Life is Lived in the Mundane

Exodus 12:40-41 – The Israelites had spent years in 430 years in Egypt. From the time of Joseph to the time of Moses, while the Pharaoh knew Joseph, the children of Israel were treated fairly, but then they were treated as slaves.

Think again through 400 years…

If the average person lives to 70, that is almost 6 generations that lived in Egypt. Each of these generations lived, married, had children, worked in Egypt doing shepherding and then working as slaves! How easy would it be to forget God, the promised land, or the promises made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob?

This was before the law, before the feasts and Passover. The only decree was circumcision, and they knew to keep their line pure (which would have been helped by Egyptian distain of them).

A few of these generations would be born, live and die in a land that was not “home.” Their plea to God was not to fulfill His promise of a land, or to take them home,their plea to God was to end the slavery. They had lost sight of God’s promised land, and simply wanted out of their temporary inconvenience.

Life for the believer is lived in the mundane

There are events in our lives that are markers spiritually:

• When we accepted Christ as our Savior
• When we were Baptized
• When we took Communion
• When we became a member of a local church

Most of our lives are lived in the in between times. We go to church, youth groups and prayer meetings. We get married, have children, and do work. It’s easy to lose the focus in the mundane, just like the children of Israel. We are pilgrims and strangers, this world is not our home. For us to live is Christ, to die is gain.

I fear that we often lose this focus and behave as the Israelites trapped in the mundane. Unable to see anything but the days, weeks or months ahead, we focus on temporal problems instead of our greatest needs, and so we pray prayers for our temporal needs.

God is still faithfully guiding us towards His ends. He does not forget His promises. His timing is not our timing.