On September 28, 1982, a twelve-year-old girl in Chicago took a popular over-the-counter pain pill. By the next day, she was dead. She was the first of numerous individuals who died from taking the same brand of pain medication. By September 29, six other people were dead after innocently trying to relieve their pain.

I won’t mention the name of the pain medication, but if you were reading the news in 1982, you probably remember this scandal. It was determined that cyanide had been introduced into a number of bottles of the pain medication that were sold in local retail stores. A number of copycat incidents were recorded, resulting in further deaths. The pharmaceutical company that manufactures the product was praised by authorities for how quickly they responded to the situation by removing the product from store shelves and introducing new, triple-sealed packaging to prevent tampering. Yet the company’s market share for pain relievers dropped from 35 percent to 7 percent in the U.S. It took several years for the company, and the particular product, to regain its good name in the market—but it did. You likely have a bottle of this product in your own medicine cabinet today.

Sadly, this was a case of a bad thing happening that saddled a company with a terrible reputation for several years. Thankfully, the problem was corrected, and the stigma was removed in a relatively short time. But that is not always the case. Sometimes a bad thing that happens can follow a company, organization, or individual through their entire life.

Something may have happened in your life that still follows you around to this day. It could be a minor thing or a major thing, but it remains a part of your life story that defines you—at least in your own mind. Others may not even know about that part of your life, but you do. Part of our challenge in the spiritual life is to reconcile our past with our present and future and allow God’s grace to help us write a new story free from the events or mistakes of the past.

Our Story

Nobody has a perfect life story when it comes to the past. We may have done things or had things done to us that have shaped the story we are living in the present. We could have been raised in an environment that was more negative than positive, resulting in a view of ourselves that is different than how God sees us. And Satan loves to capitalize on those parts of our lives. If we were at fault, he may remind us continually of how we should be ashamed and how we will never amount to what we could have been. If we were innocent—the object of someone else’s bad actions—Satan may tell us that we deserved what we experienced. In either case, our spiritual enemy will do everything possible to hijack the story of our life and make us think we will never outlive or outgrow our past.

Consider Joseph’s story, for example. He had been born to Jacob when the patriarch was in his elderly years. His mother was Rachel, the favorite wife of Jacob. Joseph was the second youngest of Jacob’s many sons and became his father’s favorite. Jacob gave Joseph a beautiful, ornamental coat to signify his pride of place in the family. Joseph wasn’t perfect as a young man; he suggested to his brothers, rather presumptuously, that they would one day serve him. His brothers responded by throwing him into a pit and selling him to Midianite traders who were traveling to Egypt. The brothers lied to their father, Jacob, saying that Joseph had been killed by a wild animal.

Imagine what Joseph as a seventeen-year-old thought his life story would be! Did he regret acting presumptuously in front of his brothers? Probably. But given his brothers’ reaction, it was probably not the first time that he had tried to assume prominence over them. He probably replayed that history over and over in his mind as the Midianite traders transported him to Egypt. But there was nothing he could do to change that story. He was destined to live as a slave in Egypt.

Sadly, stories like Joseph’s are still happening today—young people being sold into slavery for terrible reasons. What happened to Joseph may not have happened to you, but something equally painful might have. The previous chapters of your life may have left wounds or scars that you are still trying to be free of. The good news is, as we will see in Joseph’s life, God is able to write new chapters that completely overshadow the parts of our lives we would rather forget.

God’s Story

Joseph didn’t realize it at the time, but God was working out something much bigger in his life—reclaiming his story in a way he could never have imagined.

Joseph’s story is told in Genesis chapters 37 and 39–50. What happened to Genesis 38? That chapter tells the story of the moral debauchery of Judah, seemingly the most influential of Joseph’s brothers. Judah married a Canaanite woman, which resulted in a painful episode for Jacob’s family. If the family remained in Canaan, they might have devolved into insignificance, and God’s promises to Abraham could have been derailed. Jacob’s family needed to move to an isolated area where they could maintain their spiritual and ethnic identity—and Egypt was the perfect place. Jacob’s family were shepherds and would be despised by the Egyptians who would have no interest in becoming part of them (Genesis 43:32; 46:34).

But how to get Jacob’s family to Egypt? First, God sent Joseph to Egypt to become an influential ruler in the land. Second, God sent a famine to Canaan which resulted in Joseph bringing his family to Egypt so they could survive the famine. None of this could Joseph have imagined while sitting in a pit decades before in Canaan. But God was reclaiming the story of his life.

Yes, Joseph endured hardships in Egypt before being elevated to a place of influence. But four times in his story it is noted that God was with Joseph in the midst of his trials (Genesis 39:2, 21, 23; 41:38). So while the pages of Joseph’s story turned in Egypt, it was the hand of God who was turning the pages. When recounting the story, a psalmist clearly identifies God as the One who was writing Joseph’s story: “Moreover [God] called for a famine in [Canaan].... He sent a man before them—Joseph—who was sold as a slave.... Israel also came into Egypt” (Psalm 105:16-17, 23).

After Jacob died in Egypt, Joseph recounted this story to his brothers. He explained that what they had done to him decades before God used for good in order to save their family from disintegration in Canaan (Genesis 50:20).

Joseph’s story is an example, and Romans 8:28 makes it a principle: God is always at work reclaiming our story for our good and His glory.

Our New Story

Long after Joseph’s day, the nation of Israel sinned against God and experienced a locust plague that nearly destroyed the land and its economy. But that wasn’t the end of Israel’s story: “The threshing floors shall be full of wheat, and the vats shall overflow with new wine and oil. So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten” (Joel 2:24-25).

God always reserves the right to write the last chapter of any story. Your story and mine are not finished until God puts a period at the end of the final sentence. But that can be hard to remember when we are in the midst of the twists and turns that characterize all our stories. So what should we do when we are living out the difficult chapters?

Two things: Surrender to the story that God is writing as the pages turn and submit to Him knowing that He is with you as He was with Joseph in Egypt. You may not know how the plot will develop in the future, but you can trust God that it will be for your good.

God has already written your story (Psalm 139:16). Regardless of the past, reclaim your story every day by faith in the Author who knows the future!