Obeisance of the Red Sea

Reading:   Exodus 13-15

In my post about God's command over all creatures (see Frogs, Lice, and Flies 1/24/13), I discussed the importance, or better yet, the absolutism of obedience that the animals show unto God.  All creatures immediately deploy from one purpose to another at God's command (ie. the frogs swarm Egypt and then, just as suddenly, die).  As I read the verses today, Moses parting the Red Sea, I reflected on the "Frogs" post and realized that I had not allowed for the three Omni's of God (omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent).  It's not just the creatures but everything, all matter, performs a purpose for God and will divert its purpose without quarrel, instantaneously, upon God's command.

The Red Sea parted, altered from it's purpose, and created a path for the Israelites to obtain safety.  Now, was the wind involved, sure, but the involvement of wind merely illustrates the point more poignantly - the wind obeyed God as well, diverting from one purpose to another.  Keep in mind that the water did not simply detract on either side, thus flooding lands on either end of it's perimeter, it literally raised up, creating a wall of water on either side of the path...

EXODUS 14:21-22

21    And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and 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. 

22    And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground: and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left. 

I wanted to illustrate the majesty of what a water wall like that would be like by spouting off some numbers but I'm not quite sure, mathematically speaking, how I would go about formulating an equation to handle such a problem.  I figured someone out there must have already done the math but, in my minimalist search for the magic formula, I could not find the answer...needless to say, depending on the site, the max depth of the Red Sea is somewhere between 7,000 and 10,000 feet.  So add some footage to account for it dividing and cascading upward and you have quite an impressive wall.  Can you imagine walking down a path with a wall of water on either side reaching 12,000+ feet.  That's nearly 80 Statue of Liberty's stacked or 11 Empire State buildings, over 2 miles, ridiculously high!!

Anyway, back to my point, all things: creature, element, matter, all, go about their purpose as directed by God, diverting at his will.  Only we, humanity, can choose an alternate purpose to that prescribed by God.  We are given the agency to choose.  We can do as directed or choose not to...yes, God can destroy us and act upon us in any number of ways as He chooses but He does not - we are gifted with free agency!

Remember also that although the miracle of dividing the Red Sea, and all miracles, are wrought through the Omni's of God, it is man that pulls the trigger through his faith and as directed by God.  If Moses chose not to exercise his faith, and he had every right to, the great Exodus might not have happened as we read it today...

Moses parted the Red Sea by using that all powerful weapon called Faith.  As a conduit for God, a man, commanded the element of water to divide and it did as directed.  Faith truly is the first principle of power!

~Kipling