IN THE NIGHT

“All that night the Lord drove the sea back.”  

Exodus 14:21

I don’t usually think of “the night” as my favorite time of day.  I love the “sleep” part (though that is not often successfully accomplished.)  It’s often the time when worries and fears surface in the quiet darkness.

But God created night time just as intentionally as day time.  Since He never sleeps,  He’s got it covered.

I try to imagine the nation of not-so-recently freed slaves – God’s People who had spent 400 years as slaves to Egypt.  They were only days away from that dark period in their history  when they came face to face with the Red Sea.  Everybody was there….old, young, babies, sick people, animals, and all the stuff they could grab and carry in their rushed departure.

Pharoah’s highly-tuned, VERY powerful army was at their back, headed full-bore to wipe them out on the shores of the sea.

Then, God said (through Moses), “Go!”  As one brave man took his first steps into the water, the Sea moved to the side, until every last Hebrew slave had reached the other shore.  It took all night.  But God was there, actively providing a safe road along the bottom of the Red Sea.  When the last foot stepped onto the shore, God let go, perfectly timed to take out every enemy soldier, horse and chariot, soon buried on the bottom.

God was there, on active Guard duty, until His people safely stepped onto their new Path into the future.  All night.  No one was checking out the strength of that Wall of Water, nor calculating safety factors, nor referencing any “wall-building” blueprints, nor setting up “fleeing plans.”   God, via Moses, said “GO!”  And He did the rest.

God has a loooooong His-story of working in the night.  The darkness of night is often where the Enemy of our Souls tends to work overtime.  He likes darkness.  It’s his favorite domain.

But God is there, quietly holding back the darkness.