Out of Egypt

“Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and go into the land of Israel: for they are dead which sought the young child's life. And he arose, and took the young child and his mother, and came into the land of Israel. ”

My first awareness of the Middle East, I believe, was watching one of the Mummy movies. Boris Karlov was a swarthy, fez wearing Egyptian who skulked around mysteriously, and then he was a gauze-wrapped mummy caked with the dust of time and bearing an evil purpose. What always amazed me was that the mummy , hampered by vast age and all those bandages, walking with a slow and halting gate, still managed to always catch the young lady who ran like a gazelle until she tripped and fell. The mummy was always right there to pick her up and make her faint. In my first memory of the Middle East, remember seeing the mummy carrying the girl off.

Egypt has long carried a mysterious and ominous flavor. This is due to the remnants of its once powerful and ancient culture . Egypt had the highest civilization of its day. From the 3 rd millennium BC onward, Egypt held an important role in human civilization, religion, agriculture, and science until its fall to the Persian Empire and successive Greek and Roman empires. Seeking immortality, the Pharaohs of Egypt built great pyramids and secret tombs, embalming themselves for the long road to the land of death . This practice, plus the curses promised to anyone who might disturb the tomb of a Pharaoh, gave rise to the mummy movies I saw.

While Abraham and his descendants rose to some prominence as shepherds in Canaan, Egypt built a civilization so vast and powerful it was unrivaled in the world. More than once it was a place of refuge for Hebrews. Joseph went there as a slave, but over time discovered that God had sent him, even by the hands of his sinful brothers, to prepare a safe place for them in the coming famine. But while old Jacob willingly went to Egypt with his children, he made them promise to take his body back to Canaan for burial with his fathers. Joseph, at his death, made his children promise that when they returned to Canaan at last, to bring his remains there with them also. For over 400 years Israel grew and prospered in the rich land of Goshen, east of the Nile delta . It was only under the Pharaoh Ramses II, probably, that the Jews were enslaved and made to build his great new capital city. Moses, an exiled shepherd of Midian, saw the burning bush and God called him to bring His children of Israel out of Egypt.

For the Jews, coming out of Egypt became the greatest symbol of God's favor and power in their history. It marked the beginning of their nation. Many of God's proclamations begin with a phrase like, “Since the time when, with a strong hand, I brought you out of Egypt…” Then He recounts the many times Israel fell from grace, and how He corrected them and restored them to their land of milk and honey. Coming out of Egypt, they were repeatedly tested by deprivation. Even as slaves in Egypt they had food and water, graves to mark where their bodies were buried. On the wilderness, hardship made them think it might be good to return and beg Pharaoh's forgiveness; it might be good to be slaves again. Moses cried out to God to do something with these faithless people. God provided manna and quails, water from the rock, cures for their illnesses, victory against opposing tribes, and finally the downfall of the Canaanite nations before them. By the 12 th century BC, Israel was an established nation and prospered in its own land.

Hosea, an 8 th century BC prophet to the wayward northern tribes, wrote God's evaluation of Israel's spotted history and how He showed His love toward them despite their greed for idols and pagan practices they had first learned in Egypt and now learned from their Canaanite neighbors. “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt,” Hosea 11:1 he begins the lament.

We are all familiar with the account in Matthew of the visitation of the magi and subsequent flight of Joseph, Mary and Jesus out of Bethlehem to Egypt in order to save the baby's life from king Herod. God sent an angel to speak to Joseph in his dream, warning him to pack that night and leave. Egypt historically was the land of refuge for those in Israel who were under an edict of death from their kings. Soon after their arrival, Joseph began to hear of the death of Herod, and an angel once more told him to move back. Matthew indicates that the passage in Hosea holds a double meaning, and cites it as prophetic: “…that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Out of Egypt have I called my son.” Matthew 2:15

Egypt , the land of refuge, land of the Pharaohs, land of mummies, land of mystery and many gods was always a safe place to escape to, to live in for awhile, but it was a bad place to die . The Egyptian Book of the Dead tells us how the Egyptians regard the spirit world and what their beliefs lead to. When the Jews departed Egypt, they left behind security, but also their own enslavement.

So it is with our world. We can live free, or we can settle for slavery. We can seek security, but often only at the loss of our souls. A socialistic government may, for instance, offer a more secure life for its citizens: free medical care, insured food and lodging, even a state-sponsored religion. But you had better not try to get your own doctor. Don't try to improve your life with your own work: you will become the enemy of the state. It's okay if you don't go to church, but don't try to create a church free of state control. Your citizenship in such a nation could be called slavery by a free people.

Egypt is controlled society. Egypt is false religion. Egypt is fleshpots and corrupted morals. Egypt is absolute political power. Egypt is mankind satisfied with what he can invent. Egypt is slavery— whether slavery of bondage to work, or to corrupt entertainment, or to drugs, or to a false security . The only real security is our invisible God. The only true religion is what His Son, Jesus Christ, came and died that we might have. The only godly society is one in which every individual is answerable to God. The only true moral's are those God has revealed. The only worthy government is the once that acknowledges God as our king, who has bestowed upon mankind unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The only satisfaction we are due is when the Spirit of God inspires our building, our inventions, our enterprises, and makes them holy by His Presence. Egypt is false. God is truth. We must come out of Egypt.

Bishop Robert Sherwood Morse gave a great sermon at the Congress of St. Louis in 1977. He compared the secure, but wayward, Episcopal Church USA at that time to the biblical land of Egypt. Our movement called to follow God out of that church he likened to the call of Moses to the people of Israel to come away from the fleshpots of Egypt and wander over the desert in search of our one true God.

In this sermon, he said, and I quote: “Just before he died, Moses told the people what the purpose of their wandering had been: ‘Remember how the Lord your God led you on this journey these past forty years, sending you hardships to test you, so that He might know what you intended to do, and whether you would obey His commands.' In our own journey together, God's purpose is exactly the same. He leads us, and sends us hardships to test us, to find out what we intend to do and whether we will obey Him. In Christian language we call that the Cross. The Cross is what the problematic situation called Life on earth is all about…

"And God has His purpose in all of it. He wants to know what we intend to do, and whether we will obey His commands. Did you get into the Continuing Church because you wanted revenge against the Episcopal Church? That is not a good enough reason. Did you think you were saving Elizabethan English? That is not a good enough reason. Did you always dream of running your own Church? That is not a good enough reason. Were you bidding for a black shirt, or a purple shirt, or a seat on a vestry at last? That is not a good enough reason. Did you object to sodomites and pushy women in the ministry? That is not a good enough reason. Did you have a nostalgic fantasy of recreating your favorite historical era, complete with period costumes? That is not a good enough reason. None of those reasons in itself is good enough at all.

"What God has been trying to get through the thick skull of the Continuing Church is that the only reason we are on this journey is Jesus. The only purpose of this movement is so we can be obedient to God, obey His commands, bear witness to the transforming power of Christ, and save people from sin and hell. There is just not any other reason that matters.”

We each have our own Egypt. It's a place of refuge, but not of true security. We may hide out there, but God calls us from its cold, stone colonnaded halls where our immediate needs were once met, where we were comfortable, but where we became enslaved. God left you there for a time so that you might learn the difference . Life as man invents it, or Life as God intends it to be. God calls us out of Egypt . For most of us, that doesn't entail a change of address. We don't have to become monks and live in the desert. We remain in this world. As Christ said of us, we are in the world, but not of the world. We can live along with the people and society of the world, engage in government, commerce, church, school, civilization: but at all times and in all of these pursuits, we have to remain true to our God. When conflict arises between the world and God, we must go with God. If that means a trek into the wilderness, then so be it.

God will call you physically out of Egypt someday. I buried Garrie Starmer a week ago. He was called out of this world and into eternity. We gave him Christian solemnities, not a memorial service with objects of his hobbies on display, speeches of how he is enjoying tennis in heaven, or some other pursuit. The true and essential pursuit is not our personal favorite pastime. The pursuit is God, or it is unworthy of our calling.

God's own Son was sent into Egypt. In a figure, His whole Incarnation was like an Egyptian exile. He was made one of us, so that He could be betrayed by us, sold into slavery, falsely accused, imprisoned, punished for crimes He didn't commit, and executed. Only in the Spirit did Jesus rise to Kingly power . Egypt—the world—still believes that they killed Him. But His power saves men from the grip of Egypt. We must willingly go out on that desert. We have to let the desert have our souls, for on the desert we learn who we are, and who God wants us to be.

PFH+