¹⁸And Joseph said unto them the third day, This do, and live; for I fear God:

 ¹⁹If ye be true men, let one of your brethren be bound in the house of your prison: go ye, carry corn for the famine of your houses:

 ²⁰But bring your youngest brother unto me; so shall your words be verified, and ye shall not die. And they did so.

 ²¹And they said one to another, We are verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the anguish of his soul, when he besought us, and we would not hear; therefore is this distress come upon us.

 ²²And Reuben answered them, saying, Spake I not unto you, saying, Do not sin against the child; and ye would not hear? therefore, behold, also his blood is required.

 ²³And they knew not that Joseph understood them; for he spake unto them by an interpreter.

 ²⁴And he turned himself about from them, and wept; and returned to them again, and communed with them, and took from them Simeon, and bound him before their eyes.

 ²⁵Then Joseph commanded to fill their sacks with corn, and to restore every man’s money into his sack, and to give them provision for the way: and thus did he unto them.

 ²⁶And they laded their asses with the corn, and departed thence.

 ²⁷And as one of them opened his sack to give his ass provender in the inn, he espied his money; for, behold, it was in his sack’s mouth.

 ²⁸And he said unto his brethren, My money is restored; and, lo, it is even in my sack: and their heart failed them, and they were afraid, saying one to another, What is this that God hath done unto us?

 ²⁹And they came unto Jacob their father unto the land of Canaan, and told him all that befell unto them; saying,

 ³⁰The man, who is the lord of the land, spake roughly to us, and took us for spies of the country.

 ³¹And we said unto him, We are true men; we are no spies:

 ³²We be twelve brethren, sons of our father; one is not, and the youngest is this day with our father in the land of Canaan.

 ³³And the man, the lord of the country, said unto us, Hereby shall I know that ye are true men; leave one of your brethren here with me, and take food for the famine of your households, and be gone:

 ³⁴And bring your youngest brother unto me: then shall I know that ye are no spies, but that ye are true men: so will I deliver you your brother, and ye shall traffick in the land.

 ³⁵And it came to pass as they emptied their sacks, that, behold, every man’s bundle of money was in his sack: and when both they and their father saw the bundles of money, they were afraid.

 ³⁶And Jacob their father said unto them, Me have ye bereaved of my children: Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take Benjamin away: all these things are against me.

 ³⁷And Reuben spake unto his father, saying, Slay my two sons, if I bring him not to thee: deliver him into my hand, and I will bring him to thee again.

 ³⁸And he said, My son shall not go down with you; for his brother is dead, and he is left alone: if mischief befall him by the way in the which ye go, then shall ye bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.

Have you ever noticed how quick we are to blame God for things that don’t go the way we plan? You know what I mean. We plan our vacation and the day we take off we get sick or the weather goes south or both. In the back of our mind, we’re thinking What’s up with this God? What did I do to deserve this? Well we see that same thing happening in Genesis 42 with Joseph’s brothers. The part where the brother finds the money Joseph had put back in his bags. Did you catch the brothers’ immediate words? “What is this that God hath done unto us?”

Newsflash–nothing that happens in our life is God’s “fault.” God’s plans are not ours. He is the all knowing, all powerful, almighty God. And, yes, He may allow us to us to experience things we’d prefer not to or bring a difficult situation into our lives, but those things have a purpose even if we can’t see or understand them at the time.