Exodus 3:15 - God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations.”

When famous people are introduced, the emcee almost always reads out a long list of accomplishments and accolades to impress everyone in the audience.

Here, God gives his credentials in the form of the Patriarchs. He’s letting the Israelites know: the same God who did everything you know about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is going to bring you up out of Egypt. I’m going to do something special again.

He wants us to remember all his deeds he’s done in the past because what he did for them physically, he’ll do for us spiritually.

Ecclesiastes 1:9 - What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

God has told us what he did in the history of Israel - his chosen people. And he’ll do it all again and again and again.

Israelites

The Israelites were caught in brutal slavery to Pharaoh in Egypt:

Exodus 2:23 - the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God.

Today, we get caught in brutal slavery to various sins and we groan under the weight of it. Sometimes, we consciously cry out to God for help. Often, our lives have the pitiful sighs and pains of people not even aware of how sin and idolatry are affecting us. He hears us.

Promised Land

God was delivering and leading the Israelites to a beautiful place:

Exodus 3:8 - I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.

And the Promised Land of heaven awaits for us who trust in him - who have faith in him.

I AM

This same God - the God of Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses - is calling us to follow him in faith as they did.

In the end, it turned out aces for them! And so it will be for us if we stand.

May we consider the Old Testament as our spiritual story today - here and now - not only the story of people long ago and far away.

He acts today as he did then. May we give more time to the Torah and seeing the power of his hand so we trust him more:

Psalm 77:11 - I will remember the deeds of the Lord; yes, I will remember your wonders of old.

Chris Renzema - Caught In The Reeds (Moses)
You have been bread in the desert
You’ve been water from the rock
So why is it so hard to believe
That your love never stops? My heart’s been caught in the reeds
I’ve been living waist deep my whole life
Your word - it has split seas
It sets captives free
I want to live in that light
I want to live in your light.