Writing Your Story Without Regret

Written by Ian Jannaway

We write our own stories, and when asked we provide details about jobs, significant events, likes, dislikes. 

Every significant event we go through eventually becomes a story we tell. Do we have the discipline to stop and ask the right questions? What story do we want to tell?

It is not just us our story affects, each decision we make affects other’s stories too.

Make emotions a red flag, not a green light in the face of important decisions.

Let’s consider the story of Joseph in the Old Testament. He has a number of choices to make.

Sold into slavery by his brothers, he decided to be the best slave he could be and was given much responsibility by his master.

His master’s wife tried to seduce him but he decided not to succumb and remained faithful to his master.

His master’s wife accused him falsely of rape and had him put into jail.

He gets out of jail because of his ability to decipher dreams for the pharaoh and becomes the second most important man in Egypt.

Joseph’s long lost family eventually appear in Egypt seeking help from a famine and Joseph helps them. Like Joseph, we should decide against the gravitational pull of bitterness to discover the freedom of deciding the story you want to tell.

Read Josephs story here-Genesis 39-6

Now Joseph was well-built and handsome, 7 and after a while his master’s wife took notice of Joseph and said, “Come to bed with me!”8 But he refused. “With me in charge,” he told her, “my master does not concern himself with anything in the house; everything he owns he has entrusted to my care. 9 No one is greater in this house than I am. My master has withheld nothing from me except you, because you are his wife. How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?” 10 And though she spoke to Joseph day after day, he refused to go to bed with her or even be with her.

Joseph keeps his integrity even though he ends up in jail for a crime he did not commit. Joseph tells Pharaoh what he sees in his dream in Genesis 41-

37 The plan seemed good to Pharaoh and to all his officials. 38 So Pharaoh asked them, “Can we find anyone like this man, one in whom is the spirit of God[a]?”

39 Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Since God has made all this known to you, there is no one so discerning and wise as you. 40 You shall be in charge of my palace, and all my people are to submit to your orders. Only with respect to the throne will I be greater than you.”

Note the highlighted words of the pharaoh, this could only come from God.