Watched over

DEVOTION

EXODUS

WATCHED OVER

Ex 3:16-17

16 "Go, assemble the elders of Israel and say to them, 'The LORD, the God of your fathers — the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob — appeared to me and said: I have watched over you and have seen what has been done to you in Egypt. 17 And I have promised to bring you up out of your misery in Egypt into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites — a land flowing with milk and honey.'

NIV

God, the “I AM WHO I AM”, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob says this to Moses. Tell them Yahweh, the God of your fathers appeared to you. That ought to get their attention. It is what God says next to Moses which strikes a chord in our lives. He tells Moses to tell them he has been watching over them and has seen what has been done to them in Egypt. He has promised to bring them out of their misery into a land flowing with milk and honey. Is this not our story? Were we not living in a land under bondage to sin? Were we not in misery, even if we didn’t know it? We might even have thought we were having fun, but we were being deceived with a false scene, an illusion of life, while all the time we were in misery, or if nothing else certainly headed to a place of misery until the judgement day. So in a prophetic sense we were already in misery, in hell. But God has promised he would bring us up out of our misery and bring us to a land flowing with milk and honey, the new city of Jerusalem, the place he has prepared for us to live eternally in his presence. It is also possible, although we are saved, and in this same prophetic sense we are already in the land flowing with milk and honey, we could still experience some form of misery here on earth. Surely as we look forward in Exodus, the children of Israel thought, at times, their lives were pretty miserable. They even voiced their misery to the point of thinking being back in Egypt would be better then what they were facing. Sometimes we might think we experience some form of misery in this life, even our new life in Christ. All things may not go according to our plan, our desire, our hopes of fame and fortune in this life. We might have to suffer in some form or another to some extent. That could come differently for each of us. But we might think we are either forgotten by God, or that he just doesn’t care about this physical life and is only concerned about the salvation of our spirit. Sometimes it seems he does not answer our prayers. This life can be rough at times and we could get down, get depressed or discouraged, if nothing else. But our hope is in the truth. God is watching over us, he has seen our misery and he sent his Son to save us, to bring us up out of this misery, both in the eternal sense, as well in this physical sense. We do not have to stay in our miserable state of sin or of being under the influence of this world. In all reality we can live free of discouragement no matter our circumstance. We, like Paul, can learn to be content in all circumstances, whether with plenty or in want. We have been freed from worry, anxiety, fretting, complaining, discontentment and discouragement. In both the spiritual and the physical sense, God has brought us up out of that misery. Although we may actually experience some unpleasant situations in life, it does not have to affect our state of mind, our joy, our peace. We can have confidence God is watching over us. We are being watched over.