Jacob takes some time to bless Joseph’s two boys.

Jacob’s eyesight was failing because of his age, and he could not see very well. Joseph brought the boys to him, and he hugged them and kissed them. Jacob said to Joseph, “I never expected to see you again, and now God has even let me see your children.” – Genesis 48:10-11 GNT

It was his attitude that caught my attention. He gave all the credit to God for allowing him to have this wonderful time with Joseph and his family. Throughout all the losses and heartbreaks Jacob complained and to see him come full circle and to realize the hand of God had never left him must have been an incredible spiritual moment. He learn, as Joseph had, every difficult situation was meant for good to bring them to this very place.

Unfortunately I have been one who has prayed that I may not go through hardship. I am learning to pray with the understanding that God will use every hardship to make me more like Jesus. I am sensing that God is walking with me in all of them and is making me more like Jesus as I pass through them. I also have the privilege of glorifying God with me testimony.

We know who we are praying to only if we first learn it in the Bible. And we know how we should be praying only by getting our vocabulary from the Bible….It is therefore essential to the practice of prayer to recognize what [Eugene] Peterson calls the “overwhelming previousness of God’s speech to our prayers
”…. We should “plunge ourselves into the sea” of God’s language, the Bible. We should listen, study, think, reflect, and ponder the Scriptures until there is an answering response in our hearts and minds. It may be one of shame or of joy or of confusion or of appeal—but that response to God’s speech is then truly prayer and should be given to God. – Timothy Keller