Last night in GROW, we continued in Exodus 14, where the Israelites found themselves standing between the Red Sea and the Egyptian army.

We began with Scripture sharing. One verse that came up was Philippians 2:14:

“Do everything without grumbling or arguing.”

That opened the door for us to revisit something we have seen throughout the story of Israel—their tendency to murmur and complain when circumstances became difficult.

But our conversation went deeper.

We talked about fear.

The Israelites had already experienced God’s faithfulness. They had seen Him deliver them from Egypt, yet when they saw the Egyptians approaching, fear took over. They began imagining what could happen next.

And honestly, we recognized that tendency in ourselves.

Sometimes we can look at what is happening right now and immediately begin imagining everything that could go wrong tomorrow.

One of the questions we wrestled with was:

Why were they so afraid after everything God had already done?

We talked about how fear can affect our ability to remember.

God had been faithful, but their circumstances were loud.

One word that stood out in our conversation was faithfulness. Another was security. We were reminded that our security cannot always come from feeling secure about our circumstances. Sometimes security is knowing who God is, even when we don’t know what is going to happen next.

We ended our study in Exodus 14:13–14:

“Do not be afraid. Stand firm… The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still.”

We stopped there because there is more to understand about what it means to be still, to hold our peace, and to trust God.

And perhaps one of the biggest things we recognized last night was this:

God was not only bringing Israel out of Egypt. He was also working on getting Egypt out of Israel.

Deliverance can happen in a moment.

Transformation takes time.

That gives us plenty to continue exploring together.