Joseph had a lot.
He had a lot of brothers, he had a fancy coat. He had a dad who made it no secret that Joseph was his favorite son. He had a lot of dreams, which were usually about him being bowed down to.
Of course, when you have a dozen older brothers, those last two may not be the best for your reputation, and they most certainly weren't for Joseph. His jealous siblings slipped him right out of that bright cloak, dumped him in a pit and denied him any kind of food, even the crusts from their bread as soon as they could.
Really, they were planning to let him die of thirst and starvation, but when some slave-traders came near they figured that a little cash would be useful for their trouble.
And then as we read in chapter 39 of Genesis, Joseph got upgraded to a great rich guy who was a relatively nice master and once again he had a lot. He had decent clothes, food, and became an overseer of the household.
But then just as before, he was degraded wrongly, this time by the wife of his master and poor Joseph ended up in prison.
By this time it all had to seem like a joke. What is God trying to do, but lift me up only to ruin me? I had all these things that I could've used to bring God glory, but instead, He puts me first in a pit and then a prison.

Well, I've been there. I know many people who have had great gifts which they might've exercised to bring praise to the Lord. Large amounts of people could have seen the amazing glory of our God, but then He allows something to happen which makes that impossible.
Why?
I find myself thinking, "Why would You not want glory, Lord? So many might have been able to understand Your beauty and realized Your love and then... this. Why?"
It doesn't really seem to make sense to us, does it? We are here for the glorification of the Lord, so why isn't He allowing us to do that?
We all have God-given abilities and talents that we can use to bring Him glory. But could it be that we can also worship the Lord by surrendering what He has given us fully to His use, whether He chooses to let it show or not?

I believe that we can. It's a whole different kind of praise, to lay down our pride and our gifts at God's feet and allow them to be used however He would have them used, even if He decides to take them away permanently. Our family has been experiencing this and many others we know have as well.
It has been difficult to come to terms with the fact that magnifying God usually means minimizing me. If the best way for that to happen is by the loss of our gifts that we usually rely on to amplify ourselves, however, then we need to surrender the gift.

As John the Baptist, the forerunner of Christ, remarked, "He must increase, but I must decrease" (John 3:30). John understood all too well this giving up of gifts. He referred to himself as the "...voice of one crying in the wilderness, 'Make straight the way of the Lord...."
We are the forerunners also, the message-bearers. We tell others about the second coming of our Lord. But sometimes we like to 'help' God and assume that He wants us to use our gifts in a certain way. What we really need to do is let go of what we want and move over for God to do greater things in our lives, even if it's not what we want. Even if it's not our gift that becomes great, but God who becomes greater.

For to surrender the gift is to cherish the Giver.