One of the strangest and most unimaginable things we learn as Christians is that our death actually means life. Something that feels like an absolute end, a final goodbye, a no more, is actually our beginning, our hope and our entry into eternity. Yet, on the opposite side, when we pursue our life and try to protect it, we lose what is most important, we lose ourselves and it leads to true death.

In our journey through Exodus, we have seen this playing out time and time again. The Israelites were challenged to face danger and their own death, stepping into it with faith. Egypt and Pharoah acted in fear trying to protect their own lives and we know where that led. This Sunday, we watch as Jesus faces his own death, willingly and we see all those that surround him trying to protect their life. It is most obvious how their protecting their life, hurts and kills Jesus, but it isn't as obvious how they are killing themselves in this. Jesus is the only one that finds true life, but first, he faces death.

It turns out that to escape with our life, we must first die with God.

      Do you know where God wants to take you in life? Do you know what you need? Do you even know what is possible? I think we all have dreams and expectations on our lives, but the hard part is that they don’t often line up with God’s hopes for us, they don’t often line up with what we or others need and they don’t often include what is possible with God. In fact, the hard part is that God’s guidance can be scary, it can take us into the unknown, it can feel as if there is danger on all sides, but God will bring us through.

      This Sunday we look at how God guided Israel out of Egypt by a pillar of smoke and fire and then through the waters of the Red Sea. This whole story is full of dangers and potential fear. Yet, in these seemingly impossible and dangerous situations, God uses the little bit of faith they have to lead them out of slavery and into hope and promise. He wants to do the same thing with us.

     Do you ever struggle with God's justice or the idea of His punishment? It is hard to face the hurt that God lets happen, let alone the hurt that he seems to have a hand in. I think much of the time we don't understand why something needed to happen, but I think the bigger challenge is that most of the time we don't want it to happen. It is hard to trust God in both of these cases. We need to trust him though because we don't need to look far to see how our misplaced sense of justice has gone wrong for us and for others. We need him to step in and do what is needed and what actually leads to good.

      This Sunday, we look at the 10 plagues, each one worse than the last one. What would ever make these necessary? How could this be justice? What was God thinking? Where is the mercy and love that we know is the character of God? We will look at all of these questions and more. Join me this Sunday as we explore the justice of God and how he wants to mercifully deliver us from it all.

How well do you know God? Even though God is consistently trying to reveal himself to us, I think in this life there will always be something we don’t know. That makes it difficult, because the more we know about God the easier it is to follow him, understand him, and respond faithfully. That is why in the midst of our doubts we need faith.

In the next section of our story from Exodus, we will see three responses to this doubt. We will see Pharoah’s closed-off heart, we will see Moses' willingness to lean into hope and we will see the Israelites’ inability and blindness because of their suffering. Sadly, closing ourselves off from God and life in him leads to greater struggle and even death. Thanks be to God that even one person’s faithful response can lead those who doubt toward life and bounty in God.

Do you make a lot of excuses or complaints? I think our world and my heart are full of them. “Oh, I can’t do that. I’m not good enough” or “what if this bad thing was to happen?” The problem is that this can stop us from doing what we really need to do and ultimately can show our lack of faith in God.

Moses, who was called to help deliver all of Israel, did the same thing. God is amazing in his response. He is immensely patient and faithful, answering all of Moses' excuses and fears with powerful present generosity. To our unfaithfulness, God shows Himself to be even more faithful. This Sunday we look at how we should respond to such a faithful and generous God.

Do you that you have been saved by God? Depending on where you are in your faith journey you might be asking: what have I been saved from? Why did God save me? Or what have I been saved for? Our story about Moses on Sunday answers all of those questions.

We started our sermon series called Escape for your Life on Ash Wednesday night. If you didn’t get a chance to hear it, I would urge you to go back on YouTube. In the first chapter of Exodus we discovered how Egypt needed to escape from their fear and the consequence of their actions and that Israel needed to escape from death in this world. Sunday, Moses' escape overcomes all of them. It is through this escape that Moses then is given a new identity and purpose. Join us this Sunday when we will see how and why God saves us.