The famine in Canaan became severe, and Jacob was forced to send his sons back to Egypt to buy more grain. This time, Benjamin, the youngest and only son left of his beloved wife Rachel, was required to go also. Everything was being taken from Jacob. Rachel had died, Joseph was gone, Simeon had been detained in Egypt, and now the remaining 10 sons were leaving for Egypt with no guarantee of safe return. Jacob was like a jar being emptied of all preoccupying things. While this was a great suffering, Jacob, a vessel chosen and called by God, was not only being emptied, but being filled to fullness with the divine life. This was for his maturity. Jacob had been changed, that is, transformed, by the life of God, but now he needed to be entirely filled up to the brim with this life. Therefore God sovereignly allowed him to be emptied of all other things.
Our Christian experience should follow this pattern. We may have been chosen, called, saved and regenerated. However, for God to have His expression through us, we must go on to be transformed and matured. Transformation is for the divine life to change us, and maturity is for the divine life to fully fill us. By His sovereignty, God will give us the environment we need for this to happen. Every situation we pass through is an opportunity to be filled with more of the divine life. Eventually we can also be a matured person in the divine life; a person expressing God and even reigning in life for His Kingdom.