Genesis 46: "Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt"

Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for I will make you into a great nation there.  I will go down to Egypt with you, and I will bring you back again.  (Genesis 46:3-4)

Journeys away from home, even to a foreign land, are not always reluctant ones.  There are many reasons people branch out into somewhere new, away from their forefathers - whether it's just to the next village or to an entirely new continent.  For some, the movement is a privilege, but for others there is no choice as they are forced unwillingly from their homes because there is no other option available to them.  Abraham was called out of his homeland by God and chose to trust and follow that call, but it probably would have felt like Jacob's family fall far closer to the latter.  camp.  Granted, they were going to Joseph and so were by no means alone, but they were 'pushed out' not 'called from'.  

However, there is a far deeper thing going here too.  Canaan is the promised land - not just the one Jacob happened to have been born in.  It is the place to which his grandfather Abraham was called to.  To him, it is the epicentre of God's providence and promises, and the fulfilment of the hope that is in those promises.  In practical terms, it is the place where, one can assume, the nation of Israel can grow in the ways of their God, free from the 'corruption' of others?  (At least, that is the possibly what the future promise looks like, when God gives them the land fully).  Is it possibly meant to be, in some ways 'heaven on Earth'?  

And yet our God was not one who stayed in Heaven, but went down into Egypt - literally, metaphorically, and literally again just to make sure we could make the connection.  God went down into the real Egypt 1200 years earlier and rescued his people from slavery, and in doing this pointed to a truth that he would not stay in Heaven but come down into the world in the person of Jesus to be among us, to rescue us (and the infant Jesus and his family were also refugees in the actual Egypt, in order that the prophecy would be fulfilled: out of Egypt I called my Son - see Matthew 2:15).  And so he also calls us not out of the world, but to it, to make disciples, and to live as foreigners in a strange world until he calls us home.

But many of us are tempted to try and stay in Canaan.  We try and create it in our churches, our homes, and other places.   The world outside can feel fearful, so we want to shield our children and ourselves.  But here we see God speaking to Jacob: do not be afraid to go down to Egypt...I will go down with you.

God is not restricted to 'Holy Places'.  We do not need a promised land, a temple, here on earth, because God is one who goes with us.  He calls us (or pushes us!) out of the safety and into the world, because he goes with us.  There is a promised land waiting for us - the place where we will be with God forever and see him face to face, but until that day we are, like Jacob, not called to run away from the world, but bring the kingdom to it.  We should expect to be foreigners, but know that our God goes with us as Lord of all, and, as he promises Jacob, will bring us back home again.

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