Series: Becoming the People of God

Sermon #4: The Exodus

By: Donnell Wyche

Walking in the Promise of Freedom
After the decisive battle between the powers, Moses starts the process of leading the people up out of Egypt. When God called Moses to this task, God said to Moses, you will know that it was I that sent you when you and the people worship me on this mountain.

12And God said, “I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.” (Exodus 3:12)

The movement on this promise is coming into sharper focus. Having had enough Pharaoh demands that the people, their flocks, and herds leave.

31During the night Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Up! Leave my people, you and the Israelites! Go, worship the Lord as you have requested. 32Take your flocks and herds, as you have said, and go. And also bless me.” (Exodus 12:31–32)

The people agree and they make their way out of Egypt. After 430 years of slavery followed by the plagues, and a clear demonstration of power, the people seeking liberation experience the realization that God will deliver on a promise.

40Now the length of time the Israelite people lived in Egypt was 430 years. 41At the end of the 430 years, to the very day, all the Lord’s divisions left Egypt. 42Because the Lord kept vigil that night to bring them out of Egypt, on this night all the Israelites are to keep vigil to honor the Lord for the generations to come. (Exodus 12:40–42)

Moses is ready, the people are ready, and the group that leaves Egypt, a multi-ethnic group seeking liberation are taking their first steps toward freedom. As they leave Egypt there are in this in-between place. What we might call, “The already and the not-yet.” They are moving forward, but they are not yet who they will be. They are in transition.

Pay Attention to Transitions
Most transitions involve at least three phases: endings, wilderness, and new beginnings. As the people take their first tentative steps of freedom, they are no longer slaves, but they aren’t really free. The freedom has been announced. They are now starting to walk in the promise, but the transition isn’t final, it has just begun.

We struggle with endings.

When things end, often we wonder why. What’s my role in the ending? In this story, we know that the end was a declaration of freedom, an announcement by God about the destiny of humanity. When you have been held in slavery, beaten, dehumanized, and debased, taken advantaged, you may not be able to even know what freedom is, let alone, know how to be free. Often it takes years to work the reality of freedom into every aspect of your life, your mind, your practice, your outlook.

God instructs Moses and Aaron to start a new story,

The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt, 2“This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year. 3Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month each man is to take a lamb for his family, one for each household.(Exodus 12:1-3)

The clock is being restarted, it’s not an attempt to forget the past but to communicate what God is doing in the life and story of the people. Yes, you were slaves in Egypt, but your story is changing.

This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord—a lasting ordinance. (Exodus 12:14)

In the passover meal, God says, remember your time in Egypt, but don’t stay there. Remember the pain and suffering, but don’t stay there. Remember, but also look forward. Remember that through it all, I am with you. The same thing God said to Moses. The same thing God said in the beginning. I am with you.

When we are in transition we can feel alone, abandoned to our lot in life. So, I want to encourage you from the story of the exodus because when the transition is happening, we have to remind ourselves that we are not alone. While, we might not be able to see God or God’s presence with us, I would ask you to activate your faith and a story of trust. God is present. You are not alone.

So, God leads the people.

40Now the length of time the Israelite people lived in Egypt was 430 years. 41At the end of the 430 years, to the very day, all the Lord’s divisions left Egypt. 42Because the Lord kept vigil that night to bring them out of Egypt, on this night all the Israelites are to keep vigil to honor the Lord for the generations to come. (Exodus 12:40–42)

We have finally arrived at the Exodus. God’s promise of freedom. But the people aren’t free yet. They are walking in a promise, the promise of freedom. God has paved the way, but the people have to take first steps of activating God’s promised liberation and deliverance. They have to take up the task of leaving, of implementing the freedom that’s available, by walking out of the empire. Walking in the freedom that God offers us takes an activation of faith and trust. It’s a decision on whether they will activate their faith in God’s promise and whether they will trust that God will deliver on this promise.

Catch this as well, this is real freedom because while the people are free to go, they are free to stay as well. Recognizing that this exercise of freedom is new, it’s foreign, God leads the people paying attention of what might distract or discourage the people.

17When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.” 18So God led the people around by the desert road toward the Red Sea. The Israelites went up out of Egypt ready for battle. (Exodus 13:17–18)

Resistance to Freedom
Not everyone is happy when freedom comes. Some will insist on trying to re-enslave you. This happens through a lot of methods including questioning your freedom in the first place. We see this happen in this story too when Pharaoh regrets his decision to release the Hebrews and those who escape with them.

5When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, Pharaoh and his officials changed their minds about them and said, “What have we done? We have let the Israelites go and have lost their services!” 6So he had his chariot made ready and took his army with him. 7He took six hundred of the best chariots, along with all the other chariots of Egypt, with officers over all of them. (Exodus 14:5–7)

Pharaoh representing Empire uses everything available to restrict to prevent the exercise of freedom. When we take up the originally call to retreat and to worship. The empire reminds us of what we are leaving behind. It’s a constant message of you are not allowed to withdraw, you aren’t allowed to escape, you are exercise your freedom. So the empire tries to re-enslave you.

There’s a way we join with empire in our enslavement because we have contended with our fears and anxiety.

10As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians, marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the Lord. 11They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? 12Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!” (Exodus 14:10–12)

The people afraid of what Pharaoh might do now that they are walking in the faith and trust of freedom promised. We don’t like uncertainty and that’s what we get in transition. We get that things are coming to an end, but we don’t know what is coming. We prefer certainty, if that certainty involves our enslavement. Pay attention to the ways that the empire promises safety and security. At what cost. These people who have escaped Egypt are all of us. It would have been bette if we had the certainty of our enslavement over the uncertainty of this new found freedom. But Moses speaks for the Lord when he says,

13“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. 14The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.” (Exodus 14:13–14)

This word from Moses is a word we all need to hear. Don’t be afraid. But fear is so available, so helpful, it a helpful companion in uncertainty. But Moses has discovered something about God himself. Moses started out doubting, uncertain, reluctant, that actually moves to flat out refusal. Then over the course of the story,w e learn that Moses knows that God is able to come through in ways that he doubted were possible. He takes his experience with God to encourage the people. What experience of the faithfulness of God do you have to share with all of us. This is one of the reasons we have this answered prayer way. It’s a visual representation of the faithfulness of God. While God may not be answering all of our prayers, God is at work in our community answering prayers.

Moses says, if you will be still, the Lord will fight for you.

This is a difficult word. Developing patience and reliance on God is something that we develop, we don’t just have it because it is something that is shapped and formed in us as we activate faith and trust God. This people had the manifest presence of God leading them by day and the presence of God leading them by night and even with that physical presence they were afraid, but we should take heart. Read their story, learn from their fear, and activate our faith and grow our trust in the God who will fight for us. The God who had defeated the powers to set us free. The God who calls us [his] own as decide to leave Pharaoh’s world behind and follow God into freedom.

God shows again in power and rescues the people.

29But the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left. 30That day the Lord saved Israel from the hands of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians lying dead on the shore. 31And when the Israelites saw the great power the Lord displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the Lord and put their trust in him and in Moses his servant. (Exodus 14:29–31)

This is in the end of the sermon, the rest is my notes and thoughts.

Pharaoh ties and fails. With God’s help as the empire tries to enslave us, the empire will fail too.

isn’t clear, there’s overlap. There’s the end of what occurred in Egypt, but they are in the middle, the wilderness zone. They are walking in faith and tentative trust as they are led by God their delivery.

I’m moving forward, but I’m not yet who I am supposed to be. They are a people in transition. This transition has three phases: endings, wilderness, and new beginnings. As the story continues the people will occupy all three phases. As the exit Egypt their time as slaves is ending.

When things in our lives and in story, there is so much uncertainty and fear. What’s coming, what’s in store for me, what will I do as I make my way from this place to the places I’m heading.

This multi-ethnic group has now become the people of God, not just because of birthright or heredity, but because they have decided to leave behind Pharaoh’s world to enter into God’s promise.

Their time in Egypt has ended, but the promise of a new and spacious land hasn’t been realized, thus they are in this in-between space.

We struggle with endings. I think this is why the passover meal was given to the people. It’s more than a celebration, it’s a time for remembering. Remember what happened. Naming the pain, the suffering, the loss. Then there a part of the passover that acknowledges that God has redeemed our pain and suffering and made way for us to step into our new reality.

Each step they take, they take in faith. They take these steps of trust. That the God of freedom is surely going to do what God has promised.

20After leaving Sukkoth they camped at Etham on the edge of the desert. 21By day the Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to guide them on their way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so that they could travel by day or night. 22Neither the pillar of cloud by day nor the pillar of fire by night left its place in front of the people. (Exodus 13:20-22)

When you have had your life dedicated to you for your generations, freedom is disorienting.

You see this and understand this when people who have held or managed, when they are free they act on that freedom. Sometimes that freedom manifests itself as indulgence, sometimes, it’s quiet reflections. A savoring of agency. I get to decide for myself.

There’s also this response of when freedom has been granted you realize you want to take that freedom back. You are making the wrong decision, we might say in response as a means of adjusting the implemt

so I love that God leads the people by going ahead of them by day and by night. There’s by day so they could travel
God takes the lead in their deliverance. Moses was the messagner, but God is the deliverer.

Pay attention to transitions.
As the people leave, things have changed. Some of us welcome change, we thrive on it, while others have now become the people

Things change. Some of us are wired to welcome change, or thrive in the midst of it, while others of us are shaken and disquieted as transition and change occurs.

Transition often includes three phases: Endings, Wilderness Zone, and New Beginnings.

God has delivered on a promise. God ready for freedom.

As the people leaves, Moses carries the bones of Joseph out of Egypt. This fulfillment of a prophecy, that “God would surely come to the aid of the people.” There is something power that occurs when you believe something in the face of opposition. A people held in slavery for 430 years, but there this believe that this isn’t there eventual lot in life.

Over 400 years before this prophecy would become reality, but it is real as the people make their way out of Egypt. And it’s God who leads the people. God concerned for the fragile state of the people protects them from harm by taking them the long way.

the nation with the people. This small gesture is a sign to the people, a sign that the Lord keeps promises. It’s a reminder that both in life and in death we are in community.

It’s God who leads the exodus.

17When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.” 18So God led the people around by the desert road toward the Red Sea. The Israelites went up out of Egypt ready for battle. (Exodus 13:20–22)

They are hopeful. They are hoping this exodus will lead to different lives, better lives, lives where they get to determine the outcome of their lives. They

Th

17When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.” 18So God led the people around by the desert road toward the Red Sea. The Israelites went up out of Egypt ready for battle.
19Moses took the bones of Joseph with him because Joseph had made the Israelites swear an oath. He had said, “God will surely come to your aid, and then you must carry my bones up with you from this place.”

20After leaving Sukkoth they camped at Etham on the edge of the desert. 21By day the Lord went ahead of them in a pillar of cloud to guide them on their way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, so that they could travel by day or night. 22Neither the pillar of cloud by day nor the pillar of fire by night left its place in front of the people.