A Road Through the Middle of the Sea

God's people walked out of Egypt with bread dough wrapped in their cloaks, and God did not take them the short way home.

The short way ran through the land of the Philistines, who loved a fight. "If they see war, they will run back to Egypt," God said. So he led them the long way, toward the sea, going ahead of them in a tall cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.

Then God told Moses, "Turn back and camp beside the sea. Pharaoh will think you are lost. He will chase you, and I will show Egypt that I am the LORD."

In Egypt, Pharaoh looked at his empty brickyards. "What have we done?" he cried. "We let our slaves go!" He took six hundred of his best chariots and every other chariot in Egypt, and off they thundered. (A chariot is a cart pulled by galloping horses, with a soldier standing in the back. Picture six hundred, and then more.)

The Israelites looked up, and there was the whole army of Egypt, marching straight at them.

They screamed at Moses. "Weren't there enough graves in Egypt? Did you bring us out here to die?"

(Egypt was famous for its graves. Its pyramids are giant graves for kings.)

Moses said, "Don't be afraid. Stand firm, and watch the LORD rescue you today. The LORD will fight for you. You only need to be still."

God said to Moses, "Tell the people to move on. Lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea."

That night the cloud moved behind the camp and stood between the two armies, dark on Egypt's side and bright on Israel's. Moses stretched out his hand. All night a strong east wind blew, WHOOSH, pushing the water back until the bottom of the sea was dry ground. The water stood up in walls on the right and on the left, and the people walked between them: grandmothers with walking sticks, fathers carrying lambs, children staring up at the fish.

The Egyptians charged in after them. Just before dawn, the LORD looked down from the cloud and threw their army into a muddle. Their chariot wheels jammed and twisted, and some came right off. (Chariots go very fast on a road. They go very slowly without wheels.) "Turn back!" the soldiers shouted. "The LORD is fighting for Israel!"

By now every Israelite stood safe on the far shore. "Stretch out your hand again," God told Moses. As the sun came up, the sea rushed back and covered the chariots and horses and riders. The army that had followed Israel into the sea drowned, and not one of them was left alive. That morning the people saw the soldiers lying dead on the sand. They feared the LORD, and they trusted him and his servant Moses.

Even so, that road through the sea was open for one night only. The people who walked it grew old, and one by one they died. An enemy older than Pharaoh chased every family, and no staff could push death back.

Years went by. The prophet Isaiah reminded God's people that the LORD makes a path through mighty waters, and promised he would do a new thing.

Then another leader came, greater than Moses. Once he told a storm to be still, and the waves lay down. When death came for his people, he went down into it himself, and it closed over him like the sea. On the third day Jesus rose from the dead, and by sunrise his grave stood empty. The road he made through death is still open.