Change of Name

 

"Joseph called the name of the firstborn Manasseh: 'For God has made me forget all my trouble..." Genesis 41:51

The day Joseph’s first child was born Joseph looked to his past in retrospect. He looked at all the pain of what happened with his brothers. He remembered the fear of the uncertainty of the future. He recalled the many nights he was bound in prison by the decisions of his family. And somewhere in all the joy of becoming a father, he determined that he would mark that past season by naming his child a name associated with forgetting his painful past. Manasseh translates as ‘forget’. I can look back at my Manasseh, that season when one of my children was walking through the darkest valley in the life of our family. Over an 8-year period many days I had fear of her death painted across the canvas of our lives. I would awake to the possibility that I would never see her face again. Dream after dream I had for her life was laid down with nothing to pick up in its place. It is a season that I wanted desperately to forget… my Manasseh. But God knew the plans He had for her, and they were plans to prosper her and not to harm her (Jeremiah 29:11). As I consider my Manasseh season 15 years later, I see it through the same eyes that Joseph’s father saw his past. I see it through the miracle of God's redeeming grace.

Not only did God save Kristen from death, but He redeemed her life in ways I could never have imagined. As I look at her life…her testimony…her faith…her children… I don’t want to ever forget the painful past. To forget is to no longer believe in a redeeming God and what He can do with our past pain. To forget would have been to miss out on the redeeming story God was writing for our family’s life. To forget would be to never see the transforming work of our Redeemer. ‘When God redeems our stories, they are better than if they never needed redeeming in the first place.’Finding God Faithful, Kelly Minter, p. 178.

I began wondering what other descriptions we name painful seasons…widowed…divorced… unemployed…abandoned…adulterer…to name a few. Without our failures and mistakes there wouldn’t be stories of redemption. Without remembering our heartbreak our hearts would never feel the celebration of how God is faithful…all-loving…all-powerful. Not only did God allow me to see my daughter’s face again, but He allowed the same privilege He allowed Jacob all those years ago. “Israel said to Joseph, ‘I never expected to see your face again, and now God has allowed me to see your children too.’” Genesis 48:11

We all have painful circumstances from our past, but it might be the very thing that God is going to redeem.