Jacob is standing before Pharaoh. He has survived famine, grief, betrayal, and the long silence of thinking his favourite son was dead. Now, Pharaoh looks at this old man and asks a question.
“Pharaoh asked him, ‘How old are you?’ And Jacob said to Pharaoh, ‘The years of my pilgrimage are a hundred and thirty. My years have been few and difficult, and they do not equal the years of the pilgrimage of my fathers.'” (Genesis 47:8–9)
The summary of his own life is this: it’s been hard and not long enough. A pilgrimage marked by struggle. A journey with direction, even when the road was brutal. He doesn’t pretend it was easy. But he is still on pilgrimage. Jacob reveals his theology: this life is not the destination.
You are allowed to call your life tough if that is what it has been. But do so with the thought of it being a pilgrimage very much in your mind. It has been a journey, held by God who knows where you have been going, even when you didn’t. It is still a journey. This is a pilgrimage. Still moving ahead. Still going somewhere with God leading.
That is all we need to understand at times.
(https://www.justgiving.com/page/paul-hudson-elim?utm_medium=FR&utm_source=CL
I am posting this link for a few weeks to ask you to contribute to a cause that is so important and to spur me up a hill in June!
Missions Paul 