All That Night

“All that night

the Lord drove the sea back.”

Exodus 14:21

God’s desert refugees were running for their lives.   Behind them in traumatizing, deadly pursuit was the most powerful army in the world.  Ahead of them was the Sea.  Men, women, children, grandparents, the sick, elderly, newborn and soon-to-be born babies. The terror and chaos had to have been unimaginable.  Death was in hot pursuit behind them . . . no safety nor “home” lay ahead.   Well over a million traumatized slaves. . . now refugees. But there was no refuge for them. Death loomed . . . at their backs and in their faces.  In the darkness, when terror and danger was all around them.

BUT GOD WAS THERE, saying “Go . . .”   Go to your new life . . . your new home . . . your new freedom . . .   I Am here.  I Am making a way for you.  It’s scary, it’s not easy.  One foot in front of the other.    I Am right here, making the Way for you!

 Nighttime seems to hold far more fear.  Darkness surrounds us, and fears grow.  We cannot see.  Our human frailty and vulnerability becomes far more tangible.  We long for the light.

God’s people…His refugees, saw the turbulent sea open before them, and the command came to step into that unimaginable journey in the darkness of night.  There was really no other option…theyhad to go.  

God was there. In the darkness.  He, Who had opened the sea and created the path to the other side, was there.  “All the night” . . . holding the sea back from utterly wiping out the people He had chosen to carry His Story to the world.  He had created the way for them, and He was holding the sea back.  No movie creation of man could begin to depict that scene.  We can only try to imagine it.  As His dearly loved people stepped onto the bottom of the sea, with the waters of that sea towering above them. . . in the darkness of that long, long night.   No words were necessary as He “held the sea back…all that night.”  They just needed to keep putting one foot in front of the other….He was doing all the rest.

I know He continues to “drive the sea back” throughout the nights of our souls.  May we continue to put one foot in front of the other on the Path He has made for each of us.