We can change our hair, gain or lose a few pounds, and wear new clothes, but there is something essentially us that can’t be changed. The lilt to our voice or that cowlick that showed up when our hair started growing, those don’t go away.

So when Joseph, who hadn’t seen his brothers since he was a teenager, revealed himself to his brothers, it all came rushing back to them. They hugged and cried and feasted and cried some more.

To be known and remembered from a time that feels long, long ago can bring waves of emotion from a place we didn’t know existed. It can be like this when we connect with God after a season of spiritual dryness. No one knows us like he does.