Lathem Postell: Good morning. Sam Jones Methodist Church. It is so good to be here and worship with you today. Turned out to be not as dreary of a day as last night was. And, a few days before, we're talking about Exodus and the plagues.
I thought for a second we might be getting one last night around 03:30. We survived it. We made it through. So, glad that you were able to to be here and worship with us today. I know pastor Jacob told you about pastor Mark and his son.
I don't know if they are able to watch this service or if they are. If they are, Mark, Jared, Sherry, good to see y'all. We're praying for you. We'll see you see you soon. As we continue in our sermon series today, if you don't know, we're continuing through.
If this is your first Sunday here with us, welcome to Sam Jones. We are doing a year long look at the whole bible. We're calling it the whole story, looking at the full narrative of scripture to see what it is that God wants us to see. You know, we can go story by story picking things out, but God narrative together through 66 books, all of these different authors, to reveal to us his character. And so we're slowly going genesis to revelation to see what it is that that God is revealing.
And right now, we're still in the story of Exodus. We're looking at the person of Moses. Last week, we were in Exodus chapter three where God revealed to us his name. That's the big deal. We know somebody by their name.
We like to say we're on a first name basis. Right? He told us that I am who I am, or I will be who I will be. Yahweh is God's name. Story of Moses and the burning bush.
God comes to him in this burning bush. God not just gives Moses his name, but gives him a calling. He says, go and free my people. And so today, our scripture, as you see it in the bulletin, is Exodus chapter 14, where we finally see this calling, this promise of salvation fulfilled for his people. But a lot happens between Exodus chapter three and chapter 14 that we need to make sure we know.
Hopefully, you've been doing your bible reading and this is just a recap for you. But but if you don't know, Exodus chapter three starts it. And Moses does what God says, actually. Right? He listens to God's command.
He asks for Aaron to come with him to be a little bit better of a speaker. And they go to they go to pharaoh. They ask for these people to be released. And of course, pharaoh says no. In fact, he's outraged and makes the labor of the Israelites harder.
And this kind of sets up this back and forth, back and forth. We know it is the 10 plagues. Right? Where pharaoh where Moses will go to pharaoh, ask for the people to be released. His heart's hardened.
He doesn't release the people, and so God sends a plague to try and convince him. We're not going to go through all of those. We could spend probably a series, right, on on these different plagues. Things like turning the Nile into blood. Frogs, gnats, flies, all these different things.
He sends these 10 plagues. And the first nine are ineffective. They don't change pharaoh's mind. Every time Moses goes to pharaoh, a plague happens and nothing changes. He doesn't let the people go.
And so on the tenth plague, God does something drastic. He tells Moses, he tells pharaoh, look for the tenth plague, I'm gonna come and pass through the land. And the firstborn of every family will die. He says to the Israelites, look, if you don't want this to happen to your family, here's the instructions. Take a lamb, sacrifice it, put the blood on the doorstep of your house, the door frame of your house.
And if you do this, my presence will pass over your household and you will not be harmed. And so what happens is God says, the tenth plagues come, the the the god passes through the land and pharaoh's household is not spared. Where we're at when we get here to Exodus chapter 14. It seems as if the Israelites are Yeah. So, a starting in verse five, going through verse 31.
I think it may be on the screen behind as we read. Yeah. Let us hear this morning, this story of salvia from Exodus, which tells us this. And the When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, pharaoh and his officials changed their minds. Changed their minds about them and said, what have we done?
We have let the Israelites go and have lost their services. So he had his chariot made ready and took his army with him. He took 600 of the best chariots along with all the other chariots of Egypt with officers over all of them. The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, so that he pursued the Israelites who were marching out boldly. The Egyptians, all pharaoh's horses and chariots, horsemen, and troops pursued the Israelites and overtook them as they camped by the sea near Pi HaHirath, opposite Baal Ziphon.
As pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the Lord. They said to Moses, was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn't we say to you in Egypt, leave us alone.
Let us serve the Egyptians. It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert. Moses answered the people, do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance 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 the Lord said to Moses, why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on. Raise your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water, so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground.
I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them. And I will gain glory through pharaoh and all his army, through his chariots and his horsemen. The Egyptians will know that I am the Lord when I gained glory through pharaoh, his chariots, and his horsemen. 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, coming between the armies of Egypt and Israel.
Throughout the night, the cloud brought darkness to one side and light to the other side, so neither went near the other all night long. 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, and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left. The Egyptians pursued them, and all pharaoh's horses and chariots and horsemen followed them into the sea. 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.
He jammed 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. And 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. Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and at daybreak, the sea went back to its place.
The Egyptians were fleeing toward it, and the Lord swept them into the sea. 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. But the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground with a wall of water on their right and on their left. That day, the Lord saved Israel from the hands of the Egyptians.
And Israel saw the Egyptians lying dead on the shore. And when the Israelites saw the mighty hand of the Lord displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the Lord and put their trust in him and in Moses, his servant. Will you pray with me? Loving and gracious God, we thank you this day for your scripture, for your stories of salvation. Speak to us again this day, your story of life and of grace that in hearing it, we might be free.
For it's in Christ's name that we pray. Amen. Today's story from Exodus chapter 14 is a classic story of salvation and deliverance. I affectionately like to call Exodus chapter 14 the gospel within the old testament. Right?
The gospel is usually referring to the new testament, particularly to the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. But here, gospel meaning good news. This is a story of God's character of salvation. There's lots of stories in the Old Testament that point to that, that point and foretell of Jesus's salvific work on the cross. But there is perhaps nothing that so clearly shows us God's character and promise of salvation as the story that we find here in Exodus chapter 14.
And as as we read it this morning, I want you to just think for a moment. It's hard for us to do. But try for a moment to put yourself in the place of the Israelites who sat here on the banks of the sea. Right? Imagine what they had just gone to.
They've gone from a moment of overwhelming joy. I described to you what happened between Exodus chapter three and Exodus chapter 14. They had seen the thing that their people had prayed for for generations. They probably had parents and grandparents and great grandparents who had longed to be free from the yoke of slavery to Pharaoh. And what had they seen but God respond in answer to their prayers?
It tells us in Exodus chapter three that God heard the concerns of his people. Of generations of folks longing to be free, and this generation had seen it. They had felt the overwhelming joy of what it meant to be free. They had marched out of Egypt as free people to go and be sent to worship their God. Imagine then, at one point in your time, right, in your life you've got this overwhelming joy, maybe the happiest, the most joyful moment you've ever experienced.
You're there with your family, camping on the banks of the sea, when all of a sudden you look out and your heart drops. You see the banners. Perhaps you hear the battle cries. You've lived in Egypt long enough, you know what that means. It's pharaoh and his army.
And so you go from this moment of overwhelming joy to just deep dread and sadness. The dissenters among them, there's always some, might have started walking around and whispering, well, I told you so. It's never that easy. Pharaoh doesn't lose. Salvation was not possible like Moses told you.
Nobody beats Pharaoh. That's why he's Pharaoh. That's why they're Egypt. And to top it off, really, their situation here in Exodus chapter 14 is worse than it was in the preceding chapters. They kind of say this to Moses.
Right? And they'll say it later as they're wandering in the wilderness. Well, at least in Egypt, you know, we had places to to stay. We had food to eat. There was work to be done.
They they couldn't run away at this point in time. At least in Egypt, they had one problem. Now they had two. They were stuck between a rock and a hard place, an army that wanted to kill them and a sea that was raging beside them. It's a scene of death, an impossible situation.
And I love in the midst of that. I I I love as they're coming to grips with this and they're crying out to God. I love God's response. Moses and the people, they're crying out to God and he says, Why are you doing that? Keep moving.
Why are you spending your time crying out? Moses, raise your staff, part the water so that you can walk through. He says it as if it's as easy as brushing your teeth or for us turning something on our phone and turning ways on and and finding our directions. Right? It seems so easy when God says it.
Quit crying out to me. Just go. You find yourself in an impossible situation? Well, I'll just do the impossible. You see, what we find here in Exodus is that when there was no way, God made a way.
Where there was no hope, God made hope. God saved his people. He took care not just of the rock, but also the hard place. Two problems that stood before them. The waters were parted and the Egyptians were defeated.
Both gone at the command of Yahweh, the one who was and is and is to come. It reminds me of the old adage, and I hinted at it last week a little bit, but it's the old saying, when someone shows you who they are, believe them. Pay attention to people long enough they'll reveal to you their character. When someone shows you who they are, believe them. And today, God shows us who he is.
We need to pay attention. When someone shows you who they are, believe them. If I sound like a broken record on this, I hope I do. Because the story shows, God is the one who saves. If I sound like a broken record, if I say it over and over and over again, I say, good.
Because there is no song more beautiful than the song of God's redemption and salvation. That's what God offers us. And I get it, because I'm human. That I'm not just a preacher who gets to stand up here and preach the ideal. I live life with you.
I get it. I'm human. I know that things are more difficult than when we just talk about them. Talk is cheap sometimes. Right?
Each of us, most of us, we get in these situations that feel impossible. Sounds nice. There's parts of it that are tough, but it sounds nice for them. Right? Well, good for them.
Three thousand years ago. That has nothing to do with what I'm facing. That has nothing to do with with what I'm going through. Sure it was impossible but it's nothing compared to this. I have weight that nobody knows about.
And so we sit here. We sit here bound and shackled and chained by sin, by things we've done, by who we are, and by things that have been done to us. Right, you hear my words, but then you look in the mirror too. And what you see is an imperfect person. You see in that mirror someone who's full of things that you're not proud of.
You see a person who's full of anger, anger at others, anger at the world, angry at God. You're not proud, but you see a person full of pride. You're not proud of that, but you're full of pride. Is he a person full of lust, full of greed? You tell me as I'm talking about this, you go, Look, that's who I am.
I look in the mirror, and if I'm honest about my character, I see who I am. These are the things that fill me. We look in the mirror and we see the things we do. Not just who we are, but our actions. We're not really good at loving our neighbors.
I'm really bad at it. It goes beyond that though. We know our hearts and we know that hatred that we're harboring for enemies. People that used to be friends. People we trusted, but now we hate them.
We know that we like to gossip about our neighbor down the street, perhaps even the person sitting next to us today. We know who we are. We know, even though God has offered us forgiveness, we know that we have not offered forgiveness to others. We still blame them for everything that's wrong with us. Seems impossible to overcome.
And those are just the things like, we might would be willing to say some of that out loud. What about the things we don't wanna say out loud? The time we committed adultery and cheated on our spouse. A time we stole from a family member or a loved one. We took advantage of their love for us.
Or we lied on a business deal, on a transaction. Nobody will know, so who does it hurt? The time we betrayed the trust of a confidant, turned them in, or took advantage again of their love for us. We get into the things we're addicted to. We we know ourselves when we walk outside of these doors, we put on a good face.
Things like alcohol, pornography, prescription drugs, recreation drugs, the list can go on. There's any number of things we're addicted to. And Then we look at the things that have been done to us. Those are the things we've done, but what about the things that have been done to me? What about the harm that's been caused to me?
Those people that have spoken poorly about me, that have slandered my name. What about those people who were supposed to love me, care for me, and they abused me, neglected me, and abandoned me? Does it sound impossible yet? Because the truth is, we could keep going. There's not enough time in the day.
I'll run out of time if I try to go through the list and say each of our situations, right? Maybe I didn't say yours, but you can add it to it. The truth is, we're not just stuck between a rock and a hard place. There's about five rocks and three or four hard places in our life. Sure, we sit here and smile and say we're doing good, But inside, we realize that there is nowhere to turn, no place to go, and nobody, it feels like, who can help us.
That's what the Israelites fell. That's where they stood. And to that, I stand here and proclaim the same word that Moses said three thousand years ago. Audacious hope to say, do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today.
Say, Look, God can overcome both of them. I don't know how, but I know he can. Do not be afraid because God will save you. He saved the Israelites. He can save us.
And the truth is, God is staring at your sin. Have you ever thought about that? It's uncomfortable to think about. It's why we don't. God is staring at your sin.
There's nothing you've done that's surprising him. God is staring at your sin. He's staring at your abuse. He's staring at your neglect. He's staring at your addiction.
He sees all of it. And bluntly just says, why don't you walk forward? Because he wants to part the waters of your life. He wants to help you walk across the dry ground to swallow up all that binds you. God didn't just stop in Egypt.
He wants to do it today. And I know that. I know that God wants to continue to do it. I know that God is still in the salvation business because he came here himself to secure it. We're jumping ahead in our story, but I hope you'll allow me to.
Because what we see throughout scripture is that God continues to tell us who he is, he continues to show us his character. In the person of Jesus, God offers the same salvation to us that he offered to the Israelites so many years ago. It's really the same story when you begin to think about it. Because what we find in Jesus' life is that it's through the waters of the womb and through the waters of the Jordan that Jesus takes on our slavery to sin and death. And it's through his death and resurrection that Jesus drowns the enemy that binds us.
All so that we can be freed to live into the eternal kingdom, the promised land of God's presence. When God tells you who he is, believe him. This is the gospel of Exodus. It's the good news of the Old Testament, that God is the one who saves. He is the one who delivers.
And like Moses said, it's because of this, It's because of what God has done that the Egyptians you see today, which we're probably not gonna see many Egyptians today, so we would read that as the the sin you see today, the abuse you see today, the chains you see today, you will never see them again. The Lord will fight for you. You need only be still. Do you trust God enough to walk through the waters? Do you trust God enough to be still?
Do you trust God enough to believe that he really can for you? Let us pray. Loving and gracious God, Lord, we can only start with thanks. Thanks for who you are, for what you've done, for your love for us that's beyond compare. Lord, we thank you for stories like this that that show us who you are.
Lord, we thank you that you've revealed your care to us. That you are a person, that you are the person who saves. And so God, in light of who you are, in light of what you've done, we come now before you. Lord, there's no reason to hide anything. We can't do it if we wanted to.
Lord, you are staring at our sin. You're staring at our our abuse, our neglect, our addictions. And so Lord, we just lay it all at your feet. There's nowhere else we can take it. It feels like it's overwhelming us.
And so God, we we come now asking each of us on our own, Lord, for forgiveness. Lord, we're asking you for salvation. We're asking you for deliverance. We're asking you, Lord, that what you did for the Israelites so many years ago, you might do for us. We sit here and stand here today, not knowing where to go.
The path doesn't seem clear. Lord, you tell us to go, to walk, to move forward. Let us trust in you God. And Lord, as we come to the banks of that sea, Lord, we just ask that we see your deliverance, that the waters begin to push aside with a wall of water on our right and our left. Lord, we want to see it again.
And Lord, we pray especially now, each of us in our own hearts. Lord, I pray for those in this room who don't know your son Jesus as their savior. You know, maybe they've heard this story a million times and they've not thought about it this way. Lord, maybe somebody's hearing it for the first time. Work on our hearts.
And Lord, if that's us, we just ask now that you fill our hearts. Fill us with your grace. Fill us with your love. Fill us with your mercy. Empty us of all that is us and fill us with all that is you.
God, help us to see your deliverance today, tomorrow, and always, and give us courage and strength and faith to believe what you've shown us, to believe what you say, say, that you are the God who saves. For it's in his name, the name of our savior, Jesus the Christ, amen.