Today, I am reading and commenting on  Exodus 13-15.

When the Israelites left Egypt, it seems to me that they expected the Egyptians to pursue them.  The passage tells us that they left Egypt ready for battle and that they traveled both day and night.  Nevertheless, when Pharaoh’s army overtook them, they were terrified and angry with Moses.  They accused Moses of leading them into the desert to die.  They did this despite the great signs which God had done to get Pharaoh to allow them to leave in the first place.  Then after Pharaoh’s army was destroyed in the sea, the sea which they had crossed on dry land, they praised God for their rescue.  Yet a short time later when the springs at Marah were undrinkable, they grumbled about not having anything to drink.  This sets a pattern which they followed the entire time they were in the wilderness.  How often do we do something similar in our lives?  We cry out to God because of our troubles, He rescues us in ways we could never have foreseen, yet a short time later we are once again afraid that our troubles are too big for God to handle?

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Exodus 13-15.

I am not sure where I am going to go with today’s blog.  The first thing which struck me was toward the end of the passage when God told the people of Israel, “If you listen carefully to the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, …, I will not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians,…”  In the context one could easily conclude that the diseases mentioned are those from among the ten plagues.  However, I do not believe that is the case.  When one looks at the history of disease one quickly sees that when people begin to gather in cities disease becomes much more common place than when people live a more rural existence.  Interestingly, while population density plays a role in the spread of many of those diseases, most of them also spread as a result of human behavior.  So, if we do what is right in God’s eyes, we will be less likely to experience disease…and if we all, as a society, do what is right in God’s eyes, we will not experience those diseases at all.  This applies to all types of social ills,  The higher the percentage of people in a society who do what is right in God’s eyes, the fewer social ills the people of that society will experience.  The best part about this is that if we, individually, do what is right in God’s eyes, we ourselves will be less likely to experience the negative impact of many social ills.

NOTE: My title today is an oversimplification