This summer were looking at what it means to “wrestle with God.”—and not as if any one of us is an expert. Since Easter, we talked through the stories of Adam, Noah, Abraham, and Joseph. These people wrestled with God in very different, but equally intense ways. Last week, we saw how God worked providentially in Joseph’s life—as much through the evil as the good—to bring about his purpose and plan. We saw how God is Sovereign Lord over our families, our circumstances, even the nations, times, and places he situates us within!
This morning, we turn from Genesis to Exodus. The story of Moses begins with this kind of national outcry for help. At the end of Genesis, Joseph (an Israelite) is like Pharaoh's (an Egyptian) father. Both the Egyptians, but especially the Israelites, are prospering. But there is something ominous about the way Exodus 1:7 uses the word “them.” Take a look: “But the Israelites were fruitful, increased rapidly, multiplied, and became extremely numerous so that the land was filled with them.” The Israelites may as well be a plague of gnats, or frogs, or locusts. They’re not wanted. And then along comes Exodus 1:8: “A new king, who did not know about Joseph, came to power in Egypt.”
One quick observation that can be made is it can take just a single generation for the good of a people, for its fortunes and prospects, to entirely change. This is a major theme not just in Exodus, but in the book of Judges. For Israel, the pendulum violently swings back and forth generation after generation.
But another observation is that every nation there is false dichotomy of “us,” but then there is “them.” Take our own nation. Who is us? Who is the U.S.A.? What is a nation’s identity? A nation may like to think it’s a “melting pot”, but like in Exodus 1, people don’t simply melt into one another. Like the barbs of a porcupine, sharp differences multiply around matters of race, ethnicity, skin color, fairness, equality, justice, power, and control. Depending upon who is in power, there becomes a circle of people that’s trusted, and a circle distrusted.
In Exodus context, the circles are obvious. There becomes a circle of people that’s trusted (Egyptian), and a circle distrusted (Jewish). In our own national context, historically, the circle of people trusted are more white, more Caucasian, more of European descendants with a Judeo-Christian heritage, people with a general respect/shared history for Jews. Historically, the circle of distrust are less-whites, non-Caucasian, non-European immigrants, people of non-Judeo-Christian heritage, people with no respect for Jews, nor even basic Christian worldview, maybe Eastern, maybe Islamic. Those historically “trusted” are now distrusted; those historically “distrusted” are now in-power. Were at a kind of cultural crossroads.
We can see the dynamics of Exodus 1 playing out on prominent university campuses. An inversion is occurring. University campuses have long been the purported “bastions or utopias of tolerance.” But more recently, they’ve become cauldrons of profound hate, blatant racism, divisive rhetoric, rabid violence, hostility, and open antisemitism. The circle of trust is non-whites, non-Caucasian, non-European immigrants, people of non-Judeo-Christian heritage, people with no respect for Jewish, nor even basic Christian worldview, those of Islamic, maybe Eastern mindset.
If you are part of the Kingdom of God, we reject all these us/them categories. Only in the Kingdom of God can the dividing walls of hostility be obliterated. Only in God's kingdom can power and fear give way to love and service. Yet our culture isn’t predominantly Christian. So, every time we think we’re about to transcend fear, there we go again! A Pharaoh is born who neither knows nor remembers Joseph. He observes that the Israelites are becoming too numerous and powerful. He fears that if war breaks out the “others” might throw in with “our” enemies and destroy “us.”
Pharaoh's public policy becomes “Let’s deal shrewdly with the Israelites.” “Let’s assign taskmasters.” “Let’s oppress them with forced labor.” “Let’s work the Israelites ruthlessly.” “Let’s make their lives bitter with labor, bricks and mortar work, fieldwork.” “Let’s take away their straw and make them gather their own while doubling the quote of bricks needed each day.” And when that didn’t work, “Let’s command them to kill (self-genocide) the lives of their own firstborn sons!” And when that didn’t work comes Pharaoh's eventual edict: “let’s just throw all the Israelite firstborn sons into the Nile River.”
Notice at first the hostility is more subtle, but then it becomes more pronounced, formalized, overt. But also notice Exodus 2:23, “The Israelites groaned because of their difficult labor, they cried out, and their cry for help, because of their difficult labor, ascended to God. God heard their groaning, And God remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God saw the Israelites, and God knew.” God hears the cries of the oppressed, and takes up, and defends their cause! When the Hebrew midwives refuse to abort the lives of firstborn sons of Israel, God sees their courage and honors their acts of resistance. Exodus 1:21 says, “Since the midwives feared God, he gave them families.”
As this next national election looms ever larger over us, I’m taking every opportunity to say, “Help comes from the Lord.” The story of Exodus reminds that not only will God destroy the policies, but God will also oppose the very policymakers, he will oppose the fear mongering Pharaohs, who fear-not God. God hears and knows the cries of the oppressed.
As Israel cries out for help, God raises up a rescuer named Moses. In Exodus 2, the camera zooms in on a husband and wife, of the tribe of Levi, who give birth to a son and conceal his birth and hide him. When they can do so no longer, they set him in a papyrus basket, lined with tar, and place him among the reeds in the river. The baby cries and cries. But Moses older sister is there watching over the basket, and even more so the Living God, and when Pharaoh's own daughter discovers the crying baby, Miriam emerges from cover and suggests Pharaoh's daughter allows a Hebrew mother nurse the baby! And of course, Miriam brings Moses’ own mother forth. So clever! Moses was raised as a Hebrew child by his own biological mother, but was later schooled by Egyptians, by Pharaoh's daughter.
Moses names means, “I drew him out of the water.” Not only is this a picture of Moses’s salvation, it’s a picture of Israel’s salvation. God would draw them out of slavery through water. And it’s an eventual picture of Christian baptism, that God draws us out of water from death to life, from slavery to sin to freedom in Spirit. God hears the cries of the oppressed, of the fatherless. And all of this is later codified into the law. Exodus 22:21-24, “21 You must not exploit a resident alien or oppress him, since you were resident aliens in the land of Egypt. 22 You must not mistreat any widow or fatherless child. 23 If you do mistreat them, they will no doubt cry to me, and I will certainly hear their cry. 24 My anger will burn, and I will kill you with the sword; then your wives will be widows and your children fatherless.”
Early in Moses life he rises up to rescue those in distress. As a young man he witnesses an Egyptian abusing a Hebrew slave. He rises up in vengeance, kills the Egyptian, and buries his body in sand hoping nobody noticed. Of course, everyone finds out, including Pharaoh, who orders that Moses be killed. As a young man Moses forfeits his moral and spiritual authority and is forced to flee Egypt.
While fleeing to Midian, Moses happens upon a well where a certain group of shepherds are mistreating seven sisters. Moses comes to their defense, drives off the shepherds, and waters the sister’s flocks. Moses would soon marry Zipporah, one of the seven sisters, and she gives birth to a son named Gershom. For years Moses would bide his time in Midian, until Pharaoh would die, and hostilities subside.
In Midian, God must qualify Moses to be his instrument, his rescuer. God appears in a burning bush, and calls out to him “Moses, Moses.” And like all the prophets before Moses, Moses responds “Here, I am.” I’m your instrument! And like any other person God calls, he must also qualify.
God warns Moses to remove his shoes, to know that he is standing on holy ground, and not to come any closer. There is no one like God! God tells Moses all about the suffering of the Egyptians, and that he intends to go down to Egypt to rescue and bring them out into the good and spacious land. He promises Abraham a land flowing with milk and honey and every good thing.
But Moses is riddled with self-doubt. He asks a series of questions. He first asks, “who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and that I should bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” Then he asks, “If I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what should I tell them?” He asks, “What if they won’t believe me and will not obey me but say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you’?” He asks, “Please, Lord, I have never been eloquent—either in the past or recently or since you have been speaking to your servant—because my mouth and tongue are sluggish.”
For those of us who might avail ourselves to be God’ instrument, to fight with God, to defend the cause of the alien, the wisdom, the fatherless… it is God who must prepare. It is God who must instruct, and equip, and qualify us for his service. Apart from God we can do nothing in the face of such great and catastrophic needs. One of the biggest lessons Moses had to learn was that God would have to raise up leaders of 10s, 50s, 100s, 1000s to come alongside Moses. The work was too great for one! Another big lesson Moses would learn was the power of standing in prayer with others. Once when the Israelites were being attacked, so long as Moses arms were raised in the prayer, Israel prevailed. But when his arms slipped, they were defeated. So, Moses had to have two men stand with him in prayer!
Here is something we see in the story of Moses. Those who cry out to God for their own needs are just as dependent upon God for help as those who try to come alongside and help. Both the caregiver and care-receiver rely upon God. Help must come from the Lord, and when it does, it’s for God’s glory, not that of man.
The story of Moses forces us to think about the kind of help we need from the Lord. Without question, we have physical needs. The story of Moses answers what is looks like to rely upon God daily to be our Helper, our Rescuer in times of trouble, our Healer, our Provider. It took Israel forty years to learn to trust God daily for bread, for protein, and even for water. But Israel’s most profound need was spiritual. Man doesn’t live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God. Man doesn’t live on protein alone, but its sustained and strengthened through worship.
If you’ve never read Exodus, you may conclude worship doesn’t matter. I look at all these schools, coaches, workplaces that set policies denying people even a single day of worship. Pharaoh's policy was to deny Israel the opportunity to worship God. Work mattered more. Why waste time on worship. But what Pharaoh didn’t realize was that when Pharaoh denied Israel worship what he was really doing was denying God affections of his one and only beloved son. In the story of Moses, it’s one thing to stand against the oppressed. It becomes a grave and serious matter to stand between God and his people!
In the story of Moses, think of all those Israelite families who were denied the love and affection of their firstborn sons. God felt like them, when Pharaoh denied God the worship of his beloved son Israel. There is an obscure story in Exodus, where God threatens Moses’ life. For whatever reason, Moses hadn’t circumcised his son, dedicated him to God. But Zipporah (Moses’ wife) is wise to the matter, circumcises their son, and God’s anger relents.
And of course, not just the Israelites, not just Moses… but the Egyptians themselves (who threw all those Israelite sons into the Nile). Pharaoh himself, who set forth the policy, all would know the grief of being denied love and affection of their firstborn sons. What was the tenth plague? The tenth plague was the death of every firstborn child in Egypt. Pharaoh himself would discover the grief of being denied the life and affections of his one and only son.
Exodus 4:21-23, “When you go back to Egypt, make sure you do before Pharaoh all the wonders that I have put within your power. But I will harden his heart so that he won’t let the people go. 22 And you will say to Pharaoh: This is what the Lord says: Israel is my firstborn son. 23 I told you: Let my son go so that he may worship me, but you refused to let him go. Look, I am about to kill your firstborn son!”
All of this is the picture of the cost of redemption. Under no circumstance would God be denied the worship of his firstborn Israel. And those like Pharaoh who would stand in the way of God’s purpose of worship, would be destroyed. In time God would spare no cost—not even the cost of his one only Son Jesus Christ—to secure the worship and affection of his son Israel. God would give up his son to regain a son. So, in life of Moses, we see picture of God who relentless defends the cause of the physically oppressed, but who relentlessly fights for the worship and affection of his sons and daughters. God will not deny people justice or worship (see Exodus 15).