30 Pharaoh arose in the night …
and there was a loud cry in Egypt …
31 Then he summoned Moses … and said,
“Rise up, go away from my people …
Go, worship the Lord …
32 Take your flocks and your herds
… and be gone …” 34 So the people took
their dough before it was leavened …
35 [A]s Moses told them … they had asked
the Egyptians for jewelry of silver and gold …
37 The Israelites journeyed from Rameses
to Succoth, about six hundred thousand
men on foot, besides children.
40 The time that the Israelites had lived
in Egypt was four hundred thirty years.
Exodus 12
In the journey toward freedom, today is step four of four. Indeed – are you ready? – the freedom begins!
· The first step is to REALIZE that you really are enslaved.
· The second is to CRY OUT to God for help.
· The third is to turn to and trust in THE DELIVERER.
· And today THE JOURNEY begins.
Wait … what was that word? “Journey.”
How many of us, deep down, wanted something simpler. We wanted to be instantly fixed. We wanted to be immediately healed. We want God’s provision to be a magic wand … and we don’t want to hear that “our freedom will involve a journey”?
We may know it’s true. We know intellectually that we have to repent of a few sins. We know intuitively that we have to refrain from a few destructive behaviors. We know that will we have to learn to think in a few different ways if we want to get past our guilt and shame, our pride and greed, our anger or our apathy. We may have to learn to forgive the offender. We may need to work on our faith, hope, love, and trust.
Healing is not a magic wand.
It’s a journey.
For Israel, the journey from Egypt to the Promised Land could have taken about forty days. It took instead about forty years – and many of them didn’t make it.
But what’s the alternative? It’s 430 years in Egypt!
· It’s time to escape permanent enslavement. Are you ready?!
· It’s time to quit passing the dysfunction onto your kids and the next generations. Will you commit to a journey?
Admit it … You wanted step four to be a magic wand: “We have Jesus – the Deliverer – shouldn’t we now be instantly free?”
Yes, the victory is won … but you know instinctively that you have to walk it out. It can take just forty days to start a new habit and taste the fruit of the Promised Land … or you can keep staying in bondage. It truly is your choice.
But just remember this, God is powerfully beside you when you begin any Exodus journey in faith!
In Christ’s Love,
a guy who follows scouting’s
rule of the “Buddy System”
– we should always go in pairs
(It’s like Footprints in the Sand,
when God’s our partner,
he’ll carry us when
the Exodus gets hard)
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