Counted With the Stars (Out From Egypt, #1)

by Connilyn Cossette

Shira’s stories, of her people and her God, were like wild honey. They had the curious effect of making me hunger for more, and I did not want to wait long for another taste.

“But I know there is a reason for everything he does, and even if my human mind can’t wrap itself around his plan, I will follow.

Had the gods fled Egypt with the birds, or was this Hebrew god, this Yahweh, more powerful than all of them? Did he have such power over the world that even the storms and the beasts obeyed his command? He was attacking each of our gods, one by one. This was no natural occurrence as the priests had assured us when the Nile had turned to blood. These were pointed, powerful attacks on the deities of our country. Each assault was more destructive than the last. How much more could we endure? If Pharaoh did not let the Hebrews go, I feared there would be nothing left of the Black Land at all. It was as if all of creation were being undone by Shira’s god.

Soon everyone looked toward the east. Shouts of “Look!” and “There it is!” muted into awed silence as the shimmering orb grew higher and floated toward us. Blue-white light began to leap and dance and then, stretching toward the heavens, it swelled into a towering pillar of swirling brilliance. Its glow lit the evening like the sun itself. The Hebrew God had sent a pillar of light to guide us.

But sometimes it seems to me like Yahweh chooses to work through the most unlikely of people.”

“Perhaps Adonai chose Mosheh to show us all this is not about Mosheh, but about Yahweh.”

“But I am not one of his people, why would he protect me?” The man turned to me, his eyes burning with passion. “He c-c-created you . . . he knows you . . . and will . . . m-m-make himself known to you.”

The fire burned low, and the heavens were clear and full. Millions of twinkling stars peered back through the black fabric of the sky, whispering stories from eons of watching humankind. “Elohim, the Creator,” said Eben, “sowed the stars in the sky with his very words. In Egypt we heard the tales of the stars, the stories of Egyptian gods and their movements above. But the true story is much more ancient than the Egypt of old. It is not Nut who makes the stars twinkle in the heavens, but their Creator. Elohim tells a story in star pictures that will resonate through the ages, unrolling like a great scroll overhead, telling us the path of Avraham’s sons. We are walking that path now, and the story will continue long after our journey ends.”

But this god called Elohim, or Yahweh as I now knew him, asked for sacrifice not to please himself or to be appeased, but as a gift to his people, to cover their sins.

Shira had told me many months ago that Yahweh could not be contained in an image, that his glory outweighed all the gold on the earth, that a mere piece of wood or stone carving could never capture the perfection and majesty of his being.

I believe that Yahweh did not just speak creation into existence. I believe he sang it into existence.

Yahweh is the creator of all that there is. He is the most real thing, the only eternal thing. Our hearts will stop beating, our eyes will close, the mountains may someday crumble, the trees will wither away, but Yahweh will always be.”