BibleProject - God Tests His Chosen Ones – Exodus E4

Episode Date: April 4, 2022

Nobody likes tests. But the test is a recurring pattern in the biblical story for how God relates to his chosen ones. So are humans just lab rats in a divine experiment, or is there something else going on? Join Tim and Jon as they talk about the theme of the test and the famous account of Israel crossing the Sea of Reeds, as we dive into the second movement of the Exodus scroll.View full show notes from this episode →Timestamps Part one (00:00-14:30)Part two (14:30-20:25)Part three (20:25-33:30)Part four (33:30-49:50)Part five (49:50-1:02:37)Referenced ResourcesDictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch (The IVP Bible Dictionary Series), T. Desmond Alexander and David W. BakerBernard F. BattoInterested in more? Check out Tim’s library here.You can experience the literary themes and movements we’re tracing on the podcast in the BibleProject app, available for Android and iOS.Show Music “Defender (Instrumental)” by TENTSReflection by SwørnShow produced by Cooper Peltz. Edited by Dan Gummel. Show notes by Lindsey Ponder. Powered and distributed by Simplecast.

Hey, this is Cooper at Bible Project. I produce the podcast in Classroom. We've been exploring a theme called the City, and it's a pretty big theme. So we decided to do two separate Q and R episodes about it. We're currently taking questions for the second Q and R and we'd love to hear from you. Just record your question by July 21st

and send it to us at infoatbiboproject.com. Let us know your name and where you're from, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds and please transcribe your question when you email it in, try to keep your question to about 20 seconds, and please transcribe your question when you email it. That's a huge help to our team. We're excited to hear from you. Here's the episode.

The idea of taking a test stirs anxiety in our hearts. Am I prepared? Am I going to pass or fail? I know the word test doesn't activate positive associations for a lot of people, but that is a word introduced in the biblical story for how God relates to his chosen ones. Adam and Eve are offered a test. Are you going to eat from the tree of life, God's own life, or are you going to eat from the tree of knowing good and bad, seizing that knowledge on your own terms? Adam and Eve's son, Cain, is offered a test.

When God doesn't favor his sacrifice. Is he going to give in to his jealousy and anger and murder his brother? Noah is given a test. Will you trust me and build an ark? Abraham is given a test. Will you follow me to a new land? The pattern is when God selects someone to bless them, point them as an image and a representative, and gives them opportunity and blessing and abundance and responsibility, the opportunity

becomes the test. And lurking in the shadows of any test is the slanderer, the evil one, the servant. And he's asking, can you really trust God? And so we find that God tests us and so does evil. The nature of the test depends on the purposes of one doing the testing. So the snake is also testing the human, trying to trap them, but for God's chance for the humans to prove their loyalty and their capability. Today on the podcast, we continue reading the Exodus scroll. Pharaoh has let Israel go, and they are on their way into freedom. We're going to trace a new theme, the theme of the

test. Because as they leave Egypt, they're now in the wilderness. And they're going to get tested. The people have no water, and so God tests them, test their trust to trust him, get some water. Then the people have no bread, so God tests to trust him by giving them mana. And then they have no water again. And then this time Israel tests God's patience by not trusting him, even though he's already provided for them. So this whole section is about, are people going to trust Yahweh when they're in the wilderness? I'm John Collins, and this is Bible Project Podcast.

Today, with Tim McEwey, we talk about Israel being tested in the wilderness. Thanks for joining us. Here we go. Yeah, that we are doing. That is the second scroll of the Torah in the Hebrew Bible that is the Christian Old Testament. Yes, we're going through all these scrolls, breaking them up into movements. A movement is kind of ignoring the traditional chapter verse structure that you're going to find in your Bible,

which is a very helpful structure. It's a helpful structure, as I always like to say. Especially when you need to reference something. Yeah. But it often hides some very native structuring that's happening through how the book is composed through its own rhythm and its own repeated words and ideas. There's actually a lot of really cool structure going on. Yep, yeah, that's right. So we've adopted a term from the world of music movements, taking from movements of a symphony. So biblical scrolls have been organized by the authors

into movements that is meaningful large sections that have a coherent unity. So the Exodus scroll, which we're in, has three main movements. First movement went from Exodus 1, verse 1, through chapter 13, verse 16, which might seem random, but it's not, because it goes from the Israelites' enslavement in Egypt, beginning, and all of their baby boys being thrown into the water. And then God confronts their enslavers, Pharaoh the king of Egypt, by raising up Moses.

And God says, hey, you're killing my first born son, is relight. And if you don't let my people go, you're gonna lose the life of your first born sons. And so that's how first movement ends is with the night of Passover, where God is going to send or allow the destroyer to come and take the lives of the first born throughout Egypt. But he provides a means of escape for anybody who will take the offer.

And that is taking a sacrificial lamb, bring the blood on the door of the house, and then the narrative really slows down to a crawl and gives you instructions for future generations to repeat this Passover. Yep. Through a seven-day celebration called Passover in the Feast of Unleavened Bread. So that's movement one. It's about liberation. That's right. And we just talked about that movement through multiple conversations.

And we are now pivoting and moving into the second main movement. Movement two of us. Of the book. And just as an overview, this is the section where Israel is in the wilderness. It goes from chapter 13, verse 17 through the end of chapter 24. They go from Egypt to Mount Sinai. And to get there, they go through the wilderness. They go through the waters and then through the wilderness.

Yes, that's right, exactly. And what theme are we gonna be tracing? Yeah, here we are going to be tracing. That's me padding. That's a drum roll. Drum roll on the table. We are gonna be focusing on the theme of the test. The test, because they're gonna be tested quite often

in this movement. Yeah, the language and vocabulary of testing, God bringing Israel into circumstances that will test their loyalty, test their trust, testing languages all over the second movement. So we've made it our focus theme, the test. They're going to be tested because they're thirsty and they're hungry. And then this also leads into Mount Sinai and the giving of the law. Yeah, God is gonna show up in cloud and fire

on Mount Sinai and Moses will say that this is a test for Israel about whether they are going to draw close to their God or stay far away at a distance. And that's the drama that we will be exploring in this movement. But the whole thing is about God's, God has saved his people. But now that he's saved them, he's going to invite them to become his representatives to the nation. And to do that, he wants to become closer partners, which means finding out if they're really going to be loyal to him.

And that loyalty is put to the test. And why does God test humans at all? I know it. I mean, come on. We're like, we're going to fragile. Like, give us a break. Totally. Well, yes. And yes, what we see is that God is fully aware of that. Fully aware of that. So yeah, that's what we're gonna explore. We made a video about the theme of the test, because it doesn't begin here in the

Torah, it actually begins with the Garden of Eden. Yeah, give me the two minute overview. So when I think of the word test, I just think of how poorly I stood in school for basically all the way through high school. I just was a poor student in general until college. Were you really? Is it because you didn't care? I could have cared less.

Me too. I was so bored. I didn't care. I was like, if I could get a B without doing any homework, I have won at life. That was my strength. There you go. That's great.

I was happy with C's. Yeah, anyhow, so I know the word test doesn't activate positive associations for a lot of people. I get that. But that is, it is a word introduced in the biblical story for how God relates to His chosen ones. And that's important. It's not just that God just enjoys testing everybody. The pattern is when God selects someone to bless them, to point them as being, point them

as an image, and a representative, and gives them opportunity and blessing and abundance and responsibility, then all of those opportunities confront. An opportunity becomes a test. The opportunity becomes a test. The opportunity becomes the test. The abundant trees of the garden, and all that they offer out of Manif become the test of whether they'll trust God to give them wisdom or whether they want to take wisdom to rule by doing what's good in the real nice. And so here God has already delivered these people from the oppressor,

and He's de-created Egypt through the Ten Plagues. God has already delivered these people from the oppressor. And He's de-created Egypt through the Ten Plagues. He's undone the structures of the cosmos from Genesis 1. He's removed right, light, and dark. Yeah, he's moving heaven and earth to free his people. That's right. So that same people group who just experienced all that comes out into the wilderness the wild and the wasteland And they're gonna have to make a dangerous journey from Egypt to Mount Sinai

So it's interesting God doesn't test them and then see if they're worthy of being rescued No, the rescue comes before the rescue comes first. That's right. Yeah, he just rescues them because that's what he said What promised to Abraham Isaac and Jacob? So that was a theme back in when the Exodus story begins God heard their just rescues them because that's what he said. So he promised to Abraham Isaac and Jacob. So that was a theme. Back in when the Exodus story begins, God heard their suffering. He heard their cry and he remembered his promised Abraham Isaac and Jacob. And then he raised up Moses.

So yeah, it's to a saved people, a delivered people that God now is going to ask them to trust him and surrender their own ways of creating security for themselves and going to ask for a radical surrender. That's one of the main themes in this section. And so sometimes the test comes from their enemies. Pharaoh is going to chase after him, and they're going to have to trust God. Sometimes it's a lack of resources, water and food. Other times, it's the people's leader, Moses, that's going to have to trust the wisdom that God gives him through his father-in-law about how to lead this unruly people well with wisdom.

So in each case, yeah, so it's not like a vindictive, like, oh, let me set up this obstacle and see if they fall. That's a thing. Man, my kids have, where a year and a half into having a hamster that has been the greatest gift to our family. It was a COVID pet. We got a COVID pet.

We didn't go to the dog. We didn't get a cat or a rabbit. We got a hamster. And man, Opal, this hamster has become the most beloved creature to my sons. But what they do, they have this toy called magnetiles. Yeah, I got those. They're building blocks, and so they build mases and castles. They're purple.

They build castle mases for Opal. And sometimes they'll deliberately put a test, like put a obstacle in the way. And actually, well, I don't know. So it's actually not vindictive. They know that Opal's amazing and she could figure it out. Figure it out. So I guess in that sense, it's they want to show, they want to demonstrate what they know Opal's capable of.

But it does pose a challenge to Opal. So in the video on the test, that's how we framed it. That the nature of the test depends on the purposes of the one doing the testing. So the snake is also testing the humans, but he's trying to trap them. The test is a trap, but for God, it's the chance for the humans to prove their loyalty and their capabilities. And that's what my kids are doing. It's an opportunity. It's an opportunity, and that's how the test is presented here. It's an opportunity to demonstrate their reliance

on God's generosity, even another time and another time. And that's the nature of the test here. But it does pose a challenge to the people. And that's what makes the test the test. All right. You know, I guess I've gotten used to this idea because I've sat with it in the Bible for a while now. But I know that this idea that God would introduce or allow challenges into his people's lives to develop their character and test them. Yeah. This is not a comfortable idea. No, I mean, life is already hard as it is.

You know, we don't need an extra like, bend in the hamster maze. Like the maze is already a little too difficult. Well, but maybe that's the point, is that it's not about like, God introducing extra bends in the hamster maze. It's like, life is the test. Yeah.

Like, it's not like something extra. But, narratively, oftentimes it feels like an extra thing. What God could have just been like, here's the water. Okay. Here. Let me give you some water. It said it's like, hey. Yeah. All right.

So actually, this is our mission. Let's build up a portrait of the test from these narratives. And then let's let the narratives show us the nature of God's test. But I think that's a good way to frame it. Is this about God like, you know, like throwing down some like banana peels on the sidewalk?

And the sidewalks are already cracked and uneven. And it's like, it's like the least dangerous thing you could actually do is a banana peel. It's bright yellow. I don't know why I thought of that. I know, it's the classic. It's so funny.

Where did that begin? I have no idea. They're not actually very slippery. They're not even that slippery. So, but is it like that? Or is it just the sidewalk is uneven and rough? And that's the challenge. And that's the test.

All right, I think that's the question here. So let's read these stories and let's see which one is more like the banana peel or the uneven sidewall. What a particular illustration, but it works. Yeah, I get it. Because the idea across. Okay. So let's dive in. This section of Exodus goes from Exodus 13 to 17 through the end of chapter 18. And it itself has three parts, lo and behold. And so this first part here is the second half of chapter 13 through the end of chapter 15, basically, so 13, 14 and 15. So the story of the deliverance through the waters of the Reed Sea. Here we go. So in Exodus 13, verse 17, the people leave Egypt.

The thing that when Moses confronted Pharaoh and what he said is, you know, you always God of the Hebrew sent me to you. Let my people go. That phrase let them go. It's the Hebrew verb, Shalach, which means send away. Send away my people. So, this repeated all throughout the story.

Almost all the 10 plagues begin. Shalach, is that like a shlacking? Is that part of, no. I don't think so. You get shalaked. Does that mean you got hit up? Or hit? Yeah. No. I don't think so. You get shellac. Does that mean you got hit up or hit? Yeah. Okay.

No, it's just send away. The first time as you said the Bible is about Adam and Eve being sent away from Eden. Oh. In their exile. Oh, their shellac. Yep, it's exile. Vocabulary word. So, X 1317.

And it came about, when Pharaoh sent away the people, Elohim did not lead them by the road of the land of the Philistines because it was close by, because God said, oh man, these people are going to change their minds if they see war and they're going to turn and go back to Egypt. So Elohim took the people by the way of the wilderness of the sea of

reeds by 50s. The sons of Israel went up out of the land of Egypt. Now this is a good example. I'll just highlight it here. This is a good example of the patterning for how biblical authors organize literary movements. Everything that I just read is in exactly the same words, the things that Pharaoh was afraid would happen if he let the people be fruitful and multiply. At the beginning of the first paragraph of Exodus story. So in chapter one what Pharaoh says is, look, the people, the sons of Israel, are great and more might eat than me. So come, let's deal wisely with them so that they don't be fruitful and multiply.

Because what if war happens? They will add themselves to our enemies and they will make war against us and go up out of the land. So he says, I've got an idea. Let's enslave them. And then what happens is Yahweh makes war on them and they are fruitful and multiply and they go up out of the land. And that's exactly exactly what Pharaoh feared. He brings upon his own self by enslaping the people. So the same words are repeated right at the beginning and then here they are at the beginning of the next movement of the story. Does that make sense? And that repetition kind of announces to you,

the reader, we're kind of starting again. Next movement. Yep. That's right. The narrative is kind of rebooting now. That's right. So it's a shift of geographical location. They were in Egypt. Now they're leaving Egypt. Pharaoh was afraid that there would be war, and that they would go up out of the land, and there was in fact a war, and they are in fact going up out of the land, but now against as well. So here's another little structure here that creates a marker of the literary boundary. Verse 19, and Moses took the bones of Joseph. Because he made the sons of Israel swear in oath, saying, Elohim will surely come and visit you.

So you make my bones go up out of there along with you. It's a random little note. You like the bones of Joseph? Right. What is this? This is like a little arrow shooting back to the literally the very last paragraph of the Genesis scroll. So it's like a hyperlink. So once again in this paragraph, we're shooting over the whole Exodus 10-Plegue story and we just linked back to the first sentences of the Exodus story. And now with the bones of Joseph, we've linked back to the last sentences of the Genesis scroll.

So this little paragraph is like hopping over the Exodus story and linking back to the story that came before it to mark the literary boundary. And because both of those hyperlinks happen to be markers themselves of the end or the beginning of movement. That's right. So in Joseph's case, that was the very end of the exosgrove, the last movement where Joseph says, do my bones out of here when are you leave? Yeah. And so it's activating the ending of Genesis

and it's activating the beginning of the exosgrove. Exosgrove, yep. and both of those things collide right here in this little paragraph So those are the types of clues clues that the biblical authors give they'll often I think of it as like firing a harpoon with a rope attached Okay, I don't know why but it's sort of like you just read a big section and then you'll come across a paragraph It'll start repeating all this, but it's sort of like, you just read a big section, and then you'll come across a paragraph that'll start repeating all this vocabulary, and it's like, pooh! Just think of a big harpoon with a rope, and then it just launched from right here, XS13, and it anchored back in Exodus 1. The next one anchored back in the end of the Genesis scroll, and now it's pulling the

scrolls together into a unified storyline and marking that we're at a- A juncture. Oh, okay. Into a unified storyline. Oh, okay. And marking that we're at a- A juncture. Yeah, we're at a juncture. I just like putting the stuff that out. So that was maybe too much time spent on these little details. But these are the techniques the biblical authors use

to kind of link bigger chunks of the scrolls together. Repetition like this. So notice that this whole thing was Yahweh was leading people out of Egypt. There's multiple ways they could go up to the land, promised to their forefathers. One way was to go kind of north up and then until they hit the Mediterranean Sea and then just to take the coastal road. That's what is referred to here as the road of the Philistines. Okay. Because the Philistines inhabited the coastline.

That'd be right through the Gaza Strip, right there, right? Yep. As you go down the Mediterranean, basically, if you get a like a Google map out, you'll see the Nile Delta, which is a big Delta Marci region that goes right up at the northern coast of Egypt on the Mediterranean. And then as you follow that... And that goes into the Red Sea, the Naudata. Goes into the Mediterranean Sea.

Oh, it does. Flows into the Mediterranean Sea. Oh, yep. And then you just follow that coastline up. You start going east in the north and it curves. So it's all Marci right there. Yeah, or River Delta's. Yeah, Marci and...

Delta. So the Nile River starts to splinter out into like a zillion little smaller streams. It's this huge area, so lush and green, so they irrigated it and made it big farming. Huge. Oh, yes farming. Okay, this is where Kairo is. Yep, that's right. Basically, it kind of begins where the Nile goes through Kairo after Cairo, it splits out into a zillion little streams. Yeah. So they go

east of that and what God is saying here is, hey, I could lead them up to the coast and then we'll just take the coastline up. That was a normal way that people went between Israel and Egypt. But if you do that, you're going to go right through the cities of the Philistines. And so he always says, hey, listen, like I know these people are, well, he knows, and then they're about to demonstrate it. They're fearful people, and I don't want to get them entangled in war. So what we're gonna do is we're gonna go just do east, out into the Sinai Peninsula wilderness. And this would be on the map the Gulf of Suez, right? Like I mean, geographically, to get to the Sinai Peninsula, you've got that red sea.

Yep, that's right. And then you've got that, you got that jet of water. Yeah, you got it. Yeah, that's right. Where that boat got stuck recently. Yeah. It screwed up the whole world economy. Yeah, totally.

At the end of 2021. Yeah. Totally. That's right. So, and actually, I'll just flag it here. Big rabbit hole that I have read around and know that you can go deep here into the route of the Exodus, the location of the sea and the waters that people cross. These are hugely debated because they're so little information

given in the biblical story, which to me is always a clue that the biblical authors want to anchor this narrative in the actual historical memory of the people, but one of the main goals isn't to give us, as I say, security camera footage, because they give so few details. What they want to do is help us understand the meaning of it through narrative patterning and literary artistry, and that's what the section is full of. But the only way to get to the Sinai Peninsula is through some section of what is now the Suez Canal.

Yeah, that's right. But the Suez Canal didn't exist as such, and so the question is, what section did they cross? Right. But it was a marshy river land with lots of big bodies of water standing around. So what God does is He leads them not by the coastal route, but by what's called the wilderness of the Yam Suf, which means the sea of, and the word Suf is reads, sea of reads. In many, here, let's check this out.

This is interesting. Back at the beginning of the English translation tradition around the 14, 1500s, this phrase, Yom Sooth, see of read, started getting translated the red sea. And it's stuck for a long time. And you can still find it in translations today. So in the New American Standard, it translates Yom Sooth Red C with a little footnote

saying literally C of reads. I don't know why they don't do the other way around. Right, and that does this to make an A and S B move. No, that's not typical for New American Standard. The ESV. They got it right, I bet. So ESV translated as the red C with no footnote. What? No footnote? Come on. Yes.

And I was the red C with a footnote or the C of reads. Which ones that? That's the NIV. Now, why do they say or the C of reads? Suft does not mean red. It's the most common Hebrew word for like the reads that grow in marshes of the desert. The King James is red sea and our recipe is red sea. Do you want to go down this rabbit hole or not? What's the, what was that first English translation? Was that at Tindale? Yeah, what he do.

Usually that's the way this goes is that the King James translators of 1611 Followed the lead of tindale who produced the first in most widespread English translation So is that where it started here the tindale? I'm gonna look it up because you can look up the tindale Bible online at Bible study tools calm Ooh, fascinating. Therefore, God led the about thorough, whoa, this is English from 500 plus years ago. It's hard to read.

Therefore, God led the about thorough the wilderness that bordered on the red with two D's. Why are you reading it like you're a robot? Red C. Did I, oh, that was like a robot? The children of Israel went harnessed out of the lod of Egypt. So it was Red C. Satindale translated Red C, red with a double D.

And is this because there is a C there called the Red C and everyone's like, ah, must be red? That's a great question. Yeah, you know, when it comes to these like geographic stuff, I, this is where I turned it my Bible dictionaries. Do you wanna look it up? I kinda do. I mean, I feel like why is everyone so attached to this translation?

It's the phrase the Red C when it, the phrase is Yom Suf and Suf is standard word for marsh read. I mean, I get it read is close to red, but only in English. Not in Hebrew, right? Yeah, no, that's not it. That's I can't be it. All right, we're doing it. We're going to we're doing it. All right, going to IVP's dictionary, the Pentateuch, just outstanding collection of Bible dictionaries, going to R, we're going to Red Sea. See the Exodus route and Israel's wilderness, itinerary, Red Sea.

The precise location of the body of water that Israelites crossed when leaving Egypt is not known. Various positions have been argued at present no conclusion claims universal support. The present day red-see is a large body of water that makes up the northwest arm of the Indian Ocean. This however has no bearing on the location of visitors crossing because Israel's wilderness wanderings were in the Sinai Peninsula. Interesting. A variety of bodies of water in the Hebrew Bible are given the same name, Yam Suf, so you've read. The Yam Suf can refer to the Gulf of Akhaba by Elat,

the body of water east of the Sinai Peninsula. According to numbers 33, the Yam Suf. That's like the that's the Gulf on the other side of the Sunnites. It's a lot. Yeah, interesting. According to numbers 33, the Yamsooth is the body of water reached later in Israel's wanderings after leaving a limb in the wilderness, hence the Gulf of Suez, west of the Sunnites peninsula is meant. Finally, the sea of the Exodus is referred to as Yamsuf in the actual narrative and a

number of other passages. These passages don't specify whether the Gulf of Suez, the Gulf of Akoba, or some other body of water is meant. In any event, the phrase Yamsuf seems to refer to more than one body of water, throughout the Torah. Okay. Wow. It's a to more than one body of water throughout the Torah. Okay, wow. It's a way to just say body of water. Yeah, and then they provide a big long table with the list of all the occurrences and the wilderness

wanderings and so on. So a better translation than Red Sea is body of water. Actually, there's the Hebrew Bible scholar Bernard Bato that actually thinks there's a double meaning here, word play, because the word soothe is also a way spelled with the same letters as the Hebrew word, the end, or the cutoff place. And so the C of the end, because it's where Pharaoh meets his end. So he thinks it's also a title used to describe what's going to happen there to Pharaoh. That kind of stuff happens everywhere,

symbolic place names that determine why something is called by a certain name and a story. So that also makes sense here. But the fact that it's also a generic way to refer to a body of water speaks to what you said before, which was there is a lack of specificity here that you think is on purpose. Yeah, totally. Yeah, the fact that Yom Suf can refer and is used to refer to the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Akaba and the body of water further down from both of those means that geographical precision is not the highest priority. Which makes you ask, what's the other, well, what would be another priority? And I think that's what Bernard Bata was on to.

Which is, which is, that it's the plan words, communicating the meaning of this place. This is the place, it's as if they're going back into the wilderness, to the wild and waste of Genesis 1, verse 2, the watery wilderness. Where you, you're depending on whether you trust Yahweh or not, you either find life where you meet your end, which is what Suf can mean. This end, yeah. Regardless though, if they're gonna get to the Sinai Peninsula,

they're crossing what we call the Gulf of Sués. That's right, again, the Sués, that canal was dug out in modern era. Well, not the canal. They'll have to pass through that land, and there's lots of bodies of water in that land. I see that land where the Gulf of Sweden stops where the canal begins, which didn't exist back then. There's all sorts of little bodies of water there. I see. So it could have

been in any of those junctures. Yeah. It certainly was somewhere in there because they end up in the Sun eye peninsula and they left Egypt. And it's given a couple other names in the next narrative where they camp at the edge of the waters. Yeah. Okay, so let's go back to the bigger point. This whole section begins with Yahweh saying, I'm gonna leave my people out, but man, I know that they are,

the moment they see danger or war, they're gonna freak. So I'm gonna take them this other way that's not direct through the wilderness, it's by the sea of the end. And it's like Yahweh is aware that his relationship to them is tenuous. And this we're kind of selling the seeds of the test of Yahweh is going to take his people through this land, and that will pose a great test of trust. And Yahweh is aware. He says that the people may not trust me, they might freak out. And so what happens at the end of this whole paragraph

that begins this middle section in chapter 13 verse 21 is, and Yahweh went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to guide them on the way. And by night in a pillar of fire to light up their way, going day and night. The pillar of cloud did not go away by day, nor were the pillar of fire they were before the people. It's this image of Yahweh's tenderness. He knows this people, easily freaked, And so what Moses experienced in the burning bush now becomes a permanent guiding presence of fire and cloud, guiding them through the wilderness, going in front of them. This is a famous image, I think, of fire. This is the first time it appears. Yeah.

And it sticks with the story for a while. Yeah. It's going to lead them to Mount Sinai, then it's going to move up onto the top of Mount Sinai, then it's going to move up onto the top of Mount Sinai. Then once they build the Tabernacle, this Divine Presence Storm is going to move down and hover over the Tabernacle. And then continue guiding them through the wilderness on the other side of Sinai. Yep. So that's the opening paragraph, and it sets the scene for the tests that are about to follow. So, Exodus 14 begins saying Yahweh spoke to Moses saying, hey, let's keep moving through

the wilderness. Let the sons of Israel turn around and let them go camp at this place called Pee-Hachirot between Migdall and between the sea, you know, in front of this place called Ball-Saphon, and so they camped by the waters. It's cool stuff happening there, but we just need to move forward. If you were a movie director, it would just be a hard cut, and we'd go to Pharaoh's doing in his throne room. Yeah. It's like everything is ruined around him. Looking as wounds. And we hear of Pharaoh, Pharaoh said about the sons of Israel. They're lost out there. Yeah, the wilderness has closed them in.

And then we go back to Yahweh speaking to Moses. He says to Moses, so if that's what Pharaoh's saying in the throne room back in Egypt, you need to understand that I'm going to harden Pharaoh's heart one last time. And he's going to chase after you. And I will gain honor by means of Pharaoh and his army so that all Egypt will know that I am Yahweh. That's the main theme we followed. So that's the scene.

Yahweh says to Moses, go camp here. This is what Pharaoh is saying to himself back in his throne room. And I'm going to do something with Pharaoh not done here. Contest with Pharaoh is not done. The 10th plague was not the knockout punch. No, it's not. And it's because Pharaoh's there still with a hard, a hard heart. So, verse 5, so it was reported to the king of Egypt that the people had fled, and his heart was changed inside of him. Pharaoh's heart literally turned over. This is the same word of what John S. says will happen to Nineveh. 40 days and Nineveh will be turned upside down, which is so funny, because what he meant by that was, you know, like roasted.

And what actually happened was the people turn inside out. The bad guys become repentant. So they are turned upside down, just not the way Jonah thought. And so here it's the opposite. Pharaoh goes from maybe being a little humble after the Ten Plakes to like, he's back. It's hard hard again. So Pharaoh and his servants say to each other, what is this that we have done? We have sent away the people from being our slaves.

So Pharaoh bound up his chariots. He took his people with him. Six hundred chariots. Choice, man. Chariot writers, the captains, all of them. These are ancient tanks. Yeah, dude. Ancient tanks. He's bringing out the tanks. Yeah, dude, especially against the people like yeah, little no weapons on foot. Yeah, a chariot will just And a moan down. You see a couple of chariots didn't move them down. Totally. Yeah. Yeah, much less. Yeah, 600 So he chases after them and he finds them camped by the sea. That's the scene. It's a famous scene And so here's the first test, here it is, of Israel. This is down to verse 10.

When Pharaoh drew near, the sons of Israel lifted their eyes and look, Egypt coming after them and they were greatly afraid. And they cried out to Yahweh and they said to Moses, is it because there weren't any graves in Egypt that you took us out to the wilderness to die? What have you done to us? It's a snarky.

To bring us out of Egypt. Super snarky. I was on purpose. Yeah, totally. This is caricature trying to get it truth here. Yeah. Isn't this what we said to you when we were back in Egypt saying, man, Mao Zed's just leave us alone.

Let us be slaves to Egypt. You know, it's better for us to be slaves to Egypt than to die in the wilderness. I mean, that is true. If you think about it. Yeah, no, you can sympathize with the characters. There's 600 tanks coming at them. Yeah, man. And they're like, can sympathize with the character 600 tanks coming at him Yeah, man, and they're like we could have been just like totally

Make it bricks in Egypt man. That's a great point. Yeah, this is exactly how I would respond Like without a doubt. Yeah, that would be the first thought that crossed my mind like why did I leave? What were we thinking? Well, were we thinking we went along with this? So Moses said to the people, don't be afraid. Here's what you need to do. Stand here and do nothing. Stand right here and watch the salvation of Yale

that he will accomplish today. So there's one appearance of the word salvation and Genesis. That is cool, but we don't have time to talk about. But this is the first time the word appears in a narrative about a people being saved. And this narrative becomes the dictionary definition of salvation. Yeah, or rescue. Yeah, Yeshua is Jesus' name. Yeshua. Oh, really? Stand right here and see the Yeshua of Yahweh. Hmm.

Yeah. Because the people that you see here today, you will no longer see them anymore. Yahweh will make war on your behalf. And you just stand here and be silent. Man. So that's the first test. This is the first test. Oh gosh. This is so g be silent. Man. So that's the first test. This is the first test.

Oh gosh. This is so gnarly. Yeah. Pharaoh's army, 600 chariots. Yeah, just try and put yourself in. Come and at ya. Body of water behind you. You're pinned in.

Yeah. And you're like, we're gonna die. And Moses says, just stand here. Damn, I don't know. And be ready for God to save you. Yeah. I guess there's nothing else to do. Yeah, it's hard not to let the familiarity of the story low less into missing its power.

I mean, this is an iconic moment in the biblical story. It's life and death, but the way of life looks like the way of death. It looks actually like your choices are death and death. You know, I've got this body of water here. We can't go there. Water is death, but then you've got tanks coming your way, and that's totally death. So what are your choices? Death or death?

Well, your choice is to stand there and die. Yeah, stand there and die. But Moses is saying, stand there and have hope. Yeah, stand there and die. But Moses is saying, stand there and have hope. Yeah, stand there and trust the... Trust. What you think is death is actually your salvation. Yeah. Yes, a powerful man.

So Yahweh says to Moses, why are you crying out to me? Tell the sons of Israel that they should get ready to leave and go where? And here we go. You like this passage, I know. You, Moses, lift up your rod and extend your arm over the waters and split them. So that the sons of Israel will go in the middle of the sea on dry land. What's cool is this is the vocabulary of the creation story, Genesis 1, and of the flood story. Splitting the waters. Yeah, this word split last appeared when the flood, the land splits open, and the waters below, the chaos waters below the land. The guys are, guys are, guys are ring up, surging up. And it's the language of Genesis 1, where the waters recede to expose the dry land that emerges up out of the waters. So it's a good

example where the crossing of the sea story is the blending of the creation story. Where God takes the waters, separates them, so dry land will emerge. Yep. Where humans can live. Yep. And it's also blending the imagery of the flood story, which is this great splitting that will happen in here to part the waters in a flood story, it's to bring the flood waters to overwhelm the land. So what that clues us in is that this is going to be a de-creation and creation story.

The creation story was dry land out of the waters. And that's what we see. We see dry land there. The flood story was the dry land is overwhelmed by the waters again, until God send us wind to create dry land for His chosen ones. And all of that is gonna be activated right here. Because in this case, you have two groups of people

in the waters, and they experience different fates. So what happens is the cloud, the pillars, and it's his night time. So the pillar of fire sets out in front of the people and goes and this long paragraph where the pillar of cloud sets out and it actually sets up right in between Pharaoh and the people. It becomes a wall separating them. And so it's this long paragraph about how the pillar and the cloud and the fire became a wall in between them and in verse 20 it says they didn't draw near to each other neither on this side or on this side So it's interesting image where we're used to thinking about the waters as the wall. Mm-hmm But the first wall is the fire wall. Yahweh himself the fire wall

I think let's just add in one of the Exodus movies. It's cool image. But the idea of on one side and on the other side, that's a key visual image being set up here. Then after God separates the two between one and the other, then there's, Yahweh sent over the sea a powerful east wind. Yeah, all night long. And he turned the sea into dry land and the water split. This was a long splitting. Took all night. Yeah, it's a good point. I guess in my imagination, it's often just like, there's, there goes. Yeah, it's interesting. It was slow. Yeah, we're told the people, it's actually, the people start going at nighttime and at the sunrise is when they start to get through

and the Egyptians chase after them. So this is echoing Genesis 1, the spirit wind of the year. Spirit of God over the waters. It's also echoing the flood story, the pivot of the flood story, when God sends a wind to cause the waters to recede. So it's both of those happening at once right here. The waters to expose the dry land, and the sons of Israel went in the middle of the

waters on the dry land, and the waters were like a wall on their right and on their left. So just like the presence of God was a wall with Egypt on one side, this real on the other. Now the waters are this wall creating this tunnel and they're in this narrow place that is the way of salvation. All these biblical images colliding here. How do you know it's narrow?

Oh, well, I guess because it's just painting this picture of, you're in this dry land that's like a passageway. Passageway with one side and on the other side. So I guess I don't know how narrow it is, but it's painting this picture that like, you can't go this way. Right. You can't go that way. There's only one way you can go.

Into death. Through death. Through death. I mean, it did. into what most certainly must have felt like death. Yeah, I'd be intimidating Yeah, man our artists have done some great Depictions of the scene over the years in our videos. Yeah, it's very cinematic There's one where there's they to pick lightning happening and then the waters are lit up, the wall, and you can see fish like you're in aquarium. Yeah. That's my favorite one. So then think of the creation imagery here. Remember God sent the wind over the waters in Genesis 1, His Spirit, and then the first thing God

did was speak, let there be light. And so here in verse 24, at the morning watch that is at sunrise, Yahweh looked down on the camp of Egypt With the pillar of fire. We're still stuck behind the fire wall. Yeah, well, sorry I skipped over the part that Egypt sees the people going into the sea. Okay firewalls going Egypt chases after them Okay, yep, so now you've got everybody's in the tunnel. Okay. Yeah. And at the sunrise at the morning watch, Yahweh looked down on the camps of Egypt and with the pillar of fire and cloud, he confused the camp of Egypt. So we're not actually told, but we're told it's just the wheels of the chair yet started to like wiggle and come off and It made the driving very difficult and Egypt said, ah, let's flee Yaw is fighting this battle on their behalf and

Yaw said to Moses a muddy river bottom would do that. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, but we're told it was dry because of the the east wind Hmm, that's true. So it's not it's dry. It's not muddy. Yeah, but we're told it was dry because of the East wind Hmm, so it's dry. It's not muddy. Yeah, the word Confused is spelled with the same letters as the basic root word of Hebrew word to home which means chaos the chaos waters and that's for sure a like a word play happening here He's doing a chaos. Yeah, confusion is pretty chaotic. He's de-creating them, disordering their camp, their army. So, what he tells Moses is the thing you did with your hand, to split the waters, now do that again over the waters. And it's actually really, this part is pretty brief. What we're told is that the arrival of the morning as Egypt was fleeing, verse 28, the waters returned and they covered

over the chariots and the horsemen and the whole army of Egypt. And there was not one of them as a remnant. This is the vocabulary used to describe Noah and the people and animals in the boat. They were the remnant remaining. And so this gets inverted where Israel's enemies are the anti-reminant. And so the sons of Israel went through on dry land. And the sons of Israel

saw the Zalasens, for 31, the great hand of Yahweh, what he did to Egypt. And they feared Yahweh, and they trusted Yahweh. And in Moses the servant. So they passed the test. They went through the waters, they freaked out, they had a freak out, she wouldn't, then they go through the test, they die as a were. So going through the waters instead of just staying there paralyzed, that was the test. Staying there would have been failing the test. Failing the test to stand there. I mean, they were told to stand there and wait for the deliverance of Yahweh. Yeah. I guess maybe failing the test would have been going to

surrender to Egypt and saying, take us back. We'll be your slave. There's a pull of fire there. That's a hard move. It's true. Maybe they could go around it. I don't know. I mean, clearly the narrative isn't trying to... I feel like the test of stand there is not much of a test, because what else are they going to do? Yeah, that's a good point. Right? I think it's a good set, but that's not the point.

The point is like change your perspective. Yeah, that's a good, thank you. That's a better way to put it. You think you're about to die. You're about to see God's salvation. I'm telling you, God's salvation. You're about to live. But you're going to see God salvation. You're about to live. And you're gonna go through what?

The actual test is, are you gonna go through the chaotic tunnel? Yeah, the chaos tunnel? Yeah, totally. Or nothing. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Yep, that's right. So that's the iconic scene.

Sometimes life is like a chaos tunnel. Sometimes the chaos tunnel. So what follows is another retelling of the same story, but in the form of a poem, Exist 15, the song of the sea. And actually there's a long form of it that Moses leads the people in singing. Then there's a short form of it, which Moses's sister Miriam leads the people in singing. Then there's a short form of it, which most sister Miriam leads the people in singing. That's down in verse 21. Dude, this poem so rad. But what's cool is how the poem begins.

Yahweh is my strength and my power. He is for me salvation, Yeshua. Yahweh, verse three, is a man of war. Yahweh is his name. So Pharaoh thought he was the mighty warrior, but it's actually Yahweh. Verse 5, the deep water, this is the word to home. The abyss waters covered over them. They sank down into the deeps like a stone.

Your right hand, Yahweh, you're right hand, it shattered the enemy. Ah, so who was the snake crusher in this story? God. In terms of, yeah, that's interesting. Or, but Moses. Moses, that stretched his hand. Yeah, Moses, that stretched his hand.

Remember, and in one of the signs that Moses was given, he held out his hand with that staff, and that staff became a snake. Yeah. The Moses was to grab he held out his hand with that staff and that staff became a snake. Yeah. That Moses was to grab and take power over. And then he used that same staff to part the waters. And then we're told it was always, this is always hand crushing the head of the enemy. He's controlling the snake.

Yeah. Yeah, the snake is under,, you always control here by the ruach of your nostrils the waters congealed They stood up in heaps Equigulated who is like you Yahweh among the aileem just that Various one of Elohim. Yeah among the spiritual beings. How do you spell that? What's that in English aileem? Oh? EL I am that you translate alien. Oh, EL, I am. That's how you translate it.

Alien. It's actually the word Elohim, but minus the, the hay or the H sound. Yeah. So, um, you have led your people whom you redeemed. You've led them forward in your loyal love. That word leading forward links us back to

the paragraph we begin with. Yahweh led his people out and said, oh, I'm not gonna lead them by the coastal route because they'll be a war. So I'll lead them through the wilderness. I'll fight the war for them. And I'll fight the war for them. Yeah.

So you have led this key line here, X this 15, 13. You've led your people whom you redeemed. Ooh, this is the second time the word redeem is used. Got all means to purchase a slave's freedom to buy them on the slave market and then set them free. So you have led forth the people that you purchased their freedom and you did that by your loyal love. You've led them in strength to your holy dwelling. Well, we're going to a holy dwelling, I guess. Yeah. We start talking about all of the Canaanites who are going to hear what just happened

and they're going to freak out when these people arrive at their doorstep. Yeah. Philistines, the Edomites, the Moabs, the canaanites. These are all ancestors and relatives of Israel. They are going to be silent like a stone. So Pharaoh sank like a stone. Yeah. Yeah. And the canaanites are going to be silent like a stone. When your people pass over, the people that you purchased. Is that the same word we've deemed? Different. Different, but it's to buy them. Okay. For seven diskey, you will bring them and you will plant them on the mountain of your

inheritance, the location of your dwelling. This Eden. Eden. Yeah. Being planted. Got's going to plant a garden mountain. On a mountain at a place where he dwells. And the word dwelling there is spelled with the same letters as the word Shabbat.

Sabbath. The holy place Yahweh that your hands have prepared. Yahweh is king forever and ever. Well, that's interesting. I'm reading ESV as we go. Oh, yeah. It says Yahweh will reign. But we talk about this.

Mm-hmm. King is a verb. King could be a verb, which means to reign. That's right. The noun, Hebrew noun for King is Melek. The Hebrew verb to rule as a king is Malak. Yahweh will reign as King forever and ever. And Hebrew is it a noun or verb? It's a verb. Right here. Yep. Okay. Yep. You will reign. Do you will reign?

Yep. So you have Yahweh and His people. He reigns over them. They are the people He purchased. He plants them on a mountain garden where He lives with them forever and ever in a holy place. Amen. So what's interesting is that's the preview of what's about to happen.

Right. Yeah. Some foreshadowing. Yeah. All the way forward to out of the Torah and into the book of Joshua. And so as the reader, you're now anticipating that the fulfillment or at least the first stage of fulfillment of this promise will be that. But first, we got to get through the wilderness. Just another one of those literary markers then that kind of tells you something's concluding. Yeah. something new is starting. Yeah, that's right. And what's starting next isn't a new movement, but it's the second half or the second part. The second part of this middle of this movement.

That's right. So what we just had was three stories. Yahweh leading them out to camp by the sea. What happens at the sea is the deliverance and then the song about the sea, which is about them, and at the end of the song, we're going to move on from here into the land. And then the next story is, and they went further into the wilderness. So this is the first testing of Israel's trust, and it ends with them trusting in Yahweh. It's another act of creation and decreation. He decreates Egypt, but he recreates his people through what he thought was death, brings them through the chaos waters.

Yeah, I know we're calling it a test because we're going to be tracing the theme of test, and it's become, tests are become a little more clearer as tests. We're going to be called tests. Here, this isn't called a test. Yeah. In fact, it feels more just like a rescue mission. Yeah, sure, but there's a focus in the story on how the people feel and their fear and their lack of trust in the moment. So the whole question is, will they trust? And that is a test of sorts. It puts their trust to the test.

Yeah. And that's the point. That's the point here. I mean, I like these kind of tests. This is a good test. A test which is kind of like, here's the way out. Like, don't panic. Well, the kind of like, here's the way out. Yeah. Like, don't panic. Yeah.

Well, the test of like, look at death in the eyes and know you can trust me. Yes. I mean, that's a difficult thing to do. But it seems like a nice perspective to have. And then, and here's the way out. Through death, don't be scared. Go with me. Yeah. Let's bring it all the way back to the beginning of this conversation.

We said, let's let this story begin to define what it looks like when Yahweh tests his people. So, Yahweh didn't put any additional banana peels on the sidewalk. I said no, he put up a firewall. Totally, yeah, that's right. Yeah. But the circumstances themselves, because of the evil of Pharaoh. Yeah, that's what created the test So in this case it's someone else's Sin and evil that creates a test for God's people. Yeah, and the test is are they gonna fair or muted as a trap

That's right. Yeah, back twirling bridge. Yep. That's right. That's what he says is people are trapped in the world We got him so let So now that they are trapped, let's go get them, cover our slaves, or kill them all, or whatever he's going to do. Yeah, so, yeah, it was a test of trust, and it's not Yahweh being like, I know what I'll do. I'll cook up this new little maze. Like my kids do. Yeah, totally. For Opal. And these next, the narratives that follow, let's keep asking that same question. But at this point, let's just notice that the test comes

because of their circumstances, and then what Yahweh does is draw attention to it. Say, hey, you need to trust and just stand here and do nothing. And that's the choice in front of you. And that's powerful in itself. Yeah. But also what's powerful in of itself. Yeah. But also what's powerful is that oftentimes or sometimes I suppose

a test, a moment of decision is really God giving an opportunity to be rescued. Yeah. Some third way. Yeah. Right? Yeah. We're talking about moments where everything looks like death. Yes. They're death their death, their death, their God's like, actually that one. Yes. That's the way to life. Mm-hmm. Just trust me on this. Trust me.

The way I don't see it, I'm in a situation where I feel like all my options are bad. And then there's this one option that seems really bad, but I feel like that's the one that God's leading me to, and then somehow that way becomes the surprise resolution through the crisis. Let's support it here. We're echoing themes of Abraham and Isaac. Abraham's own sin has created this cascade of sad consequences, and so Yahweh tests Abram by asking him to give back the life of the sun. And it's actually Abram following that way that God pointed out that seems like at least

a death that that becomes the way to life. That's the ultimate test in the Genesis scroll is the story of Abraham and Isaac. Yeah, I mean, when you're looking through the chaos tunnel through the sea of reads, there's a hope, right? It's just kind of scary. Oh, yeah. There's dry land there. Yeah, that's right.

Abraham was not given any dry land. Yeah, he was just like, go, sacrifice your kid. Me and my son back, the son that I gave to you. It's more like, hey, just start walking through the water. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, you're saying this was a little bit less.

Less intense. Terrible. Yeah, no, this kind of test is kind of like, yeah, they're all bad options, but if all they have bad options, the chaos tunnel, you, you know, give it a shot. Yeah, totally, yep. And so the reason why creation imagery is used here,

is it's about Yahweh bringing life out of death. Yahweh creating a way out of no way, creating the hope of a garden after passage through the waters and through the wilderness. That's the image here. And just like the the ark landed on top of a high mountain where Noah got off, built an altar, met with God, planted a garden, and it all went wrong. But here similarly we're repeating that narrative patterning of a promise to go through the wilderness to arrive at a mountain garden. Where they'll be planted. Well, they'll be planted and meet with God. It has a boat and he'll rain rain over his people. So that's the hope that we have is that this passageway through the flood

will arrive them at a new mountain garden. But the meanwhile, we just have to pass through the wilderness. Let's see what's going to happen next. And what's going to happen next is more tests. Thanks for listening to this episode of Bible Project Podcast. Next week, we're continuing to explore this theme of the test. So what you always says is, look, I am going to rain. I'm going to cause it to rain bread on you from the skies. So it's going to be a flood of bread, but bread from heaven. Heavenly bread, sky bread. Today's show is produced by Cooper Peltz,

edited by Dan Gummel and Zach McKinley, and our show notes are by Lindsay Ponder. Bible Project is a crowd-funded, non-profit, and we exist to experience the Bible as a unified story that leads to Jesus. Everything that we make is free because of the support of thousands of people just like you, so thank you so much

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