"The news reached Pharaoh's palace that Joseph's brothers had come." - Genesis 45:16

Beloved,

Genesis 37 introduces a young and naive Joseph. He reported his brothers' bad deeds to his father without scruple (Gen. 37:2) and told his dreams without filter (Gen. 37:5, 37:9). His second dream made Jacob break his reserve to reprimand him severely (Gen. 37:10). This seventeen-year-old boy, his father's favorite, ticked all the boxes to stir envy, jealousy and visceral hatred among his brothers.

Sold as a slave and declared dead, he went through terrible trials: family betrayal, slavery in Potiphar's house, false accusation, unjust prison. Painful trials that yet relocated him precisely to the country God had ordained for his elevation and future prosperity.

When, years later, his brothers came to Egypt to buy grain and Joseph revealed his identity while weeping abundantly, it was only through the news that spontaneously spread that Pharaoh learned it (Gen. 45:16). Is that not revealing? The number two in Egypt could have used his proximity to the palace to officially announce his family's arrival. He could have issued an immediate royal statement. But he kept the door of his mouth closed and observed silence because he was no longer that talkative seventeen-year-old boy. The innocence of adolescence had mutated through deep afflictions. Betrayals, disappointments and prisons had shaped a more mature version, deeply attached to discretion and wisdom. Day after day, layer after layer, he had learned from his past mistakes, revisited and adjusted his behavior to avoid further setbacks and to suffer less.

Experience had taught him the virtues of a closed mouth, the priceless advantages of circumspection and the economy of suffering that directly derives from it. Joseph had now graduated from the demanding school of the pedagogy of experience.

Beloved, have you noticed that as long as we do not learn from our errors, the same events that generate them keep repeating tirelessly? It is as if God insists that we validate this life course before moving to the next level. History repeats itself until the lesson is finally learned and fully mastered by us.

While it is useful to learn from our own personal experience, it is much wiser, more mature and far less painful to learn from that of others around us. Let us learn to close our mouth when necessary. Let us learn discretion to save ourselves suffering, preserve our destiny and walk daily in divine wisdom always.

May the Lord abundantly help us all to do so today!