Rev D W B Somerset
Singing part of Psalm 106 at a recent prayer meeting, the writer was led to reflect on the spiritual connection between believers now and the Children of Israel coming out of Egypt. In the prose version, the words in question read: “We have sinned with our fathers, we have committed iniquity, we have done wickedly. Our fathers understood not Thy wonders in Egypt; they remembered not the multitude of Thy mercies; but provoked Him at the sea, even the Red Sea. Nevertheless He saved them for His name’s sake, that He might make His mighty power to be known” (Ps 106:6-8).
The tendency is for believers to distance themselves in their minds from the Children of Israel in the wilderness, because we are told of them that their “carcases fell in the wilderness” and that they “could not enter in [to the Promised Land] because of unbelief”, and believers are warned lest any of them should “seem to come short” of the promise in the same way (Heb 3:17-4:2). This is most certainly a truth, but it is only part of the use that Scripture makes of the Exodus from Egypt. The unbelief of the Children of Israel is to be a warning to those that reject the gospel, but it also serves to illustrate the continuing struggle with sin and unbelief taking place in the hearts of the people of God. The passage from Egypt through the wilderness to the Promised Land is a picture of the life of the believer, being brought by Christ from bondage to glory, and the smaller incidents, as well as the greater ones, in that passage may be useful to believers.
The major events, such as the Passover, the Red Sea, the marriage Covenant at Sinai, the water from the Rock, and the crossing of the Jordan into the Promised Land have obvious correspondences in the life of the believer, but why should not the smaller events also have their correspondences? We are not suggesting that every believer’s life rigidly follows exactly the path of the Children of Israel; but we are suggesting that a familiarity with the events of the Exodus, and a readiness to relate them to their own lives, will be profitable to the people of God, especially when they are singing the historical parts of the Psalms describing these events.
Far from being barren and irrelevant, believers will find the description of these events to show the Lord’s knowledge of their souls and His loving-kindness towards them, notwithstanding their frequent and grievous provocations. “Many times did He deliver them, but they provoked Him with their counsel, and were brought low for their iniquity. Nevertheless He regarded their affliction, when He heard their cry. And He remembered for them His covenant, and repented according to the multitude of His mercies. . . . Save us, O Lord our God, and gather us from among the heathen, to give thanks unto Thy holy name, and to triumph in Thy praise” (Ps 106:43-7).