The Bible declares that God is our deliverer! This should ring a bell for us. Pleas for deliverance will vary, but it isn’t hard, especially in a pandemic, to join those who cry out to God. Revisit with me some of these crises, we’ll see what happens.
Do you think nothing?
If you’re an atheist, this will be you. If not, hear God’s people cry out and note the unavoidable fact of their deliverance. The cry perhaps coming first to mind is that of the Hebrew slaves in Egypt. We hear it described most specifically by God himself.
Moses, having fled Egypt as a murderer, is now keeping the sheep of his father-in-law, Jethro. He’s looking after the flock in the wilderness of Mt. Sinai, and his curiosity is aroused by a bush that burns and burns but doesn’t burn up. This fire isn’t destructive? He approaches for a better look and within seconds is on his face on the desert floor because God has spoken to him, cautioning him to come no closer and to take off his shoes. He is on holy ground.
This is the physical setting. Their cry for help is the cause that will result in Passover, an effect the Jewish community still celebrates every year in the spring. The Jewish people were delivered and they don’t forget it. God describes the cry that started the whole thing: “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob . . .. I have surely seen the oppression of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters for I know their sorrows.
So I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up from that land and to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey” (Ex 3: 7-8).
Hebrew style and the Hebrew language itself are succinct—few words, no flowery descriptions, no eloquence for its own sake.
There’s one exception. If emphasis is required, the whole thing is repeated. Notice the repeats.
God says the important thing twice here and again later in the passage: I’ve heard the Israelites’ cry, I’m here to deliver them. Then he adds: You, Moses, are the one I’m sending to bring it about.
There’s more: “Now therefore, attend! The cry of the children of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. Come now, therefore, and I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt” (Ex 3: 9-10).
Nothing hard about the sense of all this—that is if you believe God exists, that God speaks and tells us about himself in the Bible. It probably doesn’t need to be said that the above faith positions, when they are foundational, create a reliable boat in which to ride out a storm.
People like to accuse biblical writers of sexism and a patristic bent. That cup of contention holds less water when we get to Esther, a biblical book with a female focus and female hero. Again we hear the cries of God’s people and witness a dramatic answer. The interesting thing about Esther is that God is never specifically mentioned. But the presence of God is unmistakable.
With genocide looming, Queen Esther commands the Jewish community to pray and fast. She and her attendants will pray and fast then she will risk her life by appearing unbidden before King Ahasuerus. She faces a death penalty if he doesn’t recognize her and receive her petition.
When she performs this courageous move and is welcomed, she doesn’t immediately make her plea. She invites the king and his prime minister, the bad guy, to dinner. Only after she has twice hosted the king and the wicked Haman does she make her appeal.
After breathtaking events, this happens: “On the day the enemies of the Jews hoped to overpower them, the opposite occurred” (Esther 9: 1).
In February, the Jewish community still remembers this deliverance as Purim celebrations are held everywhere. The story is read in synagogues, where delighted children, dressed up in Esther, Ahasuerus, or Mordecai costumes and buzzing their noise-making groggers, drown out the name of Haman each time it occurs in the reading.
After the service, they enjoy a tasty treat called hamen taschen, “Haman’s hats.” Look for the recipe online, and remember that God not only hears the cries of his people but also answers. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our Lord Jesus Christ is the deliverer.
from the Edgefield Advertiser, oldest newspaper in South Carolina
March 31, 2020
with thanks for the great images: fire, martin-adams-D9MDpAjlJ6k-unsplash.jpg; statues of Ancient Egyptian, aussieactive-GNdp2Q4VZjw-unsplash.jpg; Hebrew, mick-haupt-eQ2Z9ay9Wws-unsplash.jpg; dinner, ha-nguy-n-cswBBe9mu-s-unsplash.jpg; hamen taschen, sheri-silver-LBEytWZnxbQ-unsplash.jpg. Thanks also to unsplash.com, a great site.
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