e189 What Does Seven Years of God’s Provision Get Us? (let’s ask Joseph)

This is Faith to Witness 99, motivating us to hear God and share the Shepherd. 

Here’s the gist, human. Receiving God’s provisions is an ongoing challenge. For instance, right now. I am revving up for my annual Bible trek, Genesis through Revelation. So how is God preparing my heart this year? By putting me right in the middle of Joseph’s Egyptian journey. A “grain beyond measure” kind of motivation. When “God’s provisions eliminate scarcity” storyline. 

How does this prepare my heart? It’s easy. God’s provision for where I land on page 1140, the last page of Revelation, will be beyond measure. God’s provision will be beyond my wanting. Like the seven years of abundance Joseph stewarded in Egypt. 

So I must steward my 40+ pages well. Each day. Because this journey, and whatever journey you are currently on, will always evolve into a different need, into a deficiency that needs addressed, a relationship that is starving, a condition that is headed toward fatal. 

A famine that needs spiritual food. Grain beyond measure. Name your journey and join us.

E189. What Does Seven Years of God’s Provision Get Us?  (let’s ask Joseph)

Is it possible to forget God’s story? To let it fade into the recesses of the mind? To get details mixed up, forget names, feel your passion waning for how he loved his chosen people through the journey to the Promised Land. To lose clarity on how he loved his people all the way to the foot of the cross, the cross his Son hung on by nails? 

Is it probable that we will relax our heart’s grip on how he parts the Red Sea for all who believe? Through our problems, challenges, deficiencies, and disillusioned and prideful  goals?

It is. 

We are wired to remember what we most think about. That’s telling, isn’t it? Actually we remember what we most live out. And what we don’t live out, we forget.

Facing page one of Genesis is ridiculously humbling. Every time I do it. It makes me want to stop and affirm how this whole Faith to Witness 99 conversation started. Because I am facing the divine beginning.

This podcast has one mission at its core—to bring us to a decision to share what God has done for us, to share his nature revealed to us in any given day, with someone who is living in a not-God world. And believers who are living with a spiritual deficiency. Simply, to share the Shepherd with every person on our path. To leave the 99 and go find the one. 

Everyone is welcome here. Humans who believe in Jesus Christ, and those who do not. In my experience, the “do nots” continue to ask questions, think through life’s deeper purpose. So it stands to reason that if I believe I have the answer, I would share that. 

In Season 1 we shared a buoy together every week, 99 episodes, and that buoy turned into what I like to think of as an expanding vessel in God’s deep, blue sea. A common space where we ask the questions, we seek God’s nature through his Word, to know him better, and for many, to be introduced to him. For those who are seeking, hurting, struggling, maybe just curious and you haven’t exited this episode yet, hey, I have this God I would like you to meet.  

I’m Kathryn Bise, your host.

God is preparing my heart for my annual Bible trek. That I basically read 40+ pages per day, with a simple Bible timeline, a few maps, and music from Biblical times. No scripture-hopping or devo-for-the-day mentality here. This is my third year. Last year it took longer because I journaled it on Substack. Imagine hundreds of post-it notes… I’ve dropped a link to my Substack platform for last year’s 2025 Bible trek, Immerse in his Word: https://substack.com/@kathrynabise1  

This year I am again reading the Bible as the divine narrative it is, but also to gather research for a longer writing project. Actually, more so, praying that Holy Spirit will search my heart, guide my thoughts and bring together what right now are disparate parts into a message that reflects the amazing truth of our Savior. That he laid down his advantage to save us. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Whew. 

So I want to start by looking at a passage in Genesis that is so good at tilling the gratitude soil in my heart, and perhaps yours. It’s one milestone in the journey of Joseph, a journey that owns the last 14 chapters, chapters 37-50, of Genesis. One section in chapter 41 that illuminates God’s provision and preparing for the future. 

We look at a couple of insights that prompt and embrace stewardship, preparing us for when famine replaces flourishing. When earthly life is taking all its cues from scarcity, we are ready because God has prepared us, provided for us. And this is how he is preparing me to read through his story. This annual reading is like the seven years of God’s prosperity, his provision. You can join this Bible trek, Immerse in His Word 2026, by the way. Let me know if you do at deeperwater@kathrynbise.com or my Substack at https://substack.com/@kathrynabise1

Joseph and Stewarding Provisions Beyond Measure

Let’s consider Joseph at the beginning of his service to King Pharaoh of Egypt.

Genesis 41:46-52

46 Joseph was thirty years old when he entered the service of Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from Pharaoh’s presence and traveled throughout Egypt. 47 During the seven years of abundance the land produced plentifully. 48 Joseph collected all the food produced in those seven years of abundance in Egypt and stored it in the cities. In each city he put the food grown in the fields surrounding it. 49 Joseph stored up huge quantities of grain, like the sand of the sea; it was so much that he stopped keeping records because it was beyond measure.

50 Before the years of famine came, two sons were born to Joseph by Asenath daughter of Potiphera, priest of On. 51 Joseph named his firstborn Manasseh and said, “It is because God has made me forget all my trouble and all my father’s household.” 52 The second son he named Ephraim and said, “It is because God has made me fruitful in the land of my suffering.”

Insight 1: God’s measure is not our measure. His provisions quench the dryness of our daily top soil, yes. But his provisions also speak to capacity for our future need. And he does it through teaching us stewardship through our suffering. Joseph said that God made him fruitful through his circumstance, his estrangement from his family, his suffering. God’s provisions are beyond measure, beyond any of the futile ways we give worth to earthly gain. We must seek what is beyond earthly gain. 

In verse 49 Joseph “stopped keeping records” because he had come to know the abundance of the Lord. Isn’t this where gratitude begins? When we stop keeping track of what we think we need to fill our storehouses and accept God’s terms for provision? 

Isn’t this the gateway to living free in Christ? That what we receive by God’s measure will bring with it God’s timeless foresight, not only of how much we need, but what it is for. That’s the stuff our prayers should be made of, to pray for stewardship of God’s measure. 

That I steward well God’s abundance. In this Biblical story it is grain, but also the fruits of Joseph’s spiritual character, that he is growing stronger, fortifying his grateful spirit by managing God’s provisions well.

How does this prepare my heart? It’s easy. I have shared my lens on this Bible reading—wanting his word to focus my writing efforts—but God’s provision for where I land on page 1140 will be beyond measure. God’s provision will be beyond my wanting.

So I must steward my 40+ pages well. Each day. Because this journey, and whatever journey you are currently on, will evolve into a different need, into a deficiency that needs addressed, a relationship that is starving. A famine that needs spiritual food. 

Joseph and Provisions That Reach All the World

God’s time construct is seven years before seven years.

Let’s continue.

Genesis 41:53-57

53 The seven years of abundance in Egypt came to an end, 54 and the seven years of famine began, just as Joseph had said. There was famine in all the other lands, but in the whole land of Egypt there was food. 55 When all Egypt began to feel the famine, the people cried to Pharaoh for food. Then Pharaoh told all the Egyptians, “Go to Joseph and do what he tells you.”

56 When the famine had spread over the whole country, Joseph opened all the storehouses and sold grain to the Egyptians, for the famine was severe throughout Egypt. 57 And all the world came to Egypt to buy grain from Joseph, because the famine was severe everywhere.

Insight #2: God’s provisions teach us the way of the spirit. The spirit of generosity, the spirit of fruitful stewardship, and the spirit of forgiveness. That Joseph sold grain to the Egyptians and here’s the beyond measure part, he sold to “all the world.” 

Enter God’s omniscience. Joseph’s outreach of “go unto the world” foreshadows the words of our Savior. Our reach into the world is not measured by the length of our arms, but the reach of an everlasting God. 

And what is amazing is that God’s foresight lays down the bridge of forgiveness and reconciliation between Joseph and his family. Storehouses full beyond measure. Overflowing grain. A seven year famine. God is king of paradoxes. I have to say this, because the evil act of men, blood brothers, becomes the redeeming grace of the boy with the coat of many colors. Sold into slavery, Joseph survived to this point through God’s purpose, and moved God’s story along. 

I’ll say that again. Joseph moved God’s story along. Toward a Savior whose sacrifice was the ultimate, divine measure. 

God’s Provision Elimantes Spiritual Scarcity

What travels well here is this: God’s provision eliminates spiritual scarcity. Joseph collected all the grain during the seven years of abundance. When we collect, nurture and steward God’s provisions for us, we have what we need for times of famine, to help others “beyond measure.” God’s provisions are always about growing our spiritual character, and it is our reception to this that yields fruit in the time of famine.

Divine fruit in the time of spiritual famine. Whether it is our famine or that of others. Or both.

2 Timothy 3:16

16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,

Where did we start with all of this? Everyone has access to God’s storehouse. His Word. And we have a God who provides beyond measure.

Let’s start in Genesis. Again. This annual reading is like the seven years of God’s prosperity, his provision. How does this prepare my heart? It’s easy. I have shared my lens on this Bible reading—wanting his word to focus my writing efforts—but God’s provision for where I land on page 1140 will be beyond measure. God’s provision will be beyond my wanting.

This year’s journey, and whatever journey you are currently on, will evolve into a different need, into a deficiency that needs addressed, a relationship that is starving. A famine that needs spiritual food. Name it, human. Name your current journey.

Thank you for preparing our hearts Lord, for preparing our spirit to walk through your story, down the middle of your covenant, into the cross’s shadow of your Son’s sacrifice. Teach us, rebuke us, correct us. Train us to fill our spiritual storehouse with your provisions. That we move your story along, like Joseph. Your breath through our lungs.Your voice, to your glory.