Ash Wednesday February 18, 2026
“God’s Deliverance” Exodus 1-2
Rev. John R. Larson Ascension Lutheran Church Littleton, Colorado
Where does a salvation story begin? When I was in Phoenix this past week I got to see a real salvation story.
Here is what I know about it: My granddaughter, Allie, is 15 years old. But I haven’t had her as my granddaughter for all of those years. It was about 6 years ago that she became a Larson. Allie was chosen to be in our family. Allie is adopted.
But before she was chosen she was rejected. Too often. Her mother was a drug addict and lost the right to be a mother to her. She spent the early years of her life in foster care. But around the time when she was 9, my son and his wife became foster parents for Allie. And, with great joy, they legally adopted her.
Her early days of life were not easy. But she has a story of rescue, deliverance and salvation. I bet a few of you, maybe many of you, can tell us of a rescue and a deliverance that changed your life.
A salvation story begins with a need. The need might be a fear or worry or anxiety that one has. It may be a regret or a despair that has taken over life. During this Lenten season I will be preaching about the story of God’s deliverance of God’s people in Exodus.
If you have read the book of Exodus you may have passed over a verse that tells of the problem that faced God’s people around 1500 B.C.. “Now there arose a new king over Egypt who did not know Joseph.” (Exodus 1:6) That was a problem. Joseph had come to Egypt and rose to a great position in the land. The Israelites, fleeing a drought and starvation, arrived there. For hundreds of years they had a home, a place and they were accepted. But now a new Pharaoh took power. Of course, he didn’t know Joseph. Joseph came about 400 years before this. That would be like us knowing someone from 1600.
But the problem was much more than the length of time that had passed. The Pharoah of Joseph’s time was a foreign ruler. That is one reason he allowed Joseph such a high position in the Egyptian administration. But the Pharoah in Exodus was a pure blood, pure Egyptian. He looked at foreigners in a whole different way.
This was the edict of this Pharaoh to the midwives who assisted in the birth of Hebrew children: “If it is a son, you shall kill him, but if it a daughter, she shall live.” (Exodus 1:16) You know of the Holocaust of the Jewish people during World War II. Between 6-7 million Jews in Europe were murdered by Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany – 2/3rds of the entire Jewish population in Europe was exterminated from 1941-1945. But that wasn’t the only Holocaust brought upon the Jews. Around 1500 B.C. Jewish boys were killed or were drowned in the Nile by Pharaoh and those who followed his orders.
But to every horror and hatred, God offered a deliverer. The first deliverer for the Jews? Moses? No, not yet. Here are two names for you: Shiphrah and Puah. Two women. Strong women. “But the midwives feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but let the male children live.” (Exodus 1:17) This Pharaoh, who knew not Moses and knew not the ways of God, desired the midwives to be partners in the killing of these Jewish boys. But instead of being destroyers of life, they offered rescue, deliverance and salvation of life.
Where does a salvation story begin? It begins with a need that is overwhelming and impossible and dangerous. It always has. But sometimes this rescue takes a long time to come. Moses would become the deliverer that God had promised, but even then, it didn’t happen overnight. Moses was 80 when God sent him to lead Israel to their freedom. After his miraculous trip down the Nile, the rescue of Pharaoh’s daughter, Moses’ first 40 years were in the palace of Pharaoh, his next 40 years in exile and his life as a shepherd, and then at 80 God calls him back to take on the task as a deliverer.
God’s deliverance comes at the right time. Today you wear a smudge of dirt and ash so everyone can see it, and you. We are mortal and will face our end and so we hear, “From dust you came and to dust you shall return.” We know that “the wages of sin is death.” (Romans 6:23) We need deliverance from our mortality and our sin and our fears and worries, from our anxieties and regrets and our despair. Our salvation story begins with a confession of our need.
At the end of Exodus 2 we read of the cry for help and God’s response: During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the people of Israel – and God knew. (Exodus 2:23-25 ESV)
This begins the 40 days of Lent when we will speak of rescue and deliverance and salvation. Just wait until you hear the words of Jesus crying out in victory from the cross, “It is finished.” (John 19:30) Just wait until you hear the words of the angels, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen.” (Luke 24:5-6)
God has heard our groaning, and He has remembered His people.
My dad, before his death in 2022, would often remark about the adoption of Allie by my son and his wife. He would say, “They changed her life. They did a good thing.” He was right. A life was rescued when they made her theirs.
Our life is rescued when God made us His through the act of salvation in Jesus. Our life was rescued by the blood of Jesus, shed for our sins, and His mighty resurrection from the grave. I hope you are as glad about this as God is in giving it to you. It is like we sang earlier:
I love to tell the story! Twill be my theme in glory –
To tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love.
Amen!!
