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GOD IS KEEPING HIS PROMISES BY PUTTING HIS PEOPLE INTO IMPOSSIBLE SITUATIONSExodus 13:17—14:31INTRODUCTION Last Sunday morning, as I walked through our neighborhood helping my daughter Joelle deliver the Janesville Gazette, I thought about the families who lived in the homes of our neighborhood. The wife of one neighbor died of emphysema 3.5 years ago and he is dying of the same disease right now. Another neighbor has been chronically ill for the past 20 years, rarely leaves the house and can only eat pureed food. Across the street the wife has been fighting cancer for the past 5 years. In a house down the block a man committed suicide last spring. In a house a couple of doors away, the wife of a couple who has been married for nearly thirty years just walked out on her husband. As I walked along in front of these beautiful homes with their well-kept lawns I was struck by the hopeless conditions that exist in my neighborhood. I don’t think my neighborhood is any different from any other neighborhood in America. It is impossible to live in this world and not be confronted by hopeless situations. Whether it is failed health, failed relationships, failed businesses, failed government or failed dreams you don’t have to look very far to find hopeless conditions. I know that on any given Sunday a sizable percentage of the folks sitting in this congregation are faced with one or more seemingly hopeless situations. If you are not currently confronted with an impossible circumstance it is only a matter of time before you will be. This story that we are going to consider this morning is given to us so that we can find hope in hopeless situations. We will discover through this account of God’s rescuing the nation Israel from Pharaoh and his army how God brings impossible circumstances into our lives for very good reasons. We don’t need to despair when we are powerless in the face of circumstances in our lives because God is the one who creates the difficulties and saves us through them for our good and his glory. (I’m going to tell you the story so just listen and you check out the accuracy of my story this afternoon.) MAIN POINT God creates hopeless conditions and saves us through them so that his greatness is seen and admired by…NARRATIVE BLOCK ONE: 13:17-14:9 Wisely directing our lives Joah crept out of his tent in the dark, not wanting to disturb his sleeping wife and children. He emerged from his tent and stood in the glowing darkness. All around him were the sounds of other people getting up to begin the daily chores of caring for livestock and families. Breakfast fires were kindled and the air was filling with their smoke. As far as his eye could see fires were multiplying as the tens of thousands of Israelite families greeted the seventh day after their escape from Egypt. The entire congregation of Israel, comprised of 600,000 men along with the women and children were camped on the edge of the desert at Etham. Joah turned around and gazed in awe at the tower of fire that silently burned and glowed over the southeastern edge of the camp of Israel. The pillar of fire had appeared the first night they left Egypt and camped at Succoth. The people were terrified by its appearance until word spread from Moses through the elders of each family unit that the Lord, who had delivered them from Egypt, was making his presence with them visible by means of this pillar of fire. Joah watched as the eastern edge of the horizon began to grow pink with the new sunrise. As the light of day grew brighter the pillar of fire dimmed and in its place appeared a pillar of cloud that spread over the people of Israel as the sun rose in the sky and protected them from its scorching heat. That first happy morning of freedom the cloud had appeared and as it began to move, orders came from Moses that the entire company was to pack up and follow after it. Moses explained that God was going to lead them as his people to the Land of Promise by this visible sign of his presence. It was to be a permanent feature of their life until they reached the land of Canaan and took possession of it. Joah milked his small flock of goats as the sun began to peak over the edge of the earth and cast long shadows. The sound of children awaking and squabbling over breakfast began to fill the air and was soon followed by the laughter of their play. Joah’s own wife and children came out of their tent one by one, stretching and greeting their father and husband. He left his wife to take care of the milk and tend to the children’s needs. He went over to his cousin Amram’s tent to make arrangements with him and his other cousins for carrying the container with the bones of Joseph. They were all part of the tribe of Ephraim, one of Joseph’s two sons. Moses had asked he and Amram to make sure that the bones of Joseph, the great prince of Egypt, were safely transported for burial in the land of promise. He and Amram had gone to the royal tomb the morning after the Passover, while the Egyptians were overcome with grief and had carefully collected the enshrouded corpse of Joseph. During the past few days they had constructed a box with poles for easier carrying and had placed the mummified corpse in it. Today they were going to arrange the order in which they and their other cousins were going to carry the bones. His wife, Dinah, had complained that he was spending too much time taking care of “those old bones”, as she called them. He patiently explained to her that he was helping to fulfill an oath their ancestors swore to Joseph as his death approached. He had made all the descendants of Israel who were alive at his death swear that his bones were taken up from Egypt to be buried in the land of promise. Joseph had said to the sons of Israel, “God will surely come to your aid and then you must carry my bones up with you from this place.” That was almost 400 years ago and now, finally, God was fulfilling the promise he had made through Joseph and so he, Joah, was helping to fulfill the promise their ancestors had made to Joseph. “How God had come to their aid,” thought Joah as he made his way through the tents and animals. He wondered if Joseph had any idea of how powerfully God would come to their aid or how long it would take him to do so. He was still perplexed and even sometimes, he had to admit, bitter when he thought about all the years of suffering that he and the rest of Israel had endured as slaves waiting for God to come to their aid. Whenever he thought about the beatings he had received because his crew did not make their quota of bricks, his anger would begin to smolder. He shook his head at these morose thoughts and smiled as he remembered that he was no longer a slave. He relished the thought of the suffering of the Egyptians when all their firstborn children were killed. His anger disappeared, swallowed up in the joy of being free and the excitement of being part of such a great and powerful people. They had plundered the Egyptians, taking their wealth. His wife was wearing exquisite jewelry and he had more than enough gold stashed away to help them buy everything they would need to live a comfortable life. They had an army of tens of thousands of men who were armed with the weapons they had taken out of Egypt. Life was good and would soon get better, he was sure. He greeted his cousin Amram with a warm embrace and kisses on both cheeks. Their other cousins began to file into the tent where the box containing Joseph’s bones was stored. Their boisterous chatter was interrupted as another cousin stuck his head in the tent and told them that the elder of their clan was going to make an announcement in a few minutes. They quickly gathered in the communal meeting area with the other family heads of their clan of the tribe of Ephraim. They grew silent as their elder, Jeremiah, rose to speak. “The Lord has told Moses that we are to turn away from the main road through the territory of the Philistines and go towards the southeast. We will encamp near Pi-Hahiroth, between Migdol and the Red Sea, directly opposite Baal Zephon.” Jeremiah paused and looked over the crowd of men as they murmured at this news. He continued, “The Lord also told Moses that when Pharaoh gets word that we have not taken the road along the Mediterranean Sea, he is going to think that we are a bunch of confused slaves, wandering around the wilderness.” At this he smiled. “This path we are going to take will lead him to believe that we have placed ourselves in a box with no way out. The Lord has said that he is going to harden Pharaoh’s heart so that the Lord can get glory through Pharaoh and all his army.” Jeremiah sat down and the men began to talk with one another about these plans. In particular every one of them questioned the wisdom of leaving the easy and well-traveled road along the Mediterranean Sea. Yes, they knew that the land of the Philistines was along that path and they were a fierce and powerful nation. But didn’t they have their own army? They had plundered Egypt after all! How could the Philistines stand against them? They puzzled over what it meant that the Lord was going to harden Pharaoh’s heart so that he could get glory over him. The spirited discussion was cut short as they noticed the shadow of the pillar of cloud begin to move. Each man quickly ran off to pack up his family and follow after the Lord to their next destination. Joah and Amram quickly decided that Amram and his sons would carry the corpse of Joseph this time and that Joah and his sons would do so on the next move. Joah hurried back to his tent puzzling over why Moses had commanded them to turn around and head into the marshy, wet environs of the Red Sea. What possible reason could the Lord have for sending Egypt after them? He started to feel the tingles of fear on the back of his neck as he thought about grief stricken Pharaoh and his army pursuing them. But his thoughts were swallowed up by the work of packing his family up and setting out in the long column for Pi-hahiroth by the Red Sea. The cloud led them on and covered them as they walked and rode across the plain and then down the long valley to the edge of the Red Sea. They set up camp that night and went to bed by the light of the pillar of fire which hung over the camp of Israel and whose red light was reflected off the water of the Red Sea in front of them. Meanwhile, back in Egypt, Pharaoh received word from the scouts he had sent out that Israel was wandering around in the wilderness just outside the borders of Egypt and had boxed themselves in between Migdol and the Red Sea. Like men waking up from sleep filled with nightmares, Pharaoh and his advisors said to one another, “What were we thinking? How could we have let our slaves go? We need to go get them back. This will be easy. They are just a bunch of dumb Hebrew slaves and are probably already weakened from hunger and thirst. Their God has left them to fend for themselves. Let’s go get them and make them pay for what they’ve done to our country and retrieve our property.” Pharaoh took his chariots, his cavalry and his infantry and set out in pursuit of Israel, just as the Lord wanted them to do. They overtook Israel as they camped by the Red Sea, near Pi-Hahiroth, opposite Baal Zephon. APPLICATION If there is one thing that we have repeatedly seen in the story of Israel’s Exodus it is this: God is in control of these events and these people. Everything is going according to his plan. Even though all the humans make real choices that have real consequences, yet all the human choices, even the evil choices, serve God’s good purposes. God does not permit Israel to take the easy road along the Mediterranean Sea because he knows that when the Philistines come out to fight them they would turn tail and run back to Egypt. He takes them to the “wet environs of the Red Sea” because he wants Pharaoh to pursue Israel there so he can get the glory from them. Pharaoh is planning evil and he will justly pay for his evil and yet his evil plan is exactly what God wants to have happen. He leads Israel into what looks like a trap for very good reasons. None of the Israelites know that he is protecting them from themselves. None of the Israelites know why God brought them here. God has told them that he intends to be glorified and he intends to protect them and lead them to the land of Promise. God is wisely, for the good of his people and the glory of his own name leading these people and making sure that Pharaoh chases them down and traps them against the Red Sea. The Scriptures are quite clear that God is “working out all things according to the purpose of his own will.” “The mind of man plans his way but the Lord directs his steps.” God says in Isaiah, “I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the Lord, do all these things.” If you belong to Christ and are in a hopeless situation, regardless of how you got there, you can be sure that perfect wisdom put you there. This doesn’t mean that your choices don’t matter or that you are a robot. It means that God is working out all things for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. God intends through your hopeless situation to do good to you and for you and to bring great glory to his own name. He doesn’t confide in us and tell us the specific reasons for what he is doing. He tells us that his purpose is our salvation and his glory and that is to be enough for us. Let’s see how he does this for the Israelites. God creates hopeless conditions and saves us through them so that his greatness is seen and admired by wisely directing all the details of our lives. NARRATIVE BLOCK TWO: 14:10-14 Exposing us to threat in order to expose our hearts The next morning Joah accompanied the elder of his clan, Jeremiah, as he went to the daily elder’s council meeting with Moses. Jeremiah was old and his body was worn out from the years of slavery he had endured. Increasingly he had included Joah in this council and depended upon him to carry out many of his duties. It was clear that Jeremiah intended for Joah to take his place as elder of the clan of Rephah of the tribe of Ephraim. They gathered that morning on a small hill near the center of the camp of Israel. Spread around them were the tents and livestock of Israel. Along the edge of the hill armed men were posted wearing the stolen armor of Egypt. Joah thought that these newly freed slaves appeared awkward as they held the swords and spears of Egypt in their hands, trying to look imposing in their new garb. Joah looked to the southeast over the gently undulating surface of the Red Sea, where the cloud hung protecting them from the sun. He wondered which way the Lord was going to lead them as they were between two large and impassable ridges and the Sea was before them. He turned back to the growing council of elders who grew quiet as Moses and Aaron made their way to the center. Just as Moses was about to speak a frothing horse plunged into the midst of the elders, its rider crying out in terror, “The Egyptian army is coming! Look!” He turned in his saddle and pointed back to the northwest, up the valley Israel had come down just yesterday. A large plume of dust, such as could only be made by a great group of men was quickly advancing down the long valley. The sun glinted off the armor and spears and chariots at the bottom of that plume convincing the gathered men that indeed the army of Egypt was advancing against them. Terror gripped the hearts of the entire gathering. The men dressed in their armor were nowhere to be seen. Their weapons cast aside on the ground as they fled to their tents. Joah’s heart too filled with fear as he saw the mighty Egyptian army approach with regal Pharaoh in his war chariot leading the way. It was only by the strongest exercise of self-control that he kept from joining the young soldiers and fled to his own tent. He kept himself in check by turning his fear into anger. He knew that it was too good to be true, this new life of freedom! He was a fool to believe that God was going to free them from slavery and give them a good life in Canaan. The most powerful nation on earth would not let its slaves go free. He knew that Pharaoh and his army would have no mercy. Having lost their firstborn they would be bent on revenge, not just recapturing their former slaves. They would slaughter the men and take the women and children back to Egypt to live in cruel slavery forever. Resistance would be futile. His eyes turned from the doom coming down the valley to Moses and Aaron calmly standing in the middle of the council of elders. His heart blazed with anger and hatred towards these two troublemakers, these “prophets of God.” He burst into the inner ring of elders and screamed at Moses, his voice choked with rage and bitterness, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you and your “God” brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn’t we tell you in Egypt, when you first showed up and made our lives more miserable by your stupid demands that Pharaoh let us go, ‘Leave us alone. Let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!” His venom spent, Joah spit at the feet of Moses. But his tirade let loose a flood of accusations from the gathered elders. The entire council was filled with the hate-filled, despairing cries of the elders, accusing Moses and Aaron of misleading them. Accusing them and their God of plotting their destruction, of bringing them into the desert to kill them. The voice of the elders was joined to the growing cries of despair and bitterness from throughout the camp as all Israel watched the dust of Pharaoh’s army draw near. Moses raised his arms with the staff of God in the air. He cried out, “Don’t be afraid. Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the salvation the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today, you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you; you need only be still.” Then Moses sank to his knees while the elders glared at him and continued to grumble to one another. He began to openly ask the Lord to fulfill his promises and to defend them from the Egyptians. APPLICATION When life is going your way, when everyone is safe and healthy, when the bills are paid, when the retirement fund is growing, when vacations come at regular intervals, when the children are obedient and doing well in school, when there are friends to do things with on Friday nights, it is easy to say you are trusting God. When there is nothing standing between you and the perfect life you want, it is easy to act like a Christian. But when God sends trouble that interferes with the perfect life you deserve, that’s when you get to find out what you are really trusting in. Though these people had seen God deliver them with ten powerful plagues, though their firstborn sons had been spared under the blood of the lamb, though they had plundered Egypt, though they were no longer slaves, though they had the pillar of fire and cloud visibly present to them, though they had the bones of Joseph as a sign of God’s faithful promises, though God told them through Moses just the day before that this was going to happen, yet, when God sent the Egyptian army and all their hopes for an easy life were threatened, what was truly in their hearts came out through their lips. These are not a believing people. These people are trusting in themselves, not in the Lord who has promised to save them. You should not be shocked by this unbelief. It takes more than external miracles to convince a sinner that God alone is what you need. If you think that if you were in their place, you would have made a different choice, you would have believed, then you don’t know yourself very well. The Israelites stand before us as the chief evidence of the depth of human sinfulness. Moses, on the other hand, believes what God has said. He shows them and us how we are to respond to hopeless conditions. We are to believe the promises of God. Moses did not know how God was going to deliver them. God had not told him the specifics. He only knew that God would do what he had promised. He knew that God was the one who sent the Egyptian army. He knew that God had promised, beginning with Abraham, to bring his people safely to the Promised Land. Therefore, he knew that these Egyptians would not prevail against them. Knowing that God determined all these circumstances did not prevent him from praying but motivated him to pray. He asked God to do what God had promised to do. This is the most basic description of what prayer is; asking God to do what he has said he is going to do. But sometimes prayer is not the thing we are supposed to be doing. There is a time for action, as Moses is about to find out. God creates hopeless conditions and saves us through them so that his greatness is seen and admired by exposing us to threat in order to expose our hearts. NARRATIVE BLOCK THREE: 14:15-31 Graciously delivering us from real threats God interrupted Moses’ prayer and said to him, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to pack up and get moving. You raise up your staff and stretch forth your hand over the sea and divide the sea so the sons of Israel can go through the sea on dry ground. I will harden the hearts of the Egyptian army so that they will pursue you into the midst of the sea. Then I will get glory through Pharaoh and all his army, his chariots and his horsemen.” The fearful and grumbling elders did not hear the voice of God but saw three things happen in quick succession. First, the cloud that was in front of the camp of Israel, towards the Red Sea went behind Israel, between them and the Egyptians. The Egyptians could not enter the blackness of the cloud and so were held at bay, separated from their quarry by the angel of God in the cloud. Second, Moses jumped to his feet and commanded them to go to their clans and order the people of Israel to pack up and begin moving towards the Red Sea. Third, they saw Moses stand with his staff stretched out towards the Red Sea. Suddenly a violent wind began to blow out of the east across the surface of the sea. Joah and the other elders ran back to their clans and families. They gave the order to pack up and so the entire nation of panic-stricken Israelites packed up their camp. As the sun set in the west and the pillar of cloud turned to a pillar of fire the sons of Israel moved in an orderly fashion towards the violently stirring Sea. All through the night the wind blew and the pillar of fire gave light to the people of Israel but cast forth the blackest darkness upon the army of Pharaoh. In the glowing darkness the people of Israel watched as the wind blew back the waters of the sea until a broad path of dry ground lay through the sea with a wall of water on the right and on the left. Joah and his oldest son carried the box with the bones of Joseph upon their shoulders down into the vast gorge formed by the walls of water. The entire nation marched across the dry bottom of the Red Sea throughout the night. Joah and his son were among the final group to make its way across the sea and come up on the southeastern shore, on the edge of the desert. As the sun began to lighten the eastern sky the pillar of fire suddenly lifted and came to settle, once again, in front of Israel, towards the desert. The Egyptians rubbed their eyes and blinked rapidly as they adjusted to the light of the new day and stared in disbelief at the empty ground between them and the Red Sea. Then their jaws dropped open as they saw a path through the sea and on the distant shore could make out a mass of people who were the nation Israel with the pillar of cloud towering over them. Their shock quickly turned to hatred and fury as they saw that their quarry was escaping from their net. So they plunged down into the valley through the water, driving their horses like men possessed. They were filled with one desire, to destroy Israel and make them pay for all the harm they had brought upon Egypt. Joah gasped as he saw the Egyptians enter the Sea and furiously pursue them. He urged his family and the rest of his clan further up the bank, away from the path though he couldn’t see how moving a few yards would spare them from the marauding Egyptians. As he and his son scrambled up the slope he could see Moses standing on a prominent hill watching. Then he saw the Israelites above him pointing into the sea and crying out in astonishment. Joah stopped his hurried climb and turned around towards the sea. He could see the front ranks of the Egyptian army a short distance behind him yet in the sea. The chariots were running into each other and the horses were rearing and pawing the air. Riders were being thrown down and chariots were losing their wheels. He could hear a growing roar of confusion and terror from the Egyptians as they realized that the Lord was fighting for Israel. They panicked and sought to turn their chariots and horses around to flee back the way they had come, to flee from this relentless God of Israel. Just then, as the sun thrust above the horizon of the earth, Joah saw Moses stretch out his hand with the staff in it over the Red Sea. With a deafening roar the walls of water turned to liquid and rushed back to their place covering over every Egyptian soldier, horse and chariot, which had followed Israel into the sea. So the Lord destroyed every one of Pharaoh’s army that had come into the midst of the sea, not one of them survived. So Israel stood on the eastern shore of the Red Sea and watched as the path through the sea was covered over and the sea returned to its calm state. The waves gently lapped against the shore, carrying the dead bodies of the Egyptian soldiers. Just as suddenly as the terror had come upon them yesterday, so, as suddenly the terror was gone on this bright morning. Just as Moses had said, the nation stood and watched the salvation of the Lord. The Egyptians whom they feared were now but corpses floating in the calm waters of the Red Sea. Joah felt rising in his heart a new fear. He now feared this God whom could act in such a terrifying manner. He understood that this God could be trusted and that Moses indeed was his prophet and must be obeyed. APPLICATION There are several things that are crystal clear from this story of Israel’s deliverance and Egypt’s destruction. First, it is obvious that Egypt deserves what it gets. These are wicked people who have refused to submit to the Lord, in spite of his revealing himself and his will in the most graphic and clear of ways. They are racists, they are full of hatred for Israel, they are greedy and cruel. They only care about using and abusing the people of Israel and have no interest in trusting or worshipping the God who made them and who gives them life and breath and everything else. However, it is equally as clear that Israel does not deserve to be saved. The most startling thing in this story is not the destruction of the Egyptians but the salvation of the Israelites. In spite of all that the Lord has done for them, in spite of all the evidences of his trustworthiness, they refused to believe. Yet, God, contrary to what they deserve and not because of anything they have ever done delivers them from this great threat. You can find no reason in the Israelites for why God does not cause the waters of the Red Sea to cover them. Notice, God saves them and then they have faith. That is how this part of the story ends. They fear the Lord and trust him and his servant Moses. Faith is the product of God’s salvation, not the cause of it. God’s decision to save Israel is a free and sovereign decision. They contribute nothing to their salvation except their sinful unbelief. In 1 Corinthians 10 the apostle Paul says that this salvation is a foreshadowing of the salvation that Christ has given to us. He urges us to trust in Christ because he is a faithful savior. Paul says, “No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way of escape that you may be able to endure.” Whatever impossible situation we may be in, we are to wait for God to deliver us. God will fight for us. We need only stand and watch him save us. This does not mean that God is promising us perfect health, perfect children, good grades, plenty of money, lots of friends and an easy retirement. He may bring healing or he may not. He may give you friends or he may not. But what you can know absolutely for certain is that he will bring you safely to the land of promise. The primary thing that this story exemplifies is Romans 5:8 which says, “For God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Just like Israel we are sinners deserving God’s wrath. God has been amazingly kind to everyone in this room and yet we refuse to trust him and we blame him for any hard thing that comes our way. Yet, God looks at us in our sin and decides to love us and he shows that he loves us in killing his son for us. Rather than kill us, he kills Jesus. The result is that we walk through the waters of his wrath safely due to God’s punishing Christ in our place. God rescues us from the greatest danger we face, his wrath due us for our sin. This is in spite of the fact that we exhibit, on a regular basis the fact that we do not really trust God and do not in any way deserve to be treated well by him. There is a day coming to all those who belong to Christ when the most impossible thing you can imagine will happen. God will welcome sinners into heaven forever, for the sake of Jesus. As we live in this world, hemmed in by Pharaoh’s army and the sea, we are to stand firm and watch the salvation of God… The Lord will fight for us, we need only be still. God creates hopeless conditions and saves us through them so that his greatness is seen and admired by graciously delivering us from the real threat. © Copyright
2004 John Swanson. |