"The Most Miraculous Moment"
It is no accident that the Pentateuch is peppered with occasions where God is defined as: “the one who brought Israel out of the land of Egypt”. It’s a defining story; a tale full of miracles!
Exodus 14:10-31
October 11, 2026
Todd R. Wright
Did you ever stop to think how important the Pentateuch is to believers?
You can’t tell the story of our God without starting with the creation ... for it’s there that we hear that we are made from the dust of the earth, in God’s image, and pronounced good!
You can’t discover the nature of God until you turn aside for burning bushes … for it’s there that we learn of God’s compassion for those who suffer and commitment to free them!
And you can’t adequately worship God unless you celebrate the One who brings Israel out of Egypt … for it’s there, “between the devil and the deep blue sea”, that we see God’s miraculous power!
It is no accident that the Pentateuch is peppered with occasions where God is defined as: “the one who brought Israel out of the land of Egypt”. It’s a defining story; a tale full of miracles!
We are told that it is God who hears the people’s cries.
It is God who sends Moses to Pharoah.
It is God who presses the ruler of Egypt to let Israel go.
When Pharoah refuses, it is God who sends ten plagues to force his hand.
Each one is a little miracle – the Nile turned to blood, frogs, gnats, flies, a livestock pestilence, boils, hail, locusts, darkness for three days, and, finally, the death of the first-born.
Pharoah is worn down. He relents and permits Israel to leave.
Rick Morley imagines the scene:
“The Israelites would have been scared out of their wits. Not only had they witnessed plague
and pestilence, but they had just heard that the children of Egypt had been snuffed out in their
sleep. They made a break for it, [but] the army of an angry Pharaoh was coming after them.
They didn’t know what was going on. They didn’t know where they were going. They didn’t know what was going to happen tomorrow. They didn’t know that there would be a tomorrow.
And then darkness fell upon them.”
It must have been a moment of doubt, of fear, of panic. But then, the same God who divided the light from the darkness on the first day, leads them forward with pillars of fire and cloud.
Like cheery night lights and white blazes, they must have calmed as they guided.
Easy to follow, they were a sign of God’s kindness for a people who had been so mistreated.
Such kindness must have felt like a miracle. Poet Naomi Shihab Nye writes,
“Before you know what kindness really is, you must lose things …
What you held in your hand, what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go, so you know how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness …
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore …
only kindness that raises its head from the crowd to say
‘It is I you have been looking for’,
and then goes with you everywhere like a shadow or a friend.”
But I don’t think that any of these things is the most important miracle.
I think that is another moment, easily missed. Did you catch it?
After God does miracle after miracle to bring Israel out of Egypt and to water’s edge, God tells Moses what to do next. It is a crazy command: stretch out your hand and the water will become dry ground, an escape route, a path for the trusting. God will not do it for him. Moses must do it.
In the movie, “Prince of Egypt”, Moses hesitates. He can see the chariots and warriors. He can see the fear of the people he is leading. He has seen God do mighty deeds. But he hesitates.
You can imagine the questions swirling – Will God really do this, or have I led all these
people out here to die? Is YHWH really mightier than Pharoah? Can I trust God’s word?
You know what happened. But that is not the same as saying it was certain.
Moses believed. He trusted. He took a leap of faith. He obeyed and held out his hand.
The Lord does not hesitate. Immediately, God drove the sea back with a strong east wind.
The God who, at Horeb, promised to deliver Israel, does so, but it all hinges on Moses.
I imagine even the angels in heaven held their breath until he decided.
The Pentateuch tells the story of God; of one mighty deed after another.
But it also tells the story of people who believe – each time a miracle in itself!
And it invites us to join their number. Amen.
From “Lighting up the night”, 8/30/11
From her poem “Kindness”, from Words Under the Words: Selected Poems
Comments