The Lies We Tell

The Lies We Tell: When Egypt Still Lives Inside Us

For the next few weeks, we're going to be spending some time in the story of the Exodus, exploring themes from Chuck DeGroat's book Leaving Egypt: Finding God in the Wilderness Places.

And there's a way of understanding the Exodus story that feels particularly important.

It's the story of God getting Israel out of Egypt.

But it's also the story of God getting Egypt out of Israel.

Those are two different journeys.

One is about leaving a place.

The other is about what happens when that place continues to live inside us.

And perhaps that's why the Exodus story is our story, too.

Because all of us, in one way or another, find ourselves in stuck places. Places where we need help getting out. Places where old habits, fears, and ways of thinking have taken hold.

Sometimes we need our circumstances to change.

And sometimes we need the story we're telling ourselves to change.

Seventeen Years of a New Story

To begin this journey, we're actually going to start before the Exodus, in Genesis 50.

You might remember Joseph's story.

Through an extraordinary series of events, Joseph ends up in Egypt, eventually becoming second in command to Pharaoh. He's placed in a position where he can save lives during a devastating famine.

When people begin coming to Egypt in search of food, Joseph's own family is among them.

And eventually, Joseph brings his father, his brothers, and their families to live in Egypt.

For seventeen years, they're together.

Seventeen years.

That's a long time.

The family has been reunited.

Relationships have been restored.

They're provided for.

They're eating at the same table, raising their families together, building a new life.

And presumably, they're forgiving one another and putting the past behind them.

But have they really put the past behind them?

What If?

When their father Jacob dies, something unexpected happens.

Joseph's brothers become afraid.

Suddenly, all these questions begin surfacing.

What if Joseph wants to pay us back for everything we did to him?

What if he's been holding a grudge?

What if he's only been pretending to forgive us?

What if he was only being kind because Dad was still alive?

What if now that Dad is gone, Joseph finally gets his revenge?

Notice what's happening.

Nothing in their present circumstances has suddenly made Joseph their enemy.

But something in their minds has changed.

Or perhaps something in their minds has never changed at all.

They begin imagining a story about Joseph based on their own fears, guilt, anger, and resentment.

And then they send him a message.

Essentially, they tell Joseph that their father instructed him to forgive them.

They're afraid.

And in their fear, they begin reaching for a story that will protect them.

When Forgiveness Doesn't Feel Real

When Joseph receives their message, he weeps.

Imagine that moment.

After seventeen years of living together, of restoration, of provision, of sharing life as a family, Joseph discovers that his brothers still don't understand.

They've been living as though they're condemned.

As though punishment is still waiting for them.

As though forgiveness was never really theirs.

And the sadness of it is that they've been living in two stories at once.

Outwardly, their lives have changed.

They've been reunited and restored.

But inwardly, they're still living inside the old story.

The story of jealousy.

The story of anger.

The story of resentment.

The story of what they did to Joseph, and what they fear Joseph might someday do to them.

And perhaps this is one of the most important things to notice as we begin the Exodus journey.

Sometimes we can be free and not really know it.

The Stories That Stay With Us

Sometimes our circumstances change, but the story inside our heads stays exactly the same.

We move forward in life.

Things around us become different.

And yet something inside us remains stuck.

We may not want to admit it, but all of us carry stories.

Stories about ourselves.

Stories about other people.

Stories about what happened to us.

Stories about what will probably happen again.

Sometimes we harbor anger that we've carried for years.

Sometimes we carry guilt that's already been forgiven.

Sometimes the stories sound like this:

I can't change.

I have to protect myself.

I can't trust anyone.

I have to control everything, because if I don't, things will fall apart.

And when we believe these stories long enough, they begin to shape how we live.

They shape our relationships.

They shape our expectations.

They shape the way we respond to the people around us.

They even shape what we believe is possible.

The difficult thing is that these stories can continue living inside us long after the circumstances that created them have changed.

The Egypts Inside Us

There are all kinds of Egypts in our lives.

Not necessarily literal places.

But places we no longer live that somehow still live in us.

Old experiences.

Old fears.

Old ways of protecting ourselves.

Old assumptions about who we are and what other people will do.

We may have physically left those places behind, but they continue influencing the way we think and live.

And those stories can become prisons.

In some ways, the prisons inside us are the hardest ones to escape.

Because we carry them wherever we go.

Joseph's brothers had spent seventeen years living in a new reality.

But when their father died, the old story was still there.

Still shaping their fears.

Still influencing their actions.

Still keeping them from fully living in the forgiveness and restoration they had already experienced.

And that's what makes their story so familiar.

Getting Egypt Out of Israel

This is the deeper journey of Exodus.

God doesn't simply bring people out of the things that enslave them.

God also leads them toward a new way of living.

A way of living that is no longer shaped by the lies and fears that once controlled them.

A way of living that is rooted in God's love.

That's the freedom we're invited into.

Not simply the freedom of changed circumstances, but the freedom of becoming different people on the inside.

People who are rooted.

Grounded.

Anchored in God's love.

People who no longer have to live according to the old stories.

And maybe that's where this journey begins for us.

By noticing the stories we're still telling ourselves.

The ones that keep us afraid.

The ones that keep us angry.

The ones that keep us trying to control everything.

The ones that convince us we're still trapped when God has already begun leading us into freedom.

Living Into the Freedom That Is Ours

Perhaps the invitation today is simply to ask:

What story am I still living in?

Is there an old fear that continues to shape my choices?

Is there guilt I'm carrying that has already been forgiven?

Is there anger or resentment that I haven't been willing to release?

Is there something I keep telling myself about who I am, or who other people are, that is keeping me stuck?

These aren't always easy questions.

But they're important ones.

Because the journey toward freedom isn't only about where we've been.

It's also about what we're carrying with us.

And the good news of this story is that God invites us into a different way of living.

One no longer controlled by old lies and fears.

One rooted and grounded in the Spirit of God's love.

So may we begin to recognize the Egypts that still live inside us.

May we find the courage to release the stories that no longer need to define us.

And may we learn to live into the freedom that is truly ours in Christ.