Writers 
Joseph, the eleventh of twelve sons born to Jacob, was successful in God’s eyes. God both planned and provided for his success.
As a youth, Joseph gained an understanding of God’s personal success plan for him. He was given divine insight into God’s plan for his future, which included prominence, power, and prestige. He knew for years and years even though circumstances said otherwise that God wanted to do something in his life and with his life.
Joseph’s understanding of his future personal success was based upon two dreams God gave to him when he was only seventeen years old. At the time, Joseph’s job was to feed his father’s flocks. In one dream, however, Joseph was working not as a shepherd but as a grain gatherer. He and his brothers were binding sheaves in a field, and Joseph’s sheaf arose while all of the other sheaves bowed down to his sheaf. In another dream, Joseph saw the sun, moon, and eleven stars bowing down to him.
Like many people today, Joseph had a dream of success, but no plan for success. God had given him a glimpse of his future, but had not provided any of the intervening details. It was up to Joseph to pursue God’s plan for success with faith and obedience in doing the things that the Lord put in his path to do.
Many people are in the position that Joseph was in. They have a feeling or a knowing deep inside that their lives are supposed to count for something and that God has a purpose for their existence on the earth. They have dreams of success. But they don’t know exactly how God is going to bring about their success.
As they look around at the circumstances surrounding their lives, they see no sign of success. Instead, they may see mounds of books that need to be read and studied, mounds of paperwork that must be shuffled to its next destination, or mounds of laundry that need to be moved from wash basket to washing machine.
They have the seed of a success dream buried indelibly in the heart and mind, but they do not see success unfolding around them. They have a feeling they are “on hold,” just waiting for God to reveal His next step.
And what are they required to do while in this waiting phase? Be obedient to the tasks at hand.
A Daily Trust and Obey Relationship
God never asks any of us to sit down and wait idly for Him to vault us into success. He asks us to trust and obey Him day by day, day in and day out, by doing the things that He entrusts us to do. He asks us to learn the lessons that He sets before us some of which may be painful, some of which may be difficult, and many of which may seem unimportant. Some of the work that God gives us to do may seem menial and totally unrelated to the end result of our success. Often we cannot see that God is building a strong pattern of experience, skill, trustworthiness, honesty, integrity, and character into us, so that when the time comes for us to be in a position of authority or influence, we will be ready. Success May Be the Reality Even If Outcomes Initially Look Like Failures, Joseph had to pursue God’s definition of success even when everything around him appeared to be headed for failure. Joseph was not being treated as number one when his father sent him to check on his brothers and the flocks in Shechem. Joseph was his father’s errand boy at that point, a messenger, or in our terms today, a guy in the mailroom. He was at the bottom rung on the ladder, asked to do a task that any servant could have done for Jacob.
Was Joseph a success in his search for his brothers? Yes, but not entirely by his own ability. He found his brothers with a little help from a man he stopped to ask along the way.
Was Joseph a success when his brothers responded to his arrival by throwing him into a pit, intending to leave him for dead, and then later deciding to sell him as a slave to a passing band of Midianite traders? Yes.
On what basis was he a success? He continued to trust God and to live as a
person of honor and integrity. How do we know that was his response?
Because the Bible says he served Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and captain of the guard, in such an honorable way that Potiphar knew “the LORD was with Joseph, and he was a successful man” (Gen. 39:2). Potiphar took as a sign of Joseph’s success that the Lord made “all he did to prosper in his hand” (Gen. 39:3).
Was Joseph a success when Potiphar’s wife attempted to seduce him and Joseph refused her offers and ran from her presence, leaving his garment behind an act that resulted in his being falsely accused and sent to a place where the king’s prisoners were confined? Yes, Joseph was still a success.
How do we know? Because Joseph continued to obey God in the prison, and the Lord “showed him mercy, and He gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the prison” (Gen. 39:21). Joseph was put in charge of all the prisoners and had great authority in that prison “because the LORD was with him; and whatever he did, the LORD made it prosper” (Gen. 39:23).
Was Joseph a success when he interpreted the two dreams of Pharaoh’s butler and baker? Yes. His interpretations of the dreams were right on target. Was Joseph a success even though the butler forgot his promise to tell Pharaoh about Joseph for two long years? Yes. Joseph continued to trust
God, and when the time came for Joseph to interpret Pharaoh’s strange dream, he was ready. The Lord revealed to him the meaning of the dream, and in a day, Joseph went from being a prisoner to being the number two man in Egypt. Pharaoh said to Joseph, Inasmuch as God has shown you all this, there is no one as discerning and wise as you. You shall be over my house, and all my people shall be ruled according to your word; only in regard to the throne will I be greater than you See, I have set you over all the land of Egypt. (Gen. 41:39–41)
Certainly Joseph may not have felt successful when he was on a journey into slavery in Egypt or when he was cast into Pharaoh’s prison. But in God’s eyes, Joseph had not failed, and God’s purposes for him were continuing to unfold. Later, when Joseph had an opportunity to provide again for his father and brothers and their families in a time of severe famine, Joseph concluded, God sent me before you to preserve a posterity for you in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So now it was not you who sent me here, but God; and He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.