have to select reverse in order to move forward. And if you want a great biblical model on how to do that, how to ensure that you live by a good and positive life script, despite your experiences, then there is no better than the story of Joseph.

Explanation (5m)

Joseph’s family history is pretty bad

Begins in Genesis 37. Ends Genesis 50. 25 per cent. of first book of Bible is about Joseph and his family. This story is a big deal. J comes from “blended family”. Father, Jacob had children by four different women. His wives - Leah and Rachel. And two concubines - Zilpah and Bilhah. Altogether, Jacob has 12 sons. J is second youngest son. When we meet J, 17, shepherd with his brothers.

Because Rachel is Jacob’s favourite wife, he favours J above his brothers

And this is no jealous supposition on his brothers’ behalf. This was out-in-the-open, on display favouritism. So much so, that Jacob gives J a coat of many colours, or an ornate robe, as the Bible puts it, probably of a kind that royalty would wear. This favouritism makes J’s brothers hate him so much, that Bible tells us they could not speak a kind word to him.

Mind you, Joseph didn’t help himself!

He has a dream where he sees his brothers, in the form of sheaves of grain, bowing down to him. You can sense that as J tells his brothers this dream, there is more than a hint of arrogance, pride, immaturity. You can only imagine the brothers response to this! They hated him all the more. This hate grows so much and so fast, that the brothers plot to kill him. In the end, they decide to sell him into slavery instead. But their hate makes them decide to fake his funeral and to lie to their father about what has happened to J. Jacob believes J has been torn to pieces by some ferocious animal, and goes into deep mourning, from which no one can comfort him. Brothers continue to live this lie for 10-12 years.

J ends up as slave to Potiphar, an Egyptian official in Pharaoh’s court

P ended up trusting him with his household and everything that he owned. Clear J had great potential. And yet, he is falsely accused of sleeping with P’s wife, and thrown into prison for 10-13 years.

Can you imagine how J must have felt?

God, you say you are with me. You say you are faithful. You say you have a purpose for my life. Well, I just don’t see it. I’ve been betrayed by my family. They sold me into slavery. They abandoned me. I don’t deserve to be languishing in prison. Where’s your purpose in all of this?

But the story continues

And Joseph is given the opportunity to interpret dreams. Pharaoh gets to hear of this, and after interpreting his dreams, J is put in charge of the whole of Egypt. He becomes P’s PM, his number two. Powerful not just in Egypt, in world. At the time, Egypt is the world’s superpower. Equivalent to VP in USA, or PM in Russia. P renames him, Zaphenath-Paneah, and gives him a princess as his wife.

Seven years later, famine breaks out

J is responsible for distributing food throughout E nation. Two years into the famine, and Jacob and J’s brothers in Israel are starving to death. They come to Egypt, to J, and ask to buy food. They don’t know it’s J.

What would you do in his shoes?

Would you kill them for what they did to you? Would you refuse to help and send them back to starve to death? Would you throw them in prison and give them a taste of what you’ve been through? Or would you give them food and tell them to sling their hooks and that you never want to see their faces again?

Well, as we heard, J does something quite remarkable

He reveals his identity to his brothers and forgives them for what they did.

And as he does so, Joseph rewrites his life script with the help of God

Bearing in mind what J had been through, he could be forgiven for thinking: I am worthless. My life is a mistake. I should never trust anyone. I shouldn’t risk anything. I shouldn’t feel. I should shut myself off from pain. I’m a loser.

That is the life script his family past has written for him

Everything that’s happened to him — abandonment, betrayal, false accusations, prison — could unconsciously direct his life and the decisions he makes today.

But J rejected that life script

He thought about it, and he chose to rewrite it with God. You can see from the text that J has spent the last two decades praying continually to God, thinking and rethinking through what’s happened to him. And as he does so, God gives him wisdom. God gives him insight into his divine plan through all the negative things that have happened to him. He is able to reveal the hand of God in negative human activity. Notice what he says:

Genesis 45:5 NLT

But don’t be upset, and don’t be angry with yourselves for selling me to this place. It was God who sent me here ahead of you to preserve your lives.

Genesis 45:7 NLT

God has sent me ahead of you to keep you and your families alive and to preserve many survivors.

Genesis 45:8 NLT

So it was God who sent me here, not you! And he is the one who made me an adviser to Pharaoh—the manager of his entire palace and the governor of all Egypt.

But God - an amazing choice!

In these verses, J proclaims an amazing declaration of divine providence. He pronounces the biggest phrase in the Bible: But God. You hated me ... But God. You sold me into slavery ... But God. You abandoned me ... But God. You left me for dead ... But God. I was falsely accused ... But God. I was thrown into prison ... But God. J declares that God works his will and purpose in and through the actions of all people, whether good or bad. J is able to say, not you, but God.

Application (5m)

Joseph chose to be a blessing

And because J chose to see God’s hand in his disastrous past, he could choose to be a blessing. He could have killed his brothers in anger for what they had put him through. Instead, he chose to bless them. Joseph forgave his family for what they had done.

How could he do that?

He made a choice. He remembered those two words: But God.

What do you need to say But God to?

Difficult family past? Carrying emotional baggage around with you? Destructive, sinful habits? What life script do you need to screw up, throw in wastepaper bin and say, But God?

Will you make that choice today?

Will you choose to accept that God is safe? That he’s good? That he can be trusted?

When we choose to believe that God’s plan and purposes are greater than any human weakness, we can choose to be a blessing, whatever our circumstances

God knows about our weaknesses. He knows about the life scripts we have picked up from our past. He knows our wrongdoing. But his intentions are far more important and powerful. I pray that each of us will learn what we need to let go of from our past. I pray for the courage and wisdom of Joseph. That we will learn from our past, rather than be crippled by it. And I pray that each of us will make the choice to be a blessing, trusting in the eternal intentions of God. God bless you.

Next Steps

SB 25 - God’s love to me is wonderful

GOD’S love to me is wonderful, That he should deign to hear The faintest whisper of my heart, Wipe from mine eyes the tear; And though I cannot comprehend Such love, so great, so deep, In his strong hands my soul I trust, He will not fail to keep. God’s love is wonderful, God’s love is wonderful, Wonderful that he should give his Son to die for me; God’s love is wonderful! 2 God’s love to me is wonderful! My very steps are planned; When mists of doubt encompass me, I hold my Father’s hand. His love has banished every fear, In freedom I rejoice, And with my quickened ears I hear The music of his voice. 3 God’s love to me is wonderful! He lights the darkest way; I now enjoy his fellowship, ‘Twill last through endless day. My Father doth not ask that I Great gifts on him bestow, But only that I love him too, And serve him here below. Sidney Edward Cox (1887-1975) © The General of The Salvation Army. Used By Permission. CCL Licence No. 30158 Copied from The Song Book of The Salvation Army Song Number 25