Got a lot of ground to cover this morning, we're going to be
studying the book of Exodus and we're going to kind of be going
through the majority of the book kind of bouncing back and forth
between a bunch of verses. So if you would like to follow
along in your Bible, that's great.
I've going to put the verses that we're going to be touching
on this morning on the screen for our convenience but the book
of Exodus I want to as we study at this morning, I want us to
understand or look at the questions.
And of how. And why does God save us?
So asking that question, obviously we need to assume or
we do assume that that that means that we need to save me
saved from something and we know that we have all sinned against
God, every one of us here and that is a serious problem and
it's our most serious problem that we encounter in our lives
because it separates us from God.
If we're not saved from sin, will live now, physically, but
we will eventually die and be separated from God is and that's
not the way that we want to live or die or spend our internally.
We need to be saved from sin. So how does God save us?
And maybe a question, we don't often to stop stop and think
about why does God save us? How?
And why does God save us? So, I want us to look at these.
And think about these questions as we look at the book of
Exodus. First God Saves Us by his grace.
That is how God Saves us, the answer, the Bible gives us in
the book of Exodus as that he saves Us by his grace and grace
is God's unmerited, mercy, that's what Grace is.
God Saves Us by showing Mercy to us.
When we do not deserve Us in the Bible deserve it, the Bible
teaches that we deserve destruction and death for our
sins and that is a Biblical statement that we see.
In the book of Exodus, the excellent Book of Exodus is a
picture of that. Particularly when we look at
pharaoh and the Egyptians. So if we want to go to we're
going to be in chapter 7 first. God through Moses told pharaoh
to let his people go out of Egypt and they were slaves.
There. But Pharaoh refused to let them
go. As we know in chapter 7, verses
14 through 18. It says, so the Lord said to
Moses Pharaoh's heart is hard. He refuses to let the people go
go to, Pharaoh, Pharaoh, in the morning when he goes out to the
water and you shall stand by the rivers Bank, to meet him, and
the rod which has turned to his serpent, you shall take in your
hand and you shall say to him, the lord of the, the Lord God of
the Hebrews has sent me to you saying, let my people We'll go
that they may serve me in the wilderness but indeed until now
you would not here. Thus says the Lord by this, you
shall know that I am the Lord behold, I will strike the waters
which are in the river and the rod with the rod that is in my
hand, and they shall be turned to blood and the fish that are
in the river shall die. The river shall stink in the
Egyptians will load to drink the water of the river.
And that begins the first of the ten plagues that we see in the
book of Exodus that happened in Egypt, this was the plague of
blood, it was followed by the plague of frogs in the plague of
gnats. Fourth was a plague of flies
then livestock dying boils followed by hail Locust and then
the plague of darkness and all these plagues were clear
pictures of God. Punishing the Egyptians for
enslaving. The Israelites every one of them
came in about in response to Favors Rebellion against God and
that sets the stage for the final plague and for the tenth
plague, the final judgment, the plague of the firstborn in
Exodus 11 verse 4 through 6. It says then Moses said thus
says the Lord about midnight, I will go out into the midst of
Egypt and all the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die from
the firstborn of pharaoh, who sits on his throne.
Even to the firstborn of the female servant, who is behind
the hand Mill and all the firstborn out of the animals,
then there shall be a great cry throughout all the land of Egypt
such as was not like it before. Nor shall it?
Be like it again. So, even after favor was
threatened with this, if they were still refuse to obey, God,
and that sets the stage for what?
We know, as the Passover, which we see in Exodus 12, when God
promised, that he would send a destroyer, And that's the word
that shoes in. Exodus 12 and 23, a destroyer
who would strike down every first born child and animal in
Egypt. And we also need to understand
too that the Israelites were also in Egypt to, they were
there and that meant that the Destroyer would come over their
homes as well. God's people, a picture of the
payment do not just to Pharaoh, but to all the people in their
sin, neither Pharaoh nor the Egyptians nor the Israelites
were innocent of sin before the holy God. the promise of excess
was that destruction was coming over all however, God in his
grace and his unmerited, Mercy provided deliverance and life
through sacrifice. God provided a way for the
firstborn and homes to be saved and ultimately for the slaves to
be freed through sacrifice specifically.
God saved his people by the blood of the lamb in Exodus and
exodus. 12 starting in verse one, will go through verse 13.
It says they're now, the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron in the
land of Egypt, saying this month shall be your beginning of
months. It shall be the first of the
month of the year to you speak. To all the congregation of
Israel saying, on the 10th of this month, every man shall take
for himself a lamb, according to the house of his father, a lamb
for a household, And if the household is too small for the
lamb, let him. And his neighbor next to his
house, take it. According to the number of the
persons. According to each man's need,
you shall make your count for the lamb.
Your lamb shall be without blemish.
A male of the first year, you may take it from the sheep, or
from the ghost. Now, you shall keep it until the
14th day of the same month. Then the whole assembly of the
congregation of Israel, shall kill it at Twilight.
And they shall take some of the blood.
And put it on the two-door post and on the lintel of the houses,
where they eat where they eat it, then they shall eat the
Flesh on that night roasted and fire with unleavened bread and
with bitter and with bitter herbs.
They shall eat it. Do not eat it, raw or boiled at
all with water. But roasted in fire its head
with its legs and its intros. You shall let none of it remain
until morning. And what remains of it until
morning. You shall burn with fire and
thus you shall eat it with a belt on your waist, your
sandals, on your feet, and your staff in your hand.
So shall eat it, so you shall eat it in haste.
It is the Lord's Passover for. I will pass through the land of
Egypt on that night and will strike all the firstborn in the
land of Egypt, both man, and Beast, and Against The Gods of
Egypt, I will execute judgment. I am the Lord.
Now the blood shall be a sign for you on the house.
Where you are. And when I see the blood, I will
pass over you and the plague shall not be on you to destroy
you. When I strike in the land of
Egypt. Okay, understand the picture
here, taking a perfect pure spotless lamb that God said to
go and get bring it into your house for 14 days.
She says, and I know our household and I'm sure there's
others here, you know, you bring it animal into your house for a
certain amount of time, you're going to create a bond. 14 days.
If it was two days at our house, to be a bombed, the 14 days, you
have this lamb in your house, your kids are taking care of it,
feeding it playing with, whatever might be getting used
to this land, you take it and you Slaughter it.
You take its blood with your children, watching you wipe it
across the doorposts of your home.
And that's an image that's going to stick with your family and
your children for a long, long time.
You can imagine your your children asking mom or dad, why
are you doing this? What is the reason for this and
your response would be destruction and death are
coming? But because of this slam, it is
a substitute sacrifice and you look at your older brother, you
know, if you were another child you had an older brother.
You look at your brother and realize that this lamb died for
him. Instead.
That night you can only imagine the cries coming from all the
homes across Egypt and the only people who were exempt from the
judgment on that night. Were those who trusted in the
blood of that sacrificial lamb judgment did not pass over the
Israelites because they were better people, not at all.
It didn't pass over them because they were sinless judgment only
passed over the edge of lights because they trusted in the
blood of that lamb. A substitute sacrifice provided
by God in his grace. So we'll come back to Exodus 12
here in a minute, but we're going to go over to Exodus 24.
After the Passover and the plague of the firstborn.
God's people did leaving Egypt and they came to Mount Sinai to
worship God and to enter into a covenant relationship with him.
In Exodus 24, it is the first fully describe public worship
service that we can read in the Bible.
It's kind of like a marriage celebration of God, committing
himself to his people and then committing themselves to God.
Beginning in verse 3 of Exodus 24, it says So Moses came and
told the people, all the words of the Lord, and all the
judgments and all the people answered with one voice and
said, all the words, which the Lord has said, we will do and
Moses wrote all the words of the Lord.
And he rose early in the morning and built an altar at the foot
of the mountain and twelve pillars across according to the
12 tribes of Israel. Then he sent young men of the
children of Israel who offered burnt offerings and sacrifices,
peace, offerings of oxen to the Lord.
And Moses took half the blood and put it in basins and half
the bloody sprinkled on the altar.
He then then he took the book of the Covenant and read it in the
hearing of the people and they said all that the Lord has said
we will do and be obedient and Moses took the blood sprinkled
it on the people and said, this is the blood of the Covenant,
which the Lord has made with you.
According to all these words, Moses read all the words in the
rules from God, to the people of Israel.
He did it twice in this passage and after reading those the
people of Israel said, we're going to go ahead and Obey those
but as soon as they said that what did Moses do?
Moses sent men to offer sacrifices.
So if the people were going to follow all the rules of what God
said, why would Moses have to go ahead and immediately offer a
sacrifice? That's because the people
couldn't keep their promise, sinful people could not keep the
province. They just said all the words
that the Lord has spoken will do.
But that wasn't true. They were Sinners.
Just as you and I are and it wouldn't be long before they
would go totally against God's word and they would send rebel
against God and His Covenant, and the payment for sin is death
which we see in Romans Verse 23. So, God provided sacrifices by
his grace, Moses Through Blood over the altar, as a picture.
Again, another picture of a substitute sacrifice to cover
sin to show that the the death penalty for sin has been paid by
another sacrifice. And this picture was see, the
just penalty due to Synod had been paid through sacrifice.
Then we get the excess 24 and eight.
Gets a little weird in excess in that in that eighth verse they
say, the people say we will obey all God's words, then Moses
starts. Throwing Blood on the people,
that's kind of odd. I'm glad we don't practice that
today, you know, I think if we did that today we would not get
many people coming to worship Our God, but the point is, That
Sinners can only come into a covenant relationship with the
holy God of the universe. If there is a sacrifice that is
the only way. Just like God saved his people
by Blood of the lamb and exodus 12 here in Exodus 24, God seals
his promise with the blood of another's life, a substitute
sacrifice and then we get to verse 9 of chapter 24.
It says then Moses went up. Also Aaron nadab.
And a by Hugh, and 70 of the Elders of Israel and they saw
the god of Israel and there was under his feet.
As it was were a paved work of sapphire stone and it was like
the very heavens in. It's Rarity.
But on the Nobles of the children of Israel, he did not
lay his hand. So they saw God and they ate and
they drink, they beheld God. Sinners were beholding the god
of Israel. Our God, they had a meal to
celebrate their relationship with God.
And one thing I love about the Bible is its Unity that we can
see from beginning to end. It's one big story that has huge
ramifications, not only for those during the time of the
Bible, but us as well. It's not just a story about the
Israelites, it's a story about you and us today, we have all
sinned, me, you all of us have sinned against God.
In Romans 6:23 verse 23. Makes it clear that the payment
for our sin is destruction and death and eventually physical
death. We will die and eternal,
spiritual death separated from God, for eternity.
But in God's grace, in his unmerited, mercy, God has not
left us alone myself or any of you in our sin alone.
By his grace, God, made a way for us to be saved from
destruction and get death. God, sent Jesus, his son to come
here to this earth, to be the perfect, sacrifice to live, the
to live a perfect life, that none of us could live.
Then although he had no sin price to pay for, you know, he
died that sacrifice on the cross for our sins.
Jesus died as our substitute sacrifice for our sins.
Jesus is the Lamb of God, whose blood saved us from destruction
and seals us from eternal life, just like the Israelites.
However, many years ago, trusted in the blood of a lamb
sacrificed or an animal sacrifice.
And that covered their sin, Jesus covers our sin for
eternity. no matter what we have done, no matter how guilty are
conscious, maybe no matter how stained our past is, no matter
how ashamed we might be no matter no matter what, no matter
what We are saved by the grace of God, if we come into the
contact of the blood of Jesus Christ.
We can behold God in a covenant relationship with him which is
why it happens. We get to get to worship today.
With a New Covenant. We get to partake of the Lord's
table every week. God, prescribes a meal, where we
are to celebrate the giving of Jesus's blood in the shedding of
Jesus. Jesus is body and the shedding
of Jesus, his blood for our sins.
Matthew 6:26 says then he took the cup and gave thanks and gave
it to them saying drink from it. All of Of you for.
This is my blood of the New Covenant, which is shed for many
for the remission of sins. That's why we come together
every week to remember and celebrate the reality that we
have been forgiven by the blood of Jesus.
And now we behold God in a relationship with him.
That will last forever. How is it possible?
For a room full of sinners. Like, you and me to gather today
before the holy God, and worship him and enjoy him.
How is that possible? And it's only possible by his
grace, by the grace of God. Not one of us here, can get it
done by Merit by any means by anything that we do.
The only reason here that we are worshipping as because the mercy
and grace of God, he saves Us by our Graves by his grace
Secondly, God Saves us for his good.
I'm sorry that should say, for our good, not his good at should
be our good. Pardon my pension.
I got that one wrong. So There's two answers in.
Exodus that why God Saves us first is because God Saves us
for our good. The end of chapter 13, we
discover that God would lead his people with a pillar of cloud by
day and a pillar of Fire by night.
You have a mass amount of people who are following a cloud where
the cloud tells them, where to go, where not to go, where to
stop. We're not to stop and in Exodus
14. God leads them to the edge of
the Red Sea and by this time the Egyptians were wishing that they
had their slaves back. They wanted those slaves back
foot. So pharaoh An army after them.
Some people never learn, you know, Pharaoh, he just would not
give up on getting what was his? And he just never learned and
they're Israelites, of course, were frightened for good reason,
you got a huge body of water in front of, you know, where to go.
And you got an army that's coming to get you behind you.
You got nowhere to go. Moses tells them and Chapter 14
verse 13. It says, and Moses said to the
people fear, not stand firm and see the salvation of the Lord.
Lord, which he will work for you today for the Egyptians whom you
see today, you shall never see again, the Lord will fight for
you, and you have only to be silent.
All of a sudden, God, splits the sea in half and sends his people
through on dry ground. And we need to understand that
was dry ground. You know?
I would have we know good and well if you were to remove water
from a lake bed, now immediately you would be just silty muddy
sticky but God provided a safe way through Dry ground and all
of a sudden you know as the Egyptian Egyptians made it
through the the I'm sorry, the Israelites made it through the
Egyptian started walking through in the waters, came crashing
down upon them. So we're starting to get A
picture of the good that God Saves his people for God leads.
God fights for his people. This is why God Saves us to save
this for our good. He leads guides and fights for
us. Then we get to a song of worship
in Exodus 15 where we see three Miracles back-to-back.
First, the water God's people come to is bitter so he
miraculously makes it sweet in chapter 16 they can't find food.
So God provides bread. From heaven in the morning and
meet In the evening. In Exodus 17, they can't find
any water. God, miraculously provides water
out of a rock. And in all this, we see how God
sustains and satisfies and strengthens his people.
When we, when we get to Exodus 18, God gives wisdom to Moses on
how to lead his people, which was not an easy task.
That sets, the stage for one of the most significant and famous
moments that we can read about in the Old Testament, when God
gives his people the words starting with the Ten
Commandments in Exodus 20, The first commandment, I am the
Lord, your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt.
Out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods
before me. And I want us to think about how
all of these Commandments are good for us.
And the first commandment, God is showing us the way to
Abundant Life, through worship of the right God.
No other gods before me none. What if you were to live our
entire life, we would, we would live dedicating ourselves to
something living for something. Having that, that that thing the
center of our lives. But when we come to the end of
our life and realize it was totally empty.
We only find out that we've wasted our life and God is
saying here, there is a way to Abundant Life with the right
center, which is him. He is the god of gods, there is
no other God before him. Life at God is a sinner.
He is our foundation and the second commandment God shows us
the way to Supernatural. Love through Worship in the
right way. It says there in chapter 20
Verses 4 through 6. You shall not make for yourself
a carved image or any likeness of anything that is under in
Heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the
water, under the Earth, You shall not bow down to them or
serve them for the Lord. Your God, am a jealous God.
Visiting the iniquity of the father's on the children to the
third, and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but
showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me
and keep my Commandments. God, here is not Prescribing,
I'm sorry. God is prescribing not just?
Who is worthy of worship? But how we ought to worship him
in a way that leads to an experience of what God wants us
to have, you know, we have to worship him in a correct way for
us to gain the blessings of God that leads to the third
commandment here. In verse 7.
You shall not take the lord's name in vain for the Lord will
not hold him Guiltless. Who takes his name in vain this
commandment shows us how to cultivate.
God a god glorifying. Reverence the greatness Glory
Majesty, the Wonder in splendor of God Live humble.
Holy understanding the mind-blowing breathtaking.
Aw and reverence that we need to have for God.
That will change the way that we live if we understand and
reverence God the way that he needs and deserves to be
reverenced, commandment number 4 gives us a countercultural
rhythm to work and rest. If we see looking verse 12 of
chapter twenty four and six days, the Lord made Heaven and
Earth the sea and all that is in them and rested on the seventh
day. Therefore the Lord blessed the
Sabbath day and made it holy, you know, especially in our
fast-paced culture that we live in now.
Now, it's always work. Work work, work, work and more
work and if that is all that we do, world will always look into
work as hard as we can, but not take the rest.
That's really kind of goes against what God is.
Prescribing here for the Sabbath, we need to rest, our
bodies need rest, our minds need rest.
We can actually rest in God. Sometimes in our pride, you
know, we can say I'm just too busy to do that for God today.
I'm too busy to go to worship on.
I'm too busy, you know? We're not busier than God
himself. God rested on that seventh day.
We're not that busy. We must rest and God must
himself model that for us. So we need to have that balance
of work and rest, fifth God gives opportunity.
I'm sorry. God gives us priority on honor
and our homes. Exodus 20 verse 12 honor your
father and mother that the days may be long in the land.
The Lord your God is giving you children and students, whatever
the case may be, it is good to honor your mom and dad because
it is a reflection of Honor for God.
It will be good for your life. Sixth a priority on protecting
others Health, you shall not murder.
This is where we realize that this commandment in verse 13.
Like some of the other commands we sweetsie Through the Bible.
It's not just a Prohibition against this particular Act of
murder. It's against any act that may
physically harm another person. God.
Clearly speaks here and in other places throughout his word,
against any form of physical violence, or Blues abuse, even
anger, or rage. For our good.
God tells us in his word to prioritize protecting other
people, the seventh commandment guards, the enjoyment of
sexuality. According to God's design, when
we read, you should not commit adultery.
Don't just think about adultery. But based on all of throughout
God's word, there are clear Commandments against all sexual
activity. Tivity outside of marriage
between a man and a woman. God gives us command clearly for
our good. This is where each one of us
needs to decide if we're going to trust the word of God on
sexuality, or we're going to trust the world and we certainly
want to trust God. He has it right for our good.
Commandment number 8, you shall not steal this promotes, the
enjoyment of possessions that God has given to us the
provisions. That he's given to us the things
that we might have. He wants us to be content in
what he has provided us with not to go out looking for somebody
else's stuff or to gain more or anything like that.
Number 9, you shall not ball bear.
False witness against your neighbor.
God is holding us up for truth and trustworthiness in a world
of lies and let Downs. You know, we don't we want to
long for that in a society where there's so much lies around us.
So much untruth. We need truth to be able to
Anchor in the tenth commandment offers joy and contentment in
this world of jealousy and envy and competition.
The 17th verse of chapter. 20 says, you shall not covet your
neighbor's house. You shall not covet your
neighbor's wife or his male servant or his female servant or
his ox or his donkey or anything.
That is your neighbors. We can live with joy and
contentment with what we have instead of being caught up in
jealousy, God's word is good. And God's word is good for our
good as well. And when we put it all together,
it's not that's just what God saved us, from sin and death and
destruction. He does Deliver Us from that.
But he also saves us to something as well, which would
be joy and freedom of life. And there's an idea out there
today that that you know, when you when you follow Jesus, when
you choose the, the Christian lifestyle that you're not
allowed to have fun anymore, you know, it's not joyful, it's not
pleasurable and that is a complete lie that we need to
reject Get his God is not saved us to make us miserable.
God has saved us to have a full enjoyable life that will last
forever. And that doesn't mean that life
is going to be easy. It doesn't mean it's going to be
a cakewalk its life is full of sin.
You know, we live in a world that's full of sin involves hurt
and pain following Jesus. You know, as we've talked about
before it could actually make your life a little harder but
our life will be Fuller and deeper.
When we experience the supernatural love in the
Supernatural, Delight that we can have in God is as he leads
us. God Saves Us by his grace for
our good. God desires are good.
He doesn't save you for the bad. He saves you for your good.
Additionally, God Saves us for his glory.
This is Central to understanding the purpose of Our Lives.
We're going to go through a bunch of verses here pretty
quick. You know why did God deliver the
people out of slavery? You ask ourselves.
Why did he do that? What was the purpose and back?
Six back in Exodus 3 with the burning bush.
God told Moses to go to fail to fire off a road to bring his
people out of sleep slavery. So I want to ask the question.
Why? We'll start.
Next is 3 verse 12. It says there.
So he said I will certainly be with you and this shall be a
sign to you that I have sent you.
When you have brought the people out of Egypt, You Shall Serve
God on this mountain. This word serve here.
Sometimes is translated as worship.
And we know that service is worship.
You know, we serve God all week long, we don't just worship him
here in this building twice a week.
Our worship to him is all week long six, other days out of the
week. So notice this notice this as we
go through X is 4 verse 23, where God tells Moses, what's
going on to happen, what's going to happen and what he should
say. And I say to you, this is what
Moses says to Pharaoh. Let my son go that he may serve
or Worship You, Exodus 7 verse 16, they were doesn't let them
go. So God begins to send the place.
Why does God say he's going to deliver his people and you shall
stay? And you shall say to him the
Lord God of the Hebrews has sent me to you saying, let my people
go, that they may serve me in the wilderness.
Exodus 8 worm one where we're told God would be sending frogs
the Lord God said to Moses Godin to pharaoh and say to him thus
says the Lord, let my people go, that they may serve me.
Next and ate 20 and verse 20 of chapter 8, then the Lord said to
Moses rise up early in the morning and present yourself to
Pharaoh as he goes out to the water and say to him thus says
the Lord. Let my people go, that they may
serve me. 9:1 then the Lord got that.
Lord said to Moses, go into pharaon, say to him thus says
the Lord the god of the Hebrews. Let my people go that they may
serve me noticing the pattern. Noticing What's Happening Here X
is 9 verse 13. Then the Lord said to Moses rise
up early in the morning and present yourself before pharaoh
and say to him, thus says the Lord, the god of the Hebrews.
Let my people go that they may serve me.
Couple more. It's interesting.
When we get to verse 7 favor of servants get in on the action
here they say then Pharaoh servant said to him.
How long shall this man? Be a snare to us.
Let the men go. That they may serve the Lord,
their God do not. Do you not yet?
Understand that Egypt is ruined. So Moses and Aaron were brought
back to pharaoh and said to them go serve the Lord your God but
which ones are to go. The Pharaoh actually didn't let
them go later in Exodus 10, we see the plague of darkness in
verse 26, where we read what that Moses is saying.
Our livestock also must go with us.
Not on a hoof, not a hoof shall be left behind for.
We must take them to serve the Lord, Our God, and we do not
know that we do not know with what we must serve.
The Lord until we arrive there. Finally, we get to Exodus 12
where God institute's the Passover, the Deliverance of the
people of Egypt, then, of course, we see what Moses says
it all. Builds up to this moment.
In verse 31, then he summoned Moses and Aaron by night and
said, go out from among my people, both you and the people
of Israel, Israel and go serve the Lord as you have said.
Pharaoh learned all too late that you do not stand in the way
of worship to God. The whole point of the exes from
Egypt is that God delivers his people out of slavery as we've
already seen for their good. He then brings them to Mount
Sinai where they serve and worship him.
And the rest of the book of Egypt of Exodus will show us
God's instructions on how he is to be served and worshipped.
And if we were to summarize the book of Exodus, the first 20
chapters are about the salvation From Slavery, and then the final
20 chapters about the worship of God, and these A really
incredible. There's visions of God is a
consuming fire there in Exodus 19 and in chapter 34 in a
powerful scene that that the Bible talks about over and over
again, God causes his glory to pass in front of Moses.
So Moses falls on his face and worship and Moses will meet with
God, and Come Away with his face shining than the book ends, with
the glory of God, filling the Tabernacle in the middle of his
people. The whole point is God.
God Saves his people for the good.
But also for his glory, when we put all that together, there's
two implications that I think that we cannot miss.
First, this means that. Casual worship before God is not
possible. Sinners deserve destruction and
death before a holy God yet. Sinners can be saved.
Not by anything they do. But by what?
God and Jesus has done for us. So when we have been saved like
that, what do we do when we understand the whole picture,
the whole ramification of what God has done for us?
What do we do? What's one thing we do?
We seen, right? We seen, not only because we're
commanded to because we cannot keep our joy in, We Sing, and
Shout to the Lord. We sing his Praises, we praise
him and worship him in song. It is not possible to be saved
to serve and worship the God and be bored by him.
It is not possible. We worship Him.
And all the more for us, those of us who have been saved by the
blood of Jesus, we gather together every week before, this
God, it's not possible to know this God and to be casual about
what we're doing here this morning.
A complacent. It's not possible.
We have different personalities, but when we realize that what
we've been saved from and what we've been saved, too.
And the god whose Grace is the only reason for all that we are
driven to scene. Casual worship is not possible
before God who satisfies leads and guides and fights for us.
The second implication that I want us to understand here, the
spread of the Gospel is not negotiable the phrase they or
you will know that I am. The Lord that phrase is used.
I believe it's 50 different times in the first four books of
the Bible, I want to show us one example in Exodus 14.
This is the historical path that historians believe that Moses
and the children of Israel made from Egypt to to cross the Red
Sea. The first thing I thought of
when I saw this map is why not just go over the northern tip of
that red. See it seems like a lot easier
path to me. It's a basically, a straight
shot and then you head south. But but before they got to the
Red Sea, they headed south forever.
How long going through mountain mountain ranges?
It looks like and came to the Red Sea and then that's where
they crossed. This is the historical picture
of where it is. It is thought or This is where
they think that the crossing happened of the Red Sea.
And if you can see this, I'll try to describe it.
But it's basically a beach with where you have a steep mountain
range behind you. There's no escape to the other
to the northern side. Looks like I guess that'd be the
southern side and then you have the Egyptian forces coming from
the northern side. You got nowhere to go.
I'm not a military expert by any
means, but I think I would know enough.
If I were leading people, that this is probably the worst place
to take my people to be saved to a dead end where you're trapped
right behind you have the opposing Army that has the power
to overtake. You that just doesn't seem smart
yet. That's what God exactly did in
Exodus 14. He deliberately leads his people
to the edge of the Red Sea, with the Egyptian Army about to
overtake them. Why would God do this?
Why would God strategically lead the people of Israel to this
particular place X is 14. Verse 1 says, then the Lord said
to Moses, tell the people of Israel to turn back and in Camp
in front of Pi harith off between migdal and the Sea.
And the front of bile is a van. You shelling Camp facing it by
the Sea for Pharaoh will say of the people of Israel, they are
And in the land, the Wilderness is shut them in and I will
harden, Pharaoh's heart and he will pursue them.
And I will get Glory over pharaoh and all his host, and
the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord and they did.
So Why did God lead his people to a dead end?
The reason why is so God could split that Red Sea in half to
allow his people to walk on it and the Egyptians would know
that there is one God. One and only true God, the
Egyptians would understand that and he is glorious.
God says, I will gain the glory and that is awesome.
God, gives his grace and God gets the glory god saves.
His people not just for his glory among them, but for his
glory among the world, Exodus 9 and 16, this is right before the
plague of hail God, says to Pharaoh.
But for this purpose I have raised you up to show you my
power. That my name may be I'm through
all the Earth. God put Pharaoh in place, God
raised him up to be in that position.
So God in the end could show his glory and power to the entire
world. That is amazing.
God is causing his people to receive his grace in a way that
his glory and Neymar proclaimed. And that is our mission today.
You know, the congregation here laborers for the spread of the
Gospel throughout the world. We have multiple things that we
do here to get the gospel out, we do the podcast.
I'm going to, I'm going to show you that's a picture.
I forgot to to go to but that's Moses with God's help.
Splitting the Red Sea, but our podcast, this was taken last
night's little snapshot this information.
We've had I think we started this in early 2019.
Since then, we have had 97,000 434 listens since that time
roughly an audience size of 200 for people within the last seven
days. Okay, this map shows A places
where our podcast has been heard throughout the world.
Over 60 countries, we got places like Oman Thailand China,
Russia, the Czech Republic, Canada to Bago Morocco and I
could go on and on and on and on and on additionally we send
financial support to preachers in foreign lands to help them
sustain the spread of the Gospel or whatever.
Needs, they have Frank has been to the Philippines.
Multiple Times to help that grow in that area, we've spent
finances on Advertising which is given us leads and communication
with people of the community to do all these things.
And I started thinking about this last night and this
morning, you know, What we've done here is easy, the podcast
is easy, sending finances is easy.
What what is hard but is most effective is our personal
contact that we have with those that are around us every day.
That's hard. To share the gospel with
somebody to open up to them or have them open up to us or to
invite them here. That's hard.
Because that gets us out of our comfort zone.
This stuff that we do or we be able to spread the gospel all
over the world, that's easy stuff.
But the hardest stuff has the best reaction to it.
It is the most effective. So I challenge us to apply the
book of Exodus to our live in three ways.
First I want us to lean wholeheartedly on God's grace
and what Jesus has done for us. Secondly, I want to challenge us
to live our life in a way that maximizes this Gospel, According
to God's word for our good, for your good, don't buy into the
idea. That Christ means not living for
any good and third. I want to challenge us to live
as maximum as we can for our good label for God's glory
throughout our life. You know, Liv live that so
others can see the glory of God through our lives.
Make him known to those that we come in contact with. on a local
level here and, and the word will spread The Gospel of Jesus
includes hearing the word of God here in the good news that Jesus
came and died for our sins has made a way for us to be
redeemed. Believing in Jesus that he is
the Son of God and that were believing is loaded.
It includes things that we have to do because we believe Jesus
is the son of God. We believe that he came here and
died for our sins, we believe in him.
So when we do that, then we change the way of Our Lives
because we believe in we Don't live that sinful life anymore.
We come following Jesus as the model.
Additionally, we confess his name as a Son of God and we are
baptized for the remission of our sins, and its own van and
only then that Jesus adds us to his church.
And when we start to live a life that puts Jesus as our lord,
it's the best life we could ever live.
It's not the perfect life. By any means, only Jesus lived,
a perfect life, but when we do this, we live this life and we
make mistakes, which we will, we can now go to God on our own and
confess those sins to God directly through Jesus, we have
that privilege. That was not possible before.
Jesus died on the cross, we can directly speak with God because
of what Jesus has done for us. If there's one here that needs
the prayers of the church or would like to be baptized,
please come while we stand while we see.
We thank you for listening to our podcast, put on by the
Church of Christ at 22:15 plans. Road in Bakersfield, if you
would like any additional information or you would like to
receive a free Bible correspondence, course by mail.
Please email us at info at True Church of Christ
Bakersfield.com. Our service times are on Sundays
at 10:30 a.m. and 5 p.m. and Wednesdays at 7:30 p.m.
M, please make plans to join us. We would love for you to be our
honored guest