Pharaoh's Bad Marriage

Exodus 1:10  Come on, let us deal wisely with them; lest they multiply, and it come to pass, that, when there falleth out any war, they join also unto our enemies, and fight against us, and so get them up out of the land.

And we all know how that worked out.

There are four ways to preserve a relationship that has begun to deteriorate:

1. Disable the other person. Through emotional abuse, you can make a person doubt themselves and their ability to survive on their own. Through physical abuse, you can confine or even cripple a person so that they are physically incapable of leaving. Perhaps the most common method today of disabling a person to keep them in a relationship is by keeping them financially dependent. Your credit card issuer and your neighbor with two upside down mortgages can tell you how effective this tactic can be.
2. Instill fear of the unknown. Convince the other person that there is a big bad wolf hiding behind every tree outside the door, that every person they encounter will take advantage of them, and they will be very reluctant to strike out alone. This method has worked very well for politicians throughout history.
3. Bond. Be friends. Spend time together in situations that develop emotional attachment. Study, explore, play, fight, and work together. Have an adventure.
4. Improve yourself. Make a relationship with you look more attractive than a relationship with someone else by becoming a better you. You have probably heard it said that you can’t change someone else. You can only change you. I haven’t read it yet, but Athol Kay’s Married Man Sex Life Primer appears to be based on this idea. It’s on my reading list.

Each of these methods works to a greater or lesser extent and there is a time and place in which each would be appropriate. A healthy relationship, however, will be almost exclusively characterized by methods three and four. Pharaoh tried to keep the Hebrews in Egypt by physically and financially hobbling them. Although they wanted more than ever to leave Egypt, they had no ships, no weapons, no chariots, and no gold with which to obtain such things. They had no allies. They came to believe that they were too weak to face the Canaanites and that their God was too weak or too busy to rescue them. Pharaoh’s strategy might have worked if he had not dismissed Joseph’s God along with Joseph himself. God is the champion of the oppressed and does not allow his people to be abused, enslaved, and terrorized forever.