Original Post - August 8th 2013.
So we've been working through the Book of Exodus at JUMP Wednesday nights at 7pm in the ManCave of Glengate Alliance Church.
I call Exodus "the 1st Gospel" referring to its importance on so many levels for understanding the ministry and person of Jesus.
Last night we studied Exodus 14. If Exodus is the "1st Gospel" then Exodus 14 is the "passion" of that gospel. I know that the giving of the Law (chp 20) and the wilderness wanderings (Num 14) are still to come in the story of the Exodus but chapter 14 is the highpoint of the Israelite experience of God's sustaining protection and saving power from the Egyptians.
A few notes from last night's study which stood out to me even after preparing and teaching it.
1. People - even's God people - have equal parts faith and fickleness.
Exodus 14:8,10-12 shows the people of God alternatively "marching out boldly" from Egypt weighed down by God's blessing them with the wealth of their former captors. And then right away, with their backs to the sea and their enemies in hot pursuit the Israelites utter my favourite of all their complaints "Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die?" Forgetting about their slavery... Vengeful against Moses - of all people - for bringing them out into the desert ... Fanciful in their now imagining some earlier protests against the whole endeavour... protests which they never raised when times were good.
Even Moses at this late date... after the 10 plagues... after the burning bush... even after he calmly assuages the people's jitters with his confident assertion "Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.”
Even Moses finds himself secretly doubting God as God's retort to him in 14:15 illumines “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on." This retort makes no sense - given verses 13-14 - unless after confidently telling the Israelites to trust Moses found himself secretly or even just in his heart, crying out to God with complaints and pleas for deliverance.
Jesus so many times - like Moses - found himself tempted by the adulation and judged by the faithlessness of his followers. John 2:25 says he "and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man."
I suppose the real "art" of biblical leadership then is to help draw out and inspire the faith that His people possess, some times feel but most often feel lacking. Moses and Jesus have GREAT moments of leadership where their actions and words fan the flames of their people's faith and God accomplishes great and mighty acts through them. The Israelite's initial triumph over the Amalekites in Exodus 17 and Jesus entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday in Luke 19 is an example where the people "got it"... "got him"... and understood the right thing to do, even as his opponents did not.
2. It is hard to overstate the importance of the parting of the Red Sea to Israelite worship, identity and discipleship.
One need only read the Psalms to recognize how important - 500 years later for the most part - this parting of the Red Sea was to Moses' people. Psalm 66 for example...
5 Come and see what God has done:
he is awesome in his deeds toward the children of man.
6 He turned the sea into dry land;
they passed through the river on foot.
There did we rejoice in him,
7 who rules by his might forever,
whose eyes keep watch on the nations—
let not the rebellious exalt themselves.
When wanting to recall "what God has done" the Psalmist starts more often than not with the exodus through the sea... not the plagues... not the burning bush...
How important is the image of the Isarelites walking through on dry ground through the Red Sea even today? Take a look at the flag of Israel...
What is it a picture of? It is a picture lifted directly from Exodus 14:22
And the people of Israel went into the midst of the sea on dry ground, the waters being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left.
3. God's glory is NOT to be trifled with.
Throughout the Exodus story and finally here in Exodus 14 God makes it abundantly clear that you want to exult yourself or your gods or your nation above Him and the rightful place of His preeminent glory? Watch out.
It seems that God's lovingkindess can be presumed upon to a degree.
It seems His faithfulness can be winked at.
It seems even His holiness has boundaries that can be pushed.
But don't go up against God's glory.
Isaiah 42:8
I am the Lord; that is my name!
I will not yield my glory to anotheror my praise to idols.
In fact in order to ensure that 1) Pharaoh's army doesn't pursue his people to Canaan, 2) that the Isarelites trust in God's saving power for generations to come and 3) that His glory wins and is SEEN to win God will do some amazing things here in Exodus 14.
First He will specifically back His people into a "kobayashi maru" - the unbeatable situation. He specifically directs them "turn back and encamp near Pi Hahiroth" in verse 1. They were taking the "easy" way to Canaan along the sea through Gaza but no no, in order to show the Egyptians and assure the Isarelites of His favour he wants them encamped on the edge of the sea with...
Second, God sends Pharaoh after the Israelites, hard heart and all. Not only does Pharaoh bring his best chariots - 600 of them - he also brings along for good measure it seems his "other chariots". More than enough to wipe out the treasure laden civilians who made up the vast vast majority of the nation under Moses' command.
Third he piles up the water on BOTH sides of the Israelites all night long in preparation for their Exodus.
Fourth he uses the pillars of fire and cloud to alternatively light the Israelites way through the sea and to confuse the Egyptians as to their whereabouts. Verse 24 goes even further to say that God specifically throws the Egyptian army "into confusion" in order to keep them from catching the Isarelites passing through the midst of the sea.
Fifth, God makes the sea bed "dry ground" for the Israelites but miry enough to separate the chariots from their wheels for the Egyptians. This lack of mobility will be their undoing. God using man's supposed "strengths" against himself.
Lastly of course, God instructs Moses to stretch out his hand yet again, the sea returns to its place and Pharaoh's army is seen from no more.
Quite a sobering view of God. A view of God that requires us - as my son says - "to put on our big boy pants". It is the same view of God - and about the same topic - that Paul writes in 2 Thesslonians 2 where he notes that God will use Satan to deluge and deceive those that "refuse to love the truth" in order to confirm and prepare them for His final judgement.
What is all the more amazing about the lengths to which God will go to protect and exult His own glory is the fact that in Christ, we are told that we somehow come to share in His glory with him. Amazing!
Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ,
if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
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