PRAYER OF CONSECRATION
Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Jesus, I belong to you.
I lift up my heart to you.
I set my mind on you.
I fix my eyes on you.
I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice.
Jesus, we belong to you.
Praying in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.
Exodus 1:15–21
The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, whose names were Shiphrah and Puah, “When you are helping the Hebrew women during childbirth on the delivery stool, if you see that the baby is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, let her live.” The midwives, however, feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do; they let the boys live. Then the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and asked them, “Why have you done this? Why have you let the boys live?”
The midwives answered Pharaoh, “Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women; they are vigorous and give birth before the midwives arrive.”
So God was kind to the midwives and the people increased and became even more numerous. And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families of their own.
CONSIDER THIS
I was having lunch with a dear friend recently. It was the ten-year mile marker of the day he found his forty-year-old son dead of a heart attack. He told of how this tragedy led to the rapid decline and death—six years later—of his otherwise healthy wife of fifty-two years. He then shared the burden of his ensuing sadness and loneliness in the four years since. Then, with tears forming in his eyes, he said these words: “Plan B.” I asked him what he meant. He said, “I guess my life is now on Plan B.”
I can’t stop thinking about it. “I guess my life is now on Plan B.” I think because it’s probably how I feel about my own life. Plan A had a marvelous forty-five-year run and then a ten-year-long trainwreck brought on by our experience with mental illness, leading to the devastation of an unwanted divorce and the death of a family’s future never to be. I guess my life is now on Plan B.
How’s that for a welcome to Exodus—the brand-new, shiny series on the Wake-Up Call?!
I think I’m going to call it Plan B.
Only fifteen verses into the epic story of Exodus and we get these words:
The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, whose names were Shiphrah and Puah, “When you are helping the Hebrew women during childbirth on the delivery stool, if you see that the baby is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, let her live.”
When the unnamed king of Egypt calls a meeting with the named Hebrew (slave) midwives—we know we are well into a Plan B situation.
If you see that the baby is a boy, kill him.
Yep, that’s definitely Plan B.
Everything seemed to be going well enough for the Israelite people in Egypt:
Now Joseph and all his brothers and all that generation died, but the Israelites were exceedingly fruitful; they multiplied greatly, increased in numbers and became so numerous that the land was filled with them. (Ex. 1:6–7)
Looks like Plan A, doesn’t it? Straight out of Genesis 1: “God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it’“ (v. 28).
Then Plan B entered the picture:
Then a new king, to whom Joseph meant nothing, came to power in Egypt. “Look,” he said to his people, “the Israelites have become far too numerous for us. Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country.
(Ex. 1:8–10)
Plan B is always driven by fear, scarcity, and self-preservation, and fueled by the projection of unlikely worst-case scenarios. Watch where it leads:
So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, and they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh. (Ex. 1:11)
Plan B is cruel, oppressive, destructive, and devastating. It saps faith and slays freedom. But can we be honest about something? Plan B didn’t start with the king of Egypt. It began much earlier. It was conceived all the way back in the beauty of the garden known as Eden (a.k.a. Plan A). Plan B entered the world at Genesis 3 with three fateful words: “Now the serpent . . .”
If you see that the baby is a boy, kill him.
He’s been stealing and killing and destroying ever since. Consider Joseph, son 11 of 12, whose brothers hatched the Plan B to throw him into the bottom of a well and then relented to sell him as a slave for twenty shekels of silver to a band of Ishmaelites heading to Egypt.
In the midst of a Plan B reality, God always has a Plan A story.
Joseph, all the way back through his favored life as “the dreamer” was an agent of Plan A. And all the way forward, through the torturous path of his future—from favored son to forgotten slave to falsely accused to wrongly imprisoned and onward to becoming the hand of the king and the deliverer of those who betrayed him—Joseph was God’s secret agent of his unstoppable Plan A.
In the midst of a Plan B reality, God always has a Plan A story.
Now we see Shiphrah and Puah taking the baton and lifting the torch as the secret agents of Plan A—taking it straight into the jaws of Plan B: “The midwives, however, feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do; they let the boys live.”
We must not resign ourselves to Plan B. Why? Because God has never given up on Plan A.
As Joseph the Dreamer said so well to his brothers who betrayed him: “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives” (Gen. 50:20).
Buckle up! This is the story of Exodus; indeed of the whole Bible—the story of how the Plan A God of heaven and earth winds his way into and through Plan B—crushing the serpent underneath his feet‚ redeeming, restoring, and renewing his people and the whole creation—displacing darkness by light, desecrating sin by righteousness, destroying death by resurrection, and crushing chaos by new creation.
Plan B? I guess my life is no longer on Plan B.
What if the time for your exodus has come? That knocking you hear at the door? Plan A is back!
THE PRAYER FOR DELIVERANCE
Lord Jesus, you are my Deliverer.
I hear you decree a season of exodus over me, over my family, and my church.
I receive it. And as you decree it, I declare it.
Prepare my heart, mind, soul, and strength for the deliverance that comes with exodus.
Now let it be as you decree—for my good, for others’ gain, and for your glory.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be. World without end, amen! Amen!
THE JOURNAL PROMPTS
Have you felt resigned to the ravages of Plan B in your life? Are you ready to get back on board with Plan A? What might that mean? Do any Bible stories or particular texts come to mind along these lines? Write them in your journal.
THE HYMN
Today we will sing “O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing” (hymn 1) from our Seedbed hymnal, Our Great Redeemer’s Praise. Get your copy here.
For the Awakening,
J. D. Walt
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21 Responses
As I’ve shared with a Bible class that I facilitate recently; the first two chapters of the Bible are without sin, so are the last two. These are the bookends. Every thing in between is this story of how God restored, redeemed, and renewed all of His creation. This perspective is not original to me, and I can’t remember where I read it, but I find that it sums up the purpose of God’s revelation about Himself pretty well.
Awesome point!
Ditto. I don’t remember either, but I think it may have been JD.
Genesis 3:5 (Plan B) / Revelation 12:11 (Plan A)
Satan’s plan
Is disguised
As a blessing,
Wrapped up in
The self-focus
Of self-defining
The nature of
Good and evil,
So that people
Will replace
The desires of God
With their own desires
And be forever
Separated from
God’s Tree of Life.
But God’s plan
Is that the blood
Of Jesus Christ
Will renew your life
So that Christ
Will live in you
As you tell
The glorious story
Of how Jesus
Has set you free
From sin and self-focus.
When the risen Jesus becomes real in your life and you rely on His blood to continually remove your guilt and shame, you feel so wonderful that you can’t help telling people about what He has done and is doing in you. Then the more you testify about Jesus the more excited you get about Him and the freer you are from the bondage of self-focus. Isn’t it time that you open the door of your heart and let the living Jesus moment by moment align your life with His plan? (See Revelation 3:20.)
The timing of today’s Wake-Up Call shouldn’t amaze me, but it does, just as it has many times before. I’ve decided go into assisted-living; I have been viewing this change as a continuation of Plan B struggles and heartbreak. I see now God is sending me into Plan A and providing me opportunities to help and witness to others.🙏AMEN
Praying for you and your family,J.D. in your time of Exodus. May you rest in God’s peace and rise in Christ’s love.
Good Morning. Thank you for your insights.
Praying for you and your family, J.D. in this Exodus season. May you rest in God’s peace and rise in Christ’s love.
This is good stuff, J.D. My wife and I are at the tail end of 15 years of raising three grandkids due to mental illness in a daughter and this encourages me to look forward to seeing God fulfilling Plan A.
Pharaohs went to great lengths to ensure their names and accomplishments would be remembered long after their deaths. In this story, however, it is not the Pharoah whose name is remembered but the slave girls who feared God more than Pharaoh. You gotta love the irony.
An earnest WOW. I thought I would die overseas doing a job I loved, but God called me home to be full-time caregiver for my parents until their passing into glory. The year 2024 has been saying the last goodbye, facing a maelstrom of legal affairs after death, and clearing out decades of stuff. Nearing the end of this season finds me a bit undone. Today’s message of embracing Plan A again is so hopeful; I’m not on a second-best or “this will do” trajectory, but on HIS Plan A trajectory! Again, WOW. Thank you.
Welcome back! These wake-up calls are such a blessing. May God bless you and all your listeners.
Two thoughts from the reading: the midwives some those fearing Pharaoh more than God likely took a path as in the reading it seems it was likely. Those midwives which Shiphrah and Puah represented continued the journey though in slavery had only their master their provider, their deliverer journeyed in faith. “… though Pharaoh means this for evil…” These midwives knows Jehoviah will provide away. Fear is a face of deception and as satan brought deception with its fears to the garden. Walk in the light of hopes face and faith over come through the pathways of valleys and shadows. I like the restorative nature of plan A in the journey of the crossroads of plan B’s.
Wow JD, thank you for helping us to see this perspective. After raising the boys in the faith and seeing them walk away, I too thought, plan B? Now, even more, I realize that plan A is still being worked out and God isn’t finished with my husband and I nor our sons and their families. To God be the glory!!!!!
JD. I find this scripture verse to always help me lean into Jesus
“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”
Romans 12:2 NIV
Thank the team for setting the online experience to allow listening and reading at the same time; a great improvement!
I don’t know what returning to Plan A means for me now, but I am willing to explore that. I want to see what God wants me to do with the rest of my life.
What I think about as I read all of this and consider it in light of the examples in scripture and in my own situation & experiences all boils down to one question.
What if what we consider to be Plan B is really Plan A all the time?
You pose a fascinating question. Definitely something more to think about.
Thank you so much for this beginning to Exodus: Plan B! I love this new format of being able to listen and read at the same time. I appreciate your transparency, JD, and am a living testimony of how your Plan B has impacted my life. I love the Wake-Up call!
I very much appreciate the idea of a Plan B. I believe that mine started about 12 years ago during a nasty divorce. Since that time, I have had a multitude of surgeries and unwelcome medical diagnoses. In fact, I have surgery coming up in about two weeks. It is a relief that Plan A is still out there. Now, I need to figure out how to get back to it.
We have to fight for Plan A! Our relationship with God/Jesus/Holy Spirit is the main thing!!!
The enemy is constantly throwing/enticing/traumatizing Plan B at us.
We are either opening the door to God or the enemy. But the enemy disguises his door.
Thanks be to God as Jesus has the power to open and shut doors. We need to ask Jesus. If we find ourselves in the wrong door/Plan B. Pray. Repent. Ask God’s forgiveness, forgive ourselves and any one else as needed. Pray for God to take back the territory the enemy has stolen which is now Holy Ground belonging to God. Jesus shut the door in the enemy’s face for good. Replace with the things of God including the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Negative/sin/evil + repentance=zero/neutral. Next add the things of God=positive. Add God stuff (pray, Scripture, Holy Spirit, fruit, church, Christian friends, devotionals, grow in grace, etc…) to prevent the enemy coming back 7 times stronger. Once the enemy is caught; territory taken back for God; then the enemy has to repay 30, 60, or 100 fold/times. Plan A Baby!!!