God who divides the sea

[Nehemiah 9:9-12]

There are websites on the Internet that provide maps.  For example, if you want to know how to get to church from my house, it will give you the quickest way [it also tells you how many miles (distance) and how long (time) it will take].  If you had a short road and a long road ahead, which one would you choose?  Maybe you will take the shorter route.  But what would you do if you knew that danger lurked along the way?  Would you rather take the long way back or would you rather take the short way even if it is dangerous?

Exodus 13:17-18 tells us that there were two roads on the way from Egypt to the promised land of Canaan: Short way and long way.  The shortest way is the way of the land of the Philistines, but there was a “war” if there was any danger lurking on the way.  So, God said, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt?”  So God led the people around by the desert road toward the Red Sea.  Therefore, God did not lead the Israelites through the land of the Philistines, but led them through the wilderness of the Red Sea by a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night (vv. 21-22).  But when the Israelites reached the Red Sea, they felt a crisis.  They were very afraid.  The reason is because they were in a quandary.  The Red Sea in front, and Pharaoh's Egyptian army trying to kill them in the back are approaching.  What would you do if you were like the Israelites?  The Israelites began to grumble against Moses in fear: ‘Why did you bring us out of Egypt?  Didn't we tell you to leave us alone?  It is better to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness' (14:11-12).  At this time, Moses said to the Israelites: “…  Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the LORD will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again.  The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still” (vv. 13-14).  At that time, the Red Sea was divided, and the sea turned into dry land, and the Israelites crossed the Red Sea (and were saved), and the Egyptian army was completely destroyed.  Today, under the title of “God who divides the sea,” I would like to meditate on three things about what kind of God the God who accomplished the work of the Exodus is.

First, “God who divides the sea” is the God who sees us suffering.

Look at Nehemiah 9:9 – “You saw the suffering of our forefathers in Egypt; you heard their cry at the Red Sea.”  If there is one of the most frequent questions from those who oppose the Christian faith, it is why do those who believe in God suffer?  If God is alive, why is he allowing those who believe in God to suffer?  However, it seems that not only these people but also we Christians are asking ourselves a similar question: 'Why do believers in Jesus have to suffer?'  In particular, this question raises the question, ‘Why do the righteous have to suffer?’ in comparison with ‘the prosperity of the wicked’.  What do you think?  Have you ever asked this similar question?

We see the Levites praising and worshiping God, beginning with Abraham, their ancestor, and praising and blessing the God of their ancestor, the Israelites, in the time of the Exodus in Nehemiah 9:9-12.  In the midst of this, they praised and blessed the God who saw the suffering of their ancestors in Egypt and had compassion on them (vv. 9-10) (Park), and the God who heard their cry.  The basis for this statement is Exodus 3:7, 9: “The LORD said, "I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering.  …  And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them.”  Here, the Bible clearly tells us that our God is the God who sees our suffering.  So why do we think that our God is not seeing us when we are suffering?  In other words, why do we not feel God's presence in our suffering?  The reason is because the hardships we are going through seem bigger than God.

In the minds of the children in my family, when it comes to how we express the fact that God is great, compared to people or things, we always say that God is greater.  Of course, these conversations are when these kids are in the mood.  But when we fight, we don't say anything about God, and our daughter, Yeri, often cries.  When we think that we are blessed by God, God looks great.  However, in the midst of pain and suffering, my tears and wounds seem bigger than God's.  The great and mighty God (1:5) who created and preserves the heavens and the earth and is worthy of worship (9:6) is the unchanging God, but we keep changing God's image in the environment of blessings and suffering: A God who is great in blessings and a God who seems small in suffering.  Why?  It is because of the weak faith that does not acknowledge the God of God and the sovereignty of God.  Look at Job.  Job possessed the faith to acknowledge God's sovereignty, regardless of whether he was blessed or suffered.  What should we do in the midst of suffering?  We must believe in a God who allows suffering.  Why?  They say there are 10 reasons to believe in God who allows suffering (Internet):

• The freedom to make one's own decisions entails sufferings.

Freedom is part of being human.  A world without freedom of decision would be far worse than a world without suffering.  And an even worse world would be one where people can make bad decisions without feeling any suffering.

• Suffering warns us of danger.

Without suffering, none of us would be aware of our illness and would not go to the doctor.  We humans would not seek God if there were no remorse of conscience, no bitterness over the meaninglessness of our daily lives, no certain pressure of bitterness.  And it couldn't be much more satisfying.

• Suffering helps us to know ourselves better.

Our capacity to love or hate, to forgive or retaliate, to be heartbroken or to let go, is all especially tested in suffering.  When all is well, we cannot know our true strengths and weaknesses.

• Suffering sharpens our view of eternity.

If death is the end of everything, a life full of sufferings is not justified.  However, if the end of this life is the threshold to eternity, then even the happiest human being in the universe is only a person who has discovered through suffering that the present life is not all that human beings pursue.

• Suffering teaches us to let go.

Every new suffering makes this world seem less glamorous.  We learn to let go and steadfastly move on to the next life (Eccle. 12:1-14).

• Suffering presents an opportunity to trust God.

Job came to the conclusion that he could absolutely trust God, who has power and wisdom and who created the entire universe, even in times of suffering.

• God suffers with us.

No one has suffered more than our heavenly Father.  No one has ever paid a higher price for this sinful world.  No one wept more than He did over the suffering of selfish humanity.  No one has suffered as much as Jesus, who paid the price for our sins on the cross and thereby showed how much God loves us.

• God's comfort is greater than our suffering.

The apostle Paul asked God several times to take away his suffering.  In response, God responded, ‘Trust completely in my grace, for my power is especially manifested in you when you are weak.’

• In the midst of a crisis, we draw closer to each other.

We remember that we need each other - and above all else we need God.  Whenever we find God's comfort in our own afflictions, our ability to help others also grows.

• God can turn our suffering into good.

Through the life of Joseph, we can finally say to those who rejected us, hurt us, and sold us into slavery, ‘My brothers tried to harm me, but God turned it for good” (Gen. 50:20).

Second, “God who divides the sea” is the God who strikes our enemies.

                     Look at Nehemiah 9:10 – “You sent miraculous signs and wonders against Pharaoh, against all his officials and all the people of his land, for you knew how arrogantly the Egyptians treated them. You made a name for yourself, which remains to this day.”  During the time of the Exodus, God saw the suffering of the Israelites and had compassion on them.  He heard and answered their prayers in the midst of suffering.  What was the answer to that prayer?  He struck Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, all his servants, and all the people of the country with 10 “signs and wonders” (disasters).  Therefore, He delivered the Israelites from Pharaoh's hand and from Egypt (salvation).  However, the interesting fact here is that the reason why God struck Pharaoh, all his servants, and all the people of the country, who caused suffering to the Israelites, was not the answer to prayer, but the Israelites in the time of Nehemiah gave another reason: “…  for you knew how arrogantly the Egyptians treated them.  …” (v. 10).  This is the same principle as James 4:6 (quote: Prov. 3:34; b: Ps.138:6): “…  God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”  God knew not only the contents of the prayers of the Israelites, but also the arrogance of Pharaoh and the Egyptians.  That was why he destroyed Pharaoh and the Egyptians with 10 plagues.

                We can know that God is the God who defeats the proud through the book of James and Pharaoh in Nehemiah 9 of today's text.  How, then, can we know Pharaoh's arrogance?  In other words, what is human arrogance?  In the book of Exodus, there is a repeated phrase that tells us about Pharaoh's arrogance.  It is none other than ‘Pharaoh hardened his heart’ (Exod. 7:13, 22; 8:15; Note: 8:19, 32; 9:7, 12, 35; 10:20, 27; 11:10).  What does it mean to harden your heart?   It is interpreted in the dictionary as hard-tempered and stubborn.  Hardness is an attitude that consciously and willfully solidifies one's position and opinion, as well as an active and subjective attitude.  In other words, it's almost instinctive rather than accidental.  It refers to a hard heart that closes the door of the heart against the Word and does not break a heart like an old field (Internet).  I looked for the answer in Exodus 9:21.  It is to ignore the word of the Lord.  To not take God's word to heart means not to listen to the word of God or obey it, so do not take the word as your own (Ps. 119:56).

                When we suffer because of the proud like Pharaoh, God is a righteous God who strikes down the proud who oppose us.  The Bible says that God is the God who resists and strikes those who oppose us.  Therefore, God is the God who gains honor (v. 10).  In other words, just as God revealed His power, justice, and holiness to Israel's enemies, Pharaoh, and all the Egyptians in the time of the Exodus, so that the Israelites praised and worshiped Him, in the time of Nehemiah, the Israelites also praised God’s holy name.  So what are we to do?  All we have to do is to bow down humbly to God in the midst of suffering and pray.  We must not harden our hearts like our adversaries and try to hit our adversaries.  Vengeance must be left to the Lord in prayer.  We must listen to the words of Ezekiel 36:26 – “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”  As we pray to the Lord for a soft heart and run diligently toward the Lord's word, we must diligently and faithfully break up our hearts like the fallow ground.

                Third and last, “God who divides the sea” is the God who guides us.

                Look at Nehemiah 9:11-12: “You divided the sea before them, so that they passed through it on dry ground, but you hurled their pursuers into the depths, like a stone into mighty waters.  By day you led them with a pillar of cloud, and by night with a pillar of fire to give them light on the way they were to take.”  The God who saw the suffering of the Israelites in the time of the Exodus and had compassion on them, the God who heard their cries and gained honor by striking the arrogant Pharaoh and the Egyptians with 10 plagues. (v. 9), the Israelites, in the days of Nehemiah, praised the God who divided the Red Sea.  Furthermore, they were praising the God who made the Israelites pass through the middle of the sea like dry land and threw all the Egyptian soldiers who had followed them into the waters of the Red Sea.  And in the wilderness, they praised God for guiding them along the way with a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.

                Do you have assurance of God’s guidance?  Just as the Israelites were hemmed in the wilderness in the time of Moses, do you pray with assurance that God will guide you when you cannot find a solution to a problem no matter how much you look around in the midst of your life?  Do you believe the words of Proverbs 3:5-6?  “Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.”  If “No,” why are we not sure about God's guidance?  Why?  The reason must be that we do not acknowledge God, the Almighty Creator who divided the sea.  And the reason why we cannot acknowledge God in every moment of our lives is because we rely on our own understanding.  We who rely on our understanding maximize the problems or hardships that lie in front of us rather than looking at the greatness of God, so we are dragged around by those problems or hardships.  In other words, rather than experiencing God's presence, companionship, and guidance through His presence in the midst of suffering, we experience the guidance of suffering itself (a life that is led by suffering).  An example of this is Sarah in Genesis 16.  After 10 years of holding on to God's promise to give her a son, her husband Abraham knew that she could still have a baby (age 85).  But she knew that she could no longer have a baby, so she relied on her own understanding.  So, she urged her husband Abraham to lie with her maidservant Hagar, and eventually Ishmael was born.  However, as a result, a fight broke out in that family, and the fight in the Middle East can also be called a fight between the descendants of Isaac and Ishmael.  This result was the result of doubting God's power in an impossible situation and relying on one's own understanding instead of holding on to His promise.

                What would you and I do if we faced problems like Moses and the Israelites?  Are we ‘problem oriented’ or ‘solution oriented’?  If we look at Brian Tracy's ‘The Art of Achieving Goals’, there is this article (Internet): Let’s not forget that most of the time, you become what you think.  When faced with a problem or difficulty, successful people exhibit a special mindset called 'solution orientation’.  Successful people spend most of their time thinking about solutions, while unsuccessful people spend most of their time thinking about problems and difficulties.  A solution-oriented person seeks ways to get over, around, and through the obstacles that stand in his way.  Problem-oriented people resent problems, who or what caused them, and how unhappy or angry they are.  A solution-oriented person, on the other hand, just asks, ‘How can I solve it?’  He thinks about it, and he takes the effort to solve the problem.’  There were two groups of people in front of the Red Sea: the “problem-oriented” Israelites and the “solution-oriented” Moses.  The problem-oriented Israelites were trapped in the north, south, east, and west, especially when they saw the Egyptian army pursuing them from behind.  They thought about their life in Egypt in fear, and when they thought that they were going to die, they complained to Moses and God.  However, Moses, the “solution-oriented” leader, prayed to God in a state of being trapped in north, south, east and west.  Moses chose the right and best solution.  Then he heard God's voice and took his staff and struck the Red Sea, and the sea parted like dry land, and Moses and the Israelites crossed the Red Sea like dry land and were saved.  However, the Egyptian army that pursued them was completely submerged in the waters of the Red Sea and died.  God is the solution to all our problems!  As we rely more and more on God who makes the way of the sea, we must overcome the difficulties of life with faith.  Just as God led the Israelites with the pillar of cloud and fire, God the Holy Spirit dwells in us and is leading us to the promised land.  So we can praise God for the chorus of the hymn “I Can Hear My Savior Calling”: “Where he leads me I will follow, where he leads me I will follow, Where he leads me I will follow, I'll go with Him with Him all the way.”

                What kind of God is our God?  God is the God who was watching Jesus suffering on the cross.  However, our God regarded His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, as His enemy and nailed Him to the cross to die.  Just as God killed all the first sons of Egypt, the 10th plague, in the event of the Exodus, He killed Jesus, His only begotten Son, on the cross.  Why?  For our salvation, to give us eternal life, and to guide us to the promised land of heaven through the indwelling Holy Spirit, Jesus, the only begotten Son, died on the cross.  Therefore, like the Red Sea in the wilderness, He divides the blocked sea on the way to Heaven, so that we can advance toward the high place today.