October 4, 2026 Exodus 14:5-7, 10-14, 21-29 and Matthew 2:13-15 A Possible Past Closing and the Future Not Yet Visible

God Makes A Way

There is something remarkably fitting about reading Exodus 14 in a week when the end of more-or-less daily radiation treatments are coming into sight, and when loved ones, like my wife and son, who are driving patients and collaborating with other loved ones, find themselves completing a jigsaw puzzle they all pieced together with one another.

At its heart, the Exodus story is about being caught between what has been and what comes next. The Israelites look behind them and see Pharaoh's army. Ahead of them is the sea. They are caught in a place where no obvious way forward seems possible. Moses tells them, “Do not be afraid, stand firm, and see the deliverance of the LORD.” Then comes that extraordinary command: 

“Go forward.”

I find that as interesting as the spectacular parting of the sea. The miracle is not simply that the waters divide. It is that a people who cannot yet see the road are invited to take the next step anyway.

That seems especially resonant at the end of my long series of treatments. For weeks, the calendar has been filled with appointments, drives, waiting rooms, machines, treatments, trips home, and the accumulating effects of one treatment following another. The routine becomes almost like a landscape of its own. Then, suddenly, the last treatment happens this coming Friday.

But the end isn't quite the same thing as arriving. The Israelites don't cross the sea and find everything finished. They enter a wilderness. Uncertainty, hunger, fear, wandering, manna, arguments, discoveries, and unexpected gifts will follow. The crossing marks a transition, not the end of the journey.

That makes the jigsaw puzzle feel like more than a charming coincidence. You complete a puzzle one piece at a time. No single piece tells you what the finished picture will be. Some pieces seem useless until you discover where they belong. Some pieces are almost indistinguishable from one another. Sometimes you try a piece and discover that it doesn't fit, so you put it aside and try again.

Eventually, you look down and realize something has emerged that wasn't visible when you began. Perhaps that is one way to think about these weeks of treatment.

There have been pieces that seemed ordinary: a ride to an appointment, someone opening a door, a conversation in a waiting room, a card, a gifted quilt, muffins, providing materials to construct a chain where each link represents a treatment, sharing mysteries and musicals with the Radiation Therapists Sarah & Jackie, companions like Sarai and Marcia who are on their own journeys, a gemstone Tree of Life gift, a person remembering your name, someone sitting with you, or family driving you home.

None of those things, by itself, looks like a miracle. Together they become a picture.

This is a quieter meaning of Exodus 14 for me today. God's work isn't necessarily confined to the spectacular moment when the sea opens. It can also be found in the people who stand beside us while we're waiting for a way through.

There is even something beautiful about the fact that the people driving patients completed the puzzle pieces. Their job might seem to be simply transportation: getting someone from here to there. But the Exodus story reminds us that getting people across difficult places is never merely transportation. It is companionship.

They aren't simply moving bodies along a route. They are helping people make a crossing.

That's what has been happening throughout these treatments. People have helped make the crossing possible, not by removing the sea, but by helping get to the edge of it, through it, and eventually toward whatever comes next.

I'm struck by the contrast between Moses' words and the Israelites' fear. Moses says:

“Do not be afraid.”

The people are afraid anyway. That matters. Faith isn't necessarily the absence of fear. The Israelites don't become courageous because someone gives them a convincing explanation. They are frightened people who nevertheless discover that they can move forward.

Perhaps faith sometimes looks less like “I know everything will be fine” and more like: “I don't know exactly what comes next, but I'll take the next step.”

And now, as the weekly treatments approach their anticipated end, another kind of crossing lies ahead.

The familiar rhythm will disappear. There may be relief. There is a vague uncertainty. Fatigue may not disappear just because the appointments stop. A strange emptiness may set in when something that has occupied so much of life suddenly isn't on the calendar anymore.

So perhaps the invitation of Exodus isn't to rush toward the other shore. It is simply:

Go forward. 

One piece. One day. One step. People are there beside you. Small acts of kindness. Ordinary moments in which the picture becomes a little clearer. When you finally look back, you discover that the story wasn't only about getting through treatments. It was also about discovering who was there with you while you crossed.

The puzzle is finished. The sea is opening. The road is appearing. And there is still a road ahead. Not because we can see its whole shape, but because seeing the whole path isn't necessary to take the next step.