These are the stages by which the Israelites went out of the land of Egypt in military formation under the leadership of Moses and Aaron. Moses wrote down their starting points, stage by stage, on command of the LORD.
The people's entire journey is documented. Every place they stopped, every place they moved from. The whole wilderness route. Why would this matter?
Because memory matters. Because your journey is real and worth documenting. Because when you've gotten to the end, it's good to look back and see where you've been.
I'm sixty years old and I've recently started mapping my own journey. Where I've been, what I've learned, how I've changed. It's been humbling and clarifying. Seeing the arc of your life gives it meaning.
The Israelites' journey wasn't a straight line. They went backward sometimes. They circled places. They went places twice. But the whole thing, documented, shows a pattern. It shows that God was leading even through the seeming randomness.
I notice in my own life that what looked like failure at the time turned out to be necessary. The job that didn't work out put me where I needed to be. The relationship that ended freed me for the real one. The loss led to finding something better.
You don't see that in the moment. You only see it when you look back. Moses is giving the Israelites a gift by writing it down - the ability to see the arc, to understand that even the difficult stages were part of getting to the destination.
I'm writing my own story now, for my children. Not to glorify myself, but to show them: here's how God worked in my life.
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