Thought from today’s Bible reading from Genesis 46-47.
Bible students are familiar with the period of slavery the children of Israel endured in Egypt. But there was another period of Egyptian bondage that occurred earlier. In this case, the slaves were not the Israelites or any other foreign people, they were the Egyptians themselves.
During the time of the famine, the Egyptian people willingly gave themselves over to be slaves. But it took some time for this to happen. First they used all of their money to buy grain (Genesis 47:13-14). When their money was gone and the famine was still ongoing, they exchanged their livestock for food (Genesis 47:15-17). But the famine continued.
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“And, as already mentioned in the preceding chapter, he at once began to preach, and he never stopped for anything but serious sickness of himself or family. At first it was only an effort to ‘exhort’ a little at the regular meetings of the church, or after someone else had preached. Then an appointment to preach somewhere at night, in some school-house, or in some private dwelling, was ventured upon. To these appointments he would often walk, three, four, or five miles, after a hard day’s work. Two or three of the young preachers generally met together and united in the exercises of the meeting. And thus, gradually, he directed the forces of his mind and body to the work, until he lost his interest in all other employments. Four years after his obedience to the Gospel he sold out the mill property, and was never afterward engaged in any regular secular business.” (The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin, p. 59-60)