Joseph's brethren had plotted and planned against their brother. Apparently their malicious designs were successful. The youth had been put down into the pit—then sold to the Midianites into slavery. They had accomplished their full wickedness. They "thought evil... but God—." "If God be for us, who can be against us?"
Taken into Egypt, "the Lord was with Joseph," and he prospered. Then again, while there, evil was thought against him. For sin—not his own—he was thrown into prison. His "feet they hurt with fetters: he was laid in iron [or, his soul came into iron]: until the time that his word came: the word of the Lord tried him." Psa. 105:18, 1918Whose feet they hurt with fetters: he was laid in iron: 19Until the time that his word came: the word of the Lord tried him. (Psalm 105:18‑19). In body and in spirit he was bound "until the time."
At length that time arrived. The discipline was effected. The mellowing and the molding were perfected. Joseph comes forth to be lord over all Egypt for the blessing of the people of that land and of all people around, and for the succor of his father and of the very brethren who had thought evil against him.
"God" had "meant it" all "unto good"—good for Joseph himself, good for others through him.
"God is above everything, and there is none above Him," it has been said.
And He means good unto His own all through their history. That which is painful, and apparently contrary, will be used by His gracious hand for our ultimate benefit, and then through us for the help of others. Comforted in affliction ourselves, then we may comfort others. The affliction is overruled thus for the education of the believer in service, that he may be employed to encourage others with the comforting of God which he has known (2 Cor. 1:44Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. (2 Corinthians 1:4)).
"When He makes bare His arm,
Who shall His strength withstand?
When He His people's cause defends,
Who then can stay His hand?"