Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] We give him all our praise.
[00:00:04] Thank you, Jesus.
[00:00:08] Amen. You can do better than that. Put your hands together.
[00:00:12] I mean the reality of what God has done.
[00:00:17] May we never minimize, take for granted the beauty of what God has done, what Jesus has done for us by taking us by the hand and marching us truly into freedom, into a new life, a changed life, a better life. We're not always going to live perfectly, but we can live wholeheartedly in love with the one who made us.
[00:00:41] His name is Jesus. His name is Jehovah. Amen. God bless one more time. Put your hands together.
[00:00:50] All right, man, go ahead and have a seat.
[00:00:54] One of the friends phrases in that song is you take me by the hand, right? And you march me into freedom. I want to add to something that was said in the announcements regarding Hope Pregnancy. I think Hope Pregnancy, their ministry is really about taking the hands of those who find themselves in a situation that maybe they were not planning for.
[00:01:17] So I want to mention like last night, it was a great night, men and women getting together. And as great as the taco bar dinner was the encouragement that I heard from the men is the men in the we all had dinner together in the gym. And then like the parting of the Red Sea, the women went one way and the men went the other way.
[00:01:35] And when I was with the men, Jay messenger, who's the former pastor but the executive director now of Hope Pregnancy, he shares some thoughts from what he titled the most famous unplanned pregnancy in history.
[00:01:49] And he used the passages out of Luke and one regarding Mary and Joseph and the birth of Jesus.
[00:01:55] And part of the encouragement was for to call men to rise up, to take responsibility, to take initiative and continue to trust and obey God as we live out our lives.
[00:02:07] One of the things that Jay shared was this last year Hope pregnancy in their two room clinic. They only have two rooms right now and they saw over nearly 1996 whatever patients in this last year. That's an incredible number in just in a two room clinic.
[00:02:27] He said that about 40% of them come in and they're already abortion leaning.
[00:02:35] And in that time that they have in providing the ultrasounds and some initial conversation, 20, no, 20. Half of those of the 40 that are abortion leaning, half of those choose life with their babies. And many of the, of the of the men connected to those are also walking alongside the mothers of those babies. My friends, that's a lot of lives saved.
[00:03:03] I don't know what the exact math is, but that's a lot of lives saved.
[00:03:07] We champion the unborn, the life of the unborn. Right now, Hope Pregnancy is in a building project, an expansion. They're wanting to expand on one of their two properties.
[00:03:20] They want to expand it so that they have four clinic rooms, some of the stores for all of their things that are off site. And he said, like maybe up to five, three to five different locations are going to bring them all in house on their location, right down the street on Market Street. But they're in a building project. And the overall project is $5.1 million. That's a huge number. But the beauty is they are within $370,000 of meeting their fundraising goal. This is, I mean, this is an incredible, incredible gift of God providing.
[00:03:56] Like when the Israelites left Egypt and they asked their neighbors for gold and silver or anything else and they just gave it to them. God, God provides. And God is providing for them.
[00:04:05] One of the things we are gonna have an opportunity to do. And by the way, it's not just expanding their facility.
[00:04:11] They're building into that three years of staff funding for some new positions they wanna hire so they can expand their services and maybe see upwards to 2,000 or more people who are walking through this. So I believe God.
[00:04:28] God through his word, a guy by his spirit is a champion, strongly and unequivocally a champion of life of the unborn. So is this pastor, and so is our church. As a Nazarene church, our international denomination champions life of the unborn and Hope pregnancy is helping make a difference in our community.
[00:04:51] And so I thank God for what he's doing through them. So over the next two weeks, we are going to have the opportunity to through the rest of this month. Next week is Father's Day Baby bottles. Bring those in. But over the next couple weeks, if you are inclined to make a donation to help them move towards closing out that $370,000, we invite you to make a donation. Maybe it's $5, maybe it's $50, maybe it's 500, maybe it's a total of $370,000.
[00:05:23] Really, people, whatever gift that you can Give will be $1 more towards them meeting their goals. So I encourage you, over the next couple weeks, be thinking about that, praying about that and how we can continue.
[00:05:37] As Pastor Josh mentioned in partnering with them, you can make checks out. To make checks out to the church. You can note on the memo line, Hope Pregnancy, if you give online, there's a dropdown list from Tithe to other things you can choose special offering and we'll track it that way, we'll pass all of those donations along to them. God bless you for doing that and looking forward to what God does in blessing them. Now we're in a series called Moses the Book of Exodus.
[00:06:09] And we're gonna be looking at this truth that God is still fighting for you. He's not done fighting for you. It's not like once I did it once, or, you know, you've had your three or three strikes and you get no more fighting. No, God is still fighting for us. And I hope this morning as we look at this passage in Exodus, chapter 13 and in 14, that we are reminded that God is fighting for us. Now, I want an honest answer here, okay? Honest answer from everyone in the building to this question.
[00:06:38] Have you ever at some point thought that God was not still fighting for you? You thought he had given up on you? Maybe. Maybe your situation, he just doesn't really care about. It's not really that big a deal, you think? And so he's not fighting for you. Or maybe you think you've worn out your welcome. Whatever. You think God at some point has really stopped fighting for you? Anybody ever have those thoughts? Okay. Yeah, it's common. It's human. It's really what happened with the Israelites too, when they saw so many incredible things, they still would go back and wonder if God is still.
[00:07:16] Well, hopefully we're going to see that a little bit this morning. So last Sunday, we saw them when their deliverance finally came after that 10th plague, the plague of the death of the firstborns. And God instituted that very first Passover. Remember the blood on the doorpost? And people had to stay behind the blood if they were going to be delivered from that plague. But Pharaoh, at some point in the middle of night, called Moses and said, get out.
[00:07:46] And so the people of God, in some kind of orderly fashion, exited.
[00:07:53] Now, if we were writing a movie script and the people of Israel leave Egypt into the sunset, into the promised land, we'd see the credits rolling and it'd be the end of the film.
[00:08:08] Well, that's not really how it ends. As a matter of fact, the journey that Israel is gonna be on, and we'll see over the next few weeks, is a long journey on their way to all that God promised them. But along the way, they're continuing to learn, they're continuing to see the hand of God show up, to see the hand of God, that he is still fighting for them. And I want us to remember that he is still fighting for us. Amen. Let me Go ahead and pray and we'll get into God's word. God, we say thank you for the opportunity again to look into your word. I pray that the story that's told that Moses wrote as we reflected back on the journey of his life and the people of Israel and their exodus from Egypt. I pray God that these words, that they come alive, they speak to us in some way, in some manner to remind us of who we are certainly, but God more so to remind us of who you are and that we might give ourselves in more fully surrendering to you in our lives.
[00:09:09] And I pray that you do this in us and through us. In Jesus name, Amen.
[00:09:15] All right, picking up in Exodus chapter 13, we're going to be in the middle. We're going to start at verse 17.
[00:09:21] In this section as we get into it is what I'm going to call God's road has no shortcuts. So let's look at this. In Exodus 13, verse 17 says this. When Pharaoh finally let the people go, God did not lead them along the main road that runs through Philistine territory, even though that was the shortest route to the Promised land.
[00:09:47] God said if the people are faced with a battle, they might change their minds and want to return Egypt. Now, I have a map that I want to show you on the screen. And in this last couple weeks, actually, I've been reading through the passages of different commentaries and what the journey is that the Israelites likely took. And there are several that historians think they took. But on this map I want to see at the top, you can see they leave Ramesses. That's the Goshen area.
[00:10:25] And that black dotted line across the top, that's the shortest route to the Promised Land. It goes through the Philistine territory. It's roughly about 180 miles to get there. But they would have to face some military outposts of the Egypt along the route. And they would also run into the Philistines, which were notoriously an enemy of Israel. But based on my study this last week, I. I think the most likely biblically accurate route would be the one. And it's in the blue dot that took them south.
[00:10:59] See down at the bottom you see the Red Sea. And then you have this like y. Both of those gulfs are considered part of the Red Sea. And they think they traveled down that blue dot down into maybe Succoth is where they first parked that night.
[00:11:12] Now, in this know this, as Israel left Egypt, the Hebrew people were barely an organized mess somehow. No doubt in their culture, though they were under the oppression of Egypt. They probably had some community leaders. And so Moses and Aaron no doubt had some kind of a barely organized way to get people organized and out of Egypt on that Passover night, you remember, they were to take Passover with urgency, with their walking stick, right? With fully clothed and with their walking sandals on, because they were going to leave at any moment. And they did.
[00:11:51] But as the Hebrew people left, they left as newly freed slaves.
[00:11:57] But after hundreds of years, generations of years in bondage in Egypt, no doubt the people bore a mindset of a slave.
[00:12:10] They were probably externally compliant because they needed to be. Otherwise they would have the fury of Egypt, and they were yet internally fearful.
[00:12:20] And God knew.
[00:12:22] God knew that a people like that would be prone to nostalgic feelings about what their life was like back in Egypt. And whenever they face some kind of a confrontation, a battle of sorts, they would want to flee and run back, which is truly what actually happens.
[00:12:42] But even today, this mindset of slavery, of bondage, even modern researchers, those who understand trauma, they confirm that in fact, deeply oppressed populations, when they find their freedom, they need a buffer time. They need a little bit of decompression time to reestablish their identity as people, who they are. They're not a slave anymore. They're a free people.
[00:13:14] And so Israel, God knew Israel needed some formation time, because if they were to be exposed to any sense of mortal combat, where their life was on the line, they would, it would be triggered to a fight and flight response, and likely as slave mindset, they would flee back to their previous land. So in God's wisdom, in his, I'll call it his paternal, his fatherly or even pastorally wisdom, God provides them space for what is going to be a natural need, a covenantal need for their identity as a nation, as a people of God to be established. And that's why I think in that map, they didn't take the northerly route, they took a southerly route because God had some work to still do. And these newly freed slaves, verse 18 goes on to say, so God led them in a roundabout way through the wilderness toward the Red Sea.
[00:14:15] Thus the Israelites left Egypt.
[00:14:18] It says, like an army ready for battle, Moses is being gracious. They turned out to be an army ready for battle, but they weren't so much at that time, and we'll see in just a moment why verse 19 goes on to say, Moses took the bones. This is just kind of a side note. Moses took the bones of Joseph with him. For Joseph had made the sons of Israel swear to do this.
[00:14:40] He said, God will certainly come to help you. And when he does, you must take my bones with you from this place. You remember, Israel wasn't in Egypt always. They went there in good conditions under Joseph's leadership when he brought his. His father and his family. And then they. They grew and expanded to nearly a population of 2 million by this time. But Joseph was never put in the ground, buried in a traditional sense. His body always laid in a coffin above ground. But he had made the people, the nation's leaders over the time, promise take him back to the promised Land when we go. And so this is just a footnote that Moses gives us, that Joseph about ready to make his own journey back to the promised land. Then we go into verse 20 in Exodus, chapter 13. And I want us to remember that God is there with us day and night.
[00:15:31] Verse 20. The Israelites left Succoth, encamped at Etham, on the edge of the wilderness.
[00:15:37] The Lord went ahead of them.
[00:15:39] He guided them during the day with a pillar of cloud, and he provided light at night with. With a pillar of fire.
[00:15:49] This allowed them to travel by day or night.
[00:15:52] And the Lord did not remove the pillar of cloud or the pillar of fire from its place in front of the people.
[00:15:59] These verses remind us not only for Israel that God is always there.
[00:16:05] God is always available. And in this case, God's presence, and not only his presence, but his protection over the people was visible.
[00:16:14] For God had showed himself present in a pillar. I don't know how wide the pillar was, just a giant pillar of cloud. And then at night, a giant pillar of fire. As a matter of fact, God would continue to follow the Israelites in their journey to the Promised land because as they would camp, the pillar of cloud would settle on what they would be the center of the camp.
[00:16:40] And when it was time to go, the cloud would lift and move in a direction and it was time to go. Pack up your tent and your belongings. It's time to go. This is how they traveled with the cloud by day and the fire by night.
[00:16:56] But in the New Testament, there's no cloud and no fire necessarily, right? But in the New Testament, God promises the Holy Spirit, right, that with faith in Jesus, he's going to place His Spirit in us, not in a pillar of cloud or fire externally, but he's going to place His Holy Spirit in us. And how long is he going to place His Holy Spirit in us?
[00:17:21] How long? Forever. Forever, right?
[00:17:23] Not for, you know, for the Israelites. 40 years they wandered. And presumably the pillars were present all during their journey to the promised land. But God promises us, hey, I'm going to be with you for always. Not just when you've had the holy spirit for 40 years and then he expires and you're on your own. No, he's going to continue to be with us with all of life's journey.
[00:17:48] Then we turn over to chapter 14 as the story continues. And verse one is where we're going to be able to see that God's glory is going to continue to be on display always. This is his goal for us. Verse one, it says this.
[00:18:01] Then the Lord gave these instructions to Moses.
[00:18:06] Order the Israelites to turn back and camp by hard word. The hard word is PI Ahioth, Pihoth, between Migdol and the sea. Now, if you remember the map down in the centerpiece that said Egyptian territory, there's a point down there by the Red Sea. At the bottom, at the very bottom, near the point is where Migdol is. It's known to be a tower, kind of a watchtower to look over the ocean, much like we say a lighthouse might be. But they're the camp there at Pihaioth, between Migdal and the sea.
[00:18:38] And see, the Israelites had been following the pillar along, and then suddenly, as they move down from Suckloth, they fall on the pillar. Then the pillar stops and they're to camp right there. It says they camp there along the shore, across from BAAL Zephon.
[00:18:56] And then Pharaoh, he says, as they're camping there, and you will see the map in just a moment, and we'll get this picture. It said, when Pharaoh will think that the Israelites are confused and that they are trapped in the wilderness. So let's bring the map back up for a second down here by number two, because he traveled south.
[00:19:18] Then they get up to where it says Etham, presumably. Now, sometimes in historical and archaeology, some of the cities named aren't always clear where they are, at least back in the olden days, where they might be, have a new location even in today's. But presumably Etham is right there. So they follow the cloud up to Etham, then they are to turn back. Instead of continuing up the Gulf there, they would turn back and park right there, across from BAAL Zephon.
[00:19:50] And however, whatever satellite imagery that Pharaoh had, he somehow knew they had stopped, they had turned back, and that he would think, oh, they kind of are in the middle of nowhere and they don't really know where they're Going, they're kind of lost.
[00:20:03] Maybe it's time to jump on them.
[00:20:07] Okay, so we pick this up in verse and it says this, and once again, I will harden Pharaoh's heart and he will chase after you.
[00:20:19] I have planned this in order to display my what?
[00:20:24] I've planned this.
[00:20:27] God's enemy, our enemy. Pharaoh is not the only one who can plan things.
[00:20:33] God knows what's going to happen. And sometimes he plans things. Sometimes some commentators as I read, thought that this plan, this go up and then turn back was God setting an ambush for Pharaoh. So that as this verse says, in order to display my glory through Pharaoh and his whole army.
[00:20:56] After this the Egyptians will know that I am the Lord, I am Yahweh, I. I am the self existent one who has no equal. As if they didn't learn it already, right after the nine, ten plagues. Get out of here. I can't take anymore. Just go. Take your people and go.
[00:21:18] Still God wants to display his glory. And it says this, after this, the Egypt will know that I am. So the Israelites camp there as they, you know, as I said, the enemy's not the only one who can make plans. God can make plans too.
[00:21:35] And God is always working, making plans. There's a song that sometimes we sing in the service called Waymaker. And part of the words are this. Even when I don't see it, God's working.
[00:21:47] Even when I don't feel it, he's working.
[00:21:50] He never stops.
[00:21:52] He never stops working.
[00:21:54] This is a truth, this is a principle. This is why this morning I want us to be reminded that God is still fighting for you.
[00:22:03] God is still leading you and taking you someplace again. That distance is not always going to be the shortest distance. When we come to faith in God, it's not like we receive everything and our lives are perfect sometimes because we come out of a place of slavery to our own selves, our own sin. We need some time to learn the way of the new kingdom, to establish a new identity in Jesus.
[00:22:27] So sometimes the journey that we go on that has sometimes battles and difficulties is part of God shaping us as a newly freed people. Amen.
[00:22:41] Exodus 14:5 picks up and this is where the Egyptians pursue Israel. It says this when the word reached the king of Egypt that the Israelites had fled, Pharaoh and his officials changed their mind. Don't understand that they, they knew that they're up against with the nine, the 10 plagues, all targeting the so called gods of Egypt, including Pharaoh himself, they let them go. But when they realized that Their economic perhaps power, something was missing that they had let get away. They said, what have we done letting all those Israelite slaves get away?
[00:23:23] They asked.
[00:23:25] Well, I can think of 10 good reasons why they did that, but maybe one of the reasons is after display of those power and then they let them go. Maybe Pharaoh, maybe he thought, maybe that's the limit of Yahweh's power.
[00:23:40] Maybe it was all that display in order to let them go. But maybe that's. Maybe that's all God's got.
[00:23:47] So maybe I'm going to go ahead and pursue them because, man, we've got a great loss of manpower in our nation. So he pursues them.
[00:23:57] Look what happened. Verse 8. The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, and he rallied all his chariots and forces, and his elite forces even, and he chased after the people of Israel who had left with fists raised in defiance.
[00:24:13] And defiance in this instance, like, yeah, yeah, our God rules, right? We're free.
[00:24:21] There is a confidence, there's a boldness that our God is great.
[00:24:29] By the way, be aware when you give your life to Jesus, when you walk out of the kingdom of darkness into what the Bible calls the kingdom of light, the enemy that is Satan is not going to let you go easily, just so you know that. Be aware, he's not going to let you go easily and he's not going to forget about you once you depart his kingdom.
[00:24:51] At a minimum, he's going to want to chase after you.
[00:24:54] He's going to want to limit, maybe limit the amount of blessing that you live in your own life with God. He maybe wants to keep you on the fringe of his influence, always calling out to you to turn back because wasn't it better then look at the hard life. You gave your life to Jesus and it's not all lollipops and cotton candy. There's actually some difficulties.
[00:25:22] Remember how good you had it, Egypt? And that's what will happen for us.
[00:25:28] Ultimately. He's looking to destroy us.
[00:25:31] And God wants to continue to lead us and continue to fight for us. Verse 9. It goes on to say the Egyptians chased after them with all their forces in Pharaoh's army, all his horses and chariots, his charioteers and his troops.
[00:25:45] It says the Egyptians caught up with him with the people of Israel as they camped near the shore near Pihathio, across from BAAL Zephon.
[00:25:54] So that's where you saw that on the map, right? Number two, there's a little camp out there.
[00:26:00] Verse 10 goes on to say, and as Pharaoh approached, the people of Israel looked up, they saw them in a distance and they panicked when they saw the Egyptians overtaking them.
[00:26:15] Now at this point they had been, they're in that camp out for maybe it's now two and a half to three weeks away from their exodus. So that travel time, walking to travel time, they're about two and a half, three weeks away. And they're gonna end up camping there in that one site for upwards to seven days before God is gonna show up in their lives. And as they're camped there, the armies of Israel are bearing down on them and we would understand that they would be a little bit scared being there. I mean, let's be honest, they were an unarmed people, right? They didn't really take any arms with them. They took some silver and gold and other belongings from the Egyptians, but they didn't take any military equipment in order to battle.
[00:26:58] So they could easily be overcome.
[00:27:01] And with the forces of Egypt bearing down on them, we can imagine the joy that they had experienced maybe two weeks before whenever they, that evening, that Passover evening, with fists of defiance and praise to God, they walked out of Egypt. The joy of that, the celebration of that.
[00:27:19] Now two plus weeks later, we can see how that joy might begin to be dwindled, particularly as they see the Egyptian army bearing down on them.
[00:27:29] But what they're forgetting is just.
[00:27:33] Do you forget about the cloud that you know that's just right over there?
[00:27:37] Yahweh is right over there, he's with us.
[00:27:40] And somehow they have forgot that. And so they were panicked.
[00:27:45] Perhaps that's understandable because they're human like you and I. Because sometimes when tough times come, even as Christ following people, this is why it's so important that we get rooted, rooted, rooted in the word of God, with faith in God that we really believe.
[00:28:00] I'll tell you that I really believe Tim really believes God is fighting for me still every day. And I believe that he's gonna fight for you too. But sometimes if we don't get rude enough, situations happen and they'll knock us off our spot.
[00:28:14] And then we get fearful. This is what's happening with the Israelites.
[00:28:21] But it says that they did what any of us should do, and that is they cried out to the Lord. Presumably there was a sincerity in, in their God, what's going on? Why is this happening?
[00:28:35] Then it goes on to verse 11, but they said to Moses, so they cried out to the Lord, but they said to Moses, Moses, why did you bring us out here to die? In the wilderness.
[00:28:47] Why did you do this?
[00:28:50] God? We don't know what's happening. Where are you, Moses? Why did you bring us out here?
[00:28:54] Weren't there enough graves for us in Egypt?
[00:28:57] What have you done to us?
[00:28:59] Why did you make us leave Egypt?
[00:29:06] These words to Moses perhaps show little faith.
[00:29:11] They're crying out to God because they're scared, but they're words to Moses saying, why did you bring us out here? You should have left us.
[00:29:23] They show little faith in a loss in confidence.
[00:29:27] Maybe in Yahweh, but certainly in Moses and his leadership.
[00:29:33] But realistically, could anybody really think that Moses plan was to be the instrument of the ten plagues, the marching out of Egypt? That Moses plan was, ha, ha, I'm going to march you out into nowhere so you can die.
[00:29:50] I mean, it doesn't logically follow that that would be real. But the reality is, when we're faced difficult situations, sometimes the fear of that stirs us in a way that we're no longer thinking rationally anymore. Because maybe in that moment we're not anchored where we need to be in faith, believing God is still fighting for us. And so it's real easy to. To then think that maybe you would be marching us out here to die in the middle of the wilderness. But it's hard to imagine. But sometimes when we are oppressed, crazy things come up in our thinking. Verse 12 goes on to say, they said, didn't we tell you, Moses, this would happen while we were still in Egypt? We said, leave us alone.
[00:30:43] Let us be slaves to the Egyptians.
[00:30:47] It's better.
[00:30:50] It's better to be a slave in Egypt than a corpse in the wilderness.
[00:30:58] Really?
[00:31:00] This is how you're responding?
[00:31:03] Don't you see that cloud right there?
[00:31:06] You know what that cloud is, right, everybody?
[00:31:09] That's God's presence, God's protection.
[00:31:11] God is with you. Visibly. You can see it.
[00:31:22] We shouldn't forget when we're walking in freedom, the enemy's not giving up on us, right?
[00:31:31] But don't forget that any area of our past, the life that we lived before we came to Christ, at any time, a part of our life can still rise up and call out and say, hey, it's really hard. But remember, remember how good you had it back then.
[00:31:51] Remember when you lived like that, you didn't have all of these troubles.
[00:31:55] So we get nostalgic or we think, oh yeah, the grass was greener back in Egypt when it really wasn't in our past.
[00:32:04] The enemy wants to do that, wants to call us to say it's better to be a slave in Egypt than to be living out here in the freedom.
[00:32:15] Because they're forgetting that they're out there in freedom and that they have the presence of God with them. Goes on in verse 13.
[00:32:22] We get to this part where I've titled this section. Stand still or get moving.
[00:32:28] Do we stand still or get moving? Look at what it says here, verse 13.
[00:32:32] But Moses told the people, this is what he says to the people in this situation.
[00:32:37] Don't be afraid.
[00:32:40] Don't be afraid.
[00:32:42] Just stand still, be unmoved and watch the Lord rescue you today.
[00:32:51] Stand still, watch what's gonna happen.
[00:32:55] I know you're all panicked and you forgot that there's a cloud right there. But stand still and watch the Lord rescue you today. The Egyptians you see today will never be seen again.
[00:33:08] The Lord himself will fight for you.
[00:33:11] Just stay calm. That phrase, verse 14, the Lord Himself will fight for you. That is probably the key verse in this chapter for sure. It might be the key verse in all of the book of Exodus. Cause this thought, this truth, is still true today for us.
[00:33:33] God, the Lord is still fighting for us.
[00:33:38] Amen.
[00:33:40] He's still fighting for us. So just stay calm.
[00:33:44] But that's what's really hard. When things are going crazy, we don't get calm. We wanna fix things. And we're panicked and we're being pressed in and it's hard to stand our ground and not to move, fight or flight.
[00:33:58] But stand still and watch the Lord fight for you. Maybe Moses had no idea what God was up to in that moment. He didn't.
[00:34:06] But the one thing Moses did know is what he trusted is that God is greater and God can provide answers for the people.
[00:34:19] And he knew it was Yahweh who brought them out of Egypt, not to let them die in the wilderness. And so Moses trusted Yahweh to be the one to deliver them, even in this situation.
[00:34:34] Verse 15 says. Then the Lord said to Moses, right? Moses said that to the people, confident leader, the Lord's gonna fight for you. Just stay calm.
[00:34:45] But then God says to Moses, why are you guys still crying out to me? Why are you crying out to me? Tell the people to get moving.
[00:34:56] Stand still. Get moving. What is it? Do I stand still, watch God, or do I get moving? What is it? What is it? Well, the reality is there was a time for praying, right?
[00:35:06] There's a time for praying, But then there's a time to get moving.
[00:35:14] There's a time for holy God sought as best we can determine to get moving, to get busy about holy activity. Yes, we pray, but at other times we must do what we can do to demonstrate that we trust God in the situation. It's not like we stay, we don't do anything until God resolves it.
[00:35:39] Then it's safe to move forward. Sometimes we have to pray and then we still, as best we can, discern what God is saying from his word, maybe by his spirit, maybe from wise counselors who deeply love Jesus. And the instruction we have to take a step forward and then we trust God step by step.
[00:35:58] In that verse 16, God continues. He says after saying to Moses, tell the people to get moving. He says to Moses, pick up your staff and raise your hand over the sea.
[00:36:15] Divide the water so the Israelites can walk through the middle of the sea on dry ground.
[00:36:20] First, know this Moses staff and Moses raised hand is not the one that delivered anything.
[00:36:26] It's always Yahweh, always Yahweh doing it. Even though there was a part for Moses to play. Secondly, the truth is when we seek God, we need to do as best we can, determine what God has told us to do.
[00:36:40] Because then we'll see where stood once an obstacle, a pathway forward emerges, which is what's about to happen. Verse 17 and I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians and they will charge in after the Israelites.
[00:36:59] Raise your staff, divide the waters, walk through in the middle on dry ground and I'll harden Pharaoh in the Egyptians hearts and they will charge in after you.
[00:37:07] He says my great what?
[00:37:10] My great glory.
[00:37:12] Not just a bright light, but it's all the power and the awesomeness. It's the presence of God displayed.
[00:37:21] My great glory will be displayed through Pharaoh and his troops, his chariots and its charioteers. And when my glory is displayed through them all Egypt and even you Israelites all Egypt will see my glory and know that I am Yahweh, the self existent one who has no equal.
[00:37:46] See Yahweh in this is finishing answering a question that Pharaoh had earlier as we read about. Remember at one point whenever Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh said release my people.
[00:38:01] And he says well who is this God? Who is this Yahweh that I don't know him, so why should I obey him? Well, God is giving that answer even now to Pharaoh. This is why because of the power of the Almighty is being displayed. And the truth is in our lives when we see God show up and he brings victory not only for the Israelites, he brings victory to show God's authority over the enemy. In this case, Pharaoh. But in our lives.
[00:38:34] God uses the victories in our lives to speak to the enemy and to any other human observer, the people in our sphere of influence who watch our lives to see how we handle difficulties and how we trust God to show up.
[00:38:53] God continues to use these victories to shape our lives and to display his power and his authority and his ability to impact and Change lives.
[00:39:04] Verse 19 says this. Then the Lord, well, it is the Lord. The angel of God who had been leading the people of Israel moved to the rear of the camp.
[00:39:13] The pillar of cloud also moved from the front and stood behind them. The cloud settled between them and the Egyptians and the Israelite camps. And as darkness fell, the cloud turned to fire, lighting up the night.
[00:39:28] But the Egyptians and the Israelites did not approach each other all night.
[00:39:34] And we get to verse 21, and this is where they escaped through the Red Sea. Here it is.
[00:39:42] Then Moses, he raised his hand over the sea, and the Lord opened a path through the water with a strong east wind.
[00:39:54] The wind blew all night, turning to seabed into dry ground.
[00:39:59] So the people of Israel walk through the middle of the sea on dry ground with waters, walls of water on each side.
[00:40:08] Let's bring the map back up for a second. We look at the map, we see here where the pilot. And then there's the white dotted line that goes over to the number three.
[00:40:19] This is where Moses would sit on one shore, raised his hand and his staff, and God would have divided the waters. Now, the distance between the. Down at the bottom on that little gulf up there, the distance right at that bottom, at the top of the Red Sea, you see it right There is about 10 miles, 10 miles across, not very long. But presumably this is where the east wind blew that part of the waters and dried the land 10 miles. Now, remember, there are nearly 2 million people waiting to cross that.
[00:40:51] So. So, for example, imagine this, the size of this room, 50 or 60 yards.
[00:40:58] A path, let's just say God's wind opened a path this wide, a swath this wide through the Red Sea. That's called the Strait of Tehran, actually. Now, but the mile, the length that it would take for people to line up 2 million would be 12 miles long, 50, 60 yards wide. And the line 12 miles long. Remember last week I asked, what's the longest line you stood in?
[00:41:24] That's a pretty long line, right?
[00:41:27] But God is, through Moses, opening the Red Sea, a person walks roughly three to four miles an hour. I don't know if you're carrying a bunch of luggage and your belongings and all the things that the Egyptian neighbors gave him, the gold and silver, how fast they're going to walk. But typically a leisurely pace would take three to four hours to walk that 10 miles, right?
[00:41:52] That means from the first person who stepped out into the water as Moses hand went up dry ground, they walked across.
[00:41:59] The last person maybe is about stepping into that dry ground and making it across.
[00:42:06] That would take roughly six, eight, nine hours.
[00:42:10] Six, nine hours for them to walk across at a leisurely pace. Again, take into account how much luggage they had with them.
[00:42:16] The point is this.
[00:42:18] The wind blew all night long.
[00:42:22] They did this at night, passing through the Red Sea as God led them through that. Look at this, verse 24. And Megan, you and the team could kind of come on up. Verse 24. But just before dawn, the Lord looked down on the Egyptian army from the pillar of cloud and fire, and he threw their forces into total confusion.
[00:42:45] He twisted their chariot wheels. I'm not sure how he did that, making the chariots difficult to drive.
[00:42:50] Let's get out of here, away from these Israelites. Which is what they should have said earlier.
[00:42:55] Let's get away from these Israelites. The Egyptians shouted, because the Lord is fighting for them.
[00:43:02] The Egyptians even noticed God is still fighting for the Israelites against Egypt.
[00:43:09] God is still fighting for his people today. Verse 26. When all the Israelites had reached the other side, the Lord said to Moses, raise your hand over the sea again. Then the waters will rush back and cover the Egyptians and their chariots and charioteers.
[00:43:24] So as the sun began to rise, Moses raised his hand over the sea and the water rushed back into its usual place.
[00:43:33] The Egyptians tried to escape, but the Lord swept him into the sea.
[00:43:38] And as it did, the testimony is not a single one survived.
[00:43:44] Amen. Right.
[00:43:45] So when this all happened, verse 29 says, but the people of God who had walked through the middle of the sea on dry ground, as the waters stood up on like a wall on both sides, this is how the Lord rescued Israel from the hand of the Egyptians that day. And Israel saw the bodies of the Egyptians washed up on the seashore.
[00:44:06] And get this, at verse 31, when the people of Israel saw again, I'll add, the mighty power that Yahweh had unleashed against the Egyptians.
[00:44:18] They were filled with awe.
[00:44:20] Maybe in your Bible it says fear, but it's not fear like I'm afraid. It's fear like I can't believe how awesome God is and he's on my side.
[00:44:31] They were filled with awe before him. They put their faith in the Lord and in his servant Moses. Voluntarily, they put their faith again.
[00:44:44] It had waned.
[00:44:46] They were wondering, how are we going to get out of this? But God showed up. And I imagine that as everybody got on the other side and.
[00:44:58] An impromptu worship service broke out and they were having all kinds of testimony of people talking about, remember this plague, remember that? They're just celebrating what God has done. And then the death of the firstborn. And we did the blood thing and. And then Pharaoh said, get out of here. And we left.
[00:45:16] Remember, we left and then we got just right across over there. We got stuck there. We thought we were dead.
[00:45:25] Yahweh showed up, and there's testimony after testimony. This is what I imagine happened.
[00:45:31] And then at the end of all that, I imagine Moses gave an altar call.
[00:45:38] And at that altar call, maybe they all came forward filled with awe and they put their faith back in Yahweh.
[00:45:47] Many times for us, life gets hard. Sometimes we get drained, spiritually and otherwise.
[00:45:52] But God is always willing to receive us.
[00:45:57] The altar doesn't have to be in the church meeting. It could be at your home, in your car.
[00:46:01] You can have a moment where you return to God, you put your faith back and you say, God, God, I trust you in this situation. Help me in that situation.
[00:46:08] And God will meet us there.
[00:46:10] Because that's exactly the kind of result God wants from not only the Egyptians that may, but from the Israelites, but also for us when we see the glory of God show up in our life, that we would surrender. We would see how awesome he is, and we would surrender once again to him.
[00:46:27] So my wrap up is this. And we're going to sing a song and you come forward. I'll be down front. Jason, Guy and Rhonda will be down front. But what do you need to put your trust in God? What. What do you need to put your faith in God for? There's no doubt he showed up and you have a testimony of God's goodness in your life. But none of us are perfect.
[00:46:50] And maybe there's still an area that, you know, that God has revealed that, hey, we're gonna have to. We've got to walk away and walk through this one too.
[00:46:58] Maybe there's an area bad relationship, bad marriage, deep depression, other challenges of addictions that you need to walk away from. God is fighting for you and he wants to deliver you from those as well. Amen.
[00:47:12] So I'm going to ask you to stand and we're going to have a time of worship with a powerful, moving song called Egypt. But if you have a need for prayer, would you come and see us? It.
