January 17, 2012
Today’s reading from Encounter with God

Dramatic Reversal

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Opening Prayer

Mighty God, today help me to learn to be confident without being arrogant, sensitive without being overwhelmed, and faithful to You.

Read Exodus 12:31-51

[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 Succoth. There were about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children. [38] Many other people went up with them, as well as large droves of livestock, both flocks and herds. [39] With the dough they had brought from Egypt, they baked cakes 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. [43] The LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “These are the regulations for the Passover: “No foreigner is to eat of it. [44] Any slave you have bought may eat of it after you have circumcised him, [45] but a temporary resident and a hired worker may not eat of it. [46] “It must be eaten inside one house; take none of the meat outside the house. Do not break any of the bones. [47] The whole community of Israel must celebrate it. [48] “An alien living among you who wants to celebrate the LORD’s Passover must have all the males in his household circumcised; then he may take part like one born in the land. No uncircumcised male may eat of it. [49] The same law applies to the native-born and to the alien living among you.” [50] All the Israelites did just what the LORD had commanded Moses and Aaron. [51] And on that very day the LORD brought the Israelites out of Egypt by their divisions.

Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. All rights reserved throughout the world. Used by permission of International Bible Society.

Reflect

“He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble … even as he said to our ancestors” (Luke 1:52,55).

What a difference one night of the Lord’s “vigil” made (42), a night when he kept his promises of release and protection and freedom and movement toward the land he had promised them. Yesterday the Israelites were slaves to Pharaoh in the city of Rameses (37; 1:11), today they are on the way to freedom, told by Pharaoh himself to “worship the Lord” (literally, “serve,” v. 31). Yesterday, they were powerless and poor; now, the Egyptians shower them with whatever they want (35,36; cf 3:21, 22; 11:3). Pharaoh himself could now see where it is that blessings come from and he asks the Lord’s people, “bless me” (32). Here is a foreshadowing of the reversal between Good Friday and Easter Day, the firstfruits of the coming “renewal of all things” (Matt 19:28-30; 1 Cor. 15:20-24).

At the very beginning of the departure we are alerted to the diversity of participants. The Israelites are organized as 600 groups of fighting men (37; cf v. 17; 13:18; “men on foot” is standard for “foot soldiers,” while “thousand” is a common military grouping), but along with the women, children and elderly, they are described as a “mixed crowd” (38, NRSV), a term used for people of foreign descent (e.g. Neh. 13:3; Jer. 25:20,24). Openness is to be celebrated in the annual Passover (43-49). Those who may be temporarily in the land (“foreigner,” “hired worker”) are excluded, but “slaves” and “resident aliens” who are willing to identify with the community through circumcision are welcomed equally (“The same law,” v. 49). Here is a foreshadowing of the wider inclusivity in Christ Jesus when barriers are broken down. Again, there is reversal; we are “no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people” (Eph. 2:19) who “have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God” (Rom. 6:22).

Apply

Give thanks to God for the freedom he gives you and welcome others to share in it this week.

Closing prayer

Lord, I praise You for the Church, the Body of Christ. It is so amazing how You do extraordinary things through it.

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