You’ve all heard the expression before. When life gives you lemons, what do you do? Make lemonade!

There is no use crying over your lot in life. Your life, regardless how it started, is what you and God make it. But it takes both – you and God. You can’t do it alone, and God can’t do it without your cooperation.

I recently read a Reader’s Digest article about mayors that had done exceptional jobs. In the article was a story about Charleston Mayor, Joe Riley. The article pointed out how, when the Naval Base closed, our mayor didn’t let it get him down. He didn’t quit. He didn’t raise his hands and say, "Why me?"

No! He just made the best of the situation. He began efforts to draw industry and new business to Charleston. And it’s working.

When ministers around the state asked me what we were going to do after losing so many Navy families, I said, "Well, I guess now we’ll become a community church instead of a transient, military church." What else could we do? I could move, but we can’t all move. So, we’ll tough it out together and do God’s work.

When life hands you lemons, make lemonade!

23 years ago, in Cincinnati, we had a friend who was raised by a prostitute. When her mother had a customer, she and her siblings were sent out to roam the streets. She had every reason to fail at life. She could have turned to a life of drugs and prostitution, and nobody would have blamed her. After all, look how bad she had it.

But she didn’t. She met a boy from a nice god-fearing family; they got married and had three kids; raised them in church; had Bible studies in their home; started their own business. They were doing great for a couple who married too young, had the wrong upbringing, and came from different sides of the tracks.

He had a bad back, but you’d never know it. I watched this guy move refrigerators by himself, and he was smaller than me. This couple overcame every stereotype and we making it.

Then one day, on vacation at a lake, he dove into the water and never came up. They found his body tangled in the weeds at the bottom of the lake.

So life gave her another bag of lemons. She didn’t deserve it. She could have gotten bitter, gone sour, and given up. But she didn’t. The last we heard, she had sold the business, and was doing well on her own.

She made lemonade!

People who survive at life play the hand they are dealt. They don’t whine and moan about their ‘lot in life’. They just make the best of it. That’s all any of us can do.

Look at Joseph. Now, you may think he had it made, but it’s not easy being daddy’s favorite. Favorite children are handicapped, because they start out with people against them.

It would seem Joseph had it made. He was the favorite son, he was pampered and treated special, and he had visions of greatness. (He dreamed that his family bowed down and worshipped him. And his vision was from God.)

But then look what happened:

His brothers plotted to kill him, then decided to just throw him in a well and let him die. Then they saw a caravan coming and decided to sell him as a slave.

The caravan took Joseph to Egypt and sold him as a slave to Potiphar, the captain of the Egyptian guard for Pharaoh. He did so well in Potiphar’s employ that Potiphar set him in charge of all his affairs. Things were looking up for Joseph.

But then, Potiphar’s wife cast her eye upon Joseph and desired to sleep with him. Though he refused, she persisted until, one day, she caught alone and grabbed his coat and demanded, "Lie with me!" Joseph slipped off his coat and ran out of the house.

Potiphar’s wife was so angry and humiliated that she accused Joseph of attacking her. Alas, Joseph finds himself once again betrayed, and was cast into prison.

While in prison, he met two servants of Pharaoh who had been also imprisoned. The two men were disturbed one night about dreams they had dreamed. Joseph interpreted their dreams. One was set free, the other was executed.

Joseph asked the freed one to mention his cause before Pharaoh, but he forgot. Two years later, Pharaoh had a troubling dream. The servant remembered Joseph, and told Pharaoh he knew of a man who could interpret dreams. Joseph was fetched from the prison and told the dream.

When he interpreted the dream, Pharaoh was impressed. He took Joseph into his won employ, and found him to be very wise. Eventually, Joseph became the Pharaoh’s right hand man, and the most powerful man in Egypt.

His vision came to pass, finally, but not by the easy road. We must remember that God is in control of every aspect of our lives. He is there every step of the way, even when he doesn’t seem to be.

Now Joseph had his vision, or dream, when he was 17 years old. He was 35 when he came to position in Egypt under Pharaoh. 18 years had passed. When he was 44, two years into the famine he predicted in the land, his brothers came from Canaan, and bowed before him to ask for food. They didn’t know who he was, but here was the young boy who dreamed his family would bow before him – 24 years after he told them his dream.

Guess what! God brought Joseph to the place he promised him, though no by the route any of us would have chosen.

Listen:

• No matter what your circumstance appears to be, or how rotten things may seem to go, God is still in control. Do you know God still controls America?

• Joseph kept a positive attitude and honored God in all things, and God honored him.

• Joseph maintained that attitude throughout his experiences.

• Joseph was forgiving. What his brothers did to him was wrong. He could have felt that they robbed him of his family and his future. But instead, he showed mercy and took care of them.

(It is interesting to note here that Joseph tested his brothers to see if they were still as heartless as before. He sent them home, keeping one behind to see if they would abandon this one, too.)

• Joseph understood that God was in control and he had total confidence in Him through all that befell him. Listen to what he said to his evil brothers.

While his brothers were at ease in their father’s house, Joseph was rotting in an Egyptian jail. He could have been bitter. No one would have blamed him for taking revenge.

• Joseph recognized the hand of God in all things.

Though he had waded through the pits of hell, God meant it for good. Though he had been wrongly accused, and wrongly jailed, and wrongly sold as a slave twice, he recognized that God was behind the wheel. God was steering this whole scenario. And God had a plan. How else could God have gotten Joseph to this position?

Whatever you are going through, God is in there with you, and He will get you through. Trust Him.