After God saves Israel from the threat of Egyptian forces and the danger of the Red Sea, we expect there to be a honeymoon period of great trust and delight. Unfortunately, three days later we pick up the story and all is not well. These stories teach us what it is like for God to lead and parent an infant people as they highlight the grumbling of the infant people of God and the goodness God shows them anyway, patiently and kindly trying to help them grow up into who they are meant to be.

As they approach the Red Sea and then hear the armies of Egypt approaching, the people of God see trouble in front and trouble behind. Their panic and cries reveal that they are blind to the sight of God.

So often, we too feel stuck; seeing trouble on the left and the right, trouble in front and behind, but unable to see God. There’s plenty of things that keep us from seeing God, but this story exposes how our fear blinds us to the reality of God.

Will God stay away or show His face?

When Jesus appears to his followers after the Resurrection, He is far more playful than we would have imagined. What kind of a Savior is he?

In the yearly celebration of the Passover, as the lamb was sacrificed, roasted, and eaten, Israel was being told, “Behold your God.” More specifically, Israel was being told, Behold the justice of your God. This sermon looks at the event of the first Passover, and calls us to behold the justice of God, to see how the Justice of God is about making things right. 

As we look upon the Passover and behold His justice, we see three things. 

The Justice of God comes at a great cost. 

The Justice of God calls us to make things right. 

The Justice of God creates a new people

Any call worth undertaking is going to feel big, and it is going to be hard. We ought to be jolted in some way because we believe God intends for us to take meaningful action and risk for those who suffer in some way. Like Moses, we are called forth out of withdrawal into something better, something more, by the Christ who has done so much for us; we are called to take steps into the real world where people hurt, helping to move individuals, communities, ultimately all of humanity towards that sweet spot of God’s call that Jesus embodies and points us to.

At the burning bush, Moses meets God in an up close and personal way, and it scares him deeply. But this is the kind of fear where somehow you don't run away, but it makes you want to come closer.

In this encounter, Moses comes to know God even while questions about Israel's suffering remain, and He comes to know that God will be with Him despite his past failures.

Moses was prepared to save Israel through proximity to those in need, failure that taught him it wasn’t up to him, and waiting when it seemed like God wasn’t working.

While Moses was waiting and being prepared, so were the people he was being prepared to save. The lesson being taught was that salvation - for Israel and for us - is not ultimately in the hands of Moses but in the hands of God.

For the Hebrews under Pharaoh Ramses, there was no escaping the fear and despair, the pain and the problems of life. Hope and courage aren’t exactly in great supply in our day and age, either.

Like the Hebrews, we’re looking for something, or someone, to give us hope and courage, to help us face tomorrow and to take a step forward. To save us from our fear and despair.

The story of the birth of Moses gives us some clues about where to look.

Living in a "post-truth" world, it is vitaly important for us to understand what Jesus means when He tells us that the truth shall set us free. What is truth? How can we know it? And most importantly, how can it set us free from the philosophies, guilt, desires, and fears that enslave us?

Walking this path called life, it’s oh so common to look around and wonder what happened to that close relationship with God we have heard about or used to have. Paul wants us to walk closely with God. The passage is in fact a prayer that we would find that closeness with God that we desire and an encouragement to once again take up those practices which nurture our experience of closeness with God.