The story that Scripture tells is like a river, rushing for miles with twists and turns. In the midst of this progressing narrative there are familiar elements that serve as harbingers of the grand climax of God’s work of redemption. Jim Hamilton calls these “promise-shaped patterns”. Generally, they are referred to as “types”. Types can take a number of forms. They can be people, like priests (Melchizedek, Aaron, etc.). They might be places (temples, mountains, etc.). And they can take the form of events.
In this article, I’d like to present an overview of one of these types in the form of the event of the exodus. Of course, Israel’s redemption from slavery in Egypt is the most famous occasion of exodus in the Bible but it is not the first or the last. It is one occasion of the exodus pattern that plays out in the storyline of Scripture over and over again, ultimately leading to the fulfillment of the type: redemption in Jesus Christ.
One can argue that the first occasion of exodus occurs in Genesis 12:1 when YHWH calls Abram to leave his home in Haran. Other exodus patterns in Genesis include Genesis 12:20 where Abram and Sarai are given wealth and sent out by the Egyptian pharoah where Sarai had been held in the pharoah’s house. Another is Genesis 31 where Jacob and his family follow the exodus pattern by fleeing from Laban’s oppressive oversight. Laban and his men pursue them because he is missing his household gods (which Rachel stole, unbeknownst to Jacob). The whole episode ends with Jacob and his family being vindicated against Laban and journeying for the promised land of Canaan.
The Exodus From Egypt
Therefore, when we reach the book of Exodus, we should already be aware of this exodus pattern and the elements associated with it. God’s people (or person) are living in a place of oppression, they are brought out with much plunder, and they journey towards the promised land. Of course, I’m sure many more parallels could be drawn between these Genesis accounts and the one in Exodus. Another parallel that shows up in at least some of the Genesis occasions of the exodus event is the judgment of God against the oppressor or enslaver. And in the case of Laban, a humiliation of the false gods of the oppressor.
The main exodus event of the Old Testament, Israel’s exodus from Egypt, follows these same patterns. The people of Israel are under oppression in Egypt and God brings them out with great power. He judges the Egyptians and humiliates their gods by sending plagues that directly correspond to the gods of Egypt, yet the so-called gods are powerless to stop the plagues. In the end, the Israelites leave Egypt with great plunder and begin the journey to the promised land.
Furthermore, the Exodus account tells us that God is revealing Himself covenantally through the exodus:
Say therefore to the people of Israel, ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from slavery to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment. I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God, and you shall know that I am the LORD your God, who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.
Exodus 6:6-7, ESV
This self-revelation is not just made to the covenant community, but the world at large, including the enemies of the covenant community:
Pharaoh will not listen to you. Then I will lay my hand on Egypt and bring my hosts, my people the children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by great acts of judgment. The Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring out the people of Israel from among them.
Exodus 7:4-5, ESV
In the case of both Israel and Egypt, the exodus will reveal that the God of Israel is YHWH. The exodus reveals God as a covenant redeemer and just judge.
New Exodus Promises in the Prophets
If we fast-forward many years we see Israel in a very different position. They are settled in the promised land but through their disobedience they are facing exile. The prophets come to pronounce God’s judgment on Israel and Judah’s apostasy and call God’s people back to true worship and obedience. As God sends Israel and Judah into exile, He promises a future exodus of redemption.
Thus says the Lord,
Isaiah 43:16-21, ESV
who makes a way in the sea,
a path in the mighty waters,
who brings forth chariot and horse,
army and warrior;
they lie down, they cannot rise,
they are extinguished, quenched like a wick:
“Remember not the former things,
nor consider the things of old.
Behold, I am doing a new thing;
now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?
I will make a way in the wilderness
and rivers in the desert.
The wild beasts will honor me,
the jackals and the ostriches,
for I give water in the wilderness,
rivers in the desert,
to give drink to my chosen people,
the people whom I formed for myself
that they might declare my praise.
Here, the prophet Isaiah extends God’s promise of future redemption and new creation for His people, using the imagery of the first exodus: “a path in the mighty waters” where “chariot and horse…are extinguished” (cf. Exod. 14); “water in the wilderness, rivers in the desert” (cf. Exod. 17).
Awake, awake, put on strength,
Isaiah 51:9-11, ESV
O arm of the Lord;
awake, as in days of old,
the generations of long ago.
Was it not you who cut Rahab in pieces,
who pierced the dragon?
Was it not you who dried up the sea,
the waters of the great deep,
who made the depths of the sea a way
for the redeemed to pass over?
And the ransomed of the Lord shall return
and come to Zion with singing;
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads;
they shall obtain gladness and joy,
and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.
Again, Isaiah foretells a new exodus, with an eye looking back to the exodus from Egypt. In that day, God had “made the depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to pass over”. He will do it again, so that His people “return and come to Zion with singing”.
I will set my eyes on them for good, and I will bring them back to this land. I will build them up, and not tear them down; I will plant them, and not pluck them up. I will give them a heart to know that I am the LORD, and they shall be my people and I will be their God, for they shall return to me with their whole heart.
Jeremiah 24:6-7, ESV
Here, it is Jeremiah who prophesies a new exodus. God promises to bring the righteous exiles “back to this land” and He will do this in self-revelatory way like He did in the original exodus from Egypt. That is, He will execute the exodus in a covenantal context where the righteous remnant shall be His people, He will be their God, and they will “know that [He is] YHWH”.
The New Exodus Fulfilled
Of course, the promises of new exodus in the prophets (and there are many more we could quote) were fulfilled in an already-not yet sense when Cyrus sent the Jewish remnant back to the promised land to rebuild Zion. The fact that he did this with great material resources from the courts of Persia and Babylon is a solid parallel with the plundering of worldly kingdoms upon the exodus event (see Ezra 1). The house of YHWH is built with the plunder and wealth of the nations, over and over again in the biblical story.¹
But the second exodus from Babylon, back to Canaan, is not the final fulfillment of the new exodus promise. Greg Beale writes, “I think that the most plausible analysis is that although the nation was physically back in the land, it remained in spiritual exile, as well as physical exile, since it was still dominated by hostile foreign powers, and the majority of the restoration prophecies had not yet been fulfilled.”² He cites Nehemiah 9:36 in support, “Behold, we are slaves this day; in the land that you gave to our fathers to enjoy its fruit and its good gifts, behold, we are slaves.” Beale goes on to write, “The NT favors the notion that Israel was still in exile, since in the Gospels and elsewhere restoration prophecies are understood as beginning fulfillment in Christ and the church.”³
This leads us to look for the fulfillment of this new exodus promise in the New Testament.
Christ and His work are presented in the New Testament as the fulfillment of the exodus typology. Christ is our passover lamb, the sacrifice which redeems us from judgment (1 Cor. 5:7). Baptism, a sign of our union with Christ is symbolic of passing through the waters of judgment, typologically foreshadowed in Noah’s flood and in the crossing of the Red Sea (1 Pet. 3:21). Christians are identified as a “kingdom of priests” and “a holy nation” (Rev. 1:6, Rev. 5:10, 1 Pet. 2:9), which are designations of Israel in the wake of the exodus from Egypt (Exod. 19:6). In Colossians 1:13-14, Paul uses exodus language to describe the redemption of God’s people from sin and the “domain of darkness”.
He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
Colossians 1:13-14, ESV
Paul also says that Christians have been set free from slavery to sin in Romans 6:14-22. Furthermore, the victory of Christ over the oppression of the devil and his demons has resulted in humiliation of God’s enemies, another element of the exodus pattern (Col. 2:15).
Finally, the book of Revelation uses imagery from Exodus extensively to describe the work of redemption by Christ, the judgment of God upon sin, and the imperative for Christians to be holy to the Lord in the midst of their earthly sojourn. The plagues of Revelation 15-16 correspond to the plagues against Egypt in Exodus. As mentioned already, the identity of Israel as a kingdom of priests is applied to the church, a redeemed people from all tribes, nations, and languages. Revelation 18:4 calls Christians to “come out” of Babylon the Great to avoid the judgment coming upon her.
“Come out of her, my people,’
so that you will not share in her sins,
so that you will not receive any of her plagues;”
(Revelation 18:4, ESV)
This also leans heavily on the exodus typology.
Conclusion
The exodus as an event is portrayed over and over again throughout the Bible. In the Old Testament, the exodus pattern features in the narratives of Abraham, Jacob, Israel, and beyond. In the New Testament, we see the typology of the exodus come to fulfillment in the work of Christ who leads us out of bondage to sin and redeems us, forming us into a new creation in His blood.
As Christians we can apply this biblical idea by finding our identity in Christ and leaving our old life of sin behind. We still struggle with indwelling sin but the power of sin over us has been broken and we are redeemed. As a result, we are empowered by the Spirit to lead holy lives for the glory of God.
Footnotes
¹ For example, the tabernacle is built with plunder from Egypt. The temple is built with the wealth and resources of Tyre and Ophir. The second temple is built with wealth from Persia and Babylon. Even the promised future temple, fulfilled in the Spirit-indwelt church, will include the wealth of nations (Zech. 14:14).
² Greg Beale, Union with the Resurrected Christ, (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2023), 172-173.
³ Ibid, 173.
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