Exodus 5 - Steve Wiggins Daily Devotional

“Don’t continue to supply the people with straw for making bricks, as before. They must go and gather straw for themselves. But require the same quota of bricks from them as they were making before and do not reduce it. For they are slackers – that is why they are crying out, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to our G_d.’” Exodus 5:7-8

The World is out for itself. Make no doubt about it. To the World (and Worldly leaders), people are nothing more than resources. They are merely a means to a selfish end.

Pharaoh had one thing on his mind, and that was productivity. Because he was solely focused on the product of their labor, Pharaoh failed to recognize a key factor in the Israelites’ productivity: their spiritual health.

In that sense, Pharaoh is not very different from many employers in today’s work force. This “slave mentality” towards employees was especially true of the Big Bosses of generations past, in the era of the Great Depression. Theirs was the generation of workers who had to fight against the industrialist giants, and formed the labor laws and unions that protect work environments.

For such employers, you & I are expendable assets. We are like gasoline in a car’s tank or an air filter in a home HVAC. When the tank runs dry, or the filter gets soiled, you just refill & replace. What is most important to the heartless machine operator is that the car runs, and the air flows. Who cares about the wellbeing of “expendable parts”? But isn’t a machine comprised of the sum of its parts? Therefore, every part is integral to the performance of the machine.

The truth is, YOU are not expendable. You are EXPENSIVE! You are of such great worth to the L_rd! In the eyes of G_d, people are not disposable resources, do His bidding. G_d loves us, not for what we can do for Him. To Him, we have a value beyond our productivity. He doesn’t need us, but He WANTS us. And His desire to use us is simply because of His great affection towards us.

How much does G_d love us? He gave His life for us. (Micah 5:2, John 3:16)

We don’t cry-out and worship G_d because we are “weak slackers”, as Pharaoh alleged. We cry-out because G_d created us with the expressed intent that we worship Him! He designed us to worship and He invites us to enter into adoption as Sons and Daughters through our belief in His “Son”, Messiah Yeshua.

Bob Dylan once sang, “You gotta serve somebody.” If the choice is between the “Pharaohs” of this World, and the L_rd G_d, should we even have to think twice?.

Blessings,
~Steve Wiggins, Associate Leader, Worship Leader
Shuvah Yisrael
Daily Devotional, Thursday, March 6, 2014