It's one of the worst feelings in the world.
It starts deep in our gut.
It rises up.
We feel it.
Our pulse begins to speed up, beat faster.
Maybe perspiration will break out on our brow.
We begin to look side to side, up and down, both literally sometimes and metaphorically.
Is there any way of escape?
Is there any way out?
The feeling of being impossibly trapped is a terrible, terrible feeling.
Sometimes we feel this physically, but much more often in life.
We feel this in our life circumstances.
Maybe someone has come and confronted you and laid bare a lie that you have told.
Maybe you've been married for years and it's never gotten better.
And it rises up in you, this feeling of being trapped.
Maybe you know a deadline is looming, whether at work or at school.
And the number of hours that you have is insufficient to accomplish the work that you have to do.
Maybe your bank account continues to drop lower and lower.
And the bills continue to come in.
Impossible situations make us feel this kind of trapped.
And sometimes we feel trapped because we've been foolish.
Because we have sinned.
And it's left us in a bad place.
Sometimes we feel trapped by circumstances that are completely beyond our control.
Have no moral bearing.
They just are.
But they're hard.
Sometimes it's a mix of both.
In those moments of panic, in those moments of terror,
when you're facing a situation where it seems like there's no way out,
where do you turn?
Some of us will dig deep.
We'll find inner strength to go the extra mile.
We will find the indomitable human spirit and we will try to gut it out.
Some of us will look for an escape.
For some kind of compromise.
Some easy way out.
Even though it may cost us our soul and our character to follow that path.
Some of us will crawl up into a fetal position and give up in despair and hopelessness.
And some of us might actually turn to God.
This is church after all.
So that seems like a thought.
But you know what?
When we turn to God, what do we find?
It doesn't always get better.
Does it?
Because when we read the Bible carefully,
we see that God is not a God who has promised to simply make our lives easier.
To simply remove the challenges in our life.
To free us from every impossible circumstance.
To make our life better as quickly as possible.
He does not always get people.
He does not always get his people out of impossible situations.
And in fact, it even seems like he leads them into those situations at times.
So is there any hope for us?
How are we to think about these things?
Friends, this is what our passage this morning in Exodus is going to help us think through.
So if you want to turn with me, page 55 in your pew Bibles, Exodus chapter 13.
And while you're turning there, just to remember what we've been looking at over the past eight or nine chapters,
is God's amazing work of freeing his people who were enslaved in Egypt.
Freeing them through his mighty acts of power.
The ten plagues, the famous ten plagues where God, with increasing intensity,
brought judgment upon Egypt to break the hold that they had.
And to let people of God go free from slavery.
And right before this passage, we've seen that God has finally done this.
That through the Passover, through the judgment on the firstborn,
God has finally broken the will of the Pharaoh and he has sent them out.
He said, go, you might be free.
And so as we come into this passage, Israel is on their way out the door of Egypt.
And that's where we are in the story this morning.
So let's read it together.
We're going to read a good chunk of scripture.
So hang in there with me.
If you feel like you want to stand, actually, why don't I do this?
If you can stand and you're able to, why don't you stand for the reading of God's word?
If you don't, if you need to sit, that's fine.
But we're going to read chapter 13, starting in verse 17, all the way to the end of chapter 14.
So hang in there.
Here we go.
When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them by the way of the land of the Philistines,
although that was near.
For God said, lest the people change their minds when they see war and return to Egypt.
But God led the people round by the way of the wilderness towards the Red Sea.
And the people of Israel went up out of the land of Egypt, equipped for battle.
Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for Joseph had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear,
saying, God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones with you from here.
And they moved on from Succoth and encamped at Etham on the edge of the wilderness.
And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way,
and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light that they may travel by day and by night.
The pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night did not depart from before the people.
Then the Lord said to Moses, tell the people of Israel to turn back and encamp in front of
Pi-hahiroth between Migdal and the sea, in front of Baal, Zephon, and you shall encamp facing it by the sea.
For Pharaoh will save the people of Israel.
They are wandering in the land.
The wilderness has 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 hosts.
And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord.
And they did so.
When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled,
the mind of Pharaoh and his servants was changed towards the people.
And they said, what is this that we've done?
That we've let Israel go from serving us?
So he made ready his chariot and took his army with him and took 600 chosen chariots and all the other chariots of Egypt with officers over all of them.
And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, king of Egypt.
And he pursued the people of Israel while the people of Israel were going out defiantly.
The Egyptians pursued them, all Pharaoh's horses and chariots and his horsemen and his army,
and overtook them encamped at the sea by Pi-ha-hiroth in front of Baal-zaphon.
When Pharaoh drew near, the people of Israel lifted up their eyes.
And behold, the Egyptians were marching after them.
And they feared greatly.
And the people of Israel cried out to the Lord.
And they said to Moses,
Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness?
What have you done to us in bringing us out of Egypt?
Is not this what we said to you in Egypt?
Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians.
For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.
And Moses said to the people,
Fear not.
Stand firm.
And see the salvation of the 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.
And then the Lord said to Moses,
Why do you cry to me?
Tell the people of Israel to go forward.
Lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it that the people of Israel may go through the sea on dry ground.
And I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they shall go in after them.
And I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his hosts, his chariots and his horsemen.
And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord when I have gained glory over Pharaoh, his chariots and his horsemen.
Then the angel of God who was going before the host of Israel moved and went behind them.
And the pillar of cloud moved from before them and stood behind them.
Coming between the host of Egypt and the host of Israel.
And there was the cloud and the darkness.
And it lit up the night without one coming near the other all night.
And then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea.
And the Lord drove the sea back by the strong east wind all night.
And made the sea dry land and the waters were divided.
And the people of Israel went in the midst of the sea on dry ground.
The waters being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left.
Then the Egyptians pursued and went in after them into the midst of the sea.
All Pharaoh's horses, his chariots and his horsemen.
And in the morning watched the Lord in the pillar of fire and of cloud looked down on the Egyptian forces.
And threw the Egyptian forces into a panic.
Clogging their chariot wheels so that they drove heavily.
And the Egyptians said,
Let us flee from before Israel for the Lord fights for them against the Egyptians.
And then the Lord said to Moses,
Stretch out your hand over the sea.
That the waters may come back upon the Egyptians.
Upon their chariots and upon their horsemen.
So Moses stretched out his hand over the sea.
And the sea returned to its normal course when the morning appeared.
And as the Egyptians fled into it,
the Lord threw the Egyptians into the midst of the sea.
The water returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen and all the host of Pharaoh that had followed them into the sea.
Not one of them remained.
But the people of Israel walked on dry ground through the sea.
The waters being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left.
Thus the Lord saved Israel that day from the hand of the Egyptians.
And Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore.
Israel saw the great power that the Lord used against the Egyptians.
So the people feared the Lord.
And they believed in the Lord and in his servant Moses.
And this is God's word.
Amen.
Please take a seat.
Let's pray together as we continue to look at this.
Lord, thank you for this word.
Lord, thank you for the way that you display yourself.
And reveal yourself to us in your word.
Lord, I pray this morning that as we consider the questions before us,
Lord, that we would see you more clearly.
That we would love you.
That we would worship you.
That we would trust you.
Because of the kind of God that you are.
A God who saves.
We pray this in Jesus' name.
Amen.
So as we look at this familiar story about God's power and God's deliverance of his people,
what I want to do is explore his work for his people when they were trapped in an impossible situation.
I want to look at three aspects of God's work.
I want to look at God's plan, God's presence, and God's power.
So we're going to look at those in turn as some of the dynamics of what we see from God and in God in this passage.
So first, let's look at God's plan.
The good news is that God has one.
God has a plan for his people.
And it's very clear.
You look back at the end of chapter 13.
And God led them out.
And he led them carefully.
And by that I mean full of care.
The easiest way, if you had a map, I'm going to try to do this for you.
Here's Egypt.
Here's the promised land where they're going.
Okay?
And the easiest way for them to get from here to here is to go along the south, eastern, western, which one is it?
The edge of the sea, the Mediterranean Sea, along the coastline right up into,
it would be across the top of the Sinai Peninsula and through what is now Gaza into Palestine, into the promised land.
Right?
But the Philistines lived there along the coast.
And the Philistines were well known as a powerful nation with a strong army.
And God said, I'm concerned that facing that.
Just as a note, when it says that they went out armed, where does it say that?
They went out, verse 18, they went out equipped for battle.
Well, that's probably not a great translation of that phrase.
It probably means they went out arrayed like an army.
But they didn't have any, there's no reason to believe they actually had any weapons.
So arrayed for battle might mean to you they had armor and swords and that sort of thing.
That's not the picture.
It just meant that they were set apart in companies so that when they traveled, they had an orderly march.
March, I believe, is what that means.
So as they went out, they were facing this.
And God said, I love you.
I'm not going to put you in that position.
I'm going to take you a different way.
So he leads them.
Rather than going this way, he leads them this way.
South, probably, out of Egypt, into the Sinai Peninsula.
The geographic markers in this passage are notoriously obscure to the 21st century readers.
So we don't actually know exactly where they went.
Most of these places are not on ancient maps, let alone modern ones.
So it is not exactly clear.
There's much ink spilled in the commentaries about what this path looked like.
But we're going to go with this.
They went south.
Seems like the best thing to do.
So God was leading them carefully.
But not only did he lead them carefully, but then he led them in, in some ways, in a strange way.
Because he led them down.
And then he said, oh, now I want you to turn back.
Go back a little bit the way you came.
And put yourself in a terribly indefensible position militarily.
Camp against an ocean or against some body of water where when the Egyptians come and get you,
which I'm telling you they're about to do, you'll be trapped.
It's a very odd thing, isn't it?
And yet the text is very clear in verses 1 through 4 of chapter 14.
Do this exactly the way I tell you.
Camp with your back to the sea.
Because I am moving to do something.
I have a plan which is to display my glory by defeating Pharaoh one last time.
And he is basically baiting the Egyptians with the Israelites in this indefensible position.
God has a plan for his own glory that led his people into a very difficult situation.
This is what we see in the text.
God is leading them into it.
And he's leading them with a purpose.
But he's leading them into a situation where they will be trapped
between the most powerful army in the world at that time
and a sea that they're unable to cross.
Friends, I wonder if you have felt God leading you into impossible situations.
Maybe at your school you're the only Christian that you know.
And you wonder, how could this be God?
How can I do this all by myself?
Maybe you're a parent and God has given you a special needs child.
Maybe your boss has called you and said,
I'm sorry, we have to let you go.
Right after you put the down payment on the house
and the baby's on the way.
Maybe you've chosen to be faithful to the Lord
by remaining pure in your relationships.
But it's led you to a place where you think,
I'm never going to get married if I keep doing this.
There are all sorts of ways in which following the Lord
or the Lord's leading and sovereign control over our lives
puts us in these situations
that feel impossible and we feel trapped.
And isn't God gracious
to show us the heart of the Israelite people
so we don't feel alone?
Because look at them in verses 15 through 19.
Right?
What are they...
I'm sorry.
In verses 11 through 14.
Do you see what the Israelites say?
They say what we say in our hearts
in those circumstances, don't they?
They say,
God, what are you doing?
Why did you lead us out here to die?
Why did you...
Why didn't you leave us where we were?
Even though that was terrible,
at least it wasn't as bad as this.
God, how could you do this?
We doubt,
God, are you really in control?
Is your plan really good?
We question,
why have you done this to this?
This seems evil, not good.
The fundamental question,
God, have you really led me
only that I would suffer and be destroyed?
When we feel trapped,
those are questions that rise up in our hearts,
aren't they?
And Moses speaks to them and to us
these words in verses 13 and 14.
Fear not, stand firm,
and see the salvation of the 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.
Which might mean stop complaining and griping,
but I actually don't think so.
I think actually what that means is
you have only to be still.
You don't have to do a single thing.
Just stand firm
and watch God do his work.
As we face these impossible circumstances,
this word comes.
Stand firm.
How can we do that?
Well, the wonderful thing is that
not only does God have a plan for us,
but God promises that his presence
will go with us.
As you read this story,
God makes it so clear to his people,
I didn't just free you from Egypt
and then let you loose in the Sinai Peninsula
and said,
good luck,
hope that works well for you.
He didn't just sort of push him out of the house
and say,
okay,
you're on your own.
No.
In fact,
it's the very opposite.
God chose to give this incredible manifestation
of his presence with his people.
A pillar of cloud and a fire.
And we don't know what it looks like.
You probably have images,
whether it's from Charlton Heston
or from Steven Spielberg
and the Prince of Egypt.
You probably have some vision of it.
But the fact is,
nobody knows what this really looked like.
But it was very clear that it was big
and it was obvious
and it was clear
that God was going before his people.
And by doing that,
this manifestation was reminding them,
I am with you.
I am with you,
the one who did all these things
to free you from Egypt.
I am with you.
If you remember,
I am with you
and I will provide for you.
This pillar of cloud
not only gave them direction,
but it wasn't just like a little will-o-wisp
saying,
oh,
go this way,
not that way.
Right?
It was also a pillar of fire by night
so that they had light.
If you've ever traveled in the desert,
you might want to travel during the night,
not during the day some of the time.
Because it's really hot.
So,
God gave them light
so that they could travel by night
if they wanted to.
God gave them shade,
potentially,
during the day.
It's not clear
whether the pillar of cloud
gave them shade,
but it's possible.
Not only that,
but that pillar of cloud
became a shield as well.
When the Egyptians came
thundering over the horizon
and the people were afraid,
it says,
God moved that pillar
to land between
the armies of Egypt
and the people of God.
My kids are Star Wars fans.
I'm a Star Wars fan.
Put up a ray shield,
an impenetrable shield.
No bullets could get through.
No chariots could get through.
No people could get through.
God protected his people
with an impenetrable shield
with his presence.
And not only that,
but it also comes,
his presence comes with his promise.
Did you notice back in chapter 13
the odd little verse
about Joseph's bones?
Now, if you don't know Joseph's story,
go back to our sermon archives.
There's a great bunch of sermons
on those from about
a year and a half ago.
Joseph, who God led
in a very circuitous
and very difficult path
where he suffered deeply
and unjustly many times,
and yet God used him
in the end
to deliver his people
from famine
and to provide for his people
by bringing them to Egypt.
Joseph was a reminder
of the kind of God
that the people of Israel knew.
And not only that,
but that this God
was a God
who would fulfill his promises.
Because 400 years earlier,
Joseph had said,
you're going to be enslaved,
but the Lord will come
and he will deliver you.
And when that happens,
take my bones with me,
with you.
That's exactly what he said.
Which is sort of crazy.
But now these people
are experiencing it
and they can say,
oh, God is with us.
The God of Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob and Joseph
is the same God
who is with us now,
fulfilling his promises
to make us his people
and to take us
into his promised land.
So God's presence
is a sweet and powerful
help
as they face
these impossible circumstances.
I don't know
if any of you are hikers.
I like to hike.
I don't get to hike
as much as I like to.
I was never
a very adventuresome hiker.
I stayed on the clear paths
with the clear blazes
and the maps
and, you know,
but I have friends
who like to be
more adventuresome
and they'll try
to find the trail
that used to be there
but isn't very well marked.
And one of the things
that I learned from them
is that when you're hiking,
a map is good,
but a guide is far better.
Right?
Because when you're out
in the trail
and you've lost the blaze
and you're not sure
where you are,
a guide who has been
through those woods
many times
will know how
to address it.
Will know
where the path
should go
and how to get you
back on it.
A guide
will know
what to do
when,
like I had one
hiking adventure
where we ran into
a beehive
on the trail
and we,
the group of us
literally scattered
into the woods
and then
our guides
brought us back together
and said,
okay,
this is what we're going to do,
this is how we're going to do it
and he led us through
because he knew
better than we
how to do this.
Maybe in another example,
maybe some of you
have experienced this
as you followed your GPS
through New Haven
and you realize,
wait a minute,
I would rather have someone
who knows this neighborhood
tell me how to get
from point A to point B
because the way that
Google Maps gets me there
or Waze gets me there,
it might be the most direct
but this is not the best way
for me to go.
It may feel unsafe,
the potholes may be terrible,
there are all sorts of things
that Google doesn't know
but someone who lives
in a neighborhood
will say,
oh yeah,
the best way to go there
is you go here
and here and here.
God has said,
I will be your guide,
I will go with you
and with my presence,
I will provide both direction
and leadership.
it's like in the Lord of the Rings
when Aragorn shows up
at the Prancing Pony in Bree,
meets with Frodo and his friends
in a time of dire threat
and says,
I will go with you
and I will lead you
through the wilderness
in the face of great enemies,
I will take you.
God,
even more than that,
says,
I will go with you.
And friends,
isn't this a comfort
because when we face
those impossible situations,
when we feel trapped,
the first thing that we feel
is,
I'm alone in this.
I'm alone in whatever the thing is.
No one can help me,
nobody knows.
And God comes and says,
it's just not true.
I am with you.
He does not abandon us,
but he walks through it with us
and he makes a way for us.
So we've seen God's plan
to lead us for his glory.
We've seen God's presence
to remind us
that he will carry us through.
But then finally,
we see God's power.
God's power to make a way.
And this is obviously
at the center of this passage
that God's power
to save and deliver his people
is what this passage is all about.
It's what you see in verses
13 and 14 of chapter 14
where it says,
stand and watch the Lord's salvation.
And you see it at the end
of the chapter again.
So the Lord delivered
and saved Israel from Egypt.
How did he do this?
He did it by a great display
of his power.
Now, you might wonder
why the Red Sea?
Why water?
We don't get it.
Maybe if you're from New Orleans
or from Houston,
you might get it a little more
than we do.
But in the ancient world,
water was a very fearsome thing.
Partly because most people
didn't know how to swim.
And so water was the place of death.
But even more so,
water had a mythological power
in the worldview
of the ancient Near East.
I remember my freshman year in college,
I read the Epic of Gilgamesh
and the place of the sea
as a power of chaos
and of destruction
and of uncontrolled anger.
Maybe not anger.
Uncontrolled power.
And one of the amazing things
is when the scriptures come along,
when God begins to,
when God tells the story
of how he created the earth,
what's the first thing he did?
He took water
and he put boundaries on it, right?
It's not the first thing.
But it's one of the major things
that he did
in the creation story
is to put water into its place.
He controlled the seas
and he put boundaries on it.
This far and no farther.
And he brought dry land out of it.
To an ancient Near East person,
that story is telling us
God is a greater power
than the thing you most fear.
And God wanted to show that again.
Just like we saw
with all of the plagues
and how they were a decreation
of some sorts,
a reversal of the creation order
where Egypt was feeling
the impact of that.
Here God is going to do that
one more time
by using water.
Now, what water was it?
All right, so
if you wanted to spend
a lot of time,
you could read about
which body of water
do we think was really
in view here.
There are translation questions.
Is it the Red Sea
or is it the Sea of Reeds?
There are questions
about how this happened.
There are questions
about where this,
again, the geographic markers
aren't clear.
So there's lots of ink
spilled over these questions.
And I'm not going to
solve all of them.
Let me give you
a couple of things.
First of all,
whatever the body of water is,
we need to see
that God used
both natural
and supernatural means.
This is what the text
actually says.
Look with me in verse 21.
Right?
As his people
with their backs
to the sea
and no way
to get through it,
God says,
I'm going to make
a way through it.
Right?
It says in verse 21
that he used
a strong east wind
that blew all night
and made the sea dry land
and the waters were divided.
So there you see God
using a natural force
in his control
to do what he said
he was going to do.
But then you keep going
and send verse 22
and the people of Israel
went in the midst
of the sea
on dry ground
which in itself,
have you ever tried
to dry a piece of ground
after it's been underwater
like a riverbed
or a marsh?
You know,
you can pull out
the biggest fan you want.
It's not going to get hard
that quickly.
Typically.
Right?
So God did something
withdrawing it
that I think is
beyond what would be
normally expected
even if the wind
blew the water away.
But even more than that,
the waters being a wall
to them on their right hand
and on their left.
Friends,
this describes something
that is supernatural,
not merely natural.
And if we,
the week after Easter,
having celebrated
the belief
that Jesus Christ
rose from the dead,
if we believe
that God can raise
someone from the dead
violating the laws
of nature,
superseding the laws
of nature
for his purpose
and his glory,
we think that God
can do it here
by separating the water
in a supernatural way.
He may have used
natural means.
He clearly was also
using supernatural power.
power.
Both of these things
are true
and we don't need
to fight about it anymore.
We can just move on
and say God did this
because both the natural
and the supernatural
were in his hand
and in his control
and for his purpose
to show his power
in delivering people.
And in his deliverance,
it had two aspects
because he not only
parted the sea,
but then that sea
was both a place
of deliverance
for his people
and judgment
on his enemies.
Do you see,
did you hear
how the Lord
baited the Egyptians
to come in?
He held them back
with the pillar of cloud
for a while
and so they're
chomping at the bit
and maybe they can
see through
and watch the Israelites
begin to go through
and they're chomping
at the bit,
right?
And then he finally
releases it
and it says that
he hardened
the Egyptians' hearts
so they went after them
into the sea.
And then
their chariot wheels,
which had been
going along
on the dry ground
that the Egyptians
had been walking on,
it says that
he then confused them
and then after he,
as he confused them,
their chariot wheels
got stuck
and they realized
that God was against them
and that God was
bringing destruction
on them.
And interestingly,
when it talks about
the waters returning
to their places,
did you notice
that it said
the Egyptians
fled into it?
And did that seem
odd to you?
I think,
I may be wrong,
but I think the picture here
is that the Egyptians
are in the middle
of the sea.
They've been thrown
into chaos
by the Lord.
They've gotten stuck.
They're starting to think
about fleeing
and suddenly the water
is coming back,
not just from the side
but from the shore
as well.
And so as they're
fleeing into it,
they're actually trying
to flee out of the water
but they can't flee
out of the water
because the water
is coming at them
from all sides.
And God buried them
in a deluge
of his wrath
and of water.
And the nation
that stood itself
proudly up
in defiance of God,
the Pharaoh
who had said,
I am God himself
and I am the ultimate power.
The nation
that had drowned
the firstborn of Israel
in the Nile River.
Their power,
their greatest symbol
of might
was their chariots
and their army
and God buried them
in the bottom
of the ocean
or of the sea.
So God delivered
his people
by judging
their enemies.
but he also
delivered his people
by providing a way
through for his own.
They walked
on dry land.
They had the cloud
going before them
and they stood
and saw
the salvation
of God.
For what happened
here was final.
There is no more
Egypt after this
in the story
of Israel
for hundreds of years.
They are now
across a body
of water
that the Egyptians
cannot cross
and their power
has been broken.
Israel is now
truly and finally
free.
Free to go
and free to follow
the Lord
and free to go back
to the promised land.
The victory
was decisive
and the salvation
was clear
and now
as they looked ahead
there was only goodness
that they would anticipate.
They had been delivered
from the hand
of the Egyptians.
Look with me
at the end
of chapter 14
real quickly.
Thus the Lord
saved Israel
that day
from the hand
of the Egyptians
and Israel saw
the Egyptians
dead on the seashore.
In verse 31
I'm going to read it
a little differently
so watch with me.
Israel saw
the great hand
that the Lord
used against
the Egyptians.
It's actually
the same
it's the same root
it's the same idea.
God's hand
that brought judgment
on Egypt
was the same hand
that now
was plucking
Israel out
and delivering them
and leading them.
Now
they're in the hands
of God
not the Egyptians
anymore.
What a great salvation
this is.
God has shown
great power
over the forces
of chaos
and nature
over the greatest
army
in the ancient world
at the time
he has delivered
his people.
Friends
what good news
this is.
What good news
it is
is that God
is a God
who by his plan
and with his presence
and by his power
deliver his people
and so now
here we are
and God's going
to give you
an A
on that exam
that you don't
have time
to study for
and God's going
to give you
that job back
that you just
got fired from
and God's going
to heal your cancer
and he's going
to make your marriage
new.
Wait a minute.
No that's not
actually
what it says.
Friends
he may do
those things
he can do
those things
we see in the gospel
that for his purposes
and for his glory
God will
sovereignly
intervene
in our lives
to show his power
and show his ability
to save
and deliver.
You see it
through the gospels
as Jesus does this
to say
this is what
the kingdom of God
looks like.
This is what
the reversal
of the curse
looks like
in the world.
This is how
I can deliver you.
But friends
we must see
that though we can
ask for these things
and God may graciously
give them to us
this is not
the main point
and application
of this passage
for that is not
what God
has promised us
most clearly.
In fact
what God
has promised us
instead
and what the story
of the exodus
looks forward to
is a greater
deliverance
from a greater
enemy
with a greater
display of power.
For the Bible
tells us
that the greatest
enemy
that we have
is our sin
and death
that is the result
of it.
1 Corinthians 15
26
says that
the last enemy
of humanity
is death
and that death
is a result
of sin
and that sin
is the greatest
enemy
because it is
the thing
that separates
us from God.
It is the thing
that keeps us
from being
God's people
and yet
God has not
left us
in the face
of that enemy
without hope
but in fact
he has intervened
in the world.
He has sent
his son Jesus
to come
and to be
the ultimate
deliverer
the greater
savior
and Jesus
has come
and you can
read through
the book
of John
and see
how much
John is
telling us
that Jesus
is the second
exodus
and the greater
exodus
for his people
and Jesus
has come
and by his
perfect life
and by his
death for us
and by his
resurrection
he has defeated
the power
of sin
and death.
He has died
a death
that he did
not deserve
so that we
who by faith
are joined
with him
will not
face.
He bore
a judgment
he went
through
the valley
of the shadow
of death
and the waters
of judgment
that God
poured out
on him
he went
through those
for us
so that we
would walk
on the dry
land of the
forgiveness
that he has
achieved for us
in Christ
and he has
brought us
through that
that we
may be
raised
to new
life
with him
who is
not a
dead
savior
but a
risen
savior
who has
passed
through
death
into now
eternal
life.
And friends
we know
from the
passage
that was
read earlier
this morning
that this
is not
done.
Just like
Israel
they are
now free
from Egypt
but are
not yet
at the
promised
land.
We are
not yet
at the
promised
land
either
but we
know
that the
victory
won at
the cross
and at
the
empty
tomb
will
one day
fully
be
ours
when God
will remake
the world
and the heavens
and the earth
will come
together
and God
will dwell
among his
people
and there
will be
no more
sickness
and no
more sorrow
and no
more sin
and no
more death
and no
more sea
because God
will be
there.
And that
friends
is the
greater
deliverance
that this
passage
points
us
to.
This
is what
he has
done
for us.
And friends
that's not
just hope
for the
future
but it's
help
now
because God
does still
have a
plan
to accomplish
his glory
in our
lives
and God
still promises
to be
with us
through every
circumstance
that we
face
as impossible
as it
feels
but we
can look
back on
the victory
of the
resurrected
Christ
and look
ahead to
the certain
hope
of the
victory
the final
consummation
of that
victory
and friends
we can
endure
and we
can look
for God's
glory
and we
can ask
him
God
show me
how are
you
bringing
glory to
yourself
in this
and there
are times
you'll see
it more
clearly
and there
are times
you won't
but that's
the question
that ought
to be
asked
as you
cling
to this
great
salvation
a God
who is
able
to deliver
you
let's
pray
Lord we
thank you
this morning
we thank you
for the
exodus
and for
your great
display
of your
power
and glory
Lord we
thank you
for the
greater
display
of your
power
and glory
at the
cross
how you
defeated
sin and
death
and for
all who
by faith
are gathered
with Christ
and joined
to Christ
Lord that
we have
this hope
this certain
hope that
we are
participants
in your
victory
over sin
and death
and Lord
that we
will be
raised to
new life
Lord that
we will be
with you
in eternity
in your
ultimate
victory
over all
things
Lord I
pray for
those today
who are in
impossible
situations
Lord that
you will
strengthen
them and
encourage
them
Lord we
pray these
things in
Jesus name
Amen
thank you
.
yarana