Freed to Follow - an exodus Journey Week 7

BETWEEN THE TEXTS

Week 7
• Remember, Exodus is all about two things - knowing God and vocation. Exodus is an account of knowing God through personal experience and how it is that God would call a nation to be the community through which he would bless the human family.
• We leave the once thirsty and threatening people of Israel drinking up rivers of waters from that miracle Rock in the desert as we head on into the unknown journey. The destination has always been Mt Horeb or My Sinai (same place). Right from when Moses went up Mt Horeb way back in Exodus 3:12 to see that burning bush and get more than he bargained for, the aim of this whole “coming out” and freeing of God’s people was for the purpose of worship on God’s holy mountain.
• After their “Massah” and “Meribah” moment, and then a brief scuffle with the troublesome Amelakites (that would continue in perpetuity; Exodus 17:8-16), and a lesson in leadership technique given to Moses by his Father-in-law, Jethro (Exodus 18) the people of Israel, under God’s pillar of fire by night and cloud by day travel further across and down the Sinai Peninsular and finally reach their destination three months after they left Egypt (Exodus 18:1).
• We now switch to the second part of the Book of Exodus. The first part was the actual build up to and moment of Exodus to reach Sinai. Now from chapter 19 – 40 and through Leviticus and into Numbers chapter 10 we are at the Mt Sinai.
• A significant moment is upon us. You can tell this by the extended dialogue that now happens between, the Lord, and Moses, then Moses and the Elders of Israel (Chapter 19:3 onwards…)
• Something big is initiated by the Lord. The Lord says, “You have seen what I have done for you…… If you obey me and keep my covenant (legally binding agreement between God and the people), then you will be my treasured possession among all the nations – you will be whole nation priests and a holy/set apart nation….”
• So, for the first time we have the mention of that word “covenant” and it is very significant. God promises to be their God and make them into a specially chosen nation with the special role of being priests for the world. Priests both represent other people before God and so intercede for others as well as represent God to other people and speak God’s word to people. They are intermediaries between a holy God and his creation. Priests also mediate forgiveness between a holy God and an unholy people. Israel is to be the nation through which God’s blessing and forgiveness are given to all nations.
• God is initiating a legally binding agreement with his people that will define their relationship and responsibilities in their vocation to be a blessing of God to the world for all time. He will be their God and be present to hear them and bless them as they keep the covenant – that is – the Law – both the moral law (10 commandments: Chapter 20:3-17) and the sacrificial law _ worship system; chapter 20:22-26)) and other communal decrees for the well being of the community (chapter 21-23)
• Theophany. We are now to experience another theophany, like that of Moses and the burning bush (in the same place). God is present as he makes this agreement with the people in fire and smoke on the mountain. Moses is the go-between. He is up and down the mountain a lot!! God seals his covenant with the people in a solemn ceremony where the people have to prepare themselves, lest they incur God’s holy judgement. Special limits have to placed around the mountain (a fence) to ensure that no unprepared person is killed!
• This is a covenant not to make them into a nation. They already are God’s chosen nation through the promise to Abraham. This is their commissioning as blessing bearers to the world and this is done through a treaty or covenant.
• As is ancient practice, a covenant or treaty is not done by the signing of documents (as it is for us these days), it is done by the shedding of blood. The covenant made with the people by God is sealed by blood. (see 20 verses 24on…)
• The treaty or agreement or covenant is like any ancient treaty in form and structure. It sets out what has happened (the Abraham promise and exodus), the two parties, The Lord and the people and their parts of the agreement (as outlined above) see 19:3-7 for God’s part. See the 10 commandments for the people’s part!

WEEK 7 Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 12-20 (TNIV)
The 10 commandments ( numbers relate to THOUGHTS - the bullet points below)
1 And God spoke all these words1:
2 “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery2.
3 “You shall have no other gods before me.
4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below3, 4.
7 “You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name5.
8 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labour and do all your work5,
12 “Honour your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you 6.
13 “You shall not murder.
14 “You shall not commit adultery.
15 “You shall not steal.
16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbour.
17 “You shall not covet your neighbour’s house. You shall not covet your neighbour’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbour7.”
18 When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance 19 and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.”
20 Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning8.”

THOUGHTS
1. It important to understand that this is all God’s initiative and choice. He is present by his voice and he is making all of this happen. This is not two equal parties making a treaty like we would understand. This is two unequal parties making an agreement where one party (the Lord) is all powerful and holy and righteous) and the other party (the people) unholy, nothing and of no power or authority). So, it is all the Lord and his grace making this covenant by which he promises to be present to hear his people and bless them. It is grace, grace, grace!

2. God names himself and recounts his past action – salvation and freedom. He has freed this rabble and he has made them into a nation by a promise (when they were nothing) and now makes them into a nation of priests to mediate his blessing and salvation for all nations (by his power and authority and grace – not theirs!)

3. The first command: the most crucial stipulation of this treaty: The Lord demands exclusive loyalty and love for this to work. He wants to love, bless, listen, lead and be with his people. he is calling them to do the same, otherwise this treaty/relationship will not work and Israel will not be his holy priests of blessing for the world.

4. Icons or Idols?: Roman Catholics, Orthodox, Anglicans, Lutherans and others keep these two parts of the first commandment together (we believe they are the two sides to the same coin). Other Christian traditions have separated them to make 11 commandments and emphasised the whole aspect of “making graven images”. This is why many Christians struggle with Orthodox icons, crosses (especially with a body on it) or even Christian art and symbols in general being in the worship space. They believe it is a breaking of the first commandment. This group have risen up from time to time and often have been called “iconoclasts” – destroying church buildings, statues, images and etc in church buildings.

We see that these parts make up one commandment and it has a practical application there and then. Israel will be surrounded by other nations who practice idol worship to many “gods”. They will constantly have to steer clear of worship practices of other nations’ “things of stone and wood” because these “gods” are really no God at all but just lifeless “things of stone and wood” that do not hear or see and are not alive. There is only one Living God – the Lord, “I AM”. Art, poetry, music, imagery that helps us imagine and focus on this one Living Lord is to be valued!!

5. These first three stipulations of God’s covenant agreement with the people are all about how the people and the Lord relate together (The “First Table” of the Law). They love the Lord and honour and worship him only to the exclusion of all others for life (like Marriage?) by respecting and carefully handling/using his great name (I AM – Yahweh) and resting with him regularly as they gather in communal worship where God hears them, feasts with them and blesses them.

6. The rest of the stipulations are about how this holy nation of priests is to live together in peace in their vocation (“The Second Table” of the Law). Respect and honour of family (parents, elders, husbands, wives, children) is critical for this nation to be at peace and strong and functioning as priests for the world.

7. All the vices of the human heart are named and warned against here. Is it any wonder that this moral code has served as the universal backbone of human community across ages and continents!?

8. God’s intention is that the people live and not die; that they live in his presence and with his blessing, not incur his righteous judgement of unholy sin and be out of his loving presence. The law both demands faithfulness from his people and protects his people from the consequences of treating each other wrongly.

REFLECTIONS

1. This 10 commandments became the centre piece of life in Israel. The Rabbis over the centuries reflected on how Israel is to keep the Covenant by keeping these commandments. As God told the people to put a fence up around the bottom of the mountain to protect the people from intentionally or inadvertently sinning against the Lord while he was present on the mountain giving these holy stipulations to Moses, so the Rabbis went further and put a fence around God’s presence in a long process of defining and re-defining these ten commands into 613 rules!

2. The idea was to fully understand and practice these commandments in every detail so as to live in God’s continued promises and blessing. For example, the Sabbath command was a favourite – what is “rest” and what is “work” and how do we rest with the Lord and so “keep the Sabbath day holy” or “set apart”? Well we walk more slowly and only certain distances “A Sabbath days walk from,…”. We do not work with our flocks or livestock or at our trade. We do not cook. All cooking has to be done before sundown Friday. In modern Jewish house, we put self-timers on lights so that we don not so “work” by switching on a light…….

3. This practice of interpreting the 10 Commandments (not to mention all the following worship law and general community law) was taken on in full force by the Rabbis over hundreds of years. There are tomes and tomes of “mishna” texts discussing the practicalities and theology of the law. In the end you end up with what is called “casuistry” that is bad for two reasons. Somewhere in the endless attempt to “protect people from sinning” again God, God’s grace and love get lost and God is taught as some cosmic law keeper who is not interested in anything else but the law and keeping the rules! Also, those who are “experts” in the law, can keep the people fearful and loaded up with endless demands that keep them from questioning or thinking about anything else! This is exactly what God often charged Israel’s leaders with and Jesus charged the Pharisees with (see Luke 11:37-54).

4. In Jesus time, the Pharisees and Sadducees were really lawyers whose main concern was the keeping of the Law – all 613 rules. And yet there was some genuine faith and belief there too. Their belief was that if Israel could keep the “Torah” (Law) for just one day, this would usher in the coming of the Messiah who would restore Israel to its original Abraham promise of land, status and nationhood. So, they thought they were serving the Lord faithfully by keeping the law themselves and teaching the people to do the same.

5. When the New Testament speaks of “the Law” it is speaking of this part of the Sinai treaty/covenant. This 10 commandments given to Moses and the people on Sinai is often called the “Decalogue” (the 10 words) and forms the basis for the Old “Covenant” or “Testament” relationship between God and his people until the new Covenant or Testament” in Jesus the Messiah’s blood is at the cross.

6. God’s pass mark for staying in his blessing and presence is 100%! He says, “Be holy because I am holy”. We eventually discover in life that we can not keep the Law. We know we fall short of God’s demands. It is them that we look for someone or something to help us find peace with each other, ourselves and God. We then hear Jesus speaking of himself being the sacrificial lamb to be slaughtered for the world so that the world might live and not be condemned by God’s righteous judgement on our sin against the Lord.

7. In the Luther’s struggle to find peace with God it is the good news for his tortured conscience that he found in Romans 3:21 onwards….

21 But now apart from the law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22 This righteousness is given through faith in] Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25 God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement] through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— 26 he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.

9. Now the 10 Commandments become three things for us who believe in Jesus;

10. A Control: These commandments (the last 7) are the basis for our civil law system and through their keeping in a society, evil and its damage are limited by the Lord. This is his “left hand” work or kingdom working.

11. A driver: We hear them and we apply them to our own life and we know we fall short and so we are driven back to Jesus to find forgiveness and life. (This is God’s right hand or kingdom working)

12. A mirror: With Jesus ongoing forgiveness and life, we hear these commandments and we see who we are and what we need to do to fulfil our vocation and his “priesthood of all believers” in our workplace, family and society.



8. By the blood of Jesus Christ the Law has been fulfilled perfectly for us and God has made a new covenant with us, not based on keeping these 10 commandments but by putting faith in Jesus of Nazareth as our Lord and Saviour – the Lamb of God who really has taken away the sin (and its consequence – death) of the world – out of sheer underserved, unmerited love (grace)!

Freed to Follow: an Exodus Journey Week 6

Sermon

Pentecost 15A

Freed to Follow series

Exodus 17:1-7I have had moments where I have aggressively questioned God’s presence and plan for my life. I have had times where I have I have fought against God’s direction and asked him to prove himself to me and us. These are called “Merribah” and “Massah” times.

Water From the Rock

1 The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, traveling from place to place as the LORD commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. 2 So they quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses replied, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the LORD to the test?”
3 But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?”
4 Then Moses cried out to the LORD, “What am I to do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me.”
5 The LORD answered Moses, “Go out in front of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. 6 I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.” So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 And he called the place Massah[a] and Meribah[b] because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the LORD saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”

a.Exodus 17:7 Massah means testing.

b.Exodus 17:7 Meribah means quarreling.

We hear today about what happened out in the desert between God and his people. What happened got a name – or two names. ‘Merribah’: to aggressively question, and Massah: to put God to the proof – to demand that he prove himself to you. I reckon you may have been there too?



Life’s journey just brings these testing, fighting, doubting, and aggressive questioning of God times into our experience.



Whether it is a Year 7 Christian Studies class, a funeral for a man who dies in his early 40’s, a conversation with a spouse going through divorce or a person trying to get their head around one of those big transition times that just happen in life, “Is the Lord with us, or not?” is the Merribah and Massah question.



I led a strange kind of “funeral” yesterday. It is definitely a Massah and Merribah time for a lot of people around this community with the tragic loss of Fulvio Canetti; aged 41, husband and father of two boys – both of whom were up until recently students of our college. It was a strange “funeral” because it was not really a funeral and not really a gathering of the church in any way. It was outdoors at the Lakes with no coffin (because of the long time it takes for coroner’s reports and etc…), and yet we were able to speak of God’s presence and grace and the resurrection of Jesus as hope in these Merribah times.



Pray: Spirit of God, speak into our testing times as we hear your Word and reflect upon it. Amy our meditation on your Word be acceptable in your sight and fruitful for faith, hope and love in our lives. Amen.



Again in this journey of Exodus we are facing a “water problem” as we did just prior to the Lord “raining down” manna from heaven in 15:22ff. But this time the “testing” is of a more serious nature.


People are now not merely lodging a complaint to Moses and therefore, the Lord. No, the people are now fighting against Moses and asking God to prove himself, thereby calling the Lord’s leadership, management and character into real question. I guess this can happen when there is no water and real desperation sets in among a group of people. In these times of real crisis – be it communal of personal, people can say and do strange things in their desperation.
 They are “quarrelling” or “finding fault” with Moses (poor Moses!) and his leadership. The “fault” they find is Moses’ intentions. They accuse Moses of being a shadowy, underbelly kind of man who has their murder on his mind. They think he is masterminding a mass murder in the desert, like some megalomaniac cult leader or something.


Moses points out that as they accuse him of such underhanded and evil intent, so they actually accuse the Lord of the same things because Moses is only a mere servant of the Lord. The Lord is plotting the course of their lives, not Moses! The people don’t seem to pull back from their fighting accusations. They don’t seem to realise that when they pull down a servant of God they are directly offending and rejecting the Hand that feeds them.
 Leadership note here: grumbling, accusation, fighting and questioning of one’s integrity come with the territory of leadership! Moses will constantly have to deal with this fault finding of him by the people and on occasions it turns very nasty as he even will be on the edge of being stoned to death by these people! (Numbers 14:10). Moses has now joined an elite club of servants of the Lord who have been on the receiving end or a threat of or actual stoning by God’s people – David (1 Samuel 30:6, Jesus John 10:31, Stephen Acts 7:58, Paul Acts 14:19).


Moses’ response to this now different kind of testing is also different than previously. Notice how Moses now gives vent to his own fears as he speaks not of “God’s people”, or “my people”, or even “your people”, but “these people”. It is as if Moses is teaming up with the Lord and accusing these agro people of wrong doing. He is siding with the Lord and getting a small taste of what it is like for the Lord to have to knock these troublesome people into shape for their vocation of being a blessing to the whole world!


The Lord responds to the tricky situation of angry people ready to exact their desperate anger on Moses by doing something very visible once again. Moses is directed to go “in front” of the people with witnesses in tow (the Elders). They are all going to get good seats in the house to see again that the Lord is with them and responding to them and keeping his promise to get them to their promised destination.


Moses is instructed to use the same rod with which he “struck” the waters of the Nile to now turn this rocky land into a stream of gushing water. There is no doubt as to the Lord’s message here. He has provided them with water from dry land, as he also provided them with dry ground through the water at the Sea of Reeds. He is the Lord. He is still with them. Moses is indeed his servant. God takes responsibility for the plight of his people and handles their anger and doubt and deep questioning of his integrity with a show of power and gracious care.


In all of this, the question any person or any community asks when hard testing befalls them is uttered by God’s people at their Merribah and Massah time. “Is the Lord with us, or not?”


In this very human question they are raising serious doubts as to the Lord’s honesty, integrity and will regarding his stated promises to deliver on his promise to get them to the new land, give them a great name among the nations and keep them alive and growing as a nation, as he once promised to their father, Abraham (Genesis 12). They find fault with God’s leadership, management and plan for this to happen and they ask him to show himself and his will again – not in friendly terms but doubting, harsh and distrustful terms.


Testing times bring out the best and the worst in people. When we ask that question in real angst, “Are you with me, Lord, or not?” in our Merribah and Massah, whatever they be – broken marriage, terminal illness, violent threat, economic hardship, tragic loss, personal weakness, and whatever other place we stumble across on our desert way of Jesus’ cross, Moses shows the way faithful people respond to their Lord.


1) First, he gives voice to his own fears.
2) Secondly, he seeks the Lord on the issue. Moses seeks the Lord’s word on  
    the situation (“What should I do, Lord?),
3) He confesses faith in the Lord (Why do you find fault and fight with the
    Lord? He asks).


What have you done when under the pump in life? These three things or other things?


Moses trusts that the Lord can receive his fear, pain, complaint and anxiety. He tells God what is what.
 Moses truly reaches out to the Lord and prays that prayer in the heart, “Lord, teach me your way here”. He actually seeks God’s word on in his Merribah and Massah time.


Moses is on the Lord’s side. He does not give in to the people’s fault finding or aggressive questioning of him and the Lord. He lives through the testing by confessing faith in the Lord when there is no easy reason to do so.


Moses does these things for himself, but also for the greater good of the people. Moses “nails his colours to the mast” and declares his loyalty and trust in the Lord as he asks the Lord what he should do with “these people”.



So, where are you thins week?! Aggressively doubting the Lord for what he did not do for you or placing your life in his hands anyway?


Wherever you are and however Merribah and Massah are God seems so very able to absorb all the grumbling, complaining, fault finding and aggressive questioning his people throw at him. Most often he responds to their need with grace. Now and again he responds with judgement. This will happen later in the journey after Mt Sinai when the covenant between God and the people has been made at Sinai.

Here he gives them what they need – not just the water but a sign that he was still there with them and for them, wanting them to live and continue the journey with him.
Jesus stands up at the Feast of Tabernacles in Jerusalem (which traditionally remembered this Merribah and Massah moment in the desert) and proclaims those famous words recorded in John 7:37, “If anyone thirst, let that person come to me and drink”. He is saying that he is the living water from the rock. He is the water that quenches a person’s thirst for life for ever in all the Merribah and Massah moments of our doubting desperation and questioning of God’s integrity.


Paul says that Jesus is this rock of living water that sustains God’s people. Christ was in that desert place, in that questioning of God’s character, in that desperate fear and worry – Jesus is the life-giving stream from the most unlikely place – a dry, dead rocky source. (1 Corinthians10:4).


When the testing time is upon us, or a testing time has happened to us and we are still dealing with it, we have the choices of questioning the Lord and his leadership, his management, his church, his leaders (which may be necessary at times because the church is only full of imperfect human beings!) or doing those things Moses did – telling God how things are (an act of trust), seeking the Lord’s Word and confessing faith in his goodness given in Jesus, the Man of Sorrows and the wounded healer of our souls. Faithfulness to the God of life and promise is in these things somewhere………


In the end, this event gets this response from the priests, poets and song writers of God’s people…
In the end, we have a calling – to not harden our hearts and block our ears as Pharaoh did but to come and worship the Lord at Merribah and Massah…..


Psalm 95

Today, if only you would hear his voice,
8 “Do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah,[a]
as you did that day at Massah[b] in the wilderness,

9 where your ancestors tested me;

they tried me, though they had seen what I did.

10 For forty years I was angry with that generation;

I said, ‘They are a people whose hearts go astray,

and they have not known my ways.’


1 (But) Come, let us sing for joy to the LORD;
let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation.

2 Let us come before him with thanksgiving

and extol him with music and song.

3 For the LORD is the great God,

the great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are the depths of the earth,

and the mountain peaks belong to him.



5 The sea is his, for he made it,

and his hands formed the dry land.

6 Come, let us bow down in worship,

let us kneel before the LORD our Maker;

7 for he is our God

and we are the people of his pasture,

the flock under his care.



Through Moses the Lord really turns this question back around on us. We ask, “Are you with us or not, Lord?” The Lord and his servant Moses really respond with a question back at us, “Are you with the Lord, or not?”Footnotes:

Freed to Follow Week 6

BETWEEN THE TEXTS

Week 6


• Remember, Exodus is all about two things - knowing God and vocation. Exodus is an account of knowing God through personal experience and how it is that God would call a nation to be the community through which he would bless the human family.


• We left the Israelites feeling quite contented and happy after the Lord had responded to their complaint by providing bread and meat to eat for the duration of their desert journey on a daily basis. The ongoing dynamic of the Lord shaping his people had begun with the Lord testing the peoples’ trust in him and then giving them every assurance that He in deed can be trusted – especially in testing times. Testing leads to trust and is all about trust, we said.


• Again we come to a testing moment. This one will become quite famous in years to come. It will be put into verse and song a few times, but especially in Psalm 95.

……Today, if only you would hear his voice,

8 “Do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah,

as you did that day at Massah in the wilderness,

9 where your ancestors tested me;

they tried me, though they had seen what I did……

• This testing event was a serious one, worthy of remembering for all time.






WEEK 5 Exodus 16:2-15 (TNIV)


Water from the Rock ( numbers relate to THOUGHTS - the bullet points below)


1 The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, travelling from place to place as the LORD commanded 1 2. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink3. 2 So they quarrelled4 with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.”


Moses replied, “Why do you quarrel with me5? Why do you put the LORD to the test?6”


3 But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst5?”


4 Then Moses cried out to the LORD, “What am I to do with these people8? They are almost ready to stone me7.”


5 The LORD answered Moses, “Go out in front9 of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go10. 6 I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.” So Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. 7 And he called the place Massah[a] and Meribah[b] because the Israelites quarrelled and because they tested the LORD saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?11, 12”

Footnotes:

a. Exodus 17:7 Massah means testing.

b. Exodus 17:7 Meribah means quarrelling.

THOUGHTS


1. We get these little travelling notes from time-to-time throughout Exodus and Numbers, as the journey goes on. There are difficulties with the places mentioned and their order, so it is quite difficult to be certain of the route the Israelites actually took in the vast spaces of the Sinai Peninsular.


2. They are people on the move. God is on the move. There is constant change and constant need, testing, shows of God’s presence and commitment to his people and strength given for the ongoing journey of faith – sounds like the Church!


3. Again we are facing a “water problem” as we did just prior to the Lord “raining down” manna from heaven in 15:22ff. But this time the “testing” is of a more serious nature.


4. We are now fighting, not just complaining! When there is no water and desperation sets in among a group of people, people can say and do strange things in their desperation. The brunt of their desperation in God’s servant, Moses.


5. They are “quarrelling” or “finding fault” with him and his leadership. The “fault” they find is Moses’ intentions. They accuse Moses of being a shadowy, underbelly kind of man who has their murder on his mind. They think he is masterminding a mass murder in the desert, like some megalomaniac cult leader or something.


6. Moses points out that as they accuse him of such underhanded and evil intent, so they actually accuse the Lord of the same things because Moses is only a mere servant of the Lord. The Lord is making up the plan as they go, not Moses! The people don’t seem to pull back from their fighting accusations. They don’t seem to realise that when they pull down a servant of God they are directly offending and rejecting the Hand that feeds them.


7. Moses will constantly have to deal with this fault finding of him by the people and on occasions it turns very nasty as he even will be on the edge of being stones to death by these people! (Numbers 14:10). Moses has now joined an elite club of servants of the Lord who have been on the receiving end of a threat of or actual stoning by God’s people – David (1 Samuel 30:6, Jesus John 10:31, Stephen Acts 7:58, Paul Acts 14:19).


8. Notice how Moses now gives vent to his own fears as he speaks not of “God’s people”, or “my people”, or even “your people”, but “these people”. It is as if Moses is teaming up with the Lord and accusing these agro people of wrong doing and expecting the Lord to feel the same about “these people”. He is not saying “your people” and thereby putting all the blame for the current trouble on God’s shoulders. He will do that later!! He is siding with God and getting a small taste of what it is like for the Lord to have to knock these troublesome and so very human people into shape for their vocation of being a blessing to the whole world!


9. The Lord responds to the tricky situation of angry people ready to exact their desperate anger on Moses by doing something very visible once again. Moses is directed to go “in front” of the people with witnesses in two (the Elders). They are all going to get good seats in the house to see again that the Lord is with them and responding to them and keeping his promise to get them to their promised destination.


10. Moses is instructed to use the same rod with which he “struck” the waters of the Nile to turn them into blood to now turn this rocky land into a stream of gushing water. There is no doubt as to the Lord’s message here. He has provided them with water from dry land, as he also provided them with dry ground through the water at the Sea of Reeds. He is the Lord. He is still with them. Moses is indeed his servant. God takes responsibility for the plight of his people and handles their anger and doubt and deep questioning of his integrity with a show of power and gracious care.


11. It is noteworthy that this event is given two names to be remembered by. It must be significant! The words means “finding fault with” and “putting to the proof” someone. The people ask, “Is the Lord with us, or not?” They are raising serious doubts as to the Lord’s honesty, integrity and will regarding his stated promises to deliver on his promise to get them to the new land, give them a great name among the nations and keep them alive and growing as a nation, as he once promised to their father, Abraham (Genesis 12). They find fault with God’s leadership and management and pan for this to happen and they ask him to show himself and his will again – not in friendly terms but doubting, harsh and distrustful terms.


12. Through Moses the Lord really turns this question back around on the people. They ask, “Are you with us or not?” The Lord and his servant Moses really respond with a question back at them, “Are you with the Lord, or not?”

REFLECTIONS
1. Testing times brings out the best and the worst in people. In his own fear Moses rises to the occasion and seeks the Lord on the people’s behalf as well as for himself. Moses “nails his colours to the mast” and declares his loyalty and trust in the Lord as he asks the Lord what he should do with “these people”.


2. Moses is on the Lord’s side. He does not give in to the people’s fault finding or aggressive questioning of him and the Lord. So he “passes the testing” by seeking the Lord and confessing faith in the Lord when there is no easy reason to do so.


3. On the other hand, the people lower their colours in fear and mistrust of Moses and the Lord. They get aggressive in their fault finding of Moses, not realising that they are really having a go at the Lord, who had not only brought them into being by the promise to Abraham and the freeing work he had just completed in Egypt, but also given them a destiny, meaning and purpose in his world as his own blessing bearers to the world. In ungrateful aggression they turn on the Lord and accuse him of not being there, or if he is there, not with them and for them.


4. So, where are you thins week?! Aggressively doubting the Lord for what he did not do for you or placing your life in his hands anyway? The people ask, “Are you with us, Lord, or not?” God says, “Are you with me, or not? Where are you in your faith journey?


5. Is one of the things to notice here all about how we faithfully respond to life as people of God? In the midst of great threat not only to faith but to life itself, Moses leads the way by living his faith. In the face of hard testing, he does those two things: 1) He seeks the Lord’s word on the situation (“What should I do, Lord), 2) He confesses faith in the Lord (Why do you find fault and fight with the Lord? He asks). What have you done when under the pump in life? These things or other things?


6. God seems so very able to absorb all the grumbling, complaining, fault finding and aggressive questioning his people throw at him. Most often he responds to their need with grace. Now and again he responds with judgement. This will happen later in the journey after Mt Sinai when the covenant between God and the people has been made at Sinai. (See Numbers from chapter 10 – particularly Numbers 11:1-3 as an example). Here he gives them what they need – not just the water but a sign that he was still there with them and for them, wanting them to live and continue the journey with him.


7. This account went into the worship life of Israel in sing and verse. In the Feast of Tabernacles (one of the main feast in the Jewish calendar), this event is remembered and then used as a prayer for God’s blessing in the form of rain/water for a good crop and good year of his favour. The picture of the future messiah kingdom developed around this event with Jerusalem being the holy city of God built on top of a rock/mountain with streams of living water flowing from it to all nations (When the Messiah finally came). The prophets (especially Isaiah) took this event and pictured God’s future as “streams of living water bubbling up in the desert” etc…..(Isaiah 35)


8. Jesus stands up at the Feast of Tabernacles in Jerusalem and proclaims those famous words recorded in John 7:37, “If anyone thirst, let that person come to me and drink”. He was saying that he is the living water from the rock. He is the water that quenches a person’s thirst for life for ever (Remember the conversation with the Samaritan woman at the well recorded in John 4?


9. Paul picked up this event and the legend that developed around in latter times from the Rabbis who said that the rock from which the water came was picked up by the Lord and then followed the people wherever they went, when he says the Rock was Christ” himself with the people of old – and also now with us (1 Corinthians10:4).


10. When the testing time is upon us, or a testing time has happened to us and we are still dealing with it, we have the choices of questioning the Lord and his leadership, his management, his church, his leaders (which may be necessary at times because the church is only full of imperfect human beings!) or doing those things Moses did – seeking the Lord and confessing faith. Faithfulness to the God of life and promise is in these things somewhere………


In the end, this event gets this response from the priests, poets and song writers of God’s people…


Psalm 95


Today, if only you would hear his voice,
8 “Do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah,[a]
as you did that day at Massah[b] in the wilderness,
9 where your ancestors tested me;
they tried me, though they had seen what I did.
10 For forty years I was angry with that generation;
I said, ‘They are a people whose hearts go astray,
and they have not known my ways.’

1 Come, let us sing for joy to the LORD;
let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation.
2 Let us come before him with thanksgiving
and extol him with music and song.
3 For the LORD is the great God,
the great King above all gods.
4 In his hand are the depths of the earth,
and the mountain peaks belong to him.

5 The sea is his, for he made it,
and his hands formed the dry land.
6 Come, let us bow down in worship,
let us kneel before the LORD our Maker;
7 for he is our God
and we are the people of his pasture,
the flock under his care.



Sermon

Pentecost 14A
Week 5

Exodus: Freed to Follow

Exodus 16:2-15

Sometimes I wonder how I can see anything through to its end because of wavering attitude or tiredness or lack of understanding! That word, “fickle” seems to fit me at times. How about you? It seems that when any kind of even mild “testing time” comes along, I find it hard to hang in there and “stay the course” as they say. Certainly, when it comes to following Jesus that word “fickle” comes to mind….


The fickle human heart is on full display this morning as we encounter this first moment of real testing of the faith in the Lord of this new community on their new journey.


• We left the Israelites in a joyful moment of victory on the shores of the Sea of Reeds as they sung the song Miriam and Moses wrote for the occasion, as they saw the bodies of the once mighty Egyptian military floating in the shallows after the Lord had comprehensively won the battle on their behalf.


• They had to put fear away, stand at the ready attentive to the Lord’s work in their midst and simply be still and know that he is the LORD and he wins the victory for them. At the end of it they all “feared the Lord and trusted Moses his servant”(14:31)


• After the celebrations of song and tambourine, it is off into the desert on this epic journey that will shape a nation into their vocation – to be a people through which God blesses all nations.


• They head east and travel through the North Western part of the Sinai Peninsular (Desert of Shur)

It is not long before the first of many food and water problems present themselves before this massive travelling community. Food and water are basic to life. When you are in a situation of not having enough water especially, things get rather desperate. I think of those early inland explorers here in Australia and their stories of desperation in the search for water – like Burke and Wills, Edward John Eyre…..


Well, God’s people are now in testing times!


But there is a point to the testing times as far as the Lord is concerned – the point of the testing is trust – trust in the Lord.


This journeying community of faith will be tested on this one issue over and over again. Moses makes the point of this hard testing clear in verse 26:


“If you listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep his decrees, I will not bring any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, because I am the LORD who heals you”.


We hear of one “water problem” just before our text and then we get to other problem of food in our text this morning. How will this community on the move be shaped by God to fulfil their role in the world survive the testing times they face? This is an obvious question for any person on the journey of faith in God. How will I continue on in faith in God? We are about to find out that God will feed the people.


The LORD responds to the complaint not with harsh judgement but free gift – the gift of bread and meat for his people in the desert.


But there is something more going on here. There is that continuing shaping and testing of the people by the LORD. He gives his gifts for a purpose. He gives his gifts out of commitment to his people and love for them, but also to shape them so that they fulfil their calling as his holy people of healing and blessing in his world.


But, as we can see here ourselves, and know in our own experience, we are so very fickle when it comes to relationship in general – maybe especially so in our relationship with the Lord.


Like the people of old, we cry out for sustenance, support, learning and help from people and God, and at the same time doubt whether God and people can and will respond to us.

We so quickly forget what has already been done for us and reject the very hands that feed us by attempting trying to control our life, our present and future without the very help and inspiration we sought from others and/or God.

We reject the Lord’s manna from heaven – Jesus Christ, and his living word in a number of ways –

We don’t bother to seek it. We misuse the bread of heaven as we try to force God’s word through a number of our “filters” like science, historical accuracy, self-help thinking, and whatever else is in the wind in our time, thereby making things far too complex and missing God’s voice in our “modern sophistication”.


We reject the Manna from heaven by gathering our own manna to sustain us – a more comfortable spirituality, a more individual faith journey without much reference to the Body of Christ – the church – with all its warts.


Of course the easy one is just accumulating more things or better things – relying on other “manna” we think will do the trick - now.

The list of our ways of doubting God and his promise to sustain us even in the desert of fear and evil and death goes on.

When will the complaint and doubt end? When will be able to trust the Lord and take him at his Word, even whether we fully understand it or not? When will we contentedly place our trust in God’s grace and power, take him at his word and commit our lives into his hands, even when we cannot understand what is happening to us, but keep moving in simple trust of our heavenly Father anyway?


Enter Jesus – the “Bread of Heaven”, who opens up the possibility and the way to an intimate trust of the Lord – not as a distant unfeeling, unthinking, unloving master, but a kind and loving Father who seeks us out, bears our weaknesses and forgives our rejection of his presence and concern for our life.


As Israel wandered in the harsh desert for 40 years, so Jesus entered the desert experience for 40 days where he was also put the harshest test by the Devil himself. The test was whether or not he would trust his Father and fulfil the promised plan to defeat sin and death once and for all. Jesus did, so we do (Matthew 3:15).


Jesus even cited those same words of Deuteronomy 8:3, “Human beings cannot live on bread alone, but by every word that comes from God’s mouth”. So, he reiterating that we cannot truly live this life or our God-given calling by mere food and drink and the possessions of this world, but only by hearing every word that God speaks in his Word. The Word of God sustains our life – not anything less.


Jesus is far more than merely an obedient Israel. He is also the new and greater Moses who has begun a new age and a new relationship between the Lord and his new people – now Israelites and non-Israelites. Moses gave the people the Law (Torah) of God and was a mediator between God and the people. Jesus gives the new LAW (Matthew 5-7 – the Sermon on the Mount) and also feeds the people in the wilderness (Matthew 14:13-21).


Jesus is the “true Manna”, the “Bread of Heaven” (John 6:48-51). Jesus is the food from heaven himself who gives his own flesh and blood for the life of the world.


A friend of mine died this week in tragic circumstances. He left good mates, a loving wife and two loving boys behind, as well as a significant number of young boys in this community who looked up to him as their coach.


He was not one to partake of the bread of heaven – not in recent times anyway. I wish he was. I wish he did. Only God knows a man’s heart and God is gracious. He is the final judge on life – not you or me.


As I spent time with other blokes and their wives who also are not those who partake of the Bread of Heaven it has occurred to me again in this sadness that God’s bread is the only stuff that counts in then end.

God’s bread – Jesus of Nazareth, the crucified saviour of humanity, is life. He offers his own body and blood for life and living here and now. His body and blood and his Word are more precious than gold and of better quality than food cooked in a million cooking shows.

If you have discovered the Bread of Life and by faith receive it with God’s people then thank the Lord because this is what makes your life eternal and therefore hopeful – especially in times of grief and sorrow, but also in the everyday things of living and learning.


If you know people who have not tasted the Bread of Life, then the Call is on you to attend to his Word, be still in his presence often, trust Jesus in the testing, tell the story, do the action, invite people in to the Life of God in Jesus Christ.


If you are not sure you have ever tasted the sweet, sweet manna from heaven of Jesus Christ and his love for you, then the door is open and the gifts on offer – freely by simple faith in his good will toward you. Simply receive him.


Bread of heaven, in the desert,
feed me now and evermore.
Feed me now and evermore.
Amen

Freed to Follow - an exodus Journey Week 5

FREED TO FOLLOW EXODUS: NOTES, WEEK 5

• Remember, Exodus is all about two things - knowing God and vocation. Exodus is an account of knowing God through personal experience and how it is that God would call a nation to be the community through which he would bless the human family



• We left the Israelites in a joyful moment of victory on the shores of the Sea of Reeds as they sung the song Miriam and Moses wrote for the occasion, as they saw the bodies of the once mighty Egyptian military floating in the shallows after the Lord had comprehensively won the battle on their behalf. They had to put fear away, stand at the ready attentive to the Lord’s work in their midst and simply be still and know that he is the LORD and he wins the victory for them. At the end of it they all “feared the Lord and trusted Moses his servant”(14:31)


• After the celebrations of song and tambourine, it is off into the desert on this epic journey that will shape a nation into their vocation – to be a people through which God blesses all nations.
• They head east and travel through the North Western part of the Sinai Peninsular (Desert of Shur)

• It would be a constant worry to have to find water and food for this huge community on the move – especially in the harsh environment in which they were called to travel. They have their first experience threatening moment as they arrive at a water source after three days of travelling in the heat, shade less desert with all its dust and rocks and the water is brackish. (15:22-24)


• We get this first “grumbling” moment. There will be many of these throughout this long journey of faith (Exodus 16:2; 17:3; Numbers 14:2; 16:11; 16:41).


• These are testing times! The point of the testing is trust – trust in the Lord. This fledgling nation of blessing will be tested on this one issue over and over again. Moses makes the point of this hard testing clear in verse 26: “If you listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep his decrees, I will not bring any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, because I am the LORD who heals you”.


• So, it is clear: this community will have to learnt o trust and obey if they are going to be the people they were created to be – a people of life and healing and blessing.


• Soon after this first dice with grumbling and doubting the LORD, the LORD ends the testing and brings the healing – they come to an oasis with 70 palm trees and 12 natural springs! The testing only lasts for as long as it needs to before the promised blessing is given again.


WEEK 5 Exodus 16:2-15 (TNIV)


The bread from heaven ( numbers relate to THOUGHTS - the bullet points below)


2 In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron1. 3 The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the LORD’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death2.”


4 Then the LORD said to Moses, “I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day. In this way I will test them and see whether they will follow my instructions. 5 On the sixth day they are to prepare what they bring in, and that is to be twice as much as they gather on the other days.3”


6 So Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, “In the evening you will know that it was the LORD who brought you out of Egypt, 7 and in the morning you will see the glory of the LORD, because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we, that you should grumble against us?” 8 Moses also said, “You will know that it was the LORD when he gives you meat to eat in the evening and all the bread you want in the morning, because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we? You are not grumbling against us, but against the LORD.”


9 Then Moses told Aaron, “Say to the entire Israelite community, ‘Come before the LORD, for he has heard your grumbling.’”


10 While Aaron was speaking to the whole Israelite community, they looked toward the desert, and there was the glory of the LORD appearing in the cloud.


11 The LORD said to Moses, 12 “I have heard the grumbling of the Israelites. Tell them, ‘At twilight you will eat meat, and in the morning you will be filled with bread. Then you will know that I am the LORD your God.’”


13 That evening quail came and covered the camp, and in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. 14 When the dew was gone, thin flakes like frost on the ground appeared on the desert floor. 15 When the Israelites saw it, they said to each other, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was4, 5. 6

Moses said to them, “It is the bread the LORD has given you to eat.

THOUGHTS
1. Now water is no longer the immediate problem! The problem is food. How will this community on the move being shaped by God to fulfil their role in the world survive the testing times they face? This is an obvious question for any person on the journey of faith in God. How will I continue on in faith in God? We are about to find out that God will feed the people.


2. As the people become more and more skilled at complaining as they express their lack of trust in the Lord (through Moses), they look back to “the good old days”. It is a common ploy we humans use to express our doubt about the present. The Israelites are very good at it. They know how to make a good whinge!


3. The LORD responds to the complaint not with harsh judgement but free gift – the gift of bread and meat for his people in the desert. But there is something going on here. There is that continuing shaping and testing of the people by the LORD. He gives his gifts for a purpose. He gives his gifts out of commitment to his people and love for them, but also to shape them so that they fulfil their calling as his holy people of healing and blessing in his world.


4. The deal is this: The LORD will rain down bread and birds to eat in daily portions only. There will enough for everyone everyday and enough for the rest day (Sabbath). God sustains his people on a day by day basis. Can you see that this demands trust from the people’s point of view? They are not to take more than the allotted amount of bread (manna) or Quail – only enough for daily need. The manna will not store – except on Friday afternoon when it will be OK overnight for the Rest day.


5. For the most part, the people trusted God’s daily provision and his Sabbath Day food. Both took trust – trust that the Lord would provide what he promised and that there would be enough for his requirement to rest together with him on the Sabbath.


6. Some people could not trust God on this daily basis. They decided to take control of their life and needs by gathering more then was needed and trying o store up for themselves more then enough, “just in case”. Just in case? Just in case God could not be trusted and did not follow through on his daily provision. Greed is lack of trust in God’s provisions for us.


REFLECTIONS
• This reality of God testing his people’s trust of him is an ongoing stream in the bible. In Deuteronomy 8, we are told later by Moses that this whole Manna experience was a teaching thing. Through this daily provision of food for the journey, his people learnt that no human being or community can live only by bread, but actually, we can only truly live by the very Word that comes from God’s own mouth (Deuteronomy 8:3).


• In Psalm 78, the writer describes this provision by God in the form of manna as “grain of heaven” that “rained down” on the people. It was “and “food in abundance” bread of angels” (Psalm 78:24-25). Yet, in spite of this magnificent food from God himself, the people still doubted and rejected God’s nurture and sustenance. They did not believe (Psalm 78:32).


o How has the LORD been providing for you and how have you been doubting him and his promise to keep you?
o We have so much in this place. Maybe it would be easier in some ways to actually trust the Lord if we had little and were travelling in a desert in tents?
o What do you find it hard to trust God for – “things” or relationships and well-being and future?


• Have you done the “murmuring” thing against God lately? Did it lead you to want the “good old days” or just to get out of the situation asap?!


• Israel’s rejection and doubt of God was made good by the new Israel – the Messiah – Jesus Christ;


o As Israel wandered in the harsh desert for 40 years, so he entered the desert experience for 40 days where he was also put the harshest test by the Devil himself. The test was whether or not he would trust his Father and fulfil the promised plan to defeat sin and death once and for all. He did so we do (Matthew 3:15). Jesus even cited those same words of Deuteronomy 8:3, reiterating that we cannot truly live this life or our God-given calling by mere food and drink and the possessions of this world, but only by hearing every word that God speaks in his Word. The Word of God sustains our life – not anything less.


o Jesus is far more than merely an obedient Israel. He is also the new and greater Moses who has begun a new age and a new relationship between the Lord and his new people – now Israelites and non-Israelites. Moses gave the people the Law (Torah) of God and was a mediator between God and the people. Jesus gives the new LAW (Matthew 5-7 – the Sermon on the Mount) and also feeds the people in the wilderness (Matthew 14:13-21).


o Jesus is the “true Manna”, the “Bread of Heaven” (John 6:48-51). Jesus is the food from heaven himself who gives his own flesh and blood for the life of the world.


• St Paul reflects on this manna episode in the desert in 1 Corinthians 10:1-4, where he holds up the people and their doubting as something not to engage in. Somehow, Jesus himself was present in the desert and was the “Rock from which they drank”.


• Paul uses this doubting moment as a warning to New Testament Christians – this is a warning not to swap God’s provision for other things in an attempt to sure one’s life up. He says “they became idolaters and engaged in immorality. His lesson is no “shun the worship of idols (1Cor 10:14) because it is impossible to partake of this bread of heaven (Jesus) at the altar and at the same time partake of demons at another table.


• The Promises and calling of the Lord is received on a daily needed basis and includes rest with him in his presence among his people. This however, can be rejected doubted and lost.


o How are we doubting God’s ability to sustain us as church and choosing to live by bread alone?
o Where do you go back to when under the pump?
o What is the Lord calling you to ignore, dismiss or reject in order to participate in the body of Christ?

Freed to Follow - an exodus Journey Week 4

Sermon

Pentecost 13A
Sunday September 11, 2011.

Exodus: Freed to Follow

Exodus 14:19-31

19 Then the angel of God, who had been traveling in front of Israel’s army, withdrew and went behind them. The pillar of cloud also moved from in front and stood behind them, 20 coming between the armies of Egypt and Israel. Throughout the night the cloud brought darkness to the one side and light to the other side; so neither went near the other all night long.  

21 Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the LORD drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land. The waters were divided, 22 and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left.

23 The Egyptians pursued them, and all Pharaoh’s horses and chariots and horsemen followed them into the sea. 24 During the last watch of the night the LORD looked down from the pillar of fire and cloud at the Egyptian army and threw it into confusion. 25 He jammed[a] the wheels of their chariots so that they had difficulty driving. And the Egyptians said, “Let’s get away from the Israelites! The LORD is fighting for them against Egypt.”

26 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand over the sea so that the waters may flow back over the Egyptians and their chariots and horsemen.” 27 Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and at daybreak the sea went back to its place. The Egyptians were fleeing toward[b] it, and the LORD swept them into the sea. 28 The water flowed back and covered the chariots and horsemen—the entire army of Pharaoh that had followed the Israelites into the sea. Not one of them survived.

29 But the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left. 30 That day the LORD saved Israel from the hands of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians lying dead on the shore. 31 And when the Israelites saw the great power the LORD displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the LORD and put their trust in him and in Moses his servant.



Today’s part of this Exodus journey is for any of us who have ever tried to fight our way out of trouble or fight our way to success forgetting that The Lord is the One who fight our battles.


It is a Word for us who forget that the Lord is involved in our day, our issues, our fears, our world and all its concerns and who then try and who then try and win battles, be effective, be successful or control our circumstances to “feel better” about life.

We move from that great and dreadful night of the Passover to the first days of freedom with a huge mass of God’s people on the move out of Egypt to an unknown future. The future maybe unknown but at least it is freedom. The feeling of the people is jubilant, triumphant and hopeful. This will rapidly change to fear, doubt, complaint and back again!

Eventually even Pharaoh relents on his hard heartedness and in complete defeat and some anger and grief at the loss of his own Son (the future Pharaoh and son of Ra) and can’t wait for this troublesome people to get out of his country.

The Lord had promised that Israel would not leave empty handed from their slavery. As the Israelites quickly wrap up their meal on the move, word gets out they are out! The Egyptian locals can’t wait to see the back of Israel and in their enthusiasm give lots of stock, jewellery and things of gold and sliver.

This is Israel now as the victorious nation plundering the defeated foe. This is compensation for 400 years of slavery!


1.2 million people and all their livestock and belongings finally get going across the desert under Moses’ leadership. They are not going the short way though. We get a hint that this “little trip” up to Canaan will not be so direct or simple.


This makes sense if we keep the purpose of God in mind. He has created this nation by a promise and sustained his promise from generation to generation. he has said that this nation will have a job. It will be the chosen nation through which He will bless all nations. They need to learn how to be a nation of blessing. They will learn this in the desert. It will take a whole generations length of time (40 years). But this is all ahead for the buoyant people of God at the beginning of their victory procession out into the desert to worship the Lord on his holy mountain.


Pharaoh again changes his mind and this time there is a shift. Up until now, Pharaoh has been wanting to keep these people alive and working in his building sites etc…. But now he wants them dead, dead, dead. Eleven times in the texts before and including our text today we hear that “Pharaoh and all his horses and his chariots” pursued the Israelites. This is unbridled fury. This is road rage! The goal is no longer preservation of a slave nation but the total annihilation of a people.


Can you imagine the terror that overtakes the now not so jubilant Israelites as they feel the vibration of hooves and chariots, see the dust cloud on the horizon and then finally “Look up and see” the Egyptians coming after them at speed!


Instantly, the joy turns to terror, the victory to defeat and the faith to doubt. The doubt of Moses and “his” God comes in the form of complaint. This will be the first of many times when the people will complain against Moses and therefore doubt God. On one occasion later on they are ready to stone Moses to death!


As the feeble arms drop an the knees knock, the people are now “crying out” again as they did in slavery, and as Moses did in the little ark. Nothing seems to been achieved and nothing seems to have changed. The same old foes and fears are upon them and they fall into the same old ways of dealing with them – without faith in the Living God. Sound familiar?


To all of this fear and doubt and turning away from the Lord, Moses gives three short directives. Don’t be scared. Stand. See.


Don’t be afraid, Stand up and See.


When the old foes come and we feel like we are back where we started, we are to put fear away. We are stand at the ready like a soldier waiting for the battle and then See? What are we to see? We are to see the Lord at work – fighting our battles for us.


Israel is an army now. A victorious army on the march but they are a strange army indeed. They are the only army in history who are to not be fearful, stand at the ready and not fight! This is because they cannot win and because the Lord does their fighting for them. They need only to “be still”.


We are an army on a victory procession to life forever in the Lord. He has defeated the greater enemies of sin, evil and death itself and continues to do so as we put fear away, stand alert and watchful so we can see how the Lord fights our battles for us. We need only to be still and know that I am God, as the Psalmist says in Psalm 9.


What a strange army we are! Are you trying to win your battles without reference to the Spirit of the Risen Jesus? You will fail. Are you trying to sure up your own position among others by a show of power or craftiness. You will fail and you will not be a blessing carrier to others as your called to be. Are we trying to work our way out of trouble without faith, reference or time for God’s word to us? We are then being that wicked and adulterous generation that Jesus mentions in Matthew 12. The Jewish religious leaders come to him and ask for a “sign” or show of raw power to convince everyone that Jesus really is “from God”.


Jesus says that even the greatest show of power – the sign of Jonah – a person being dead three days in the belly of the earth like Jonah was in the belly of the whale – and then coming back to life and defeating the great enemy, death, will not be enough for sign-lookers.


Friends, power will not sustain us or bring life and blessing to us and our world. It has its place and time as we see in our text when God does one more mighty act of defeat on Pharaoh by swallowing him and his army up in the sea. Our text ends with the witness that “the people feared the Lord and put their trust in Moses, his servant”.


But how fleeting this moment of faith based on a show power would be! It would be a nano-second until doubt and unbelief and then idolatry would be back again in these same people.


Is this why the Lord eventually became a human being in Jesus Christ and why Jesus wins the final victory over our idolatry and sin and its consequence of death in the weak looking crucifixion and death of his own son?


Is this why Paul says that the good news of God’s freedom and grace poured out for all people is foolishness to people who look for signs of power to be convinced of God’s presence and will?

Is this why Paul says he proclaims Jesus Christ and him crucified, which is a stumbling block to people who are wanting a show of force to win the day?

Is this why Jesus revolutionised the Passover with his own body and blood given for the life of the world through very ordinary bread and wine and commands us to baptise people in God’s name with simple water but his powerful word and why belief and faith and joy come through hearing the Word, not by might or intellect or human strength?


Friends, it is clear in all of this first part of Exodus that we have no power and no victory over anything that really matters in life and that to face life without reference to or faith in the Word of the Lord is futile. This way of the hard heart against the Lord will end in only one way – total destruction, as it did for Pharaoh.


We are called to put fear way and trust. We are called to stand ready to be used by the Lord and see his hand at work in our day. To do anything else leads to our human idol factory getting the upper hand as we all convince ourselves that it was all our doing and that we have got to make this thing work and that we really are the key players in what we face. No, the Lord is always the key player. He is the beginning and the end, the Lord of all lords and the one who does our fighting for us in places we don’t even know about – “principalities and powers”, as Paul calls them.


How sweet it is to be in the Lord’s victory procession and on his holy mountain as we worship in his presence and where he gives us the bread of life – his Word for the journey with him.


Don’t be afraid of what you have to do or have to stop doing.


Stand at the ready with your “sword” – the Word of God in your hand.


See – see the Spirit of the risen Jesus at work in things


Be still. It is enough for today to be still and simple know in the heart that God is; that God is I AM, fighting for you and winning his victory for your body mind and spirit everyday through very ordinary looking things.


Moses and his sister Miriam penned a song after this great victory in the sea was won by the Lord on their behalf…


In your unfailing love, O Lord, you will lead the people you have redeemed.
In your strength you will guide them to your holy place.
The nations will hear and tremble…
The Lord reigns for ever and ever. (Exodus 15:13ff)