Choose Life

Exodus 1:22 Then Pharaoh gave this order to all his people: “Every boy that is born you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live.”
 
Hebrews 11:23 By faith Moses’ parents hid him for three months after he was born, because they saw he was no ordinary child, and they were not afraid of the king’s edict.
 
WE have seen how Abraham, Isaac and Jacob struggled within God’s promise, “I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore.” (Genesis 22:17) But then God began to bountifully expand his people in Egypt, even as the Egyptians severely oppressed them. Pharoah became afraid of the growing nation, and he ordered every baby boy killed. How is it that the newborn would threaten Pharoah? Centuries later, Herod’s evil killed the infants in Bethlehem (Matthew 2). Evil’s intent is to destroy God’s life-giving purpose.
    Into the darkness of infanticide God delivered and protected Moses, the Deliverer. He would grow to guide Israel to the land God promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
    Moses’ faith-filled parents, Amram and Jochebed (Exodus 6:20), feared God more than Pharaoh. They refused to obey Pharaoh’s ghastly command. By faith, they recognized a special quality in Moses that demanded even more that they reject death and choose life. Amram and Jochebed were not afraid of the law because life is more powerful than death.
    We also learn of faithful midwives who feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do. (Exodus 1:17) God blessed these righteous women with their own families. And God surely protected Moses and his parents from evil’s murderous intent.
    About 120 years later near the end of his life, Moses spoke perhaps one of Scripture’s most personal and life-giving blessings to Israel as they prepared to enter God’s Promised Land. Read this carefully: Deuteronomy 30:19 This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live 20 and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the Lord is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  
    Moses called Israel into a living relationship with God. Obedience to God’s law would bless them to faithful relationships with each other and with God. They would multiply as a nation to establish a visible example of God’s kingdom on earth. This was the mandate God gave to Adam and Eve – be fruitful and multiply – for the purpose of expanding God’s voice throughout his creation. The first couple decided to reject God’s law, and they died in the wilderness. God wants us to live in the Promised Land – the place of blessing and union with him.
    Our world is full of deadly laws – laws that turn us away from God’s commands toward a prideful exhibition of death and self-worship. Laws permit infanticide and mutilation of children’s bodies. Governments since the day of Babel (Genesis 11) have believed they could replace God’s commands with their own laws and ideas. And all have failed. World population is declining because we have replaced be fruitful and multiply with “be childless and ‘free’”. Only the Kingdom of God filled with those who have chosen life will remain when world history is complete.
    Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”  (John 14:6-7) This is what God told the first couple. This is what Moses told Israel. This is the message Hebrews gives to the church. Know the right way to blessing is God’s way. Have faith to live it. Fear God more than you fear the evil that threatens life. Choose life. Choose God. What other choice is there?