Imagine yourself in Egypt. Picture yourself in slavery. It is a place of real bondage. Forced labor! Persecuted for your non-Egyptian ethnicity. You are treated like an alien instead of a fellow human being! You are scorned and demonized. They fear you because you are different than they are; they fear you because they think you are going to “take over” or side with their enemies. So they double your brick quota. You weep. You feel helpless. You cry out to your God. You hope that He will rescue you from your oppressors.
Father, you are revealed in the Exodus story as a God who hears the cry of slaves. You heard us when we cried out from being a slave to sin, and You rescued us. Thank you, Holy Father.
From “The Master’s Table”, by H. Lamar Smith
