Having a Moment
 As soon as Joseph saw his brothers, he recognized them, but he pretended to be a stranger and spoke harshly to them. “Where do you come from?” he asked. “From the land of Canaan,” they replied, “to buy food.” Although Joseph recognized his brothers, they did not recognize him. Then he remembered his dreams about them and said to them, “You are spies! You have come to see where our land is unprotected.”

Genesis 42:7-9 (NIV)

The text takes all of our guessing and speculation away when it tells us that Joseph’s initial response to his brothers after all these years was to talk to them harshly and accuse them of being spies. Now that word harshly in the NIV really doesn’t get at the description of the Hebrew understanding of this passage in terms of his response. A way of better describing it is Joseph decides to treat them cruelly, severely, rudely.

He is anything but welcoming. Maybe Joseph wanted to test his brother’s character to see if they had really changed since they sold him into slavery. Maybe he wanted to observe their reactions, assess their honesty, and test their integrity. Maybe when he saw his brother standing before him, it stirred up a range of emotions, including anger, resentment, hurt, and the want for retribution and revenge.

Why mention all of these things? Because it’s important to note that Joseph’s actions were part of a larger plan that eventually led to the reconciliation of the entire family. With all Joseph’s anointing, with him living squarely centered in the perfect will of God, Joseph, the man of God, is just having a moment. He’s being rude and cruel and harsh, and it doesn’t need to be painted in a positive light. It needs to be accepted that anointed people have moments.

Joseph teaches us that we can be deeply necessary, powerfully anointed, gracefully successful and still have these moments when we can’t forget what has happened to us. We still have moments when we feel justified in checking other people’s motives as if we can judge the integrity of the human heart. We all have these moments. Accept them and expect them so that you can steward them rather than hiding or ignoring or being secretly controlled by them. Don’t try to hide your bad moments and become a hypocrite until you emotionally implode because you’re walking around holding what you wanted to release instead.

Loving God is not a guarantee that you will not be tempted by these moments when it’s easy to slip out of your spiritual character—the character Christ is forming in you. Loving God does not eliminate having moments where your words don’t reflect just how much you love Him and how much He has been doing in your life.