Daily Devotions
Called Out of Egypt
Title: Called Out of Egypt
By Joshua Carter
Reading for July 28: Isaiah 44-46
Weekly reading for July 22-28: Matthew 1-4
From the humble beginning until the bitter end, Jesus’ life on earth was fraught with both adversity and rejection. In fact, the first threat to Jesus’ life came only a few days after it began, in Matthew 2. As Mary and Joseph were returning home from Bethlehem with their infant son, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, warning him to take his family to Egypt for protection. Apparently, Herod the king felt threatened by all the talk of this new “king of the Jews” (Matthew 2:2) and would be attempting to end His life before it had even barely begun (Matt. 2:13-15). Matthew goes on to record that this event in Jesus’ life fulfilled what the Lord had spoken by the prophet Hosea, “Out of Egypt I called my son” (Matt. 2:15, Hosea 11:1).
There are three major occurrences in Scripture where God has called His offspring out of Egypt, this being the second, and evoking imagery from the first. In Hosea 11:1, the entirety of the quote is, “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.” The first and most literal interpretation of this statement is as a reference to the physical nation of Israel. In Exodus 12, after 430 years of slavery and oppression, God called His people out of Egypt. He delivered His children from their enemies to show Himself strong, and to demonstrate that evil opposition cannot undermine His purpose for His people.
When the Lord protected Jesus from Herod in Matthew 2, He made the same points about Himself and a clear statement about Jesus. By delivering Him, the Lord made it apparent that Jesus was in fact His Son. The true king was not the Pharaoh-esque infant murderer who sat on the throne in Jerusalem, Herod. It was Jesus, the Son, who the Father had called out of Egypt.
The third application of Hosea’s prophecy is hinted at in Hosea 11:11, when the prophet speaks of a greater exodus saying, “they shall come trembling like birds from Egypt.” In Galatians 6:16 Paul speaks about “the Israel of God,” and in Romans 9:6 he states, “not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel.” Speaking of Christians, Colossians 1:13-14 say, “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”
For each one of us, our Egypt, our slavery, and the enormous threat to our spiritual lives was our bondage to sin. We were oppressed by it and powerless to overcome it on our own. But by delivering us from it, God has shown Himself strong and demonstrated that evil opposition cannot undermine His purpose. In addition, Hosea reveals that the people who God calls out of Egypt are in fact His people and His children. The people who have been freed from their sins can know that they are God’s sons and God’s daughters, an offer extended to all who believe (John 1:12, Acts 2:39).
Thank You, Lord for calling us out of our own Egypt of sin. Thank You for the awesome privilege to know that we are Your children and to call You our Father.
