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To listen to an audio version of this post, visit www.covenantchurch.ca/podcasts/covenant-weekly.

On Sunday, we read about God’s call to Moses in which God revealed the divine personal name. This is a profound shift from simply being “the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” And when I think about it, it is kind of remarkable that none of those three patriarchs ever asked, “Okay…I hear your promises and I’m grateful for your blessing, but I’m curious…who are you?” But that’s not really what I want to talk about today. Next Sunday, we’ll be talking about Israel after deliverance from Egypt. Between God revealing the divine name and Israel’s freedom, there is a huge showdown. It is a showdown between the gods of Egypt and Yahweh. It is a showdown between the global power and an enslaved and oppressed people. It is a showdown of epic proportions, and this morning I’m suggesting something from it that might be a challenge for us to consider. But I think it is important on this National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. This is the Covenant Weekly for September 30, 2025.

Usually, when we read the story of Israel under oppression from Egypt and God’s amazing deliverance, we consider how God is delivering us and hearing our cries. This is a good and right way to read the text. In Christ, we are inheritors of the blessing and promise given to Abraham. (If you aren’t sure on this, check out Galatians 3.)

But on days like today, when we seek to be honest about our history and consider how we can best move forward, it seems good and right to consider another way to read this text.

Most of us listening to this today have more in common with the Egyptians than the Israelites. Most of us today are inheritors of and participants in cultures of power. We have enjoyed, we do enjoy, relative comfort and prosperity - often due to the labour and struggle of others.

I’m not saying this to try to initiate guilt or shame. I’m simply making an observation that we often overlook. It is easy, when we side with Yahweh, to always see ourselves on the side of those biblical people. But even Yahweh’s people, in Scripture, find themselves at odds with God’s ways. This is one of the indictments the prophets have against Israel later in the Old Testament. Those who knew what it was like to be oppressed became the oppressors. It went against God’s ways, and it ultimately led to them losing their land and freedom.

I know it doesn’t feel like we are the Egyptians in the biblical story. We often look at it very personally. We know our challenges to make ends meet each month. We know how hard it is to find a job. We know the familial burdens we carry and the major health challenges we face. Life is hard. How can you say we’re like the Egyptians!

In the time of the Biblical story, life would have been a struggle for the vast majority of the Egyptians. And even the wealthiest of the Egyptians had challenges, family struggles, and health issues. Their own struggles may have been a part of what led them to be so aggressive and opposed to the Israelites. After all, those people were on Egyptian land. If they were allowed, they’d take Egyptian jobs. They were eating Egyptian food. And so many Egyptians were struggling to make ends meet! It was an us-versus-them scenario, and Egyptian interests had to be protected!

Or, to give normal Egyptians the benefit of the doubt, most of them were wrapped up in their own daily struggle to even really consider whether or not things were what they should be. I mean, they might wonder, but a) if they said anything, they’d be ostracized, and b) they truly did have enough worries of their own.

Yes. Most of us today have more in common with the Egyptians of the story than the Israelites. We need to be reminded that God is with us in our struggles. And the way of Jesus is to set aside our privilege to come alongside those who are or have been oppressed. We need to be open to the truth, even when it challenges us. Maybe, especially when it challenges us.

And reconciliation? It is not a woke, liberal idea. It is the work of Christ, and through him, our work. I encourage you to go to www.biblegateway.com and search “reconcile” in the New International Version. You will see just how important this is to what Jesus came to accomplish and to our ministry as Jesus people.

My prayer is that naming our place in the story isn’t something that sparks debate or creates shame. I pray that seeing this truth should encourage us to humility and love. I pray it will encourage us to be active participants in the hard work of discerning how we can embody truth and reconciliation in our lives and in our country.