From Bondage to Freedom

Today, we begin a new message series regarding Moses and the work that God did to bring freedom to the Israelites in Egypt. We can call it Freedom to God’s People

The book of Genesis ends with Joseph and his family living in Egypt. The book of Exodus begins by concluding the story of Joseph and showing us what happened to the descendants of Joseph’s father, Jacob, also known as Israel. (Exodus 1:1-14). What we see here is that 350 years have passed (Exodus 12:40) since the end of Genesis. During that time, the descendants of Jacob have become a multitude of people – approximately 2 million people! Now lest we think that 350 years isn’t a lot of time to go from one family to 2 million people, let’s see how long that really is…

350 years ago was the year 1656. At that point in time:

Bach and Mozart haven’t been born
Pilgrim’s Progress has not been written
Australia hasn’t been settled yet
The King James Bible has been around for less than 50 years
The Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock 30 years ago and…
American settlements have not moved past 50 miles from the shore of the Atlantic

So, going back to Exodus: at this point in time, the Israelites are being kept as slaves in Egypt. As we can see, life is not easy for the Israelite slaves. They are being kept in brutal conditions and the Egyptian Pharaoh is so concerned that the number of Israelites is a threat to him, that he orders the murder of every male that is born. He attempts this more than once (Ex 1:15-22), but God’s work will not be thwarted. When God has a plan, He ensures it is done to completion!

So He gives His hand of protection to one family and Moses is born and saved. (Ex 2:1-10) His mother places him in a basket, which happens to float down the river to where the Pharaoh’s daughter happens to be bathing and happens to finds the child in the basket and happens to decide to adopt him for herself. Coincidence? Of course not! God’s hand ensured that Moses was in the basket at the exact right time and that Pharaoh’s daughter was bathing with the right mindset. In this way, God allows Moses to become an Egyptian prince!

As Moses grows up, he learns the truth of who he is and knows that God has saved him for a great reason, to do His work of freeing the Israelite slaves. But after 40 years of waiting on God, Moses decides to take it upon himself to find the right time and way to bring deliverance. He kills an Egyptian who was beating on an Israelite slave and finds himself a fugitive from Pharaoh, hiding in the desert. At this time, things are not any better for the Israelites. They continue to suffer under the hand of Pharaoh. (Ex 2:23-25) And when Pharaoh dies forty years later, God begins the work that He has for Moses from the beginning.

The Israelites are crying out to God for Him to bring them out of their slavery and their prayers are heard. God speaks to Moses and tells him to return to Egypt and to be the deliverer for His people. (Ex 3-4). However, let’s not confuse things. God chose Moses to do His work. Moses did not bring the Israelites out of bondage – God did. Moses was the tool that God used, but Moses didn’t bring salvation, God did. (Ex 14:13, 15:13)

So what was this salvation, this deliverance, which God brought to the Israelites? First, he delivered them from the bondage of the Egyptians. He removed them from the bondage that had enslaved them for hundreds of years. Then, He led them safely to the land that He had promised them from the time of their ancestor Abraham. (Ex 13:21-22). Finally, He brought them into settlement in that Promised Land and began a new relationship with His people.

The wonderful thing about this chronicle of Moses and the Israelites is that it is a perfect example of what God has done for all people and what He is doing for us right now. We are also in bondage, we just don’t realize it. Anger, fear, guilt, hatred of authority, an attraction to violence, or to material goods, words, sex, drugs, even ideologies and thoughts are all things that can enslave us. But God has given us salvation from these things. He has given us a way out and that way is Jesus.

Sin can keep the heart captive. It keeps us in bondage as the Egyptians kept the Israelites in bondage. The good news is that, just as God set the captives free in Egypt, Jesus Christ can set the captive free today! The chains of bondage can be broken by faith in Christ and where there once was brokenness there can now be wholeness.

Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” They answered him, “We are Abraham’s descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?” Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:31-36).

When we sin, we are in bondage. But Jesus has given us his teaching that he is the way, the truth and the life and that no one comes to the Father except through the Son and he has told us that if we hold to his teaching, we will know the truth and that this truth sets us free! If Jesus sets us free, then we are truly free! Jesus is our way out of the sins that keep us in bondage. Even look at the 12 step programs. Step 1 says that you are powerless against the sin that holds you in bondage, whether that be drugs, alcohol, sex or any of the sins that enslave us. Step 2 says that you need to recognize that there is a higher power that can restore you – of course, that higher power is God. Step 3 says to turn their will and lives over to God. Millions have been helped by these 12 step programs. It’s no wonder since they teach the basics of freedom from bondage – you can’t do it yourself, only God can do it. Jesus tells us that he is that God who can free us from the bondage of sin.

Have you ever thought that life isn’t going the way you would like? That things aren’t working out for you? That everything seems to go against you? Well, if you do, you need to remember the situation that Moses grew up in. If you are trying to do things in your own power, you will end up in the desert until you learn your lesson that it is God’s will and not yours that needs to be done. If things aren’t going well for you, recognize that Moses was born into slavery, was born during the time that Satan was trying to destroy God’s work of redemption by killing every male child. The odds of Moses being born was slim, the odds of him being successful in trying to free the Israelites from bondage!

Review Deut 26:2-10

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Last modified: March 12, 2006