The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1901-12-22
Sunday Study.
PASSAGE OF THE RED SCI

The International Sunday school lesson
for Dec. %, is found in Exodus xiv, 1877.
The golden text is Exodus XIV, I.
l. We are given the choice of a Christ
mas lesson from Isaiah, TX, IL, but
as the burden of that lesson is Israel s
deliverance and future glory with but two
or three sentences referring to His coEa-
ing humility, while the lesson in Exo-
dus is concerning a great deliverance by
the same Lord, who was afterward born
in Bethlehem, the Child born, the Son
given, whose goings forth have been
from of old, from the days of eternity.
The Israelites were not yet free from
their oppressors. Undisciplined and i'll
armed and unprepared they were an easy
prey. They needed divine help. Fear ye
not. Stand still and see the salvation OF
the Lord which He will shew to you to-
day. The Lord shall fight for you, and
ye shall hold your peace" Just 43O years
after the first promise to Abram in DR.
Israel came out of Egypt by the strength
of the hand of the Lord 100000 foot men
besides women and children. He
Brought them forth also with silver and
gold, and there was not one feeble person
among their tribes They took the bones
OF Joseph with them, and the Lord Him
self led them by day in pillar of cloud
and by night in pillar of fire, which l1e
never took from them. AS soon as they
were gone from Egypt the heart of
Pharaoh became more hardened, and he
followed after them with all his chariots,
and our lesson opens with Israel by the
Red sea and the hosts of Pharaoh behind
them and escape seemingly impossible.
They cry to Moses, and these first two
verses of-our lesson give us Moses reply
to them. God leads His people into diff
in ct1 ,icr1t u
er on their behalf
Conditions have so changed about the
Red sea that it is impossible to say
just how the Israelites were placed
1t is certain, however, that the Situa-
ton seemed very serious, as the Egypt
ians were close behind and the sea in
front The complaint of the Israelites
was not unnatural, and obedience to the
command of 14:15 required great faith.
The presence of God between the
Egyptians and the Israelites prevented
the night attack which would have been
easy and overwhelming. The clearing
of path through the sea was not a
miracle in the strict sense of the word,
because it was brought about by known
natural causes. The shape of the sea,
the tide, the strong wind blowing dag
onally across the shallow place beside
which the Israelites had encamped, COM
b1ned to make passage through the
sea. Similar combinations had before
produced the same results and the same
thing happened afterwards. But that
1t should happen just when Israel need
ed deliverance, and that Israel should be
just at the spot where a path might
thus be opened was one of those combi-
nations which point Enthusiastically to a
divine power and a divine plan. The wa
tiers were "a wall' not in appearance
but in effect 1.-The Lord caused the sea
to go back by a strong east wind all that
night and made the sea dry land, and
the waters were divided" The passage
was narrow enough so that the
Egyptians could not attack the Hebrews
from either side while they were cross
ing The ground was of course damp
and softened by the crossing of sthe
great multitude of Hebrews The wheels
of the chariots thus became mired and
in some cases wrenched off, and hopeless
confusion resulted. The return of the
waters was certain with the change
of the tide, even if. Moses had not lift
ed his rod. ''The Lord overthrow the
Egyptians in the midst of the sea. There
remained not SO much as one of them''
Thus the Lord saved Israel that day out
of the hand of the Egyptians.