This chapter has a remarkably significant position in the history of the typical redemption of the people of Israel. It lies between the shedding of the blood of the Paschal Lamb in Egypt, in ch. 12, and the song of redemption in ch. 15. We find the people in great distress of soul; — “sore afraid,” and crying out unto the Lord, who makes a way of escape for them from the bondage of Pharaoh and Egypt, into the liberty of complete salvation from every foe. They sing the song of victory and triumph with their feet on redemption ground.
The moral lesson which is here must be learned sooner or later by every soul. Many live long enough in the condition which we find in this chapter, supposing this misery and uncertainty to be a proper Christian state. Perhaps only learning on a death-bed the deliverance which should have been enjoyed all their life long. Such are quickened souls too. Souls in which grace has wrought, but who stop short of the ground of redemption, where God begins with the soul.
Now, we find many who have learned Christ’s work as far as is typically taught in Ex. 12 in the Passover. They have learned their own sinfulness in God’s sight more or less, and have looked to Jesus as their only refuge, and found that His blood was shed for sinners such as they. They have found themselves sheltered from the judgment of God for sin. God has passed over them. But in all this they have not peace with God. They are sheltered from his judgment, but God has still in their sight the character of Judge. I do not believe any soul ever had peace with God on this ground; consequently, when a moment of pressure comes, the soul is thrown into the deepest distress and misery.
We find this strikingly before us in this chapter. They had been sheltered by the blood of the Lamb on the night of judgment and terror. The blood was the sole ground of their safety from the hands of the destroying angel. There was “no difference” between them and the Egyptians. His hand was stayed, not by what they were, but because the blood was on the lintel, and all sheltered under it were safe from the judgment of God. The blood kept God out—this was the great thing on that night. God was kept outside—His hand was stayed. But they were still in Egypt, and God was only known as a Judge. Here (c. 14.) the great question is decided, “Was God to have them now, or Satan?” It was a moment of intense pressure; but a pressure in which they learned to “Stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord.” It was a state in which they could not lift a hand or strike a blow. A moment when the crushing pressure of enemies behind, and no outlet of escape, extorted a bitter cry of helpless misery from their inmost souls.
It may be asked, Why did God allow them to get into this great extremity? Could He not have brought them out by the way of the land of the Philistines, which was near, and there have saved them from that people? Why bring them into a place of such dreadful fears and terrors? A place where, with the sea in front, mountains hedging them in on each side, hosts of exasperated enemies pressing behind? What was it for? Why is a soul often brought into this terrible extremity, while at the same time, God has passed over it as a Judge? Because it was with them—it is with us, a needed lesson. On the one side, to search our hearts out to the depths and make us learn ourselves, and the utter helplessness of man to deliver himself; on the other, to learn God in His resources and delivering grace. God allows us to get into these extremities. He allowed Job to get into them in all their bitterness; and when he learned to abhor himself, which he had not till then (Job 42.), he learned what God was, to one whom he abhorred, in all the richness of that heart of love which spared not His Son to be its exponent and missionary!
Is it not thus on a death-bed? The soul is brought to an extremity which perhaps till then it never knew. It looks into an unending future, and now for the first time is about to face the living God. In a moment of intense pressure like this, it finds itself cast over on the sovereign mercy—the rich and ungrudging grace of God in Christ, and all is perfect peace. It has nothing then but Christ, and He is everything. This is why God allows these moments of extreme pressure to come upon souls, over whom He is yearning in tenderest love; because, in no other way can they learn themselves or Him. See Joseph, while his heart was yearning over his brethren, speaking roughly to them—putting them in ward till they learned their guilt for their treatment of him. Thus with God, He abases His people, all the while with the most yearning love, that He may exalt them in due time. He makes them thud learn their utter vileness as men in flesh, and responsible before Him, that they may learn what He is to such, in a love which knows neither measure nor end.
The name of the place where Israel encamped that moment has beautiful significance. It is named “Pi-Hahiroth” and means, “The, opening, or gate, of liberty.” It was such to them.
Do I speak to any soul who has not rejoiced in this wondrous liberty of grace? Awakened surely to the sense of sin and its exceeding sinfulness; with some undefined hope too, that Christ is its only refuge, and yet groaning under the terrible bondage of sin and Satan’s power? To will present, yet how to perform that which is good found not. The desire to do good then, and the desire only making more apparent than ever the fact, that a law of sin in the members wraps the soul in its chains of bondage, bringing it into captivity to the law of sin in its members. How many souls are in this state—groaning under a bondage which in unconverted, unawakened days was never known. Now, all is changed, and the heart is tempted to cry out, like Israel on that day, “It had been better for us to serve the Egyptians,” than this terrible strait, into which they had come. Pharaoh’s hosts behind, the Red Sea in front, and no escape on either side. Often in this state would the soul he tempted to desire the former days of careless ease, rather than this terrible state of misery.
All these exercises of soul come at last to a most blessed termination. They are all leading up to the blessed condition in which God begins with the soul. But this is not Christian state at all. Christian state is perfect liberty. What is so distressing is, to find souls accepting this state, and looking for nothing beyond it. Satisfied to be sheltered from the judgment of Egypt, and going on in Egypt all the while.
The state in which we find Israel—or souls—is not one of conflict, but exercise, which breaks down every hope in self, or from self, casting them entirely over upon Christ. Moses says to Israel, “Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will show to you today... the Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace.” (v. 13, 14.) God now takes the matter into His own hands; no more as a Judge, but as one whose judgment had been answered for by the blood of the Paschal Lamb. He is thus at liberty, as it were, to show how fully, with His whole heart and with His whole soul, He was for His people. He opens a pathway through the Red Sea—a pathway which had a double effect—to Israel the most perfect deliverance from every foe. Dry shod they passed through the depths, the waters a wall on their right hand and on their left, till their feet stood on the wilderness side of the Red Sea, brought to God Himself in the fullest liberty of grace. To Egypt,—the mighty waters returning to the channel through which the Lord’s redeemed had come, swallowed up the foe. They “fled against it” without avail. “The waters returned and covered the chariots, and the horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them—there remained not so much as one of them.” Israel saw their enemies dead upon the sea shore. They saw the mighty work which the Lord did to their enemies. They beheld them no more forever. Grand and glorious victory—achieved not by them, but by the Lord. Israel had not to lift a finger, to speak a word. They had but to enter into that victory which God had achieved for them alone.
In what way then has God wrought to bring deliverance to His people now? God has not only provided a Saviour Jesus—but has raised Him up again who had been slain! Every whit of his righteous judgment for sin had been borne by His Son, when he entered the mighty waters of death. Every sin of His people had been answered for and put away. Here then is the true character of Christian faith. We believe “on Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification.” (Rom. 4:24,2524But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; 25Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification. (Romans 4:24‑25).) God forsook His own Son when he was bearing the judgment of sin on the cross. There, Jesus “put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.” (Heb. 9:2626For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. (Hebrews 9:26).) God came in when every vestige of sin and sins were put away to His glory forever, and raised up His Son.
Reader, the resurrection of Jesus, like the passage of the Red Sea, tells its own glorious tale. I gaze behind into His empty tomb, and find in it the ending of every foe. The end of the sins committed, and the nature which offended God, and broke my heart with its vileness. The end of Satan’s power. He has no power further than death. I have died with Jesus there. If I revive myself He still has power. If I am practically dead His power is gone. I have passed by the resurrection of Jesus, into new ground.” A shout of victory in my heart for the ending of every foe. I have peace with God, when the judgment is past. But here the type fails to show the magnificence of the victory which I enjoy. It was the same flesh which came out into the wilderness, through the depths of the sea, in Israel. We can say, now on the other side of his empty tomb, “when we were in the flesh.” (Rom. 7) When the flesh was myself! Now I have got another life, a new life in Jesus raised from the dead; which walks in perfect liberty, and brings forth fruit to God.
Beloved reader, the resurrection of Jesus has these two aspects. To the Christian, Jesus risen is the eternal witness that our sinful nature and our sins are put away, and that it is God—our God—who has done it in love. To the world it is the solemn witness that God has “appointed a day in the which He will judge the world in righteousness, by that man whom He hath ordained, whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.” (Acts 17:3131Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead. (Acts 17:31).)
Like the presence of Jehovah on that day of the Red. Sea, it was “cloud and darkness” to the Egyptians; it was “light by night” to Israel. To the one it was a savor of life unto life-to the other, of death unto death. We read, “In the morning watch the Lord looked unto the host of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and of the cloud, and troubled the host of the Egyptians,” &c. (v. 24, &c). In the “morning watch,” again, when the soldiers guarded the tomb of Jesus —when Satan’s power was put forth to retain Him in His last stronghold, the angel of the Lord rolled back the stone of His tomb, and for fear of him the keepers did shake, and became as dead men. The foe was discomfited, and His people saved. While, on the other hand, he pointed to the grave clothes in the empty tomb, as the sight to calm the disciples’ fears, and fill their mouths with a song of praise.
The Lord give my readers to sing this song of victory—this song of God’s triumph over every foe. Christ has made an end of the foe—an end of all that could rise up again between us and the living God forever. As the risen One He leads this song of praise. Do I still refuse to sing this song? If so, I call in question the efficacy of His work. I seek to have some part in it myself. This can never be. There it stands, His glorious work of redemption. I can neither add to it or diminish its value. God is satisfied, nay, glorified, and the sinner saved, by a salvation worthy of God.