Now, I know these are five-minute Bible studies, but the first 14 verses of Exodus 14 are important to read. I have entitled this, “Vertical Doubt, Horizontal Anger.”
Then the Lord said to Moses, “Tell the people of Israel to turn back and encamp in front of Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea, in front of Baal-zephon; you shall encamp facing it, by the sea. For Pharaoh will say of the people of Israel, ‘They are wandering in the land; the wilderness has shut them in.’ And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will pursue them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, and the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD.” And they did so.
When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, the mind of Pharaoh and his servants were changed toward the people, and they said, “What is this we have done, that we have let Israel go from serving us?” So he made ready his chariot and took his army with him, and took six hundred chosen chariots and all the other chariots of Egypt with officers over all of them. And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he pursued the people of Israel while the people of Israel were going out defiantly. The Egyptians pursued them, all Pharaoh’s horses and chariots and his horsemen and his army, and overtook them encamped at the sea, by Pi-hahiroth, in front of Baal-zephon.
When Pharaoh drew near, the people of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they feared greatly. And the people of Israel cried out to the Lord. They said to Moses, “Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us in bringing us out of Egypt? Is not this what we said to you in Egypt: ‘Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians?’ For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.” And Moses said to the people, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.”
Now we have the answer for what God had in his mind for his people, and how he's going to get them ready for the battles they will be facing in the promised land. God is going to use what seems like an unmitigated disaster to demonstrate to Israel that he will unleash his glory to defeat their enemies. But when the people of Israel are camped in front of the Red Sea, with the army of Egypt coming down on them, look at their response. Check out these words. They said to Moses, “Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us in bringing us out of Egypt?” In other words, “Why didn't you just leave us alone?”
Their doubt is expressed in two ways. First, their doubt of God is actually expressed in accusation of Moses. Second, their doubt is expressed in reasoning that it would be better to go back and be slaves in Egypt, to die in the wilderness. All this is happening just as God was going to provide them with something they desperately needed–hope and courage!
Well, there are a couple of things that need to be said. First, there are two kinds of doubt. There's the doubt of wonderment because we will always be surprised at what God brings our way because “God's ways are not our ways.” There's nothing wrong with the doubt of wonderment. And then there's the doubt of judgment. That's a very different thing. That's when we have judged that God is not what He says He is, and He's unfaithful, unkind, and unloving. That doubt will take you nowhere good.
Second thing to observe is often our doubt and anger with God is expressed, not directly toward him, but in anger toward people in our lives. We look for somebody to blame and Moses was the target. None of these decisions had been made by Moses; they had all been made by God. In the same way, we look for targets. May we look into the mirror of this passage and cry out for God's rescuing and delivering grace that we would not give way to doubt and the anger that follows!
Questions for Personal Reflection or Group Discussion
1. What kind (or kinds) of doubt have you been wrestling with lately that has been aimed vertically toward God? In what ways have those vertical doubts transformed into horizontal anger for you?
2. Have there been times in your life when you felt like you just wanted to be “left alone” by God because of the difficulty of your circumstances? How did your doubt of God express itself in those times? What was helpful for you spiritually during that season? How did the Lord meet you?
3. Knowing the Exodus story and how God’s provision would come through for the Israelites, what can you personally glean from this story that would increase your faith in the Lord despite the difficulties you may be currently facing?
4. How have God’s ways pleasantly surprised you in the past? What was surprising about how God moved and worked? What did you learn during those times that has made you a more wise and godly person?
5. Who have you blamed horizontally when you’ve really been upset with God? How might the Lord want you to approach that person or people and ask for forgiveness? In what ways could that horizontal relationship get stronger between you and them as a result of your apology?
For Younger Children:
1. Who are the people you usually get mad at when things in life don’t go the way you want them to go? Why do you think it’s so easy to get mad at other people and blame them when we’re actually just mad at the way things are going in our life?
2. Can you think of any times when you’ve been surprised by the way God has worked things out, even though you didn’t expect him to work in the way he did?
3. What kind of choices can you and I make so that our doubts of God don’t turn into anger towards other people?
For Older Children:
1. Who do you usually get mad or upset with when things don’t go the way you want them to go? Do you take it out on others when you may just be upset with God? Why do you think it’s so easy to get mad at other people when we’re really just angry with the way God is working?
2. What have been a few of the surprising ways God has worked in your life lately? How did God work in your heart through those surprising ways?
3. How can you and I help each other to trust the Lord even when our circumstances seem to be crazy and chaotic? How can we know that God is trustworthy during the difficult and confusing times?
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