Here are some notes from this morning’s journal. I wrote our Exodus 6:6-8 in an outline form as a way to make its chiastic structure more explicit. A>B>C>D<C'<D'<A’, with “D” as the central affirmation.
I am YHWH
>>> A) and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians,
>>>>>> B) and I will deliver you from slavery to them
>>>>>>>>> C) and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment
>>>>>>>>>>>> D) I will take you to be my people
>>>>>>>>> C’) And I will be your God, and you shall know that I am YHWH your God, who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.
>>>>>> B’) I will bring you into the land that I swore to give to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob
>>> A’) I will give it to you for a possession
I am YHWH
[…] And that leads to the central point of the speech—YHWH will take Israel to be His people. This is the result of His redemption, this is the act of His self-revelation….to covenant Himself to a people—chosen by grace—and to redeem them from slavery in the land of death and bring them to Himself in the land of life, by “an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment.” He WILL have His people…
And this is our God too. This is the God we know, this is the God we love, this is the God we call out to as “Abba, Father.” And we know this God because He has come and dwelt in our midst in the person of the Son (John 1:14). This same God who saved His people out of the land of Egypt has walked on the dust of this earth (Jude 5) so that we might know Him (1 John 5:20). And when He came….when YHWH dwelt among us…He showed us Himself, He showed us His Name—the Name of the Father—the Name declared to Israel and Egypt and the nations at the Exodus, the Name declared to Moses on Sinai, the Name declared to the world through the many acts of judgment and salvation, the fires and the hammer-strikes and the quenching baths that forged the nation of Israel, this same Name he declared in our midst.
As He stood up from prayer in the Garden, as He went as a sheep to the slaughter before the Sanhedrin, as He stood silent before Pilate, as His brow was crowned with the red wounds of our curse, as His face was marred by the vicious blows of our shame, as His body was torn by the bitter wages of our sin, and as He has lifted up between heaven and earth to endure the hell of our eternal exile, and as He died, and as He lay as one of the dead for three days, and as—beyond all hope—He rose again to new and invincible life, His whole being proclaimed:
“I am YHWH, and I have brought you out from under the burdens of death, and I have delivered you from slavery to sin, and I have redeemed you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment. I have taken you to be my people, and I have become your God, and now you know that I am YHWH your God, who has brought you out from under the burden of death. I have brought you into the promised land of my presence, and I have given it to you as your possession. I am YHWH.”
Yes, THIS is our great salvation, THIS is the true exodus, THIS is the supreme work of redemption and the final act of revelation.
