That They May Believe.

Exodus 4

"Perform this sign, and they will believe you," the LORD told him. "Then they will realize that the LORD, the God of their ancestors – the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob––really has appeared to you." – Exodus 4:5 NLT

The story of Exodus is about redemption – God redeeming His people from slavery and setting them free to serve Him. But it also a story about belief. In it you see the constant battle of belief as the chosen people of God struggle believing in the reality and reliability of God. It is a book filled with signs and wonders, plagues and miracles, incredible events and unexplainable stories of God's intervention in their lives. Yet they refuse to believe. They doubt, fear, grumble, whine, moan, and refuse to do what God tells them to do. Even Moses, the one God chose to lead His people out of captivity struggles with belief. As he debates with God over his role as the great emancipator of the people, Moses tells God, "Look, they won’t believe me! They won’t do what I tell them. They’ll just say, ‘The LORD never appeared to you.’" (Exodus 4:1 NLT). Thus begins Moses' long list of excuses for not doing what God is calling him to do. Moses' real problem is not that the people wont believe him, it is that he is having a hard time believing God. His own doubt is a sign of unbelief. He is basically telling God, "You can't do this!" When he says, "They won't believe me!", he is telling God that this plan of His will not work. But God gives him a sign, and it was a sign that came with a cost or risk to Moses. God turned his wooden staff into a poisonous snake. Then he told Moses to pick it up by the tail, not something anyone who had lived in the desert for long would ever do! But it was that risky step that would cause not only the people to believe, but Moses. Belief is faith in action. It involves a degree of risk.

God gave Moses another sign, He told Moses to put his hand inside his cloak, then remove it. When he did, it came out covered in leprosy. Can you imagine the shock and fear Moses went through. He knew about leprosy and he knew it wasn't good. It never ended well. But God told him to put his hand back in his cloak and when he removed it, it was clean again. God told Moses, "If they do not believe the first miraculous sign, they will believe the second" (Exodus 4:8 NLT). But this sign was really aimed at Moses. He had a personal stake in it. It was designed to help Moses believe. But in spite of what he had just seen, Moses continued to struggle with his unbelief. He uses his own personal flaws as a reason to doubt God. How could God use someone like him, a man who was a lousy public speaker, to be His spokesperson. At first glance, this would appear to be a case of Moses doubting himself, but he is really doubting God. He believes God is limited by his own limitations. That's unbelief. That's doubt. But God tells Moses, "Now go, and do as I have told you. I will help you speak well, and I will tell you what to say" (Exodus 4:12 NLT). Stop doubting and go! God even agrees to give Moses his brother Aaron as his right-hand man and mouthpiece. But he does not let Moses off the hook. He is still going to have to go and do what God has called him to do.

This is going to be a journey of belief and disbelief, trust and doubt, faith and failure, reliance and rebellion. And through it all, God will be revealing Himself in unbelievable ways so that His people will believe in Him. But isn't that the journey of faith we find ourselves on? Every day we are being forced to put our faith to the test. We find ourselves in situations and circumstances where we have to find out what it is we really believe. Do we believe in God or do we believe the lies of the enemy? Will we lean on God or our own limited understanding. When Moses returned to Egypt and gathered the people together, he and Aaron told them what God had said and performed the signs God had given them. The result was that the people believed. "So the people believed; and when they heard that the LORD was concerned about the sons of Israel and that He had seen their affliction, then they bowed low and worshiped." (Exodus 4:31 NASB). They believed and worshiped. But the next day would bring with it renewed doubt. Their belief was going to be tested. The worth-ship of God was going to come under fire. Could He really be trusted? Was He really worthy of their praise and honor? Today will hold the same thing for you and me today. Will we believe? The truth is, we believe in all kinds of things. We believe sin will bring pleasure. We believe our way is better than God's way. We believe we are smarter than God. We believe we're not usable by God. We believe. But we don't always believe God.

Father, life is all about belief. Will I believe You today? Will I worship You today? In spite of the circumstances and situations I encounter. Will I see You in the midst of all that is going on in my life? Will I believe Your promises and Your Word regardless of what I see happening around me and to me? I want to believe. I want my belief to be more than an intellectual assent. I want it to be real. I want my belief to be in You and not myself or the world around me. Help me learn to believe You as I read through the story of Exodus. Open my eyes. Change my heart. Amen.

What A Coincidence!

Exodus 2-3

Years passed, and the king of Egypt died. But the Israelites still groaned beneath their burden of slavery. They cried out for help, and their pleas for deliverance rose up to God. God heard their cries and remembered his covenant promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. – Exodus 2:23-24 NLT

Chapters two and three are examples of Scripture passages we can read and blow right through them, missing out on all the incredible details of God's sovereignty and power. We read them as stories and marvel at some of the "coincidences" that take place. But we run the risk of missing the picture they present of God's underlying plan of redemption for His people. Nothing is a coincidence. Nothing just happens. It is all part of God's grand plan. If you read verses 23 and 24 of chapter two, you could easily draw the conclusion that God was unaware of their need until they cried out to Him. But if you read between the lines, you see that God was already well aware of what was going on and had already begun putting into place the necessary ingredients for His plan to begin.

An obscure Jewish woman named Jochebed, who happened to be married to a descendant of Levi, has a son. Nothing too spectacular there. It happened all the time in Jewish households. Except for the fact that the Pharaoh had just ordered that every male child born to the Hebrews was to be killed. So Jochebed, a Godly woman, hides her son in a basket lined with pitch and sets him afloat on the river. Interestingly enough, the Hebrew word for "basket" is the same word used when referring to the ark that God used to save the family of Noah (Genesis 6). This defenseless baby, floating alone on the river just happens to wind up right at the foot of the Pharaoh's palace, where the great Egyptian leader's daughter is bathing. She discovers the basket and the child within, immediately recognizes that he is a Hebrew baby, then makes a surprising decision. Rather than turn him over to the authorities for immediate execution, she turns him over to a young Hebrew girl who just happened to be passing by. Miriam takes the baby and gives him back to his mother Jochebed to raise – on the payroll of Pharaoh himself.

Eventually Moses is returned to the Pharaoh's palace and is raised as an Egyptian. In that environment, he receives a great education, military training, and develops leadership skills that will serve him well in the future. Yet his life as an Egyptian ends when he accidently kills another Egyptian while trying to defend one of the Hebrews. News of this crime results in Moses having to run for his life. He goes from prince to murderer to fugitive in a very short period of time. But in his running he ends up in the land of Midian where he meets Jethro, a worshiper of Yahweh. Moses marries one of Jethro's daughters and settles down taking on the life of a shepherd.

It was here that Moses received his call from God. Everything that had happened up until this point had been preparation for this moment. We are told that God heard their cries and remembered His covenant promise. This was not new news to God. He was well aware of their situation and had a plan in place to deal with it. Jochebed was part of that plan. Miriam was part of that plan. Pharaoh's daughter was part of that plan. Pharaoh himself was part of that plan. Jethro was part of that plan. Zipporah was part of that plan. And Moses was part of that plan. God called Moses. He shared His plan with Moses. He revealed Himself to Moses. And He made a promise to Moses that He would use Moses to deliver the People of Israel from captivity and provide for them a land of their own – "a land flowing with milk and honey." A land of abundance and prosperity.

This is not the story of Moses. It is not the story of the people of Israel. It is the story of God. The whole Bible is the story of God. He is the star. The plot revolves around Him. Everyone else is a bit player. Including Pharoah, Jochebed, Amram, Miriam, Pharaoh's daughter, Jethro, Zipporah, and Moses himself. God reveals Himself to Moses as the great I AM. He is essentially telling Moses "I am the One who is." "I am self-existent, not created."  "I am not bound by time." "I am present right now and into the future."  You can see the reality of this all throughout this story. God has been there all along, working behind the scenes. God is not just the God of the future, He is the God of the present and the past. He is timeless. He knew the situation the Hebrews were in long before they cried out. He knew what they would need long before He stepped in to deliver it. He had already begun putting the pieces in place, as far back as Joseph's arrival in Egypt after having been sold into slavery by his own brothers.

So what's the point? This story is about God. Look for him. See what it reveals about Him. Instead of concentrating on the characters in the story, dwell on the character of God.

Father, You are the great I AM. You are, have been , and always will be. You are not limited by time and space. You are timeless, limitless, and your power should leave us speechless. Help me to see You in the story of Exodus. Give me a glimpse of You. May I see the reality of Your redemptive story for mankind in the story of the redemption of Israel. Amen.

The Party's Over.

Exodus 1

They made their lives bitter with hard labour in brick and mortar and with all kinds of work in the fields; in all their hard labour the Egyptians used them ruthlessly. – Exodus 1:14 NLT

When we last left the family of Jacob (or Israel), they had just moved to the land of Egypt to be with Joseph, Jacob's long-lost son, who was now second-in-command to the Pharaoh himself. When they had arrived on the scene, they were treated well by Pharaoh, as an honor to Joseph. In fact, Pharaoh told Joseph, "Now that your family has joined you here, choose any place you like for them to live. Give them the best land of Egypt––the land of Goshen will be fine. And if any of them have special skills, put them in charge of my livestock, too" (Genesis 47:5-6 NLT). And that's exactly what Joseph did. "So Joseph assigned the best land of Egypt––the land of Rameses––to his father and brothers, just as Pharaoh had commanded" (Genesis 47:11 NLT). When they had arrived there were only 66 of them (not including their wives), but in the years that followed, the family of Joseph would grow. Exodus 1 tells us "But their descendants had many children and grandchildren. In fact, they multiplied so quickly that they soon filled the land" (Exodus 1:7 NLT). God was with them and He was blessing them, in keeping with the covenant He had made with Abraham many years before.

But even in blessing there can be difficulty. In fact, their fruitfulness would lead to conflict with the Egyptians. There was a new Pharaoh in charge now and Moses tells us that he "did not know Joseph." Joseph was dead and this Pharaoh had no recollection of who he was or what he had done to help save the nation of Egypt during the time of famine. All he knew was there were far too many Hebrews living in his land and he was going to do something about it. This is the first in a long and sad line of attempts by men to eradicate the Jewish people from the face of the earth. History is replete with case after case of men trying to wipe out the Hebrew people. Hitler wasn't the first to come up with the idea.

But this conflict was going to set the stage for the rest of the story. God had a plan. And His plan was bigger and greater than that of Pharaoh. The persecutions and pogrom of Pharaoh was not going to get in the way of what God had planned for His chosen people. As a matter of fact, it was going to be the very thing God would use to set His people free. Slavery and persecution would become the backdrop for His plan of redemption for them. But to set them free, they would have to be enslaved. Had they never been persecuted by the Egyptians, the Israelites would never have wanted to leave. They had nothing to go back to. They had no land, no home, no gardens, no farms. They were content living in Egypt. But things were about to change. The situation was about to heat up. Because God had a plan for them. He had a promise He was going to fulfill.

Chapter 1 sets up the great redemptive plan of God for the people of Israel. It is act one in the play that God has written. Things look bleak. It seems as if everything is going wrong for the people of Israel. But we see that God is there. He is blessing them and multiplying them. He is working behind the scenes with the midwives, giving them courage and conviction. And He is getting ready to raise up a deliverer.

Father, thanks for the reminder of Your sovereign plan in the lives of men. I am so short-sighted. I can only see so far, and then I begin to panic, because I don't see You at work all the time. I concentrate on the circumstances and forget that You are working behind the scenes in ways I can't see. Let the story of Exodus remind me once again of Your unstoppable plan. You are in control and I have no reason to fear – even in the face of overwhelming odds and inexplicable circumstances. Amen.