Out of Bondage
While Israelites toiled as slaves in Egypt they sighed by reason of the bondage. Their agony did not go unheeded, for they were beloved for the fathers’ sakes. God heard their pleading, and remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Exodus 2:23,24). In that covenant, He promised that the nation whom they shall serve will be judged, and afterward they shall come out with great substance (Genesis 15:14). The time had at last arrived for this pledge to take effect. God indicated this in His message to Moses at the bush: “I am come down to deliver them out of the hands of the Egyptians” (Exodus 3:8). This being so, Pharaoh was powerless to frustrate the Divine purpose. Within a short period, Israel had come out according to God’s word.
But did those who were delivered by that word, regard the exodus to be an end in itself? Or had God’s purpose stopped when He delivered them from bondage? No. It would have been a meaningless and futile act. There were rebels who made protests and were not only mutinous, but in human terms they were logical and unanswerable. They asked Moses, “Have you taken us away from Egypt to die in the wilderness, because there are no graves in Egypt?” They concluded bitterly that it would have been better to serve the Egyptians, rather than die in the wilderness (Exodus 14:11,12).
God’s answer was the marvel of crossing the Red Sea. This should have silenced their murmurings once and for all, yet within a short time they complained again to Moses and Aaron: “You have brought us forth into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger” (Exodus 16:3). God’s answer was the provision of manna. But they were still not satisfied that the miracle would suffice to preserve them from the same folly on subsequent occasions. But the people continued to betray an insultingly low estimation of the character of God Himself. In speaking out, they ignored the covenant with Abraham, “In the fourth generation they shall come hither again. Unto your seed I have given this land from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates” (Genesis 15:16). They acted as though the pledge had not been given. But that same promise had been repeated in God’s assurance to Moses, which had already been vindicated itself in their miraculous deliverance, “I am come down to bring them up out of that land unto a land flowing with milk and honey” (Exodus 3:8).The exodus was a guarantee of the entry into the land of Canaan, and God had spoken as if everything had already been an accomplished fact, “Thou in thy mercy hast led forth they people which thou has redeemed, thou hast guided them in thy strength unto thy holy habitation” (Exodus 15:3). “I will bring you in unto the land which I did swear to give to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. I am the Lord” (Exodus 6:8).
The book of the covenant legislated Israel’s settlement in the land (Exodus 21:13; 23:19). God clearly regarded Sinai as merely a halt on the march from the land of bondage to the assured rest of the land of promise.
Bro Johnstone Kaliwanga (Kilembe, Uganda)
