[This is part 2 in a series on the temptation of Egypt. See part one, three, four, five]

Leaving Egypt Ministries, Obadiah D. Morris

The comforts and distractions that are found in our Egyptian society for the time being have been successful at lulling men into complacency and keeping them from seeing the need to break out of their bondage and seek the Kingdom of God. As long as the bread and circuses—the chicken wings, beer, football, and other material pleasures—continue to flow, men see no need to turn away from these systems, which they come to believe are a result of the very ways of these systems — that taxation, public goods, state militaries, war, are life-giving.

Those who have become comfortable believing the Egyptian-statist system we live under today will be able to provide benefits indefinitely need to snap out of their delusions, because there is a price to pay for all systems of plunder — one that we’re already paying. Men should not get comfortable believing that the Egypts and Babylons and Americas of the world will work forever. For as we learn in the scriptures, “the complacency of fools will destroy them” (Proverbs 1:32). 

Then and now 

The false prosperity that still exists in the United States today helps to keep men slothful to the ways of God’s kingdom which they already forsook to lead them into bondage. They see no reason to walk out of Egypt because they believe that Egypt provides for all their needs. They see no reason to build the literal Kingdom of God and trust that the Lord will bless such labors and be with us as doers of His word (1 Cor 15:58; Gal 6:9; Eph 6:10; Col 3:23-24; Heb 6:10; Rom 2:7; Luke 11:2, 12:43; Matt 7:21; Psa 22:28).

Just as the Israelites doubted God’s provision during the Biblical exodus from Egypt, people today cling to the false security of human government — not always realizing they are trading their freedom for an unsustainable peace and prosperity. They doubt that God will care for them and turn backward to the false and temporary comforts of Egypt instead of moving forward in faith toward the Lord.

“The people contended with Moses, ‘Give us water to drink.’ ‘Why do you contend with me?’ Moses replied. ‘Why do you test the LORD?’ But people thirsted for water there, and they grumbled against Moses: ‘Why have you brought us out of Egypt — to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?’” (Exodus 17:2-3). 

Rather than seek God’s kingdom and make the difficult journey to the Promised Land that requires sacrifice, patience, and faith, many men prefer to stay behind in Egypt, even though it means they will eventually be destroyed.

“‘If only we had died by the LORD’s hand in the land of Egypt!’ they said. ‘There we sat by pots of meat and ate our fill of bread, but you have brought us into this desert to starve this whole assembly to death!’” (Exodus 16:3). 

Such hunger and desperation in the desert leads men back to the “free” bread of Rome, which is however buttered with the blood of their neighbor. People start turning their eyes back to Egypt, where they endured lives as tax-slaves on one big plantation that always threatened to put them in a cage for not sending Pharaoh money, but at least had chicken wings and beer to show for it! 

Further scriptures account for this complaining by the people on their way out of Egypt, where they were (like men today) living in tax bondage but mistakenly believed they were being provided for in exchange for it, just as statists do today when they justify taxation under the notion that “we get something in return for it.”

“Meanwhile, the rabble among them had a strong craving for other food, and again the Israelites wept and said, ‘Who will feed us meat? We remember the fish we ate freely in Egypt, along with the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic. But now our appetite is gone; there is nothing to see but this manna!’” (Numbers 11:4-6). 

False prosperity keeps men in bondage 

The false and apparent benefits of Egyptian-statist societies that are able to exist for sometime during the peak of empires make it difficult for us to lead people out of their enslavement. The free, God-centered society that we attempt to point men toward remains largely unknown and unseen. It is a different route altogether from the one men are used to driving on — the road less traveled that men avoid not knowing if it’s worth the risk to try a new, much more narrow path.

The present and visible system around them is then perceived to be a safer bet, even if men have a hunch it isn’t quite working out. They are then able to place their chips with their Egyptian captors, even if it means they live as slaves. The place we’re trying to lead them from, with its yoke of bondage, is seen as acceptable as long as the food and other benefits are forthcoming. Statism is essentially maintained on the saying “better the devil you know,” even though the alternative society in God’s kingdom is no devil at all — it’s simply an untried method of mutual service and love of neighbor that people struggle to put their faith in. Whereas God grants liberty and prosperity, statists take the “safer” and known road of bondage-with-benefits and give up freedom for the illusion of security and plenty.

Living under an empire that has managed to project this illusion of prosperity and comfort makes it incredibly difficult to wake people from their complacency and warn them that the foundation of their beloved Egyptian societies are a foundation built on sand, destined to wash away when the storm comes (Luke 6:47-49). Despite our urgent pleas for repentance and separation from worldly systems, most men stubbornly cling to the comforting lies and propaganda of many soothsayers who rock them to sleep with sweet words of how great things are going in their empires, and they mock the prophets who bring them the truth. It becomes difficult even for us to bear the resistance to our call for these men to stop being deceived by lies and abandon the systems of this world. These complaints were so burdensome to Moses, who was trying to lead the men out of their bondage, that he asked God to kill him (Num 11:15). The prophet Elijah, feeling as if he was one of the only ones seeing the truth, had come to the same point of despair too (1 Kings 19:4). 

When trying to lead men to seek the Kingdom of God, which comes with its own sacrifices and trust in God’s providence in the absence of state rule, they often cling to their existing socialist systems. These systems offer a false sense of security and prosperity, financed through borrowed wealth and credit expansion rather than genuine savings and investment. They offer the appearance that things are better in Egypt, that Pharaoh’s hand is richer than God’s. Thus, men are resistant to living the way that God commands us to live, preferring the familiar—if enslaving and ultimately doomed—comforts of their current way of life, allowing them to lament, “We were better off in Egypt” (Num 11:18).

Despite the false prosperity offered by the Egyptian system, which ultimately enslaves and destroys men once the empire has run its course, people often prefer the fleeting comforts of Egypt over seeking God’s eternal kingdom. They fail to recognize that the supposed riches of Egypt only provide temporary nourishment, while the Kingdom of God offers everlasting fulfillment. They fail to realize than men can’t live on bread alone but need the whole word that proceeds from the mouth of God. The bread of Egypt, which comes with bondage, remains a reference point that men look to that keeps them from seeking God’s kingdom. 

“There in the desert the whole congregation of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron. ‘If only we had died by the LORD’s hand in the land of Egypt!’ they said. ‘There we sat by pots of meat and ate our fill of bread, but you have brought us into this desert to starve this whole assembly to death!’” (Exodus 16:2-3). 

Rather than look toward the future where God provides for His faithful servants providentially, the people who are lost in the world of lies prefer to trust in Egypt—in the staff of Pharaoh and his chariots and horsemen—rather than walk away from it. They abandon the idea that God protects His people and come to believe security requires human rulers. They believe that everything they have comes from state rulers, militaries, and tax-funded governments, even though God says that all those who trust in these systems are fools who get destroyed and handed over to their enemies (Psa 118:8-9, 146:3; Isa 20:5-6, 30:1-3, 31:1, 36:6; Jer 2:36-37, 46:25-26; Hos 7:11).

The grumblings we see in the Bible of men looking back to the alleged glories and dainties of Egypt is the same thing we see today, where men neglect to seek the Kingdom of God because everything appears to be going great in the empire today. But they should know that these “benefits” of living in Egyptian-statist societies do not last forever. They are socialist systems, built on robbing your neighbors as a means of providing for their welfare, which always results in everyone being robbed and broken. These are the means that are contrary to true service and love of neighbor, which are based in voluntary charity, mutual aid, and true brotherly love. The apparent abundance and wealth and benefits have come through plunder and cannot continue indefinitely.

Anyone counting on Egypt today to keep providing these benefits and living standards forever is a fool. All empires must face a day of reckoning — a day of the Lord where they come under complete judgment for their evils and are torn down for their sins.