Recovery Devotional 349 Knowing God Knows

JMD Devotional 349 Exodus 1:13-14 2:24-25 3:7-8 Knowing God Knows

1:13-14 And the Egyptians reduced the Israelites to severe slavery. They made their lives bitter with hard service in mortar, brick, and all kinds of work in the field. All their service was with harshness and severity.

2:24-25 And God heard their sighing and groaning and [earnestly] remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the Israelites and took knowledge of them and concerned Himself about them [knowing all, understanding, remembering all].

3:7-8 And the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters and oppressors; for I know their sorrows and sufferings and trials. And I have come down to deliver them…

Egypt represents the secular world, and it is still dishing out oppression and misery. We cooperate with our cruel taskmasters to earn a living; some have it better than others do; but life on the lower rungs of the corporate ladder is harsh and difficult. I have known people on the assembly line who could not afford the medicines they needed, who pray their way to work every day in dilapidated cars, who have worked past the age of retirement because they have no pension and little reward for their labor. Workers who have made it to the middle have improved wages and benefits, but often at the cost of incredible demands and pressure. Chronic stress takes its toll on the heart, the body and the mind. There is no job security. I have also seen the masters who dine sumptuously, who live too large, and who show little concern for the many backs that support them. We are economic slaves, and we are partially to blame for the burden we carry to maintain the lifestyle we want: but the workplace is no paradise, either. All of us are rich compared to a child born in a garbage dump in Brazil: but judged from the acceptable norms of our society we are all struggling to keep what we have and not slip down hill economically. Perhaps the physical and emotional and mental stresses add up to make all equal. When the prospect of what I will face Monday makes me sick at my stomach Sunday afternoon, when thoughts of work wont leave me alone at three in the morning, it helps to believe that God knows. God knows because He cares. He cares because I am His child. God will ultimately deliver His children from misery because He is good, and had promised it. Knowing that He knows makes me feel better. Faith in God is the victory that overcomes the world.

Dear God, (Prayer is Psalm 142 verbatum)

I CRY to the Lord with my voice; with my voice to the Lord do I make supplication.

I pour out my complaint before Him; I tell before Him my trouble.

When my spirit was overwhelmed and fainted [throwing all its weight] upon me, then You knew my path. In the way where I walk they have hidden a snare for me.

Look on the right hand [the point of attack] and see; for there is no man who knows me [to appear for me]. Refuge has failed me and I have no way to flee; no man cares for my life or my welfare.

I cried to You, O Lord; I said, You are my refuge, my portion in the land of the living.

Attend to my loud cry, for I am brought very low; deliver me from my persecutors, for they are stronger than I. Bring my life out of prison, that I may confess, praise, and give thanks to Your name; the righteous will surround me and crown themselves because of me, for You will deal bountifully with me.

Amen

All (but*) quotes are from The Amplified Bible, published by

the Lockman Foundation. (AMP)

Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation

*New International Version (NIV)

Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society

**Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group. (Eugene Peterson's easy-to-read, contemporary Scripture translation)

I originally produced these blogs between 2006 and 2007, which were then published in my book, JMD Recovery Devotionals. In 2010, I am sending these out to a few people as I review them and see if my point of view has changed.

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