Time for a Clean-up
Opening Prayer
“Change my heart, oh God, make it ever true; change my heart, oh God, may I be like You” (Eddie Espinosa).
Read Exodus 12:31–42
31 During the night Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Up! Leave my people, you and the Israelites! Go, worship the Lord as you have requested. 32 Take your flocks and herds, as you have said, and go. And also bless me.”
33 The Egyptians urged the people to hurry and leave the country. “For otherwise,” they said, “we will all die!” 34 So the people took their dough before the yeast was added, and carried it on their shoulders in kneading troughs wrapped in clothing. 35 The Israelites did as Moses instructed and asked the Egyptians for articles of silver and gold and for clothing. 36 The Lord had made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and they gave them what they asked for; so they plundered the Egyptians.
37 The Israelites journeyed from Rameses to Sukkoth. There were about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children. 38 Many other people went up with them, and also large droves of livestock, both flocks and herds. 39 With the dough the Israelites had brought from Egypt, they baked loaves of unleavened bread. The dough was without yeast because they had been driven out of Egypt and did not have time to prepare food for themselves.
40 Now the length of time the Israelite people lived in Egypt was 430 years. 41 At the end of the 430 years, to the very day, all the Lord’s divisions left Egypt. 42 Because the Lord kept vigil that night to bring them out of Egypt, on this night all the Israelites are to keep vigil to honor the Lord for the generations to come.
New International Version (NIV)
Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Reflect
As you prepare for the journey with God into the future, what remnants of your pre- Christian life need clearing out?Yeast from an old batch of bread is often used to start the next batch. When the Hebrews set off from Egypt, they were making a fresh start. They were to make unleavened bread without the yeast that symbolized the sins of the past.
Paul makes a direct reference to this when he tells the Corinthians to “Get rid of the old yeast,” which he described as “malice and wickedness” (1 Cor. 5:6–8). Becoming part of God’s family takes us into a completely new life; we have to let go of the old attachments and allegiances of the past.
The Hebrew people were set free. They left Egypt physically but many of them kept Egypt in their hearts, like hidden yeast affecting their allegiance to God and their attitudes to him.
Reflecting on your journey of faith so far, are there aspects of the old sinful life that you hang on to? Have ungodly attitudes crept back in? Are you trusting God with your future or are you reverting to self-reliant habits?
Apply
Take time to answer these questions today. Choose to follow God, trusting him with every area of your life.
Closing prayer
“Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting” (Psa. 139:23,24).
Click here to sign up to receive the EXTRAs via email each quarter.
© 2024 Scripture Union U.S.A. All rights reserved. Reproduction of the whole or any part of the contents without written permission is prohibited.
Discovery is published in the USA under license from Scripture Union England and Wales, Trinity House, Opal Court, Opal Drive, Fox Milne, Milton Keynes, MK15 0DF.