The Letter That Took Twenty Years to Open

In 2019, a woman named Sara Northrup found a sealed envelope tucked inside her late mother's Bible. It was addressed to her uncle David, her mother's estranged brother, and dated 1998. Sara's mother had written it but never sent it. Inside, in careful handwriting, were these words: "I forgive you. And I finally understand why it all happened the way it did."

Sara tracked down her uncle — now seventy-three, living alone in Tucson — and read him the letter over the phone. He wept so hard he couldn't speak. The family rupture that had torn them apart decades earlier had, through a chain of consequences neither could have predicted, led Sara's mother to relocate to Oregon, where she met her husband, built a church community, and raised three children who went into ministry. The pain had a trajectory neither sibling could see at the time.

This is the staggering moment in Genesis 45. Joseph stands before the brothers who threw him into a pit and sold him like livestock. Every human instinct says this is the scene for vengeance. Instead, Joseph weeps and says, "Do not be distressed. God sent me ahead of you to preserve life." He doesn't minimize what they did. He simply sees a Hand moving behind every betrayal, every dungeon night, every forgotten promise.

The Almighty does not waste our suffering. He routes it. What others architect for harm, God quietly repurposes for rescue — if we will let Him finish the story.