The Bible Challenge, Day 23: Exodus 7-9, Psalm 19 and Matthew 20
God charges Moses to ask Pharaoh to let the Israelites go from Egypt to worship God, their own God. God provides Moses with a side-kick, his brother Aaron as “a prophet,” a spokesperson to the people. God gives Moses and Aaron the miracle-working staff and promises that the very God who is commissioning them – the God of their forbears – will bring about this victory.
God backs up Moses’ words to Pharaoh with signs and wonders, but Pharaoh has a short-term memory deficit. As God inflicts one threatening occurrence after another on the Egyptians, Pharaoh retreats to a stubborn frame of mind. Any awe or terror he experiences vanishes like a vapor at dawn once the danger is over.
Psalm 19 declares that we understand God’s glory in the music of the (voiceless) spheres. Countless human beings have had the experience of discerning the presence of God in the beauty of this created world. Our diocesan boundaries of the ocean to the east and the Everglades or the Gulf to the west offer glimpses of these treasures in the first beams of the sun bursting over the horizon, mirror images of trees on the surface of lagoons, and a great variety of birds lifting their wings on the wind.
But we, like Pharaoh, struggle to hang onto our memories of God’s touching the world. At times we cling to our autonomy. And since the so-called Enlightenment at the end of the 18th century, human beings in Western Civilization have shared a need to figure God out. We do not want to be dumb sheep, blindly accepting anything, even the good message of Holy Scripture. Our craving for self-sufficiency can suffocate our soul.
Figuring out God is a daunting task. Even Jesus’ disciples, who walk with Jesus, cannot figure him out. When he speaks about his impending death in Jerusalem, two of his best friends approach Jesus – with their mother in the lead – to secure a prominent place for them in heaven after the fireworks are over. They think success is about power – that power that eventually cowed hard-hearted Pharaoh. But Jesus says life to the full is about service, pouring all our energy into work for the welfare of others. Jesus’ insistence on service is a sound bite worth remembering. A servant’s soul encounters miracles of mercy every day. That’s life!
The Rev. Jennie Lou D. Reid+
Rector, St. Faith’s Episcopal Church, Cutler Bay, Florida
God charges Moses to ask Pharaoh to let the Israelites go from Egypt to worship God, their own God. God provides Moses with a side-kick, his brother Aaron as “a prophet,” a spokesperson to the people. God gives Moses and Aaron the miracle-working staff and promises that the very God who is commissioning them – the God of their forbears – will bring about this victory.
God backs up Moses’ words to Pharaoh with signs and wonders, but Pharaoh has a short-term memory deficit. As God inflicts one threatening occurrence after another on the Egyptians, Pharaoh retreats to a stubborn frame of mind. Any awe or terror he experiences vanishes like a vapor at dawn once the danger is over.
Psalm 19 declares that we understand God’s glory in the music of the (voiceless) spheres. Countless human beings have had the experience of discerning the presence of God in the beauty of this created world. Our diocesan boundaries of the ocean to the east and the Everglades or the Gulf to the west offer glimpses of these treasures in the first beams of the sun bursting over the horizon, mirror images of trees on the surface of lagoons, and a great variety of birds lifting their wings on the wind.
But we, like Pharaoh, struggle to hang onto our memories of God’s touching the world. At times we cling to our autonomy. And since the so-called Enlightenment at the end of the 18th century, human beings in Western Civilization have shared a need to figure God out. We do not want to be dumb sheep, blindly accepting anything, even the good message of Holy Scripture. Our craving for self-sufficiency can suffocate our soul.
Figuring out God is a daunting task. Even Jesus’ disciples, who walk with Jesus, cannot figure him out. When he speaks about his impending death in Jerusalem, two of his best friends approach Jesus – with their mother in the lead – to secure a prominent place for them in heaven after the fireworks are over. They think success is about power – that power that eventually cowed hard-hearted Pharaoh. But Jesus says life to the full is about service, pouring all our energy into work for the welfare of others. Jesus’ insistence on service is a sound bite worth remembering. A servant’s soul encounters miracles of mercy every day. That’s life!
The Rev. Jennie Lou D. Reid+
Rector, St. Faith’s Episcopal Church, Cutler Bay, Florida
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