The next course I selected as part of my Unschooled Master of Theology program was the KI course, Exodus part 1, which covers the first half of the Book of Exodus. Here are the Discussion Questions for the entire course, along with my responses.
As a reminder, you can find all of my course assignments for the uThM here.
So, let’s get started….
What I Know?
I do not know much about Exodus beyond the surface-level text. I know that Joseph closed out the book of Genesis by bringing his entire family (father, mother, twelve brothers) down to Egypt, and Pharaoh set them up with the best land and gave them space to live and thrive as a family. This was all due to Joseph and what he did for the nation of Egypt, for the Pharaoh (transforming the economy), and saving millions from death by famine. Exodus is said to be part of the Torah Code, but through my own investigation, I have found this to be false, as it does not align with Dr. Missler’s explanation.
I also know from personal experience that Exodus is very difficult to read, so I’m thankful to the people behind the Bible Project and others who make such books much easier to access, especially for my children.
What Do I Want to Know?
1. How does Jesus show up on every page of the book of Exodus?
2. What prophecies does Dr. Missler refer to when he says Exodus is filled with prophecy?
Lecture 1
How does the faith of the midwives speak to the issue of civil disobedience? Share an incident of how you have acted in a similar manner.
So we see the midwives in question, Shiphrah and Puah, in Exodus 1, exhibited great faith and trust in God when they were commanded to execute the Hebrew babies. Instead, they “feared God” and passively refused the order. When questioned, they answered with a justification that, while not necessarily untruthful, was deceptive. The fact that the Jewish women gave birth before they could arrive was not the actual reason that they did what they did. So, in essence, they did lie, if only by omission (not giving the full justification). But in verse 20, we see that “God dealt well with the midwives,” which indicates that God justified or approved the midwives’ actions. This goes against the popular idea that God cannot lie or support or condone a lie, even though it directly contradicts 1 Kings 22:19-23, which clearly shows that God does author deception when needed for his good pleasure.
Peter echoes this idea of obeying God and not man in Acts 5:27–32 and we see it rubbing against the prohibition to ideas of revolution as outlawed by Paul in Titus 3:1; Rom 13:1-7; 1 Tim 2:1-3; Heb 13:17; 1 Pet 2:13-17. Even Jesus said the same in Matt 22:21. So, we must obey the authorities put over men in everything until those laws contradict what God’s Word says, or what God convicts us of. Once this contradiction occurs, we must always side with God, even to death. We see this in the midwives, as they could have just as easily been executed as questioned for not doing as they were commanded.
The only time I’ve experienced anything like this is when I refused to take the COVID vaccine when our employer finally made it a requirement. I submitted a religious exemption based on an argument drawn directly from Scripture. This was approved, and I was allowed to keep my job, even though many around me did not get their exemptions approved. But, I would say that what I experienced was nothing compared to what others experienced in losing their jobs or being publicly shamed for their religious convictions. Indeed, it was nowhere near the same as what those midwives must have gone through when they disobeyed the king’s command. The Bible is actually replete with this kind of “civil disobedience,” though I would caution the use of this term since it is imbued with much more than just refusal based on religious conviction.
How do you see Moses’ upbringing shaping him for God’s service? How has your upbringing shaped you for God’s service?
Moses saw two distinct 40-year periods in his upbringing before God, before he was given his task, ministry, or mission. First, he was raised in Pharaoh’s court, and second, he was raised in the wilderness on the backside of the desert. Both prepared him with the skills, traits, personal dispositions, and cultural insights needed for his journey from Egypt into the desert. He would have forged a great deal of patience, which was very needed, given the stiff-necked nature of the Israelite people.
As for myself, God saved me at 17, put me through a four-year desert in the military, where I was firmly grounded in Scripture. Then he set me out for 10 years in futile service to modern evangelical churches. In my 30s, I explored the house church movement. After this, I found contemplative Christianity and spent 13+ years testing my vocation as a contemplative. I was certain at this point that I would spend the rest of my life as a religious celibate. I could accept this and longed for it. It was the perfect expression of my faith and pursuit of Christ. I longed to enter a monastery, but was rebuffed multiple times – mostly by monasteries closing in the US, but other times because of debts, illness, or compromise by the monasteries themselves. I finally settled into idyorhythmic monasticism under private vows. But before I could step into this vocation and state full-time, God changed my trajectory, and I am now married. I have found that all that preparation in the last 30+ years was forged for this very purpose – loving my wife and raising our adopted children. My time spent in the military (which had little to do with the army itself but everything to do with God), my time with the churches, my time with housechurches, my time as an non-monastery monk, the jobs I had over the years, the books I read, it all has been put to use in some way or another in this new life. God has blessed me with excellent provision, opportunity, challenge, and issues to address within myself. All for his greater purpose.
Consider the implications of chapter 2:11-25. How do you feel about God using a murderer to further His plans? How has God used personal failure in your life to His glory?
So, I look at this a little differently than I think many do. I do not have an issue with Moses being a murderer. God uses people from all walks of life, from every conceivable past, and he puts people through horrendous pain and suffering all for the sake of others later. The Bible is full of shady characters that God used and even touted as people of great faith. So this idea that we must be ethically pure or ethically upstanding before God can or will use us is ludicrous. God uses the foolish things of this world to confound the wise.
I explore these themes in my work, in the novels we publish and classes we teach, especially one young man who has inherited a family curse—demonic possession—that drives him to do horrible, unspeakable atrocities—unforgivable evil. And yet, in the end, God does save him. He comes to Christ. And how can all of his horrible sins be forgiven when he has made no retribution or contrition? What about the families and loved ones of those he so brutally tortured and murdered? Must they accept the judgment? Is there a sin or an aggregation of sins that would be too much even for God’s grace?
In Hebrews 11 we read “by faith Moses’ parents…”, and “by faith Moses…” Continue the story “by faith (substitute your name…” and discuss your journey of faith.
So, by faith, I have walked through my life without understanding God’s direction or plan for me beforehand. A lot of the time, I have walked in ignorance of his will for my life. It was not until three years ago that God made in me a dramatic and extreme shift in my orientation – moving me from a celibate, contemplative life of eight years to a new life with a devoted wife and a massive group of children to love and raise, as well as placing me in active service to the local church. Everything he had me do, learn, or build up over my entire life has benefited someone in these last three years. Even my own trauma, my own childhood, has prepared me to be able to help my own children and also help people in the church work through their own pains of their past. It has given me a greater appreciation for the difficulties in my life – the challenges, the roadblocks, the hardships – they were all for the benefit of another, my own learning, and God’s glory.
What does Pharaoh fear? What did his fear prompt him to do? Discuss the role of fear in your life. Has it led you to make unwise decisions? Explain. How should we deal with fear?
Pharaoh feared that his own authority and the stability of the kingdom would be threatened. He saw the Jews’ population outpacing that of the Egyptians, and thus, they were seen as a potential threat to the status quo. Even though they had enslaved them and used them for manual labor, they were prosperous in numbers if nothing else. He was concerned they might rise up against them, either aligning with their enemies or revolting outright. He was driven by fear and wanted only to keep what he already had. He not only enslaved them, but he also tried to enact population control by killing the male children when they were born.
Fear has guided my life a great deal over the years. Mostly, it was the fear of being hurt by others, so I systematically cut off all contact with others. Then I intentionally brought back into my life only those activities and individuals that could be controlled and were safe. I designed my entire life under this principle. In the end, I think it resulted in my resistance to heeding God’s call to fellowship with the local church again. For probably a year or more, I was convinced to reach out to several churches, but I resisted. It was only when he upended my life and brought me a wife and family that I finally heeded the conviction, and we began to associate with and invest in the church.
Fear is a complex issue to deal with, mainly because it often rests on either a lie or a truth we adamantly believe. It is either rooted in the thought that we will lose what we have or are not good enough to achieve what we desire, or some variation thereof. But, to deal with this effectively, we must persistently present it to God, lay it at Jesus’ feet, and ask him to help us with our unbelief. We cannot do anything about it on our own. We can seek counseling, we can develop coping skills, but in the end, it is God who must heal us from our own beliefs that are deceiving us.
What do you hope to get out of this course of study? What are you willing to put into it? Share a new insight you gained from this session.
I am interested in finding out what Exodus is all about. Why was it written and included in the Torah? What does it have for us today, and why would it be beneficial to study it and absorb it along with the other Scriptures? As with all my KI classes, I have committed to answering the discussion questions in-depth. I watch the videos, taking notes as I go. I have enjoyed my time at KI and look forward to finishing the program and launching headlong into full-time ministry. I never thought I would ever get to this point. I don’t know if I gained any new insights from this lesson. It has been mostly reviewed.
K-W-L Self Assessment: L- Describe what you LEARNED from this session.
I found it interesting that Hebrews 11:26 discusses Moses’ understanding and knowing about Christ. I did some digging, and in John 5:46, Jesus says, “For if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me.” He explicitly states that Moses wrote about Jesus in the Mosaic Law. Deut 18:15–19 is a specific prophecy about the Messiah and the raising up of a future prophet. This is also seen in Luke 24:27. Jesus even extends this to other parts of the Old Testament (Luke 24:44). The apostles were convinced of this fact (John 1:45).
Lecture 2
Share a time when you felt as though you were standing on “holy ground.” What made it sacred? How did it affect your relationship with God?
There have been a handful of times when I was out in the woods or out on the lake, out on my property. I could sit there for hours, just be still and listen to the silence. It was and still is my church. It saddens me that I’m not able to go out like that much anymore. Since getting married, we are either on the go (driving here or there for this or that, lots of long trips, etc.), at home schooling the kids, or I’m up in the office writing full-time.
The sacredness of those past experiences was very special to me. It is truly the only time in my entire Christian walk that I genuinely felt God working in my life, communing with me, sitting next to me, talking to me without words. It summons thoughts about what it must have been like for the civilizations before ours, what it must have been like for the native americans here on this same land, what it might be like for those civilizations that will come after ours. We know next to nothing about those from the past. How many of us will remain in the future? Those times were special because I could sit and consider, ponder, and ruminate on Scripture. It had a profound, transformative experience for me, and it has led me into a much deeper relationship with God.
My relationship and walk with God have never had to do with other people as much as with how he would deal with me, guide me, walk with me in the quiet places, the wild places. But now, he has called me to put all of that knowledge, all of that contemplative experience, and apply it to others, for the sake of others, for their benefit. It is much, much harder to do.
I trust him, and I trust in his plan for my life and for the different seasons he has me walk through. But I do miss those days in the woods, or in my kayak, watching sunrises and having bats flying inches from me while paddling in the early morning dark. They are very fond memories.
What would God have to do to get your attention to commit to a new mission in life? Explain.
He has done this now three times in my walk since I was 17. It first started when I was 17, and he set up circumstances where I would be alone in a hospital room with a Bible (as a Buddhist), and he took my martial arts and my worldview and turned it on its head. He took my meditation and replaced it with a thirst for his word, a thirst that has stayed with me for over 30 years.
The second time was the end of my first marriage. I recognized as I was driving away from our house, losing everything – my wife, my children that I had just spent and invested five years of my life with – in exchange for a broken down van that I would live in for the next few months. That traumatic event changed the course of my faith, where I was shortly after introduced to the contemplative life, something that was rarely spoken of in evangelical circles back then. That sparked a personal journey into the mystical expression of our faith, one that I hold on to.
The third time he did this was three years ago, when, out of my contemplative bliss, he called me to married life once again. He told me in no uncertain terms that I needed to prepare for a future wife. That was it. He just woke me up one day and put that in my head. I spent three long, miserable months arguing with him, reasoning with him, bargaining with him. But nothing worked. Exactly three months after that first day, I met my future wife, and two months later, we were married. She is my best friend, my biggest fan, and we spend just about every waking moment together. Now I am the father to three children, four if you count our adult daughter, and six more adult children (who left home right when we were getting married), and three other adults who the family claims as siblings. And we are working on adopting five more children in the next year or so. It has become a crazy life full of change. I have also been given ample provision to pursue a writing career, writing supernatural suspense novels that will hopefully serve as a bridge to bring people to Christ. I started writing again after my divorce, and there was no way I could have continued with what needed to be done to succeed. But my wife has become the biggest supporter of my writing in the last three years, and she provides me all the time I could need to make this a success for us, for our family, and, prayerfully, for the glory of God.
Describe a time when God called you to do something that went beyond your natural ability. How did God sustain you?
The last three years are a good example. First, he called my wife and me to serve at a local church. It was a small church with about 40 people. We were warmly welcomed, and our willingness to serve and do whatever was needed was graciously accepted by the pastor. I started teaching Sunday School even though I was a nervous wreck, and it was not at all enjoyable for me. We took on way too much, and it strained our marriage for two solid years. But we persevered. We held out. We tried and tried to provide the church and her people opportunities to serve and grow. It finally became clear that the problem lay with the church’s leadership. One individual had a stranglehold on the church, made every decision about what would be done, when, and how, and actively suppressed the gospel and the works of service from being done. The last year became a nightmare for my wife, my children, and me. We discovered that the pastor and his wife, though we had thought they were our friends, turned on us. The individual in question, who was calling the shots, sicced his family on us – they were very hostile, nasty, just mental, and made life miserable for our kids and for us. When we discovered that the church leadership was not following the bylaws, we first tried to work with them. Still, they closed ranks to keep the status quo, and it went to the church business meeting, where a large majority passed it to establish elders.
Through it all, we had people who we thought were our friends betray us and try to throw us to the wolves for their own hidden agendas. We had a pastor who claimed to be a Christ follower, but his actions betrayed his real motives and his overall lack of integrity.
In the end, the church received what it asked for—the same with a different name. The man who was forcing himself on the church is now an elder of the church. So is the man who feigned friendship with us only to get himself also elected as an elder. And the pastor who has no moral scruples at all, likewise, is still employed. They have now essentially run off anyone who was in opposition to them, leaving several people without a church, from a church these people had been attending and were a part of for many years.
Throughout the whole fiasco, there were times when I did not think we would survive. There was a tremendous amount of stress on me, on my wife, and our children had to suffer the loss of their friends after the children in the church (those of the pastor and the legacy family in question) instructed their children to stop talking to us. It broke their hearts, and it broke mine, knowing there was nothing I could do about it. We discovered through it all that the friendships and relationships we thought we had with the people were fake, fraudulent. When we finally left, we found in the weeks and now months after that, we were and are still all suffering from a deep-seated wound, fighting rising bitterness, and an all-consuming aimlessness as we try to understand what the point was of all of it.
I have learned that I do not want to be a teacher in the conventional sense. I know that I do not wish to serve in a church where no one else is willing to stand up and do their part or exercise their gifts. It has refocused and clarified what it is we feel called to do for Christ and for the Kingdom of God. The pastorate is not it. We are now trying to become a part of a larger church close by, but it is challenging. They are not the warmest or welcoming of people. But our children like the youth group. They attend camp with the kids from this church. So my wife and I are trying to make it work, despite feeling very out of place and very bitter and sensitive. When I look out now at the sea of faces on Sunday morning, I see the people there. Still, I also see the old faces of those people we let into our lives, that we opened up to, that we became vulnerable with, who in turn stabbed us in the back and in the front and every other way you could wound a person. It is tough not to presume that it is when, not if, these new people will do the same thing.
My instinct is to cut and run. To disavow the modern organized church, which is what I did after my divorce, and it served me well for 18 years. I concluded that the contemporary evangelical church model was not the church Jesus was building (and I still think this). Still, it is an amalgam, an albatros, a human invention where the genuine church is often found “in” because the American church is so broken and full of apathy that she cannot organize herself under the direction of the Spirit of God. But for whatever reason, we are confident that we are to go and stay with a modern, evangelical church. For the sake of the kids, maybe, who all three have a powerful and evident call from God on their lives—a call out of pain and abuse and trauma, into Christ.
But after all this, we can come away with the confidence that God does provide everything we might need. It might not be fun what he calls us to do. It might not be comfortable. It can even be downright painful. But through it all, we have learned that he does not leave anything behind. He does not squander resources, lessons, or corrections. I can attest that he is not stingy with the joy, the peace, and the good gifts he gives his children. I am a walking testimony to the goodness of our God, for my life today is the answer to a prayer I prayed five or six years ago, when I felt God tugging on me to write as a ministry, to use the latent, buried gift that he gave me in childhood. He has provided everything I could need and then some. He is a great God, and he has provided the opportunity for me to do the one thing that I’ve always wanted to do, and he continues to inspire me, give me the ability and desire to do it.
To him, I am so grateful.
From what you have learned so far about Moses, what lesson(s) will you take to fulfill God’s plan for your life?
Moses spent more than forty years in the wilderness of Midian before God called him back into public service in Egypt. That period was not punishment but preparation. God formed Moses through obscurity rather than prominence, shaping his dependence, patience, and attentiveness away from power and recognition. What looked like delay was, in reality, deliberate formation for the task God had already determined.
I recognize the same pattern in my own life. For more than thirty years I believed my faith was somehow malformed and that my distance from the church reflected a deficiency in me. In that season of isolation, however, God was quietly feeding me, giving me time for sustained immersion in Scripture and spiritual formation. When He finally led me out of that “desert” into service, mission, and ministry, it became clear that nothing had been wasted. Every skill, habit, experience, and resource formed during that hidden season has since been used—either for my growth or for the benefit of others. God’s plan does not arise from human readiness or self-perceived qualification, but from His faithfulness and providence, working all things together for those who love Him.
Discuss the objections Moses made at the burning bush. What objections do you make? Are they the same or different? What does God say to you about them?
Moses’ first objection—“Who am I?” (Exod 3:11)—reveals a crisis of identity rather than uncertainty about the task. Having lost his status in Egypt and spent decades in obscurity, Moses no longer saw himself as fit for leadership. God does not dispute Moses’ self-assessment; instead, He redirects the focus away from Moses and anchors the mission in His own presence: “I will be with you.” The calling rests on God’s faithfulness, not human worthiness. I experienced something similar after my first divorce, when I became convinced I was disqualified from ministry altogether. Believing that legitimate service meant pastoring a church, I resigned myself to obscurity and returned to writing merely as catharsis. What I could not see then was that this act of resignation became the very ministry God had prepared—writing fiction that embeds the gospel for those who would never step into a church.
Moses’ questions—“Who are You?” and “They will not believe me” (Exod 3:13; 4:1)—reflect concerns over authority, legitimacy, and acceptance. God answers by revealing His covenant name, YHWH, and by providing signs that place the burden of credibility on divine power rather than human persuasion. I have long wrestled with similar feelings of illegitimacy, shaped by inadequate credentials and reinforced by academic culture. Over time, I have learned that acceptance itself is often an illusion. The work God has given me, and the way it is expressed, was never designed to fit comfortably within modern evangelical structures. My distance from them has not been a sign of deficient faith, but a consequence of faithfulness that challenges tradition rather than conforms to it.
When Moses says, “I am not eloquent” and finally, “Send someone else” (Exod 4:10, 13), he moves from perceived inability to resistance. God responds by asserting His sovereignty over human limitation and, when Moses refuses outright, by correcting him without abandoning him—providing Aaron while still requiring obedience. God never attempts to build Moses’ confidence; He consistently points to His own presence, name, and authority. The mission depends entirely on who God is, not on who the servant believes himself to be. Even God’s anger is tempered with provision, demonstrating that His purposes are accomplished not through human readiness, but through His faithful providence—sometimes through obedience, and sometimes even through resistance.
In Exodus 6:1-8 how does God assure Moses of His trustworthiness? Who do you know who needs some encouragement? What will you do to encourage that individual?
In Exodus 6:1–8, God assures Moses of His trustworthiness by grounding His promise in His identity—“I am YHWH”—and by declaring seven definitive “I will” statements that emphasize His covenant initiative and certainty: He will bring out, deliver, redeem, take, be their God, bring into the land, and give it as a possession. Trust is rooted not in circumstances but in God’s unchanging character and sworn promises. I know individuals who are discouraged by delays and resistance. I also have children who need consistent encouragement, so they can learn how to frame their circumstances in the most appropriate ways. Encouragement can come in many forms and must be tailored to the individual, but generally, prayer (known but better closeted), encouragement through Scripture, and illustrating God’s mechanisms for comfort and encouragement without blasting them with Scripture.
K-W-L Self Assessment: L- Describe what you LEARNED from this session.
Nothing to add.
Lecture 3
Who or what would be represented by the “sorcerers” in today’s world? Explain.
These two individuals (Jannes and Jambres) represent the counterfeit spiritual and fleshly authority we find in what is classified as “the church” today. Just as those magicians could imitate some of Moses’ miracles, they could not do all of them, and as they reached the limits of their power source, they finally admitted, “This is the finger of God” (Exod 8:19). There are now whole systems in place, traditions that have hundreds of years of history behind them, and established gatekeepers who brand any alternative view to their traditional view as heretical. They are supernatural deceptions, mimicking (2 Th 2:9) truth but lacking divine authority.
This certainly could include occultism, occult-adjacent spirituality, false religious systems, or ideologies that contain moral language but are absent from biblical grounding. But, the most aggregious are those who claim to be followers of Christ but by their actions they prove that they are something else. Such individuals and groups as a whole exercise technological or pyschological manipulation and present it as ultimate authority.
In what ways are you like Pharaoh?
Once Pharaoh made up his mind, it took the active, intended will of God to break it. I am often this way. Most of the time I see things unclearly, do not see the whole picture, especially spiritual ramifications. We all suffer under pride, partial obedience, resistance toward surrender, ignorance of repeated warning, and a gradual hardening of my will until I have shut out God’s voice altogether.
How does God “harden hearts” today? Give examples. How has your heart been hardened?
Those who are persistent in choosing their flesh and their own desires, God turns them over to those same desires so that those desires might increase in intensity and severity (Ro 1:24-28). It appears to be an almost synergistic process: we harden our hearts; God hardens our hearts; we make choices; and we were made in such a way that these were the choices we would make all along. It is the searing of the heart against God and against truth. The more we reject him and the longer we ignore his voice, the quieter he becomes, to the point that we can no longer hear him at all, or, I would say, even worse, he stops talking to us.
If involved in an illicit affair with a coworker, we can make all kinds of excuses as to why we can do so. We might be having trouble with our spouse. If the other person’s spouse were a better communicator or a better lover, or the like, then that person wouldn’t be stepping out on them. I am lonely. I am angry. The list can be endless. But this is the beginning of the long journey toward delusion, where we can come to a point where we are divorcing our spouse to marry the person we were having an affair with, and thinking that it is God encouraging us to do so!
Personally, for many years, I was hardened against relationships altogether. I believe the lie that I was not worthy of love, that people could not be trusted, and that there was simply no one in this world who would meet my requirements for a spouse. I believed that I had ruined my first marriage, and so I was taken out of circulation. Little did I know then that God had much different plans for me.
Does God still send plagues today? Explain and give examples.
God still allows us to be judged, to be subjected to natural events, to be exposed to false doctrine (this is widely prevalent), and we can be punished by governmental events, responses, and activities. There are still societal collapses, which are often linked to moral decay. God controls disease, famine, and everything else under the sun. This does not mean that every disaster is direct punishment for sin (Lu 13:1-5).
CM points out that Satan works by imitation. Have you been caught in his web? Explain.
I was, as a new believer, subjected to imitation when a dear brother I worked with made it his mission to get me “baptized by the Holy Spirit” so that I would speak in tongues and be saved. He took me to every Pentecostal church he could find in Germany, and I sat through many sermons and church events, watching everyone in the room but me get worked into complete chaos—screaming, wailing, babbling, being slain—for most of the service, only to pick themselves back up off the floor, dust off their clothes and return to their seats ten minutes before the service let out. They purported miracles and Christ-like authority in their pronouncements. They used Scripture to back up their claims, and it was a bizarre scene for me because, as a new believer, I had no context from which to judge what was happening. It looked real, but it just wasn’t working on me for some reason. But, then again, I was in the process of reading through the entire Bible at the time. As Missler states, if you are intimately familiar with the genuine article, the counterfeit is easily spotted. I was able to see that much, if not all, of what I was being exposed to was cultural, ego- and sign-seeking-driven, and was often detached from spiritual maturity and consistent biblical interpretation.
As for me personally, being taken in by imitation, I would say, was when I was in Texas and was invited to become an Amway distributor. I was driven by the promise that I could make 100K in a year, which would be enough to break my enlistment in the military. Once in, I discovered a culture of religious vocabulary and talk, but eventually I uncovered the scam behind the artifice. By the time I got to Germany, I was able to distance myself from it. I attribute this to my increased grounding in Scripture that first year overseas, which I did not have to rely on while in Texas. As my intimacy and familiarity with the genuine article grew, the imitation became apparent.
What safeguards do you have in place to protect you from Satan’s weapon of imitation?
I would say one of the greatest weapons I have is a deeply intimate, second-nature knowledge of Scripture. I have spent years consuming and saturating myself in God’s Word. I made it the prime endeavor in my life, even over furthering career, family, or other relationships. I forsook wealth and convention and instead pursued God wholeheartedly (you do not have to do it this way, but it is simply what I chose).
Additionally, Acts 17:11, thanks to Dr. Missler, has been a touchstone for me since I was 19 and I first listened to one of his tapes late at night in my barracks room. I was able to subject emotional impulse to doctrinal grounding, and also subject tradition and denominational dogma to biblical truth. I exercised 1 John 4:1 and tested the spirits before believing what they claimed.
K-W-L Self Assessment: L- Describe what you LEARNED from this session.
Nothing to add.
Lecture 4
Have you ever celebrated a Passover? If so, please share with us your experiences. Did it have a spiritual impact on you?
Yes, I have. It was a Sedar held at a tiny rural church God had called me to restore when I was in my 20s. The members were predominantly Pentecostal (the leader of the church had forcefully taken over a few years before and kicked all of the local people from the community out).
The Sedar was organized by one of the women in the church, who was a messianic believer (not Jewish). She made some really horrible-tasting and smelling food. I was unable to eat any of it. She also took offense at me for not wearing a yamica because of 1 Corinthians 11:4.
It was very confusing, with little activity actually explained. The rituals were not explained either.
Do you think God is issuing warnings today? Explain. If so, why do you think people are ignoring those warnings?
I would say that God warns us through Scripture. Prophecy has been quite dramatic over the last 50-100 years. The reestablishment of Israel was traumatic for the entire world. I think when America finally turns its back on Israel, what happens to us will also be a great warning sign for everyone else.
I think people ignore it because of the blindness God has given them, so they cannot see the truth (2 Cor 4:4).
I would also say that I do think God talks to us individually when he wants to. I believe he has spoken to me on several occasions, but it is neither audible nor verbal. It is to my soul, and he provides impressions, healing, and resolution. This was how I came to believe in God in the first place. He impressed upon me the truth of the Bible when I was a Buddhist on my way to the monastery. He took my meditation from me, and for the next year, regardless of how much I tried, I could not return to my false religion.
I have also found numerous divine warnings in the actions and behavior of other people. Most people. I have watched people make mistake after mistake and subsequently reaped the consequences of those poor choices. I have spent the better part of my adult life learning lessons from other people and then self-correcting so I do not make the same mistakes they do.
What are the gods of your culture today? Is God demonstrating His power over those gods? Explain.
Mostly, our gods are not deities because in our modern culture, we are thoroughly atheistic, even in modern churches. Despite the claims to belief in God and the Bible, many professing Christians and professional clergy only give lip service to the supernatural realm, to the reality of demons, angels, and powers and authorities.
Our gods are materialism, technology, political power, human autonomy, and wealth; in the last five years or so, we have erected the new god of woke ideology. This falls directly in line with Isaiah 5:20, in that they would “call evil good, and good evil; that [they would] put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that [they would] put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” Only today do we see the landscape of mental health claiming all mental health issues are a problem except for one: gender dysphoria. That, they claim, is a legitimate expression and an individual right. It is insanity! And it leads directly to the persecution of biblical Christians who are unable or unwilling to remain silent about the truth of it all.
God seems to allow a great deal of sin and havoc to unfold. He certainly does not punish the wicked in their wickedness. He does allow the weak to be taken advantage of. Sickness, sadness, depression, and addiction all run rampant in our streets. I believe he demonstrates his power and his authority to those he is saving. But to those who are committing these atrocities, he has turned them over so that their sin might increase.
What lessons do you draw personally from the Passover? How is it relevant to your daily walk?
You have to apply the blood, not merely know it. You must surrender, must put the blood on the doorposts. If you do not, then you will die. I don’t know how relevant it is to my daily walk. I do not ascribe to the modern concept of the purity pledge that is so often taught in evangelical circles. Yes, we are to abstain; we are to transform through the miraculous power of sanctification. But it is an unfinished work. None of us is perfect, and none of us is finished with that process. No matter how well we might clean up or how pristine my church clothes might be.
We are given Christ’s blood explicitly because we are unable to get to the finish line (the completion of our sanctification) without it. If we were to be held responsible for our infractions, none would be saved but Christ. So we are given this safety net, and while we are working out our own salvation with fear and trembling, God is giving us an escape hatch. A do-over. The only reason we should live a certain way in this world is that God specifically told us to, and we have the conviction to do so. Not because of some inflated external standard set by the religious zealots of our day.
Select a difficult experience from your life and explain how God demonstrated His power.
There was a time in my mid-20s when I found myself trying to help a family in need. They were homeless, the parents addicted to drugs and alcohol. I met the father where I worked at the time, and we became friends.
It took a few years, but the father could not remain sober, even though he tried to. Once he confessed that he was back to using again, I made the decision to move out of their house. They then decided to go after me. They would call my parents’ house nonstop, yelling at anyone who would listen. They continued attending the rural church I was a part of at the time. It was a terrible time in my life, a season I would not wish on my worst enemy.
But through much prayer, I got through it, and within a few months, the family imploded. The husband and wife split up, and they all moved away. I was unscathed. God protected me, provided for me. He never once gave me more than I could handle.
For me, it was a confirmation of Romans 8:28.
The Passover was celebrated in haste, staff in hand, shoes on feet. They were prepared to move out. What do you do to keep yourself in a state of preparedness for Christ’s service?
This has been a long process over the years since God wrangled me free of the false worldview I was living under. For many years, things, money, career, all of it meant something to me. But through the course of time, and as a result of some long-term experiences, I came away no longer caring about anything the world here had to offer. I could be homeless. I could be affluent. I could be employed or without employment.
My main focus in life, especially in the latter years, was the intense study of Scripture. Daily. For hours at a time. God spent years preparing me in isolation and solitude, giving me great freedom to pursue his truth.
Now that I’m in full-time ministry, I have found that I am ready, willing, and able to do whatever God asks of me. Just this last summer, God brought us out of an institutional church that outwardly professed to care for other believers, but in reality, they cared only that their religion and comforts remained intact. Through all that, my family and I had to suffer abuse and insincerity at the hands of people who claimed that we were family. But once that year was over, once the task he had called me to was completed, God let me go, and I waited no time. I left.
I think it is important that we live our lives however we choose, but be ready and prepared to go somewhere else or do something else if God convicts us.
K-W-L Self Assessment: L- Describe what you LEARNED from this session.
Nothing to add.
Lecture 5
Share an event from your life when you were instructed to “fear not, stand still and see God’s salvation.”
If that instruction came from a person, I’ve never experienced it. From God, multiple times. In my twenties, I tried to help a family out of addiction; they turned on me and tried to destroy my reputation. I had no recourse but to sit still and pray while everything unraveled. God resolved it without me, and the family in question fell back into their old ways and their old habits, and I quickly became forgotten. Later, He told me to prepare for a wife; three months later, I met her, unmistakably His doing. Now it’s happening again in ministry—He has provided everything, but I must δουλεύω (serve) and wait. As in Exodus 14:13–14, there are moments when striving would sabotage the outcome. God forces stillness, not passivity, but trust. The pattern is consistent: He removes control, requires obedience, and then acts decisively in ways I could not engineer.
What do you most fear? How do you deal with it?
What I fear most is that everything is meaningless—that my life amounts to nothing beyond temporary function and illusion. That at death, it all dissolves into nothing. But I don’t really “deal” with it in the modern sense. God has implanted conviction I cannot escape. Philippians 2:13 is real—He works both τὸ θέλειν and τὸ ἐνεργεῖν (to will and to do). Despite resistance, doubt, or exhaustion, I keep moving toward things I never chose for myself. So I cling to Him because in my situation, the fear doesn’t go away—it’s still there—but it gets restrained by what I know is true. Like Israel in Exodus, my fear comes from uncertainty, from not seeing how this resolves. But my trust comes from looking back at what God has already done in my life. I don’t argue myself out of nihilism; I can’t. The only answer I’ve found is God Himself. Without Him, nothing in my life holds together. With Him, even the parts that feel like suffering or waste actually have direction, meaning, and a purpose I couldn’t see in the moment.
Discuss the role singing plays in your life. What effect does it have on you? How are strength and song tied together in your life?
Singing plays a real role in my life, but not in the way the modern church frames it. In private, especially in the car, it’s intense, loud, and fully engaged—cathartic. Music carries theology and worldview, and it reinforces conviction. Exodus 15 shows that song follows deliverance, and Psalm 118:14 ties strength and song together—God becomes both. Singing recalibrates me by shifting the focus from circumstances back to truth. But corporate worship, as practiced today, often feels forced, slow, and disconnected from reality. It lacks authenticity. The music I connect with—Thousand Foot Krutch, Skillet, even some secular artists—carries weight and intensity that aligns more with how I process truth. Strength and song connect when the content is real, not manufactured. Otherwise, it’s just noise.
Describe your own wilderness experience. What sustained you through it?
If wilderness means hardship, I’ve had several. But the real wilderness was about 18 years of isolation, study, and internal formation before I met my wife. Like Moses or Paul, it was a prolonged season of obscurity. I believed I was malformed, possibly even outside orthodoxy, and that God saved me more to restrain damage than to use me. But in hindsight, that wasn’t punishment—it was preparation. God was building something unconventional. The wilderness in Scripture is not just deprivation; it’s where dependence is formed. What sustained me was immersion in the Word, constant contemplation, and God’s presence, even when it felt distant. Deuteronomy 8:3—man lives by every word of God—became real. Now that the season is over, I recognize it as foundational, not wasted.
Discuss the role of the firstborn in today’s society.
In Scripture, the firstborn carries weight—inheritance, authority, representation (Exodus 4:22, Psalm 89:27). But in modern society, that structure is largely gone. The family unit itself is fractured, so the role has no real function any longer. There’s no firstborn, no covenantal responsibility tied to birth order. Everyone is flattened into equal standing, at least legally. But that flattening comes at a cost—loss of structure, legacy, and continuity. Christ warned of familial breakdown (Matthew 10:35), and we’re seeing that now. The firstborn used to represent stability and succession; now those concepts barely exist. Society has shifted toward individualism and hedonism, so roles like this feel irrelevant. Biblically, the firstborn still carries typological weight—ultimately fulfilled in Christ—but culturally, the category has largely dissolved.
Much of what we have studied thus far is a type of what will happen in the future. Do you see signs of this being replicated today? Explain.
Yes, but not in a simplistic one-to-one way. Exodus establishes patterns: bondage, rebellion, judgment, and deliverance. Those patterns repeat. In American history, you can loosely trace similar arcs—formation, conflict, perceived deliverance, then gradual hardening. Today, we see moral inversion (Isaiah 5:20), increasing opposition to biblical truth, and widespread idolatry in secular forms. There is also imitation, such as false systems mimicking truth, which aligns with what Missler emphasizes about Satan’s strategy. I do expect major geopolitical shifts ahead as power divests itself from the American sphere. But timelines are speculative. Scripture shows patterns, not precise sequencing. The key is recognizing the trajectory: increasing resistance to God, not decreasing it. Like Pharaoh, systems harden over time, and the replication is less about exact events and more about recurring spiritual dynamics playing out at scale.
K-W-L Self Assessment: L- Describe what you LEARNED from this session.
Nothing to add.
Lecture 6
Describe the spiritual bread you are partaking of today?
I am feeding daily on Christ and His Word (John 6:32–35), not as a structured ritual but as part of the fabric of my life. Scripture is embedded in everything I do—writing, studying, thinking, listening. Like the manna in Exodus 16, it cannot be stored; it has to be gathered fresh, continually. It shows up in my work, in the questions I wrestle with, and in the way I process reality. This is not occasional intake—it is constant exposure, because without it I lose alignment quickly.
At the same time, my connection to the broader church is not primarily local. I engage more through teaching, books, and communities like KI than through traditional structures, which I often find difficult to navigate. That does not diminish the reality of the body—it just changes how I interact with it. The bread is still real: Christ revealed through His Word, engaged daily, not passively but actively, and often in ways that challenge rather than comfort.
What purpose did the Sabbath rest serve to the children of Israel? How do you spend you Sabbaths (regardless of the specific day)? Does it serve the same purpose as it did for Israel?
The Sabbath functioned as a covenant sign for Israel (Exod 31:13), but more than that, it was a forced mechanism of dependence. It required them to stop working and trust that God would sustain them without their constant effort. It interrupted the illusion of control. Missler often points out that it was also a rehearsal of God’s completed work, pointing forward to ultimate rest (Heb 4). It was not just about physical rest—it was about recalibrating trust.
For me, I don’t observe a fixed Sabbath day (Rom 14:5–6). I treat every day as belonging to God, but that doesn’t mean I ignore rest. I take it when needed, based on capacity and the needs of my family. My approach is functional rather than calendrical. The principle still holds—rest is necessary to sustain pursuit of God—but the structure is different. It’s less about a mandated day and more about recognizing limits and stepping back when needed.
What does the incident with the manna tell you about trusting God? How is this manifested in your life?
Manna demonstrates that God’s provision is intentional, not incidental (Exod 16). It is measured, purposeful, and tied to obedience. Missler emphasizes that it comes “just enough, just in time,” and while that is true in principle, my experience has included both scarcity and abundance. What has been consistent is that nothing provided is random. Every season has had a function. Times of lack trained contentment (Phil 4:11–13), and times of excess have revealed that provision itself is a tool, not an end.
In my life, this means I don’t evaluate God’s faithfulness based on quantity. Whether He provides little or much, it is always calibrated. What matters is what He is doing through it. Trust, then, is not about expecting a certain outcome—it is about recognizing that everything given is deliberate. The provision is never the point; it is always serving something deeper.
What do the incidents with the manna and the water teach you about stress? How can you utilize the lessons learned?
These incidents show that stress exposes what you actually believe. Israel had already seen God deliver them, yet under pressure they reverted immediately to complaint (Exod 17; 1 Cor 10:4). The problem wasn’t lack of evidence—it was instability under stress. I see the same pattern in myself. Stress doesn’t always announce itself; it creeps in quietly, distorts perception, and begins to shift decision-making before I even recognize it.
Because of that, I’ve learned the necessity of deliberate recalibration. I have to step back, reassess, and realign with what I know to be true. Stress is not just something to endure—it is diagnostic. It reveals drift. If I pay attention, it becomes a tool that shows me where I’ve started to move off course, and it gives me the opportunity to correct before the consequences compound.
CM said that either they gathered the manna or they trampled it underfoot. Manna is representative of the Word of God. How is the Word of God being trampled underfoot today and how is it being gathered? Which activity do you generally engage in? Explain.
The Word is trampled when it is reshaped to fit comfort—when culture overrides Scripture, when difficult truths are softened, or when sin is protected rather than exposed (Isa 5:20). I see this frequently. The form of faith remains, but the substance is hollowed out. Scripture becomes something to reference, not something to submit to. It is ignored where it conflicts with personal ethics, reinterpreted where it is uncomfortable, and sidelined where it demands change.
In contrast, gathering the Word means engaging it directly, consistently, and without compromise. In my case, that engagement is constant, but not always structured. I don’t rely on designated study times as much anymore. Instead, the Word is integrated into everything I do—writing, thinking, teaching, wrestling through difficult ideas. It is not passive intake; it is active interaction. That is how I gather it—continuously, and often in places that require real effort.
What lessons have you personally learned from this week’s session? How will you implement those lessons in your life?
The primary lesson is to stay the course and finish well. God has already equipped and positioned me for what He intends, and that carries responsibility (2 Tim 4:7). Like Israel, I am not responsible for outcomes—I am responsible for obedience. The work in front of me is not random. It is assigned. That changes how I approach it. It removes the need to force results and replaces it with the need to remain consistent.
Implementation is not about adding something new. It is about reinforcing what is already clear. That means continuing daily engagement with Scripture, resisting drift when stress begins to distort perspective, and applying myself fully to the work I have been given. The focus is not on whether it succeeds in visible terms, but on whether I remain faithful in carrying it out.
K-W-L Self Assessment: L- Describe what you LEARNED from this session.
Nothing to add.
Lecture 7
Who do you identify with the most – Amalek, Joshua, Moses, Aaron or Hur? Explain.
I don’t identify with any of those categories. For a long time, I thought something was wrong with me—that my faith was malformed and that God had isolated me to keep me from damaging others. I assumed the Holy Spirit was there more as a restraint than an empowerment. But over time, I’ve had to confront that assumption and discard it. What I thought was disqualification was actually preparation. The isolation, the study, the distance—it wasn’t rejection; it was formation.
If I had to place myself anywhere, it’s not in the structure of Exodus 17 but more in the pattern of someone like Paul or Philip—moving into spaces that are not already mapped out, engaging people who are not being reached by traditional structures. Missler frames Amalek as the flesh and the others as roles in the battle, and that’s helpful, but I don’t see myself confined to those roles. I see myself as someone sent forward, working in a territory that feels largely unclaimed, where the real battle is not visible structure but spiritual confusion.
In your personal journey when was prayer support necessary. Be specific.
Prayer becomes unavoidable for me when pressure becomes overwhelming—when something ominous settles in, and I recognize that I don’t have the ability to resolve it. In those moments, it is not scheduled or structured; it becomes constant, almost involuntary. It’s not a discipline I maintain evenly. It intensifies under strain. That’s when it becomes real, when it is no longer theoretical but necessary for endurance.
Missler ties prayer to spiritual conflict, and that aligns with my experience. When things are stable, prayer can become intermittent. But when there is real opposition, uncertainty, or weight, it becomes continuous. As with Moses on the hill in Exodus 17, the outcome is not determined by activity alone but by something beyond what is visible. For me, prayer is most active when I am most aware that I am not in control.
This has played out in practical ways across my life. When I was first saved, everything shifted. During my four years in the military, I regretted enlisting and had to wrestle through that. I’ve faced difficult positions in work and career, even situations where I was put at risk because I helped someone out of obedience to Christ, only to be betrayed in return. During my separation and divorce, prayer became constant. In seasons of isolation, when I believed I was a defect, I even prayed for God to take me from this world.
Years later, when God made it clear I needed to prepare for a wife, I saw His direction again. And now, in this current season, I’m stepping out in faith—doing things that are uncomfortable, pushing forward in both ministry and writing so that the message embedded in my work can reach as far as possible.
How is prayer and God’s Word balanced in your life?
I don’t separate them cleanly. The Word without prayer becomes inert—information without illumination. And prayer without the Word becomes unstable, driven by feeling or assumption. James’ framework applies here: faith without works is dead; likewise, Scripture without the Spirit is unactivated. The Bible is spiritually discerned, not just intellectually processed. Without engagement with God, reading becomes empty.
Missler often emphasizes the balance between Word and prayer, and I agree with that in principle. In practice, for me, they are intertwined. The Word informs my understanding, and prayer aligns me with what I am reading. One without the other breaks down. The Word provides structure; prayer provides activation. Without both, there is no real movement—just either knowledge or sentiment, neither of which is sufficient on its own.
Do names have any special significance today? What does your name mean? Do you see any relevance between your name and its meaning?
In Scripture, names carry weight—they are tied to identity, purpose, and often prophetic meaning. God assigns names with full knowledge of the person, their role, and their trajectory. Moses, Joshua, and Abraham—these names are not arbitrary. They reflect something real about the individual. In contrast, today names are mostly assigned before birth, without knowledge of who the person will become. That disconnect removes most of the inherent meaning.
So while names in Scripture are deeply significant, in modern culture they are largely arbitrary. That doesn’t mean they are meaningless, but the connection is weaker. The relevance now is not in the name itself but in what God does with the person. The meaning is no longer embedded in the name—it is revealed through life. The name may carry a definition, but it does not define the outcome in the same way it often does in Scripture.
What do you do to prepare to hear God’s Word?
I don’t follow any structured preparation process. I’m not convinced that rituals or specific behaviors create readiness. From my perspective, God initiates, and I respond. The emphasis is not on preparing myself through external actions but on being responsive when He speaks. I don’t see preparation as something I generate; I see it as something God creates through circumstance and positioning.
Missler emphasizes preparation of the heart, and I understand that concept, but in my case, I don’t approach it formally. I speak to God directly, without ceremony. That may come across as irrelevant to some, but it is where I stand. Romans 14:23 applies—anything not done in faith is sin. So I operate in what I am convinced of. I don’t try to manufacture readiness; I trust that God has already placed me where I need to be to hear what He intends.
Give examples of prayer changing things in today’s world and in your own life.
I tend to see prayer as primarily changing the person who is praying rather than mechanically altering external outcomes. It clarifies, stabilizes, and reorients. It enables endurance. I’m not convinced that all outward expressions commonly associated with prayer—like raised hands—are inherently meaningful or biblical unless they are directly prompted by God. Much of that can become performative.
Missler often connects prayer to outcomes, like Moses’ raised hands influencing the battle in Exodus 17. I see that differently. I view that as a direct act of God tied to obedience in a specific moment, not a general formula for prayer. In my experience, prayer changes how I engage with reality. It brings alignment, not control. The real effect is internal—clarity, endurance, and the ability to continue forward under pressure.
K-W-L Self Assessment: L- Describe what you LEARNED from this session.
Nothing to add.
Lecture 8
Commandment One says, “You shall have no other gods before me.” What gods are worshipped today in your culture? Which one do you find most difficult? Explain.
In my own life, money used to be one of those gods. In my twenties and thirties, it had a level of importance that shaped decisions more than I realized. That shifted dramatically after my heart attack at 38 and the ten months that followed, where I was forced to confront how little I actually need to survive. The military failed to keep its promises, but God did not. In that season, He gave me something far more valuable than material provision—faith, patience, and a level of contentment that doesn’t make sense in worldly terms (Phil 4:11–13).
Now the struggle is more internal. It’s doubt, criticism, grumbling—what Israel did in the wilderness. Missler is right that idolatry is not just external; it’s an internal displacement of trust. When I question or complain, I’m effectively elevating my perspective over God’s provision. That’s the battle now. It’s less about tangible idols and more about whether I actually trust God in what He has already given and established.
How do you keep the Sabbath?
I don’t observe a Sabbath in the traditional sense. My conviction aligns with Romans 14:5–6—every day is the Lord’s. I don’t divide life into sacred and secular, holy and common. Every moment is either aligned with God or in rebellion against Him. There is no neutral space. So in that sense, every day is my Sabbath, not because I rest constantly, but because every day is set apart for Him in intention.
That said, I do take rest when needed. The principle behind the Sabbath—dependence on God and cessation from striving—is still valid. Missler emphasizes that it was a covenant sign to Israel and a model of trusting God’s provision (Exod 31:13; Heb 4). I just don’t see it as bound to a specific day. For me, the reality is continuous: I am either walking in alignment with God, or I am not, regardless of the calendar.
Compare one of the Ten Commandments with what Jesus says about it. How is this manifested in your life?
Jesus takes the commandment “You shall not murder” (Exod 20:13) and internalizes it—if you hate your brother, you’ve already committed it in your heart (Matt 5:21–22). That reframes everything. The issue is not behavior; it’s intention. The law addresses action, but Christ addresses the condition of the heart. That raises the standard, not lowers it.
In my life, that means accountability doesn’t stop at what I do—it extends to what I think, what I feel, and how I process others internally. I can’t justify myself by saying I didn’t act on something. The question is whether the root is present. Missler often emphasizes that the law reveals sin, but Christ exposes its source. That’s where the real work is—not managing behavior, but confronting what produces it. This is precisely why I reject the purity pledge mentality of many modern-day evangelicals, because our sanctification has very little to do with us “doing the right thing” and has everything to do with why we are not doing the right thing in the first place. One day, I believe this will all be over, this fallen world, and we each will have to stand and walk and have our being in Christ, and we will then be responsible to uphold the perfect law of liberty for eternity. The consequences we’ve already seen in Genesis 6:2-4, Jude 1:6, and 2 Peter 2:4.
Do you think the morality of this age is conducive to keeping the commandment regarding honoring father and mother. Explain.
No, not at all. If anything, the culture is moving in the opposite direction. The command to honor father and mother (Exod 20:12) assumes a functioning family structure, but we now see a systematic erosion of that structure. There is a growing push toward individualism, isolation, and, in many cases, the transfer of authority from the family to the state. That creates an environment where honor is not cultivated—it’s undermined.
Missler points to passages such as 2 Timothy 3:1–2, in which disobedience to parents is a marker of societal decline. That’s not theoretical—it’s visible. The family is no longer treated as foundational; it’s treated as optional or even as an obstruction. In that environment, the commandment is not supported—it’s resisted. Honoring parents requires a framework that values authority and continuity, and that framework is breaking down and may never again be reestablished.
How do you prepare yourself to come into God’s presence?
I don’t approach this with a preparation model because I don’t see God’s presence as something I enter into—I’m already in it. There is no place where I am outside of His awareness or authority. Even before I was born, I was known by Him, and long after I die, that doesn’t change. So the idea of preparing to enter His presence feels misplaced. The issue is not access; it’s awareness and response.
At the same time, I recognize that I have no worthiness of my own. If I were judged on my own merit, I could not stand. But that’s not the basis on which I approach God. The only reason I have access at all is because of Christ’s finished work (Heb 10:19–22). That is the preparation—already completed, not something I perform. So I speak to God directly, without ritual, because my standing is not based on what I do, but on what Christ has already done.
What has God said to you through this week’s study? Explain.
What stands out to me is how much depth is embedded in Exodus, often overlooked. It’s easy to read it as narrative and miss the layers underneath—the typology, the patterns, the structure that points beyond itself. Missler highlights this well, that Exodus is not just history; it’s prophetic and instructional at multiple levels. That has become more apparent the more I engage with it.
For me, the takeaway is not just intellectual—it’s a reminder to slow down and actually examine what’s there. There is far more going on than a surface reading reveals. Too often, it’s glossed over, treated as familiar, and moved past quickly. But the more I look, the more I see that nothing in it is incidental. It reinforces the need to stay engaged, to keep digging, and not assume I’ve already understood what is being said.
K-W-L Self Assessment: L- Describe what you LEARNED from this session.
Nothing to add.
Conclusion
Exodus Part 1 turned out to be far more layered than I expected. I came into the study knowing only the broad strokes, but what kept surfacing was how much is actually embedded in the text and how easily most of it gets passed over. Exodus is not simply a record of Israel leaving Egypt—it is a book of formation, judgment, covenant, and typology, all pointing beyond itself. Christ is present throughout, not always explicitly, but structurally: in the Passover Lamb, the manna, the rock, the deliverer, the tabernacle, and the priesthood. What looks like narrative is actually a consistent pattern of God revealing His redemptive plan in advance.
At the same time, the prophetic dimension became difficult to ignore. Exodus is not just history—it is a template. The plagues anticipate future judgments, Pharaoh models hardened resistance to God, the wilderness reflects both the believer’s walk and larger future testing, and the covenant framework points forward to what is ultimately fulfilled in Christ. Even the feasts and structures begin to outline a prophetic calendar. What I found is that nothing in Exodus is isolated; it all connects to the future. More than anything, this study reinforced my conviction that God is never incidental. He prepares, patterns, and reveals with precision. What seemed like a familiar book has proven to be one of the most instructive and structurally rich studies I’ve worked through.
Until my next post……
If you’re interested in how these theological themes play out in fiction, explore my novels here.
What do you think?