THE THEME OF THIS DEVOTION IS:
GOD WHO FEELS OUR SUFFERING DELIVERS US BY HIS MIGHTY HAND AND HIS OUTSTRETCHED ARM.
Exodus 6:2-7, “And God spoke to Moses and said to him: I am the LORD. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty [EL SHADDAI], but by my name LORD [YHVH] I was not known to them. I have also established My covenant with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their pilgrimage, in which they were strangers. And I have also heard the groaning of the children of Israel whom the Egyptians keep in bondage, and I have remembered My covenant. Therefore, say to the children of Israel: ‘I am the LORD; I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, I will rescue you from their bondage, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. I will take you as My people, and I will be your God. Then you shall know that I am the LORD your God who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.’”
Isaiah 53:1, “…and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed….?”
Luke 22:19, “…This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me.”
John 16:33, “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me you might have peace. In the world you shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
It is almost a universal law:
The greater the suffering,
The greater the triumph.
The descendants of the patriarchs first saved the Egyptians from death by famine through God’s providential ministry to them by Joseph. Afterward, in subsequent generations, the Egyptians feared and then persecuted the prospering descendants of Israel as they multiplied in Egypt. After a long time under persecution, the suffering of the descendants became unbearable, and they groaned and cried out to God.
Then God heard the groaning of their sufferings and called to His Divine Mind His Holy Covenant with the patriarchs. Immediately, God acted to bring their children out, to rescue them, to redeem them, to take them to Himself as His People, and to lead them into the inheritance promised to their fathers. The LORD did this by his outstretched arm.
The same God who suffered with his people as he dwelt in the thorn bush in Exodus 3, like a mother in the travail of childbirth, rose up as the God who does battle with the woeful world of wickedness. He does this continually for us who are the heirs of Promise by the arm of His Suffering Messiah—Jesus (Isaiah 53).
Triumph is first in the realm of the spirit. It is through Yeshua our LORD that we overcome evil in the world*. But what God initiates in the spirit he then consummates in the natural realm of our tangible experience. God will bring down your enemies before you and through him you will triumph over them all.
(Luke 1:71 with context; Hebrews 10:13; Acts 16:36-40)
[*Egypt is the great symbol of the world system in the Bible.]
Where are you suffering? God is there with you, touched with the feeling of your infirmities.* First he is there to nurture you with comfort by the blessed Holy Spirit.^ But he is also about to arise for your deliverance by the hand and outstretched arm of His Word Made Flesh in your life!*^
*(Hebrews 4:15); ^(John 16:7); *^(Ephesians 6:10-20; Revelation 19:15)
