(This blog entry is worth 20 pts and will cover the Exodus and the Covenant themes.)
Long before the exodus, God made a covenant with Abraham: "I will establish my covenant between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you. And I will give to you, and to your offspring after you, the land where you are now an alien, all the land of Canaan, for a perpetual holding; and I will be their God" (Gen 17:7-8). After the exodus from Egypt, on Mt. Sinai, God said to the people of Israel, "Now therefore, if you obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession out of all the peoples. Indeed, the whole earth is mine, but you shall be for me a priestly kingdom and a holy nation" (Exodus 19:5-6).
The Exodus story is about freedom: freedom from slavery in Egypt under Pharaoh, freedom to worship God, freedom to work the land and provide a legacy for future generations. The Bible says that God chose the people of Israel to be a special, holy people, dedicated to worshiping God and to living as a community of faith in a land filled with non-Israelites. But in order to live in that land they needed first to escape slavery in Egypt and defeat the "foreigners" already living in the promised land. The Exodus story has provided hope for many people. During WWII, Jews, who believe very strongly in their covenant relationship with God, found hope that they would one day escape their imprisonment and flee to Israel to live on the land that was promised to their ancestors. During the 1800's, African-American slaves based their hopes for freedom on the Exodus story. Their music especially reflects their hope for freedom (www.negrospirituals.com).
But it must also be said that the Exodus/covenant story in the Old Testament has also caused some problems. For example, because the Jews believe that Israel is their promised land and that they are the chosen people, the Palestinian people (descendants of the Canaanites) have suffered death and destruction of their land. In addition, black South Africans were brutalized for centuries because white South Africans believed that South Africa was their promised land and that the "unbelieving black 'Canaanites'" needed to be conquered. One black South African says this: "Protestations to the effect that white people are misusing the Bible have neither empowered black people to deliver themselves from this white slavery nor successfully explained to anybody, except the beneficiaries of apartheid, why such a tradition of conquest exists in the Bible in the first place. My contention is that the only adequate and honest explanation is that not all the Bible is on the side of human rights or of oppressed and exploited people" (http://gbgm-umc.org/umw/joshua/apartheid.html). The problem is made even worse when one takes into consideration that in the New Testament Jesus becomes the new covenant and Christians become the chosen people. Many wars have been fought throughout the centuries because Christians believe in their superiority over peopl of other faiths.
What do you think? Is God on the side of all people, regardless of their "chosen" status? How do you know? What does the Bible say? What if you were to put yourself in the place of the "other"? How do you think you might read the Exodus/covenant story if you were a different color, ethnicity, or faith? In this multi-cultural, globally conscious world, who are the "foreigners" and are they truly the enemies? (Remember, this entry is worth 20 pts; think before you type!)
