386. Deliver and Redeem
Micah 4:10 Be in pain, and labour to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail: for now shalt thou go forth out of the city, and thou shalt dwell in the field, and thou shalt go even to Babylon; there shalt thou be delivered; there the Lord shall redeem thee from the hand of thine enemies.
When women go into labor to bring forth a new life there is much pain and travail. Everyone knows this common human experience. This image is used to call to mind the suffering and death of Jesus on the cross to bring forth new life in us believers. John 16:21: “When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world.”
Jesus will go through the pain and suffering of our sins upon Him in order that He may deliver us from death unto life, a new life, an eternal life, a beautiful life as God meant it to be from the beginning. We are delivered from death to life, from evil to good, from the punishments of sin to the rewards of grace. Jesus delivered us from evil, and still does, by becoming a curse for us. One direct result of Adam’s sin was the curse on the woman: “I will multiply your pain in childbearing.” Every mother knows the pains it took to deliver a baby, but she also knows the “joy that a human being has been brought into the world.”
Jesus was able to endure the pain of the cross for the joy set before Him. That joy was the new life He was able to give to you and me. Oh, the joy of deliverance! Can we even imagine what unbounded joy we bring to God?
There, in Babylon (the world), Jesus has delivered us from exile. We are cast out of God’s Presence, like Adam was cast out of Eden. There the Lord promises to redeem us from the power of our enemies. We were cruelly enslaved and kidnapped by sin, death and the devil, but we have been redeemed. In that bondage and from that bondage we are redeemed. We can pray daily with confidence: “Deliver me from the evil that was meant for me this day. Thank you for redeeming me.”