Moses: The Power of God lives in YOU!

[00:00:00] Speaker A: There is no one only. There is no one like you, Lord. [00:00:13] Speaker B: There's no one. There is no one. Let's just, just rest. There's no one, Jesus. No one worthy and yet as wonderful and glorious as you are. You welcome the praises and song and of words, God, you welcome those from us. We are honored to be able to come before you, to stand before you, to kneel before you, to speak your name because of who you are and what you've done for us, God. And you welcome our praise. Can I ask you church where you're at? Would you just, just whisper it if you will. Or maybe some of you raise your voice and just tell God how you feel about him in this moment, what he's done for you and how you're grateful, how he's worthy. Would you just tell him, God, you're so good. I'm here today because of you. And there's been times that I couldn't see tomorrow. I was wrapped up in the tears of the moment. And God you showed up and God you. Who else is worthy? That's all we got to say. There's none. It's only you, Jesus. We say we love you. Can we sing that? We sing that chorus again, Megan. [00:02:00] Speaker A: Who else is worthy? [00:02:03] Speaker B: Who else is worthy? [00:02:07] Speaker A: There is no one, only you, Jesus. Who else is worthy? Who else is worthy? There is no one, only you, Jesus. Who else is worthy? [00:02:34] Speaker B: Thank you Lord. [00:02:45] Speaker A: Who else is worthy? There's no one like you. There's no one, only Jesus. [00:03:00] Speaker B: Can I get an amen? Amen. God bless. God bless you. Thank you Jesus. Thank you, Megan. Thank you team. God bless. God bless. Go ahead and have a seat. Good morning. Some of you know that six high school students went to Salt Lake City, Utah with Pastor Josh a couple weeks back for our denomination's Nazarene youth conference. For five days they gathered with over 10,000 high school students. 10,000, that's a lot of people. It's like twice the number that's in here. 10,000 high school students who gathered for a powerful, life changing time of worship and teaching and community service. God did some things. Next Sunday we're going to have the opportunity to see a video recorded testimony of some of their story. Next week Pastor Josh will be teaching, but we're going to have a time to celebrate what God did in these high school students lives and what he wants to do in every high school student's life. I share this this morning because first of all, I'm excited about what Pastor Josh has already shared with me and I'M really looking forward to hearing the rest of the stories of these young people's lives that, that are gonna be changed. Their lives are gonna be continually changed from then on, but also the impact that they're gonna have in their homes and in their friendship circles. Praise God. But I also wanted to share that because today we're gonna look at a story out of Exodus chapter 19. When the Israelites would have an encounter with the sobering presence of God. For five days, our high school students encountered the sobering presence of God. And the reality is, is when we meet God, when we meet that sobering presence of the Almighty God, it calls out something from within us. It calls us to a deeper understanding and a deeper devotion to the one who loves us. We're gonna talk about that this morning and we're gonna be able to celebrate what God is doing in some of our kids lives next weekend. But let me pray for us and we'll get into God's word. Father, we say thank you for who you are. I pray that you open our hearts to hear from you. I pray that your word would come alive. As we look at the story, the testimony of your people as recorded by Moses, as we hear the story God, we're reminded of who you are. And God, what a gift it is to know you, to be invited into a relationship with you. And so, God, I pray that you use this time to continue to grow us at our understanding and our appreciation of who you are. And God, may we surrender ourselves to live more purposefully for you. In Jesus name I say amen. Amen. All right, we're going to turn to Exodus, chapter 19. Chapter 19 begins exactly two months after the Israelites left Egypt. In verse one, it says this exactly two months after they left Egypt. They arrived in the wilderness of Sinai after breaking camp at Rephidim. That was on day 47. Is it on the screen? Our screen's off. What happened? Technical difficulties. Okay. No, no, I don't. You know, you can watch it back on replay. Make a little meme out of was day 47 of their exodus from Egypt when they broke camp and they moved on to the wilderness of Sinai. And they set up camp at the base of Mount Sinai. And in your copy of God's Word, it might say Mount Sinai, but it also might say Mount Horeb because Mount Sinai, Mount Horeb are used interchangeably. They're believed to be the same mountain. Now, in their journey, the Israelites had been out of Egypt for now, what, is eight weeks? And they're Going to set up camp at the base of Mount Sinai, and they're going to be there for the next 11 months. So so far, they've been traveling for eight weeks. They've traveled about 466 miles from Goshen and Egypt, down the peninsula, across the Red Sea, and then they wandered a little bit along the coast of the Red Sea before they turned up and headed to Mount Sinai, where they're camping now. 466 miles. They've been walking for eight weeks. That's like walking from here to Coeur d', Alene, Idaho, or to Nampa, Idaho. Walking, that's roughly 10 miles a day, five, six, seven hours a day. Two million people with all their belongings. And remember, when they left Egypt, they took a lot of precious jewels and gold and silver along with them, remember? So they're hauling all of that, walking 10 miles a day for eight weeks till they rest on day 48 at the Mount Sinai. You remember, this is the same place, Mount Sinai, where Moses had his encounter with God in the burning bush, right? Changed his life. God sent him to Egypt to deliver the people, Israel. And when God spoke to Moses that day, he said to Moses in Exodus, chapter 3, verse 12, when. When you deliver my people and you bring them out of Egypt. Not if. Because when God says something's going to happen, it eventually will happen. Not always the way we think it is, but it's going to happen. When you bring them out. You will worship me, Moses. You all will worship me here on this same mountain. So here we are, eight weeks later. They're sitting at the base of Mount Sinai. God has brought them there, and it won't be long before the whole nation of Israel will experience some of what Moses experienced with the burning bush. And that is the sobering presence of God. In verse three, it tells us that Moses climbed the mountain to appear before the Lord. Now, when the screen comes back up, there's going to be several times as we're going to see the scripture on the, on the, on the screens. And there are at least three times that Moses goes up the mountain and then he comes back down. Then he goes back up and he comes back down. He goes back up and he comes back down. Now, there isn't universal agreement on which mountain is Mount Sinai or Mount Horeb, but the one that generally is accepted has an elevation of about 7,500ft. And for Moses from the base to walk up to wherever he walked up to meet with God was at least a four to five mile walk uphill. Four to five miles uphill. I don't like to walk up 12 steps, much less five. But this is what he did as God called him. And then he went back down, back up. So Moses climbed the mountain to appear before the Lord. And the Lord called to him from the mountain and said, give these instructions to the family of Jacob. Announce to the descendants of Israel, say this. You have seen what I did to the Egyptians. You know, how I carried you on eagle's wings and brought you to myself. For example. He says, moses, give this instructions. Tell the people to remember. A couple weeks back, we talked about remembering. Remembering where God has brought you from and how he has shown up. Remember that so that whenever you face the next thing, you can remember the power and the presence of God showing up in your lives. Remember. And he tells Moses to instruct him, Remember, Israel, now that you are camped right before the mountain, that I spoke to Moses and then I sent him to you. Remember, you have seen my mighty hand at work. You've seen it with your own eyes. And you know how I've carried you on eagle's wings, how I've protected and provided for you. And I have brought you to this very mountain to worship me. You see, when God delivered the Egyptians, just like he delivers us from our sinful self, when God delivered Israel from Egypt, he didn't deliver them to live on their own. He delivered them so that he might have fellowship, that he might have a relationship with them. God didn't deliver them so they could live apart. And it's like, hey, I wanna get you out of that Egypt. Cause it's a really bad scene. It's a lot of oppression. I mean, it's just bad. So I'm gonna bring you out, so then you can just live free. Live however you want. That's not what God did. God brought Israel out of Egypt not that they could live apart from him, but so that they could live for him. Because God delivered them so that he could live in fellowship with him every Sunday morning, in a manner speaking, I would say that we gather. We gather at the base of the mountain of God to meet with him, to hear from him, to remember what he's done for us, and to be encouraged to not live apart from him, but to be encouraged to live for him. Verse 5 goes on in the story, and it says this. I get God, still speaking to Moses and giving instructions, says, now, if you obey, so say this now, if you will obey me and keep my covenant, you will be my very own special treasure from among all the peoples of the earth, for all the earth belongs to me. This covenant that speaking of here is known as the Mosaic covenant. It will include, which we'll get to next week, it include the Ten Commandments as the beginning, details of how that would shape really the Israelite culture. It would shape their communal life as well as their religious life and practice. But this covenant is not compulsory. It's voluntary, it's conditional. It says, if you will obey me, if you will voluntarily keep, that is, you understand how this relationship works. If you obey and keep the covenant, the condition is if you do that, then you will have covenant blessing. That covenant blessing is access. It's the nearness, it's the presence of God showing up, continuing to carry you on eagle's wings, providing and protecting you. Goes on to say in verse six, and you will be my kingdom of priests, my holy nation. Moses, this is the message you must give to the people of Israel. So what he's saying here is in exchange for this voluntary surrender to God, if we will, of our own free will for the Israelites as well as for us, give ourselves to God, then we can be, we are welcomed into be, his very own special possession. He says that this will be, that we are a kingdom of priests. That means we can draw near to God. God isn't continuing to be distant. We can't come close to God. And then as we live with God and as we see the benefit and the blessing of this covenant relationship, we get then to testify about the goodness and the purpose of God, not just to each other, but for Israel to do that to the other nations, give testimony to God, to Yahweh. You see, you and I might recall from the New Testament, when Peter makes a reference to we are a kingdom, a royal priest, royal priesthood. It's a similar thought. Because we who are Christ followers through Jesus, we here, who follow his voice, become his possession as well. When we give our lives in faith, we become the children of God. And then we have the privilege of having God care and protect us, as well as for us to be able to be the ones who testify about the goodness of God. As a church. We want you to know him because we want you to be his own very special possession, his own treasure. We want you to know him so that you can learn to live in this New Testament covenant relationship. It's conditional, it's not compulsory. You get to choose to obey God, to live for God, but we also then get to testify. We get to show by our own lives that God is real, that God works, and we get to share that with the world. Goes on to say that they're a holy nation. You see, God intended for his people to be set apart from the culture that they lived in, to come out, not be, not to carry forward the things they learned during all their time in Egypt. And God invites us to come out from our own Egypt to live differently, to step out, to be set apart from the culture that we live in, so that the things that we think, the things that we do are different, different than culture. Reminds me of what Paul wrote to the Romans. In Romans, chapter 12, verse 1, he says, do not conform any longer to the patterns of this world. And I say to you, with the help of God's word and the power of his spirit within us, we can come out and live differently. Not like the world, we can live differently. Called out from our culture as well. So he says, this is the destiny. This is the plan that I have for my people. So then he asks, so what do you say? And I say to you, what do you say? Church are you in? Are you into God? Are you going to live for God? The Israelites responded, verse 7. So Moses returned from the mountain. You see a little hiking, man. This is a reminder. Each time he went up, he returned from the mountain. So he's coming down, he's facing that way. When he goes up, he goes that way. He goes four to five miles uphill and then four to five miles downhill to deliver the message to the people he got his steps in. So Moses returned from the mountain and called together the elders of the people and told them everything the Lord had commanded him. And all the people responded together. Read it with me. We will do everything the Lord has commanded. This is what they said collectively as a nation. I believe their answer was sincere, like ours is. When we come to faith in Jesus, we're sincere. We want to do what God asks us to do, what he invites us to do. They wanted to give their wholehearted allegiance to Yahweh and voluntarily live for him. The next verse goes on, says, and finished up. So Moses, he brought the people's answer back to the Lord. So that means he went back up. He came down, gave them the message. What do you guys say? We're in. Great. I'll be right back. Up he goes again, verse nine. Then the Lord said to Moses, I will come to you. I will come to you in a thick cloud, Moses, so that the people themselves can hear me when I speak to you. I'm going to say that again. I'm going to read that again. God tells Moses, I'm going to come to you, Moses Thick cloud. And I'm going to come so that the people themselves can hear me when I speak to you. Then they will always trust you. God's saying, I'm going to come down, Moses, and I'm going to speak to you audibly in some way. Going to speak audibly in some way to you, Moses, so that the people can hear me speaking. Literally hear me speaking to you. Then when they hear me speak to you, Moses, everyone will know that I've been speaking to you all along. That I've been working through you. I've been leading you. Sure, there was a pillar of cloud and fire day and night, leading these 2 million people to the base of Mount Sinai. Yeah, sure. But the people are gonna know, Moses, when they hear me speak to you, they're gonna know. They're gonna trust you. They will always trust you and your leadership going forward because of what is about to happen. Because no doubt in the last six to eight months, with the plagues in Egypt and then the last two months wandering through and finding, finding themselves now at the base of Mount Sinai, they've been growing more and more in the relationship of trust of Moses and his leadership. But God saying, when they. When they hear me speak back to you, this will. Your leadership will be cemented. They will be always trusting you. Then he goes on and he finishes up this verse. And oh, Moses told the Lord, the people said they were all in, by the way. Okay, they're all in. So verse 10 goes on and says this. Then Moses, no. Then the Lord told Moses again, because he had to deliver the message. The Lord told Moses, go down and prepare the people for my arrival. Consecrate them today and tomorrow and have them wash their clothing. Be sure they are ready on the third day, for on that day the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai as all the people watch. This verse has a word that we don't use much, Consecrate. It's underlined there. Consecrate. That is the idea of setting something apart. So consecrate, set it over here. But in the biblical sense, it has to do with setting apart something for a holy. A godly purpose. A holy godly purpose. So he says to Moses, go down and help people get ready for me to show up, to appear to them. If they say they are all in, Moses, then help them prepare themselves. Help them make right in their priorities. Help their words and their lives to align with. With what they Say, they say, we will do everything Yahweh has asked of us. So help them prepare their hearts for me to show up. Goes on and say, verse 12, Moses. I mean, God's still giving instruction to Moses. He says, mark off a boundary all around the mountain. So all around the mountain. And I don't know if that meant literally the whole mountain or just in that plain where they had come up to the base of the mountain, but set out some construction cones, Moses, so that people won't go past them. Warn the people, be careful. Do not go up on the mountain or even touch its boundaries. I can just see a bunch of kids. You know when you tell kids, don't touch something and they're going to, you know, they get, how close, how close can I get to the boundary without breaking, Breaking the boundary? Warn the people, be careful. Do not go up on the mountain or even touch its boundaries. Anyone who touches the mountain will certainly be put to death. No hand may touch the person or animal that crosses the boundary. Instead, stone them or shoot them with arrows. They must be put to death. However, when the ram's horn sounds a long blast, then the people may go up on the mountain and literally just up to the boundary. See, during these three days, they are not to touch Mount Sinai at all. And this boundary will remain in effect, the whole remaining next 11 months would. While they're camped in front of the mountain, that boundary continues. They're not to go up on the mountain or cross the boundary. This will underscore this boundary. It underscores the holiness of God, the seriousness of his presence. See, there is this intense separation between God's holy perfection, because God's not like you and me. He's far above us. It's a reminder, the boundary of God's holy perfection and mankind's imperfection. That means me, as good as I might be on some days, I'm so far from where I need to be. And this boundary made a reminder of the separation. And this boundary also began to establish a healthy reverence for Yahweh. Think about it, when we set boundaries, what do they mean for our kids or for relationships? Sometimes we set boundaries. The boundary becomes a thing that people have to stay away from. It calls for us to have some self restraint. And in this case, it began to provide for a healthy respect of divinely ordered limits. Because with God, not just in that day, physically with a boundary, there were divinely ordered limits. And in our lives, even today, there are some, some divinely ordered limits. You see, God didn't deliver us so we can go live however we want to live apart from Him. God delivers us so that we can live for Him. And live for him is within the divine limited boundaries. There are some things that God says in His Word, and it comes by conviction of the Holy Spirit that we are not to do because it's for our best, that we don't do certain things. Sometimes we feel like God is just trying to rob us of our joy by setting up these boundaries, but they're ultimately for our good. This is what boundaries are for. It's also a reminder to caution people who are following God. Though God is a personal God and He invites us into a personal intimate relationship, we should never treat the relationship with God casually. Never treat it casually. The people could come near to God at God's invitation. And when that ram's horn blew, as it says here, they were able to come near to God, but not to cross the boundary that God had established. Verse 14 goes on to say, well, got all this instruction from the Lord. So Moses went down four to five miles to the people, and he consecrated them. He helped prepare them for worship, and they washed their clothes. Remember, they've been traveling for at least eight weeks. How many times they stopped to wash their clothes, I don't know. When they were dying of thirst and God provided water from the rock, I think their interest was probably in drinking water rather than washing their clothes. But anyways, they needed. Maybe their clothes needed to be washed, but also because they were about to experience God in a way they never had. They were getting prepared to meet God. And so Moses prepared them for worship, and they washed their clothes. He told them, get ready for the third day. And until then, he says, abstain from sexual intercourse. You see, soon God was going to appear like he never had before, and in a spectacular way. And so Moses was preparing the people. I liken this to this idea of examining and preparing ourselves. You know, Paul writes to the Corinthians in First Corinthians, chapter 11. When it comes to communion, hey, don't eat or drink in an unworthy manner. He says, I encourage you, I caution you. Examine yourselves before you come in the celebration of communion to remember what Christ did with his body and his blood. Because if you participate in it and you're not examining yourself to say, I'm not perfect, but I know my heart is clear, I'm right before God. He says, when you come in that unworthy manner, you actually bring judgment on yourself when you do it in an unworthy manner. And yet still here, the emphasis that God is giving on the washing of clothes and of the abstaining from sexual relations is nothing other than to demonstrate, because it doesn't say elsewhere in the Bible, anywhere else, that, hey, before you come to church on Sunday, you probably shouldn't have sex on Saturday night. I'm talking to the married folks. Well, I would say that also to the unmarried folks, but it doesn't say anything about abstaining. But in this moment, because this was going to be a unique first time experience, Moses was leading them to demonstrate their real desire for purity, to be consecrated for their meeting with God for the very first time. And why? Well, because God is getting ready to come down like he never has before. Verse 16. On the morning of the third day, thunder roared and lightning flashed and dense cloud came down on the mountain and there was a long loud blast from the ram's horn and all the people trembled. You see what Israel saw, what they felt, the thunder, the lightning, the cloud, the smoke, and the earthquake. No doubt it was overwhelming and probably a little frightening. Yet together, all of those elements proclaim the power and the majesty and the glory of the sobering presence of God. Verse 17. Moses led them out from the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain. All of Mount Sinai was covered with smoke because the Lord had descended on it in the form of fire. The smoke billed into the sky like smoke from a brick kiln, and the whole mountain shook violently as the blast of the ram's horn grew louder and louder. Moses spoke and God thundered his reply. You see, Moses led the people right up to the boundary at the base where they could hear the voice of God, where they could see, smell, hear and feel the very presence of God as he covered it. And it tells us that Moses spoke, and in the nlt, the New Living translation, it says, and God thundered his reply. In some other translations, maybe in your own copy, it says something like God answered him by voice. I mean, I really don't know if it was a literal voice, but something was heard. Another translation said, God answered him by voice that rumbled like thunder. I'm not sure what it is, but they understood God was speaking back to them, back to Moses, and they heard it with their own ears. Collectively, they heard that Yahweh speak something audibly, and they understood it. And as a result of that, it says they troubled a little bit, but they also learned to trust Moses and his leadership at that site. Verse 20 goes on. The Lord came down on the top of the mountain and called Moses to the top of the mountain. So Moses climbed back up the mountain, four or five miles. Then the Lord told Moses, go back down. Oh my goodness, Lord, why do you keep asking me? Come up and go down, come up and come down. And the Lord told Moses, go back down and warn the people not to break through the boundaries to see the Lord or they will die. Okay, now all of this lightning and thunder and earthquake and smoke and fire, maybe Moses, as he'd grown in his relationship, he would. He would probably take it back, taken aback from it, but it didn't frighten him. And he might have been comfortable enough in his growing relationship with God that it didn't frighten him. But I still think it took a lot of courage in that moment to cross the boundary and go up on the mountain. But Moses did it anyways. Even today, for you and I, God and the wonder of God can certainly be amazing. But God still calls us because of our faith in Jesus to come close. There's nothing to fear of God when he invites us into a relationship with him. But many people today, maybe some in this room, Christ following people might say, hey, we can sure use in the church a lot more thunder and lightning and fire preaching and God raining it down on people to frighten them into obedience. Well, I don't know that kind of God. I don't think that's what God is saying. We don't need any more of that. I think what we need is some consecration. We need a changed heart is what God is calling for in his people. You know, just not 40 days from this very event. These same people, these Israelites, who said, hey, we'll do everything the Lord commands we want to. But yet at all of the lightning and thunder, it caused them to be a little frightful. But just 40 days from here, their allegiance would turn because they would find themselves having an orgy around a golden calf, praising the golden calf as the God who delivered them from Egypt. They were not following God. They don't need more lightning and thunder, light show to call them to obedience. What they need is a changed heart. So God continues. Even the priests who regularly come down must purify themselves so the Lord does not break out and destroy them. But Moses protested, lord, the people cannot come to the mountain. You already warned us. How many times has that ever happened for you? All you had to hear is one and you were all good, right? You tell your kids once and they're all good. No, God knows people need to be reminded of the divinely ordered limits, verse 24. Megan, you and the team can come on up. But the Lord said, go down Moses one more time and bring Aaron back up with you. In the meantime, do not let the priests or the people break through to approach the Lord, or he will break out and destroy them. So Moses went down to the people and told them what the Lord had said. See, Yahweh gives another warning. Don't come close without being called. You can't approach God unless He invites you. The good news is, in our story here, God is called Moses. And then God invites Moses to invite Aaron. In the New Testament, we know that what Jesus did opened up the invitation to all. We're all invited. Everyone in this room is invited to come near to God. You're also invited to invite other people to come near to God because of what Jesus has done for us. So this morning, all that we've reviewed, it really sets the stage for what's going to happen next week. And God's going to share those 10 basic rules, the 10 Commandments, to begin to shape the Israel community life and their religious life. But for day today, as we've looked at this idea of the sobering presence of God, I ask you, do you have a healthy reverence for God as you're here this morning? Praise God. We can have a personal relationship with God. Philippians 2 tells us that Jesus gave up certain divine privileges in order to come and to take on and be born as a human being, as a man, that he would then live in obedience to God to show us how to do it. But then ultimately, he would be killed on a cross for us. In Jesus, God did more than come down on a mountain. He came down to earth. And he invited everyone into a personal relationship with him more profound than Moses ever knew. Because not only do we have access to God and His Word, which speaks to us, that informs our faith life, but God has promised his very own spirit to be within us. Lightning and thunder and fire and smoke, man is all in here. And I can live out a changed heart, a changed life, in a way that honors God, even as imperfect as I am, from time to time, God invites all of us into that kind of relationship. And so I ask if you've not given your life to Christ, I invite you to do that today. If you've been away and wandering, drifting from God, I invite you back. He welcomes you back. Nothing to fear. You're not going to be struck down. You're going to be embraced as a loving father. Embrace the prodigal son. So I'm going to be down front and Pastor Diane and Mike Downer are going to be down front. If you'd like to come and give your life to Christ or rededicate or maybe there's something else that today's word is spoken to you, we'd love to pray with you about anything, but we're going to ask you to stand and we're going to close with a song of worship as well. So go ahead and stand with us, and you come as you would have a need.