The Sunday School Story
I have spent my entire life in churches. For as long as I can remember, I have heard about God leading the children of Israel OUT of Egypt. How Israel, enslaved and persecuted, cried out to God. How God sent Moses and, with plagues, miracles, and great fanfare, delivered His people. But I have yet to hear anyone touch on the fact that God TOOK THEM IN.
Israel Goes To Egypt
Joseph was sold, by his brothers no less, into slavery (Genesis 37:28). He eventually ended up in Egypt and, through various events, was made de facto ruler of the entire kingdom. Joseph became the first of the children of Israel to enter Egypt. And it was God who brought him there.
God sent me ahead of you to ensure for you a remnant on the earth, and to keep you alive by a great deliverance.
Genesis 45:7 NASB
Later, Jacob (Israel), his children, and all he had moved to Egypt to be with Joseph. And it was God who told him to go.
Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for I will make you into a great nation there. I will go down with you to Egypt, and I will surely bring you back.
Genesis 46:3b-4a NASB
Things Got Bad
Things were pretty good in Egypt for a while. I mean, why not? The guy in charge is a close relative; The best of the land is your new home. All in all, things are pretty sweet. So you settle in.
But then Joseph dies, and everything changes. You no longer have a friend in high places. Now you are abused, oppressed, and enslaved.
Now a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph.
Exodus 1:8, 13&14 NASB
The Egyptians used violence to compel the sons of Israel to labor; and they made their lives bitter with hard labor in mortar and bricks and at all kinds of labor in the field, all their labors which they violently had them perform as slaves.
So Israel moved to a new place, things turned sour, and bad stuff happened. But that’s just how life goes sometimes. Nothing truly out of the ordinary. Right? However, there’s more to the story.
God Revealed It All Beforehand
200 years before all this, before Jacob or Joseph were born, God told Abram (Jacob’s grandfather) that it was going to happen.
God said to Abram, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years.”
Genesis 15:13 NASB
So to recap:
- God leads His people into Egypt.
- He lets them become slaves.
- He allows them to suffer.
- He leaves them there for 400 years.
Funny, I don’t remember my Sunday School teachers telling me all this.
But Why?
Why didn’t God keep them out of Egypt? Why didn’t He intervene when things got bad? Why did He wait so long before coming to the rescue? If these were people I cared about, and I possessed the power to keep them from harm, I would do it. So why didn’t God?
I have often heard it said, “God knew it was going to happen.” Does God know all (yes He does) and just sit back passively in that knowledge? Is He like some fortune teller who can tell the future, but is not actively involved in that future?
Or perhaps God just chose not to intervene. Maybe there is some Star Trek, Back to the Future, space-time continuum rules that can’t be broken. Perhaps interfering with future events would wreak havoc on our universe at a quantum level and have disastrous consequences. (Don’t laugh, we don’t know.)
OK, here’s the thing.
This wasn’t passive foreknowledge. This wasn’t an aloof lack of intervention, nor rules that couldn’t be broken. It was God’s plan and intention. Not only did God see it. He PLANNED it. The whole sordid episode. The move to Egypt, the slavery, the suffering, and the 400 years, were all part of the Purpose of God.
Do I agree? No! But, for some strange reason, God didn’t consult me. If He had I surely would have set Him straight. Do I understand? Again, No! We spend our lives trying to avoid the bad parts. We pray for God to keep us from such things. But here God is leading them INTO it. God is doing something I admit I don’t understand. I can’t see His overarching intent. But it was providence, plan, and purpose.
What Are Our Expectations Of God?
Most Christians, me included, expect God to bring us (only) good things. We want our lives neat and tidy. No bad days. All progress, all the time. Then when we do suffer loss or have setbacks, we wonder what went wrong. We question God. (Or we get all pseudo-spiritual and start blaming “the enemy”, and then heatedly rant about getting back what was stolen.) We think something is amiss when our experience fails to match our expectations.
But maybe it was God. The God above our understanding. The God whose plan is beyond our ability to see. Perhaps it is God destroying our expectation and speculation as a “lofty thing” raised up against the knowledge of who He is.
…destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God…
2 Corinthians 10:5 NASB
The God who created light and darkness. The God who causes well-being and disaster. The God who wants us to know Him. Truly know Him. The all-powerful, incomprehensible, infinite God.
I am the Lord, and there is no one else;
Isaiah 45:5a & 7 NASB
The One forming light and creating darkness, Causing well-being and creating disaster; I am the Lord who does all these things.
There is a point, not that I have reached it, where you understand it’s all God. Nothing in this universe, or any other, has any control over what happens to you. Nothing created can touch you, only the Creator.
for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
Philippians 2:13 NASB
I must admit that I am not a fan of this side of God. Honestly, it feels like I have had more than my fair share of the “downside.” I want to experience only the good things. I would like for God to conform to my finite understanding and be the God of my expectation. But God will only be who He is. The God who leads us out, and the God who takes us in.