The God Who Takes Notice (part one)

We worship a God who takes notice! The book of Genesis ends with a promise: "God will surely come to your aid." Fast forward only a few chapters ahead to the book of Exodus. 400 years have passed! The Israelites are living in Egypt and growing in numbers. The only problem is that they are being treated without dignity. They are slaves to the Egyptians who use physical violence to crush their spirits.

The Israelites began to cry out to their God. Exodus 2:24-25 says that "God heard their groaning and he remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob. So God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them." The King James substitutes "concerned" with "had respect unto." The word "respect" in Hebrew is "yada" (long first a, I think) and means to know and understand.

The message version puts it this way:
God listened to their groanings...
God remembered his covenant...
God saw...
God understood.

The very next scene puts us with Moses at the burning bush. God tells Moses in Exodus Chapter 3 to tell his people, "I have watched over you and have seen what has been done to you in Egypt. And I have promised to bring you up out of your misery in Egypt into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites--a land flowing with milk and honey."

God wanted his people to know that He, the God of their fathers, had heard their cries and would be delivering them very soon and making good on His promise to give them freedom and a new land.

Exodus 3 is rich with phrases like "I have indeed seen the misery," "I have heard them crying," "I am concerned about their suffering," "I have watched over you," and "I have seen what has been done to you in Egypt." He is a God who takes notice.

Here is where it gets good! Rob Bell, in his book, "Jesus Wants to Save Christians," says that the Hebrew word for the cries and groans of the Israelites in chapters 2 and 3 is the word, "sa'aq." He says it is "an expression of pain, the ouch, the sound we utter when we are wounded." Walter Brueggeman refers to sa'aq as the "primal scream."

Bell says that sa'aq is one of the most powerful words in the Hebrew language. It is the cry of the broken. The oppressed. Those in need of rescue. It is the word that brings God to action. He hears our cries of anguish and is moved to compassion to bring about a new story. Sa'aq goes out and God in return, answers.

Bell says that sa'aq is also "a question, a question that cries out of the pain of the wound. Where is justice? Did anybody see that? Who will come to my rescue? Did anybody hear that? Or am I alone here?"

I actually haven't read this book, but I can't wait to order it! The most glorious thing I previewed said that the exact opposite of sa'aq is the word "gospel". He brings victory and good news when we cry out to him in desperation. He brings Jesus, and He is all we need.

Stay tuned for part two, where we meet Hagar in the desert!