The God Story: Rising Action

Exodus 16:1-4

Numbers 11:4-6

I.

We started our study of the God Story in a timely place: In the Beginning. In the first chapter of Genesis we find this interesting, captivating story of how the author and main character, God, got this whole thing spinning in motion. After God created humans, God did something revolutionary that gods aren’t supposed to do: God spoke to them.

That was Thread #1, our first connector that we will see throughout the story: God speaks because God desires relationship.

We talked last week about Abraham and the laughable dream God gave Abraham that at the age of one hundred; he would become the father of a great nation. We talked about our own dreams, our own stories that we still hope will be written, and learned about Thread #2: If God makes a promise, God keeps it. 

We jump back into our Story this week at a place that is critical for understanding the connections or threads throughout the whole God story. But first let me catch you up. You might think of this as a montage, or a sequence of clips in a movie that covers a long period of time in just a few minutes (usually accompanied by a great song) to get you up to the next point of major action. In our montage, we see a few generations pass. Abraham and Sarah did have a son, Isaac. Isaac married Rebecca, and they had twin sons: Esau and Jacob. Jacob had many children, twelve sons who would become the twelve tribes of the nation of Israel. One of the sons of Jacob, Joseph, ends up going to Egypt and saving all of Egypt during a famine. When they became a great nation, part of God’s promise to Abraham is fulfilled.

Then a new king who did not know Joseph came to power in Egypt and forced the descendants of Abraham into slavery. And that is where we find ourselves in the Book of Exodus, a record of people who were enslaved, who then became a people on the run, who then became a people with no home.

II.

Exodus is, if the Bible is one grand story, the Rising Action. You remember those elements of a story from middle school. Here is the basic definition of Rising Action. During the Rising Action the basic conflict is complicated by the introduction of secondary conflicts including various obstacles that frustrate the protagonist’s attempt to reach his or her goal.

In our story the basic conflict is the conflict of the people being separated from God, which started in the garden. It is carried throughout the God Story, and in Exodus it is now complicated by the introduction of secondary conflicts including various obstacles that frustrate the peoples’ attempt to reach their goal. Secondary problems like slavery, hunger, and exhaustion further complicate the already growing issues of a nation of people trying to stay connected with God.

So God radically saves the people from slavery using Moses, who was almost killed as a baby and then had to flee his home country because he murdered someone.  He was a guy who was scared to speak in public. Moses leads the people out of Egypt even as they are chased by an angry army. Then they find themselves in the desert wandering around, starving, tired, and exhausted. That is where we find them; facing secondary conflicts with various obstacles before them.

And somebody says, “Hey, remember when we were in Egypt?” Another says, “Yeah, we had meat to eat.” Another says, “yeah and cucumbers.” 

And someone makes the preposterous proposition, “Why don’t we just go back?”

The warning from this Scripture today is there will come moments in transition times, when we are headed toward our dreams that we will be tempted to go back to where we were before; to what is familiar and known.

Have you ever heard someone say, “I will never go back to that restaurant again”? My Pop-Pop was infamous for this.  He could have had the best dining experience possible with great food and great service.  But let’s say after a great dining experience he has to walk through a maze of hallways to get to a small, dingy men’s room.  Forget about it!  He’d say, “I will never go back to that restaurant again.”  But eventually he would.  Have you ever heard a long-time member say “I will never go back to this church again!”  To say this, one would have to have been so offended that they say they will never darken its doors for the rest of their lives.  And all because they took offense to a decision of the Session perhaps or the pastor’s sermons are boring and out-of-touch or they are not getting their way on church decisions or have a seat of prominence at the head table, so to speak.  But old habits are hard to break and more times than not the person or persons are back in the pew after a short period of time away.

The people of God who had been delivered from slavery, given water in the desert and bread from heaven, after a little time in the desert said, “The heck with it! Let’s just go back.” What they didn’t see was that God would give them all they needed for the journey. It is the thread running throughout the story.

III.

Thread #3—God will provide all you need for the journey.

We have to take this story seriously because some of the secondary conflicts and various obstacles in our lives can lead us into believing a lie. The lie is that life in slavery is better than following God, and you might as well just go back. When you start listening to that voice, you get yourself in trouble.

If you find yourself hoping for the next page to turn in your life, you may be in a chapter of transition. If so, here is what you have to be wary of. In these times it is easy for things to move so fast you can’t get a handle on them. You can become distracted. You can become exhausted. And these are the times when you are vulnerable to the temptation to turn around and to turn away from what God wants.

Surely the Israelites, if they thought about it real hard would not have preferred Egypt. It was a place of slavery, beatings, working in abusive and impossible situations. Life in the desert, in transition, is difficult and disorienting, making you vulnerable to complaining, grumbling, and unhealthy desires.

The transition times, the Rising Action, is in many ways the best part of the story. It is here you really learn the true depth of the characters; this is where the true depth of the character is formed. Romans 5:3-4 says, “we can boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope”. This is what defines you, not the in the beginning, and not the happily ever after; this is where you become who you were made to be.

The Hebrew people would re-tell this part of the story over and over again to remind them of what they went through, to remind them that God took care of them, and to remind them that God will still do it today.

IV.

If you are in a transition place right now, you may have seen a glimpse of where God might lead you. Don’t give up when you start feeling tired and start desiring meat and cucumbers. God will give you all that you need for the journey. Believe that. Trust that.

And sometimes we need some type of sign, something from God to let us know he is still with us. The people who were hounding Jesus were asking him for some type of a sign, something to hold onto. They said, “Our fathers ate manna in the desert. God gave them bread from heaven. What do we get?”

Jesus said, “I am the bread from heaven. If anyone has me, they will live forever” (John 6:31-36, paraphrase). We find Jesus in the Rising Action, and he is all we need. This is the Good News!  Thanks be to God!