A Delivered People
[bl]I[/bl]n the quiet, our eyes are on the cross. And I can’t help but think of my sin. Our sin. The reason for the cross. And I find myself once again in the story of Israel.
Like Israel, we are a people who live in bondage. To media, food, sexual desires, power, work, money. We are held captive by the things that feed the flesh. It was their stomachs – a genuine need for food – that led the Israelites to Egypt. What if Jacob’s family had trusted in the Lord to provide for them during the drought in Canaan? What if they never sought grain in Egypt?
They may have never reconciled with Joseph. And Jacob may not have seen his son again. Or would God have brought that redemption in another way? Maybe God would have led Joseph home one day.
The initial ways of God are never fully known, for he is continually entering into our choices and making new ways to lead us back to his intended places of freedom.
Most often, sin and bondage are acknowledged as individual. We are a society of individual rights, personal freedoms and space. Values imposed and inherited by our nation. It’s no surprise that we process sin as private experiences, with personal consequences…that also affect other people.
But all sin is communal. Like Israel, we are groups of people collectively struggling with our fallenness.
And the consequences of all sin and brokenness are felt deep and wide within families and societies.
When we live in sin, we judge more often. We’re less capable of intimacy. We’re less willing to enter into the suffering of others. We’re more insecure. We doubt. We defend ourselves. These relational inhibitors deeply affect our ability to live and relate as God intended.
Our sin separates us from God and those around us. This is what makes it collective. A mutual reality. A shared responsibility. A communal journey toward deliverance.
Deliverance: rescue. Recovery. Preservation from danger. Being taken from one place to another. From Egypt to the land of Canaan. From bondage to a life of freedom. Israel, God’s chosen people, are a delivered people. Their journey of life and faith led them into captivity, and God intentionally and faithfully leads them from a life of bondage and debt to a life of freedom and grace.
The story of Israel, the story of us.
I am the LORD, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the LORD your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the LORD.
The deliverance of Israel is hope for the sinner. We don’t have to live a life of bondage to our sin. The intended places of God are lands of freedom, environments of grace. It’s the vibrant, living garden he created us in.
It’s Canaan. The place God’s people began. The place they left to fill their stomachs. The place they return after deliverance.
The story of Israel, the story of us.
When Moses told the Israelites that God was going to deliver them, their discouragement and cruel bondage kept them from listening. An entire generation of people whose reality was always slavery. Never freedom. How could they have possibly understood?
The story of Israel, the story of us.
And before deliverance there is wailing. Suffering. The death of many, of One.
The story of Israel, the story of us.
A pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. The people are led. He always goes before us.
The story of Israel, the story of us.
And in the path of deliverance there is fear in the next step, in the journey to His places. It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!
The story of Israel, the story of us.
Israel was delivered from a life of slavery. What do you need to be delivered from? What enslaves you?
We have countless self-help books on obesity, pornography, finances, marriage, parenting, happiness, simplicity – you name it, and there’s a book out there to empower us in these matters of the heart and flesh. But these books are powerless without the life giving commitment of confession and repentance that delivers us toward reconciliation with God and those we sinned against.
Recognizing our sin it essential. Name it. Speak it. Share it. Confess it before God and others. This is the loosening of chains. The beginning of deliverance, of freedom.
As you anticipate the cross this Easter – the death and resurrection that brings you life – confess what you need to be delivered from. And ask God to part the sea before you – the obstacles preventing you from entering into new places of understanding. New places of freedom. He will lead you.
“Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the LORD will bring you today. The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still.”
To be still. Which brings us back to the quiet. Find some today.
