For Everyone To See

For Everyone to See

The LORD said to Abram, “You can be sure that your descendants will be strangers in a foreign land, where they will be oppressed as slaves for 400 years. But I will punish the nation that enslaves them, and in the end they will come away with great wealth.”

Genesis 15:13-14

The LORD said to Moses, “Return to Pharaoh and make your demands again. I have made him and his officials stubborn so I can display my miraculous signs among them. I’ve also done it so you can tell your children and grandchildren about how I made a mockery of the Egyptians and about the signs I displayed among them—and so you will know that I am the LORD.”

Exodus 10:1-2

These days, if you want the world to know all about you, you might put up a Web site on the Internet or set up your profile—indicating your likes, dislikes, interests, and abilities—on a social networking site. When God wanted the world to know about him, he expressed himself not on an Internet page but in history—particularly in his dealings with his people, the Israelites.

Through an amazing series of events—from spectacular miracles to devastating tragedies—God showed his character and purposes to the human race. We wonder why God poured out ten plagues on Egypt and then delivered his people through the incredible act of dividing the Red Sea. More significantly, why did he allow his people to become slaves in the first place—something he seemed to have planned ahead of time since he told Abram it would happen centuries before the people became slaves (See Genesis 15:13-14).

In Exodus 9:16, God told Moses to explain to Pharaoh why God had not destroyed Egypt: “to show you my power and to spread my fame throughout the earth.” The parting of the Red Sea was not a hidden act of God. It was front-page news. It was done for all the world to see, so that hearts might fear and melt before the great and powerful God of Israel. God uses history to put his glory on display in the world.

When hard-to-explain and hard-to-understand things happen in our own lives, we can be confident that God wants to show us and show the world something significant about himself through our circumstances. He wants to put himself on display through his work in our lives.

DISCUSSION STARTERS

Listen again to the three verses above. What purposes are given in these verses for the slavery and deliverance of the Israelites?

Do these purposes seem worth it to you for the years of slavery and the suffering of the ten plagues? Why or why not?

Read Joshua 2:9-10. How did God’s deliverance of his people impact Rahab, many years later?