pharaoh pharaoh
http://www.nmaz.net/media/audio/kl-songs/NMKL20020923-06-PharoahPharoah.mp3
i apologize for the above link. i have grown to hate this song, but i just couldn't read this passage without singing it in my head...over and over... so, thanks to the wonderful world of google, you can listen to neighborhood ministries in phoenix, az perform it yourself.
as i read this passage, i found it funny/strange that god made pharaoh stubborn so that he would give chase. it kept saying it. god made pharaoh stubborn. god made pharaoh stubborn. and i thought, "well, i can't say that that's really all that fair..." i mean seriously, if god made him chase after the israelites, then god was setting him up. totally uncool, god. you made a guy who had already decided to leave them alone change his mind and chase after them, just so you could show everybody how strong you are...sheesh... he wasn't going to bother them any more. but can we be sure of that? how do we know he wouldn't have changed his mind on his own a little later?
the phrasing of this verse just really got me. god delivered israel from the oppression of the egyptians. i'm trying to get my head around that. it's not a small thing. the way it's phrased, god's action yields the eternal, permanent result of eliminating the oppressor and his ability to oppress. it has a much bigger scope than just setting them free... pharaoh will never again change his mind and chase them down. he'll never again take the lives of newborn israelite children. he'll never again demand that they make the same number of clay bricks, with fewer materials. he'll never again...breathe... so god delivered israel that day from the oppression of the egyptians. not from pharaoh, a guy who would've died eventually, if he hadn't died in the sea that day, but from the oppression by the egyptian nation. that's pretty big.
Created over 4 years ago
