Exodus 14 Bible Study (Moses & Israel Crossing the Red Sea) | Pastor Daniel Batarseh

Exodus chapter 14 verse one. And the Lord said to Moses, tell the people of Israel to turn back and encamp in front of Pihaath Hathoroth, between Migdol and the sea, in front of Baal Zephon. You shall encamp facing it by the sea. For Pharaoh will save the people of Israel, they are wandering in the land. The wilderness has shut them in.

And I will harden Pharaoh's heart and he will pursue them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, and they did so. When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, the mind of Pharaoh and his servants was changed toward the people. And they said, what is this what we have done, that we have let Israel go from serving us? So he made ready his chariot and took his army with him and took 600 chosen chariots and all the other chariots of Egypt with officers all over all of them.

And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he pursued the people of Israel while the people of Israel were going out defiantly. The Egyptians pursued them. All Pharaoh's horses and chariots and his horsemen and his army overtook them, encamped at the sea by Piahiroth in front of Beelzebun. Can I have Moody pray and then bear it? Can you pray right after Moody before we expound on this text?

Please do so.

Lord, as we're praying right now that we may receive your work and that, you would make fantastic in us, Lord. Our situations are different, Lord, and I pray that you would meet each meet each and every single one Yes, tonight's meeting. That's the second I woke up. So, lord god, become expectant knowing that you have something for each of us. Father, and god, I I pray that none of us could leave here the same, Lord.

May we never gather in your name as a community, Lord, without being changed. And may we not be like a man who looks in the mirror and forgets what he looks like to be even if you die. I pray that our our words, our thoughts, our actions, Lord, can only change. And that tonight we would pick something out in our lives, Lord God, and show it to us and conform us to your image. Yes.

So we we humbly ask us to your image. Yes. So we humbly ask that you would have mercy on us and change us and make us more likely because we can't do it ourselves. Yes. God we ask for these things in the name of Jesus Christ.

Father, simply, we believe right now we are standing on holy ground. That you are here. And Lord we just pray that no man would be seen and that Jesus would be exalted. And Lord may the words of our mouths, the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in your sight. In Jesus name we pray.

Amen. You may be seated. Exodus 14 beginning in verse one. If you remember from last week, if you were here last week, we talked about the principles of God's guidance in our lives. The principles of God's guidance in our lives.

And though God worked in a specific way with the people of Israel coming out of Egypt, the way he deals with us, the way he leads his people are still the same. They're timeless truths and we talked about how he takes us the long way sometimes, and how he makes us wait, and how he develops us, and how he knows what we can handle in this season and what we can handle in the next season. And I would like to say that those principles still continue into the next chapter. And as we come from verse one down, we kind of touched on these verses last week, but we're gonna spend some more time with them. This is a glorious chapter, And by God's grace, we would try to cover all of it without rushing.

But let's look over the first five, four verses. Did anybody notice anything in verse one? The Lord said to Moses, tell the people of Israel to do what? Turn back. You wanna talk about leadership.

You wanna talk about leading people out of Egypt and here they are, they're coming towards where they need to be and God all for a sudden says I want you to turn back. I want you to turn back, not only turn back, what else do I want you to do? Encamp. Stay at a certain location. And so what does that mean?

What does that what does that have to do with what we learned about last week? It's still the same thought really. We don't understand his leadership sometimes. And so we talked last week about how they were moving forward and God led them the longer way. Now all of a sudden he's doing this one eighty, and he is telling them to turn back and to stop.

Now why would God wanna do that? What does he have in mind in this chapter?

In chapter four it says, the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord. So he wants to prove once and for all to the Egyptians.

So he wants to prove once and for all to not the Israelites necessarily, but to the Egyptians that he is Lord? Sure. Yes. And he is approaching

for the people to believe who he is.

For the people to believe who he is. Absolutely. God has some unfinished business with Pharaoh. He wants to deal with some issues here. He wants to put a final exclamation mark on his sovereignty, on his power, and it required something though.

It required the faith and the trust of the people in his leadership. And if we were to just continue the thoughts that we were expounding on last week, when we talk about God leading us in this life through the wilderness journey when he delivered us out of Egypt, we have to trust that not only in the longer way, remember he took that detour, not only do we have to trust him that in the things that we eagerly desire to do or get to, he takes us in a way in which he develops us, we also have to trust him in the moments where everything seems like it's on pause. Because that's exactly what's happening to them right now. They're not even moving at this point. We talked about going the longer way, how God wants to develop our character and our personality, wants to give us experience about what happens, and we touched on this a little bit, when not only do you feel like everything is on pause, but when everything feels like it's going in reverse, turn back and go the other way.

It's, Lord, are you sure? You you took us out of there. Now you wanna you want us to go closer to Egypt? And sometimes in our own lives, we feel like things are not moving, things are not changing. We're praying, we're fasting, we're faithful in what we're doing, and we literally see nothing happening.

But even in those moments where everything seems to be frozen, spiritually, in our fruit, God has something in mind. He tells it to Moses in verse three, For Pharaoh will say of the people of Israel, they are wandering in the land, the wilderness has shut them in. And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and he will pursue them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh. So he gives a little bit of insight, specifically to Moses, but I believe the people of Israel have no idea what's going on. And I believe that God is developing developing them to trust in not only God, but God through Moses.

And he has something in mind though, that he wants to get glory over Pharaoh. But even Moses himself doesn't have the full picture. He doesn't God loves to just hide blueprints. He doesn't wanna give us it's like when we're led by the Lord, it's like your street lights, or not your street lights, your car lights. You don't see the full road, you just see the necessary amount, and then when you get to that point you see the next amount, and then you get to that point you see the next amount.

You're not gonna see the full street. And so you just gotta trust in the light to lead you to the next step. So what else can we say? So what else does he what does he have in mind by saying turn back and encamp? What does he wanna do?

It says in him specifically in verse four. He wants glory. God wants glory. God loves to share. Does he not?

He loves to share. He shares his goodness. He shares his love. He shares his mercy, but there's one thing he does not share, his glory. That's all to him.

And some of us had a privileged preacher to come and having a conversation with him, I remember he said one thing that stuck with my mind forever. He says, don't ever touch the glory because God will bury you alive. We had that over lunch. I can imagine how that went. But it was true.

God does not share his glory. My glory I give to no other. It belongs to him. Look at verse three. For Pharaoh will say of the people of Israel, they are wandering in the land, the wilderness has shut them in.

So it seems as though God wants to bring the people in a in a place in which obviously Pharaoh can see or his spies can see, his spies are probably following him, and to bring pharaoh to a place in which he thinks he has the advantage or thinks he has them trapped. But there's this this critical analysis that pharaoh has. Now the question is, is it right or is it wrong? Has the wilderness shut them in? Are they wandering aimlessly?

No. But pharaoh sees differently. Pharaoh has a different understanding. Pharaoh has a level of discernment that the people of God don't have. We have a different perspective.

What am I trying to say here? Pharaoh here in verse three is like the world towards Christians. They see us being led by God through this journey called life, and they go, what are they doing in life? They look lost. They look like they're wasting their time.

They look like they're giving themselves over to somebody that doesn't matter. Look, this is what it looks like when God leads you in life. This is what it looks like when you dedicate yourself to this thing called the Christian faith. Look at you. Look how silly you look.

And Pharaoh is being very critical, but his analysis is wrong. And so is the world. Because the things concerning the spiritual realm, the things concerning the cross are foolishness to the world, but it is the power of God for those who are saved. And so we see Pharaoh has a different perspective, the wrong perspective, and so does the world when they look at us and how we live. What else can we say about these precious verses?

And I will harden Pharaoh's heart and he will pursue them and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his hosts. And who will know that I am the Lord? The Egyptians will know. The Egyptians specifically will know that I am the Lord. And we're gonna get into that in a moment because it's a very, very important truth.

So let's read on in verse five. When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, the mind of Pharaoh and his servants was changed toward the people. And they said, what is this that we have done, that we have let Israel go from serving us? So he made ready his chariot and took his army with him, and took 600 chosen chariots and all the other chariots of Egypt with officers over all of them. So what happens here?

It seems pretty straightforward, but there's little little hints for us here. And you can even go back to verse four and grab some insights from there. Yes, Christine.

In this event, God hardened Pharaoh's heart when his brother left him to let us

Right. Well, if you look, that's a good observation. If you see here in verse four, what does he say? I will harden Pharaoh's heart. Right?

Because sometimes we read that and we we think that he already he did harden Pharaoh's heart up to this point. But if you notice, he says, I will do it. Pharaoh hears that the people have fled. He changes his mind. He gets the army ready, and he pursues the Israelites.

Once he started pursuing the Israelites, then it says look at verse eight. And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh. Do you see that? So we can read that kind of just quickly and think that God hard hardened Pharaoh's heart to go after the Israelites and to chase them. But that was Pharaoh's decision, and once he made that decision, he he sealed his heart.

He says, okay, you wanna go that way? I'm gonna take you to the bottom of the ocean to be with the fishes. That's what happens. Do you see how the wording is so careful? It's so precise.

When I read verse four I I come with a conclusion. One conclusion at least, that God is in control. What do I mean by that? That even when we are walking in this wilderness journey, we already have this understanding that we are being led into somewhere where we're not necessarily know where we're going. But on top of that, we have pharaoh attacking us.

Don't think just because you and I left Egypt that Satan is done with us. So we think that the Israelites come out and that Pharaoh will never attack us again. Pharaoh's coming out of Egypt to come after them. And when you and I get out of the world, the enemy now sees you as a threat and wants to do something, and it doesn't end with the Egyptians either. We're gonna see later on throughout Exodus that enemy after enemy come after the people of God.

And it's never to bring them back necessarily into the bondage that they were in, meaning they can't take you away as being the people of God, but they can hinder your journey. And they can rob you from the blessings of the journey. Right? What do I take out of verse four? This is what I take.

Even when Satan attacks me, God can turn it for his glory. Even when Satan pursues me, God in his wisdom and his power can say, yeah, but I'm gonna get glory over that too. So I can confidently walk through this life knowing that even the adversary of my soul wants to come against me, and have full confidence that whatever attack, hint hint, especially through people, God Almighty can turn it around for his glory. And that's what we have to learn here, that God is in control. He's in control.

That Satan is on a leash. I see something else here too. Because Pharaoh, on some level, his heart is hardened. And look what a hardened heart looks like. When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, the mind of pharaoh and his servants was changed toward the people.

And they said, what is this that we have done that we have let Israel go from serving us? You wanna know one evidence of person that has a hardened heart? They forget and neglect and disregard the goodness and the warnings of God. This is the evidence of a hardened heart right here. What is he saying?

He's saying, what have we done to let Israel go from serving us? Where were you the first 14 chapters, dude? Did you not see 10 plagues? Did you not see your firstborn die? What happened to you?

See, when you let your heart harden, when you don't submit to the word of God, when you don't allow Jesus to soften your consciousness, soften your inner man, when you allow sin to come and creep into your life, you can harden yourself. And what is a hardened heart? A hardened heart is a conscience that is desensitized to the point in which it cannot discern between what is right and what is wrong. A hardened heart is a heart that is desensitized. The conscience is seared to be able to discern rightly what is righteous and what is evil.

That's a hardened heart. And we know in Romans one that he gives people over to that kind of a heart eventually, where they have no discernment between right and wrong. So one of the evidences of a hardened heart is that you have no regard for the goodness of God. You have no regard for the word of God, it doesn't move you when you hear it. It doesn't move you when you know how God has been gracious in your life.

You you it just nothing is there. It's hard. Another evidence of a hardened heart is that you attack people. He pursues the Israelites. A person that has a hardened heart has no problem attacking other people.

They're not compassionate. They're not understanding. They're quick to attack. They're quick to slander. They're quick to go about and rip people apart like no problem.

That's a dangerous thing to have. And we see, Pharaoh has it. And it's only gonna get worse because a hardened heart will ultimately end up to your destruction. Gil, you had your hand up. Sorry.

I was just gonna say that I I see here that in

a way God is doing this in a way to get maximum glory and that when Pharaoh goes, he takes all of his army. He takes, like, every every man he can get. And I think God, his sovereignty, knows that, and he he he he's accounted for that, and that's part of him getting all the glory of wiping out all of Egypt's, our

Host and army. Yes. Absolutely. God knows what he's doing. He's the master chess player.

He knows what to move to pieces. So he moves Israelite right in the in the right place for the whole army to see, for Pharaoh to see, and to take them all out at once. Absolutely. What else can we say? We touched on this last week a little bit too.

Remember he says, I will get glory over Pharaoh. Oh wait, God. Don't you only get glory through people who obey you? What do we say to that? No.

God gets glory regardless of your obedience. Now God gets a specific amount of glory and a specific type of glory from those who obey him, but But no matter what, in the end every knee will bow, every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. In the end, even Satan, thinking that he's running loose and wreaking havoc, God is still getting glory out of that. God gets all the glory in the end. The one who doesn't benefit is us when we don't wanna live for God's glory.

And so we remember Romans nine in which he says that he prepares vessels of wrath and vessels of mercy, but he endures with much patience vessels of wrath. And he wants us to be vessels of mercy. He wants us to be instruments for his glory. He he longs. He takes pleasure in working in and through us.

But when we resist long enough, he says, okay, I'll get glory out of you one way or another. And so he's gonna get glory out of pharaoh by showing his strong-arm in his wrath and in his justice. And so we have to choose whether we wanna be vessels of mercy, vessels for his glory, or to be indirect vessels of his glory. And so what happens? Verse eight, the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he pursued the people of Israel while the people of Israel were going out defiantly.

The Egyptians pursued them, all Pharaoh's horses and chariots and his horsemen and his army, and overtook them encamped at the sea. Now look at verse 10. This is where things climax a little bit. When Pharaoh drew near, the people of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them. And they feared greatly.

Let's stop. What do we see here? Visualize it for a moment. It's good to visualize what you're reading here. They are encamped in a specific location in which the sea is right there, and now they have what behind them?

An army chasing after them. And so you can imagine here these these Israelite families, they're pitching their tents, probably making some lunch, and all for a sudden one person lifts their eyes and they see this cloud of smoke coming from the hills in the desert, and they hear from a distance the horses galloping, they hear this war cry coming, and they look at each other and they all look up, and what's their first reaction? Fear. Their first reaction is fear. But what is their reaction to their fear?

And the people of Israel cried out to the Lord. Because when there's something in front of you and there's something behind you, the only way you can do the only thing you can do is look up. Right? Lord, I need you. I'm looking north, I'm looking south, we're trapped here, and God puts us in situations like that so that we can only look up.

They cried out to the Lord. That is the right response to fear. That is the right response when there is an anxiety attack. That is the right response when you are facing a situation where you're sandwiched between circumstances and you literally cannot move, you and I must have that knee jerk reaction to when we face anything, we have to cry out to the Lord. That is the right reaction.

So is that the reaction whenever fear or anxiety comes to your life? It is for them. And what they do in verse 10 is absolutely right. What they do in verse 11 is not. How things quickly change.

They said to Moses, is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us Wait, wait, what just happened? You were crying out to the Lord. You had a prayer session. You had everything was, you know, let's trust in the Lord, and they got together and they cried out. And all for a sudden, verse 11 comes, is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness?

What have you done to us and bring us out of Egypt? Is this not what we said to you in Egypt, leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness. Their cry turned into a complaint. And if you notice, the Holy Spirit who wrote this did something very beautiful.

It looks like in verse 11 that God want to show us through their recorded sayings that they spent more time complaining than crying out to God. Do you see that? It says they cried out to the Lord. Quick general statement. Verse 11, it gives us what they said.

And so we see here that they took more time complaining about the situation than crying out to God about the situation. Isn't that true of our human nature? We know, we're Christians, right? Pray about it. Lord, help me with the situation.

But we seem to find more relief in complaining than we do about praying. Now why do you think that is? I would argue the reason why they went from verse 10 to verse 11 very quickly is because they did not see God's immediate intervention when they cried out to him. Understand what I'm saying? They cried out to the Lord, and we don't see God doing anything.

And so that cry quickly turned into a complaint. And that complaining is very dangerous. It's very dangerous to the Christian walk. Do you think God heard them when they cried out to him? Joshua twenty four seven says what happened in a different commentary.

I'll just read it to you. You don't have to turn it there. And when they cried to the Lord, Joshua is telling the people of Israel before they go into the land of Canaan, he's telling them, rehearsing the story to them, and when they cried to the Lord, the people of Israel in Exodus 14, he put darkness between you and the Egyptians and made the sea come upon them and cover them. So he's saying there, God did hear you when you cried out to him. Nehemiah does the same thing in Nehemiah nine nine.

He says, and you saw the afflictions of our fathers in Egypt and heard their cry at the Red Sea. So God did hear them. What are we what are we getting here from? The Holy Spirit in these different portions of scripture. This is what we're getting.

When they did cry in verse 10, God was not deaf in the moment. And here is something very important for you and me. We cannot confuse God's silence as his absence. Many people do that. Many people think that because God is silent, it's because he's absent.

There is never a moment where he is not present. He will never leave you nor forsake you. And so so many people confuse that when we're they're asking God for something, that because he's silent, he must not be there. He doesn't see the situation, he doesn't understand the situation, he's not preparing a solution for the situation. That is never the case.

Because what we see in verse 10, in the earthly realm is they cried, and in the heavenly commentary, in these different verses, God heard it. And so, because they didn't know that, because they didn't believe that, they needed another way to relieve their fear and their anxiety. And so what did they do? They complain. They grumble.

This is what's gonna mark the Israelites for their whole journey. Now is all complaining wrong? Maybe that's the wrong word. Is expressing the fear and anxiety that we are going through necessarily wrong? Why?

Jesus did it. He was on the cross.

Jesus did it? Did he cry out to God? There is a sanctified way of crying out to God about your issues, about your problems. Or else throw out 70% of the Psalms, which are Psalms of Lament. There is a holy and sanctified way of going to God with our issues and our problems.

Here's the differentiating factor. This is what makes it holy and what makes it sinful. One is you are complaining and you are expressing yourself to God. The other one is complaining about God. Nobody would ever do that.

Right? We're gonna find out how they do it. Let's analyze the way they grumbled. They said to Moses, is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? So they're saying something here, but there's there's an underlining message behind that statement.

What are they saying by saying this? Two things. What are they saying here? They're questioning God's character. They're questioning God's character.

They're questioning his promises. They're saying, is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? No. The reason why I took you out of Egypt is to bring you to the promised land. But in their moment of fear and anxiety, they begin to question the character of God because they begin to question his promises.

What else did he do? They said to who? Verse 11, they said to Moses, they said to Moses So what are they doing here? They're questioning his leadership? Yes.

I would say that they are unjustly blaming Moses or blaming others for the unfortunate circumstance that they find themselves in. That's not good. When you look at others and you begin to blame them, unrightly and unjustly for what you're going through, that's dangerous. What else do they do? Look at verse 12.

Is not this, what we said to you in Egypt, leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians, for it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness. What kind of statement is that? This is the statement. We rather live as slaves in Egypt than follow you, Lord, in the wilderness. Do you see the nature of their grumbling?

Do you see what and how they're doing this? This is why the bible is gonna call it a specific word in a moment. We're gonna go through it. So here they are. They're blaming others for their circumstances, unjustly and unrighteously.

They're questioning the goodness and the character of God because of his promises. They are in their hearts and outwardly expressing, it was so much better to live in the world than to live for God. And all of this really is a failure to realize that when we follow Jesus and when he leads us out of Egypt, it's not roses and daisies. That we do rejoice in the deliverance out of slavery and bondage, but that does not mean we are free from the attacks of the enemy, nor does it mean that we are free from trials and tribulations. See, if we taught people this early on in their faith, they would not be so spineless in their devotion to the Lord.

Do you understand what I mean? So many people are so quick to give up on their devotion, on their sincerity, on their pursuit of the Lord because somehow, someway, they believe that if I'm gonna follow Jesus, it's just gonna all work out. It's not true. It's just not true. And they failed to realize that.

And this is true for the New Testament Christian. So what does this complaining look like to God? He he gives it one type of word, and it's very, very strong word. It's in Psalms one zero six. Psalms one zero six verse seven Says, our fathers, when they were in Egypt, did not consider your wondrous works.

They did not remember the abundance of your steadfast love, but rebelled by the sea, at the Red Sea. He gives a word for this. What's that word? Rebellion. Unbelief mingled with grumbling is seen as rebellion to God.

Why? Why is grumbling seen as rebellion to God? Yes. Because in many ways, even though, like, you know, we see how feral is hard on this heart, and he's ignorant to the promises of God.

You know, people of God, you know, God's immature people are ignorant to his promises, so we're not willing to trust them wholeheartedly. It's a trust issue.

It's a trust issue? Yes, absolutely. That's the core of it. But grumbling specifically, the fact that these things are coming out of their mouths is very very very significant. Yes.

Yes, absolutely. Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.

Speaking against

Speaking against God. God. Check this out. Grumbling is our testimony to the world and to those around us that God's goodness, power, and wisdom is not sufficient. And it ultimately taints his character to those around us.

Did you get that? Grumbling, and there's a New Testament verse to this, grumbling is our testimony to those around us that God's wisdom, his power, and his goodness is not sufficient for us, therefore tainting his character to those who are watching us. That's how powerful grumbling is. You say why? Go to Philippians two fourteen.

Paul tells us why in Philippians two fourteen. Let's see what the inter interesting international version has for us. Do all things without murmurings and disputings. Another translation is complaining or grumbling. Do what?

All things. All things. All things. Like, what's all things? In the Greek, it means all things.

It means like doing the dishes or being asked to do something in church. All things. Why? Why? What happens if we grumble or we complain?

What what is the effect of it? Here's the next part. That all of you may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation or generation, among whom all of you shine as lights in the world. When you complain and grumble, it dwindles your light. It dwindles your testimony.

Why? Because when you, who are an ambassador of Jesus Christ, begin to grumble and complain You know, there are other people who have ears and they're watching your life. And when they look at your life, a Christian, begin to grumble and complain, they wonder, is your god really worth following? When you and I are supposed to be bursting forth from joy, I'm not saying everything is happy and dandy all the time, but he is saying very specifically, he's not suggesting it, he's commanding it. Do all things without dispute, without complaint, without grumbling, because it literally has an effect upon your testimony.

Do you see now why we need the Holy Spirit? We need the Holy Spirit because nobody can bridle this thing called a tongue, but he can. So I am to do this, because what they are doing, these people who were delivered from Egypt is testifying outwardly whether they're knowing it or not that, you know, Yahweh is not as powerful as he says he is. Yahweh is not good to us as he says he is. Yahweh is not as wise as he says he is.

We are the reflection of who God is. And when we taint his character with grumbling, it's seen as rebellion. It's seen as rebellion. And that's why we have to learn how to, in any circumstance, allow our hearts to come before God and to cry out to him honestly. That's what the Psalms are for.

They are honest confessions before the Lord. But be careful of how you sound around others around you. Do you have your hand up? Is there anything else we can say about that? And if you don't believe that, what was the reason why the Israelites did not get into the promised land this generation?

Was it sexual morality? Because they did that. Was it complaining in the sense of this or that? Partly, but it it came down to one thing, that expressing complaining and grumbling. Numbers fourteen eleven tells us, and the Lord said to Moses, how long will this people despise me, and how long will they not believe in me?

In spite of all the signs that I have done among them, the number one thing that did not lead them to the promised land was not all these gross sins, it was unbelief. New Testament says the same thing in Hebrews three nineteen. What does he say? So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief. When we grumble, it is a symptom of unbelief.

It is the fruit of a heart that says, I don't believe God for what he says. And that says something to God because it's a direct attack to his character and his word. And it has a secondary consequences, once again, around those who are around us, who are watching our lives and hearing our lives. And so it was unbelief that kept them back. Wow.

How many things do we not believe God for? Especially the things that he's promised us in his word. I wanna believe God for everything. I don't wanna be seeming rebellious in his eyes because I don't believe him in in that grumbling. It's it's manifested in grumbling.

That's the extreme of it. So when we follow the Lord and he leads us through this journey in the wilderness, when he takes us out of the captivity of Pharaoh, and when we come before a Red Sea, and not only do we come before a Red Sea, but behind us comes a marching army, this is what we don't do, verse eleven and twelve. What do we do then? We do what Moses did in verse 13. And Moses said to the people, fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord.

Those are the three things that we do. So when you're faced with an impossible situation and when you are being attacked in a way that you know that if it reaches you, you're overtaken, three things, including crying out to God. That's four. Cry out to Lord, and when you cry out to Lord, you don't fear. Because when you fear, what happens?

You panic. And when you panic, what happens? You move. And when you move, what happens? You fail to see God move.

Let me say that again. When you fear, you panic. And guess what happens when you panic? You move. And when you move without God telling you to move, you fail to see God move.

So what do we do? We do the opposite. We don't fear. And the result of that is we stand firm. When we stand firm, we position ourselves to see God move in a in a venting way.

Why shouldn't we fear? Because he's gonna teach us a timeless truth here in this Red Sea story that even the world knows about. Opposition and obstacles are opportunities to see God's hand move in a mighty way. So instead of fearing, we should rejoice. And I know that's hard to do, but we should.

Why? Because when I'm faced with an obstacle or if I'm facing opposition, those things are literally producing an opportunity to see God's hand come in and to do an amazing work. And so once again as we talked about last week, when we are faced with the Red Sea, when we are facing a transitional period in our faith, we should have this sense of excitement because we're gonna see God do something. Like that's so good but I Be realistic, I am. It's the Bible.

That's what the story is all about. And so, we should not fear. We should not move. What does Moses say here in verse 14? The Lord will fight for you, and you only have to be silent.

You only have to be silent. Just chew on that verse for a moment. What does that mean? The Lord will fight for you. You only have to be silent.

How many of us need that in our cars when we're driving to work? How many of us need that on top of our doorpost before we walk out of the room? There are certain situations and circumstances in life that do require us to be confrontational and do require us to make practical steps. Right? Jesus gives us specific commands when there are conflicts and we have to actually because some people take this for all things and they do nothing.

God's like, you know, I already gave you my word to tell you what to do. There are some things that you shouldn't pray for because God already made it clear. What? Yes. Some people pray about things and it's like, you know what to do already though, why are you praying about it?

Do it. But this is a specific moment, this is a specific situation in which we have to trust in God to do all of that for us. So what is the situation? Once again, they are in a place in which they are surrounded by impossibilities, where their abilities, their network, their resources, their efforts will prove ineffective, and it requires God to do something. It is those situations that are out of your control, that demand us to put a demand on God.

That's what this is about. And it's more specific than you think. Because for us, this doesn't really mean much to us. Oh, when I'm faced with the Red Sea or when pharaoh and his chariots are not gonna attack me in 2017. Yeah.

But people will slander you in 2017. And you won't know what to do when you have no job and you feel like you've tried to apply everywhere and you have no idea what the next step is in your life. And so what happens here? The Lord instructs through Moses and many times throughout the Old Testament that he will fight for you. You only have to be silent, and that is a practice with godly men in the Bible.

Can I give you a few examples? I'm just gonna read these verses and just meditate on them. You don't even have to turn there. If you want them, just come see me afterwards. Let me just read these verses.

Jeremiah says in Jeremiah eleven twenty, he says this twice as a prophet. Now if there was one guy that you probably didn't wanna be minister ministry partners with, it was Jeremiah. You weren't getting the funds, you weren't getting the crowds, you weren't getting the Facebook likes on your ministry page with Jeremiah. And what does he say here? He says, but, oh, lord of hosts, who judges righteously, who tests the heart and the mind, let me see your vengeance upon them.

Why? For to you I have committed my cause. It's this idea that we talked about last week of trying to take vengeance. Jeremiah is not having chariots follow him. You know what he's having?

People criticize him. People beating him up and people throwing him into a well. And he says, god, I wanna see your vengeance, so I'm gonna take this into my own hands. No. He says, lord, I committed my cause to you, and because I've committed my cause to you, I trust that you're gonna take vengeance on and for me.

See, when we cry out to God, it's an invitation for him to fight for us. When we fail to commit our cause to God, wanting to do it in our own strength, ability, and wisdom, we miss out on what David missed out could have missed out on when he faced a man named who? Nabal. Remember that story in first Samuel 25? What happens?

He's in this journey where he's running away from Saul and he's low on resources and he's doing his part by taking care of people's land and sheep, and he does so for Nabal, this man who was a foolish man, who had a wise wife, a discerning wife, named who? Anybody know? Abigail, yes. Good job. Abigail.

And what happens? The men go talk to Nabal and they say, you know, we took care of your sheep. Do you have anything for us just so that we can, you know, eat? And Nabal says, are you kidding me? I don't know who you are.

Not only that, David, the guy that rebelled against King Saul, you want me to do and he mocked, and he criticized, and he slandered. And the men come back, and you know what David does? Something that he rarely does, he gets in the flesh. And he says, round up the troops. We're gonna have a brawl.

And so they go and they're walking, and David is so angry that he's talking to himself on the way. The Lord so do to me, and he's just going. Here, Abigail hears from his servant what happens. She comes and runs to him, talks to him, talks him out of it, and she says a specific thing. She says, do not take vengeance for yourself.

Do not have blood guilt on your own hands, but leave vengeance unto the Lord. And something happens. David rejoices over her discernment. David takes what she has given her. He walks away from the situation, and when he walked away from the situation, somebody stepped into the situation.

The Lord. And it says that Nabal's heart became like stone, ten days later he dies. Because it says the Lord stroking him. The Lord has stricken him. And And something happens when David finds out in first Samuel twenty five thirty nine.

Look what he says here. When David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, blessed be the Lord who has avenged the insult. We're talking words here. The insult. I received at the hand of Nabal, and has kept back his servant from wrongdoing.

See, when you and I wanna take justice into our own hands, we wanna avenge, or we wanna get back to somebody who's done something wrong to us, you are going to, most likely, step into something which you're gonna regret. You're gonna say something you're gonna regret. You're gonna do something you're gonna regret. You're gonna plan something that you're gonna regret. And David realized that later on.

He goes, oh, thank god. If I were to step into this, there would have been guilt on my hands, there would have been guilt on my testimony. Praise be to God that he avenged for me. Look what it says, the Lord has returned the evil of Nabal on his own head. So these are a lot of old testament principles, which are true for us, but Jesus himself Jesus himself, when he taught on prayer, which gospel did he teach the most on in prayer?

Luke. Luke is the gospel in which there is more teaching on prayer, more observation about Jesus praying than any other gospel account. And in Luke 11, he talks about who? He talks about a friend that needed bread because a friend was visiting his house. What's the other chapter in which he talks about prayer in a in a story as well?

Luke 18. And what was that story? A persistent widow. Now we take both those stories and we say, well, those stories are Jesus teaching us about persistence. True.

They both are about persistence, but we do not have to we can't forget rather what they are asking for in those accounts. In Luke 11, there's a need. There's physical need, something there was a supplication prayer there. In Luke 18, it's something else. Does anybody know what the widow asked for?

Justice against her adversary. And the unrighteous judge finally gave in, and the Lord says in verse seven of Luke 18, and will not God give justice to his elect? This is a specific request. She's asking for justice. Who cry to him day and night, will he delay long over them?

This is a New Testament truth that Jesus is inviting us to take all the wrongdoings that have been caused to us and to bring it before him persistently. This is what we need to do in situations that do not require our confrontation, do not require for us to step in. Or maybe we can't do it. We commit it to him, and what else do we we step back and watch him do it. And watch him take revenge.

Because he will do it righteously, and he will do it the perfect way, and our hands will be free from guilt. And so the pain that you might have in your life, maybe somebody's tree, maybe there is a past hurt, And you have no idea how they seem to be going scot free about it. Commit it to the Lord. Commit it to the judge. Will not the judge of all the earth do right?

He will. You have to do that's what Luke eighteen eighteen is about. You have to bring it to him. You have to bring it to him and say, Lord, intervene on my behalf. Lord, deal with this.

And it can be about anything. It can be about an unrighteous boss. It can be about unrighteous parents. It can be about anything. Now we're not ones to call down, like, in the Psalms, Lord, break their teeth and cast their children upon stones.

Okay? We're praying for their souls as well. But there is an element in which we find relief to our souls when we say, Jesus, I need you to step in for me. You do it, Lord. You step in, God, and you handle this situation.

I'm not touching it. For some of us here that might sound so weird, but wait till you go on in life and you experience some hurt. You you might have no idea what this means right now, but this truth will help you greatly when you move on in life and when you stay around church culture long enough and you realize that Christians aren't perfect. Just give it some time. Learn how to commit it to the Lord.

Learn how to commit it to the Lord. Once again, learn how to commit it to the Lord. Verse 15, the Lord said to Moses, why do you cry to me? Tell the people of Israel to go forward. Lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it, that the people of Israel may go through the sea on dry ground.

Wait, what? Verse 15, the Lord said to the Israelites, the Lord said to Moses, why do you cry to me?

I feel like sometimes God has has a clue to us and prepared us.

We just have

to say, step down, step step and step, like step and faith and do something. So God is asking the Lord why you're crying to me. I have equipped you and I give you, you know, I give you what you should do. You just have to take step and faith and do it and go for it.

Yes. So once again there are moments in which we do cry to the Lord, we can cry to the Lord about everything, but then once again there are moments in which God says you already have the solution, just move forward. That's true, that's a good observation, but there's something else here that there's no link here. Why? Do we see Moses crying out to the Lord?

Do we see any recording of Moses saying, God in fact, he gives pretty good advice. But sometimes preachers need to take their own advice. And the conclusion I make with verse 15 is that Moses did not do it audibly, but he did do it internally. And God saw his heart. Because you know what?

Check this out. You might seem all calm and collected in church and Friday bible study, and that volume in your heart might be low to the ears of others around you but it is pitch perfect clear to Jesus Christ. He hears it, he is more near to you than you think. That your thoughts are just as loud as my voice is in this microphone as you're sitting in that chair. Think about that.

As your thoughts throughout the day are going forward and going through, they sound like this to the Lord. And Moses' heart perhaps is saying the right things, but internally he's like, Lord, what's going on here? I'm really not because that's the power of complaining from other people. It can rub off on you. You want proof this is proof in the New Testament?

When Mary pours out that oil on Jesus' feet, It's recorded in Luke, Mark, and in Matthew. In Luke, it's not. Not that specific account. And when you read the accounts and you put them side by side, you realize we all know the story that when she does it, the disciples complain. Right?

It says, why are you doing this? Why don't you give it to the poor? But it did not start with the disciples. It started with one person. Who?

Judas. Judas was the first one to say, why are you doing this? Do not give it to the poor instead. And when Judas started to say that, it became infectious to the rest of the disciples and they joined in on it. It's a powerful, powerful contagious thing to grumble.

Moses begins to feel it, God sees it and says, why do you cry? Why do you cry? And he says, take your staff and stretch it forth over the sea and walk through it. In your situations, my circumstances, the problems that we face in life, do not be surprised if God answers it through a human agent. Do not be surprised if God uses people to come into your life as a direct intervention.

And that is so true of the body of Christ. That God through the Holy Spirit has dispensed gifts unto all men for the good of the body. Now why? Because he's the head, we're the body, we are connected to him. So technically, it's still him.

But it's through us. And so you would be amazed when somebody says, lord, I need to hear from you. I need a word from you, god. I need to know what to do next. And somebody picks up the phone and calls you two days later, a day later, sometimes the day of, and says, something you're on my heart.

And I don't know if this is the Lord, but going on and you're like, that is the Lord a 100%. Don't be surprised if there's a sickness and the Lord uses somebody to to pray for you and that sickness goes. God uses people as extensions of the head to fulfill his purposes. And so he could've not used Moses and said, alright. You want it?

And blow and the wind and they owe it all a walk through, but he uses Moses specifically. And so you and I because we failed to do we sometimes we ask, say, Lord, do something, and we want the Holy Spirit himself to blow open the door and come in and fix our problem. And it can be as simple as you coming to church Sunday morning, there's a word of encouragement from somebody that's sitting on the same pew as you. That's what we have to realize, that God uses people, we are all Spirit filled. And God gives inclination, and God uses gifts for one another.

That's the joy of the body. Now, we have to be careful. When the Lord uses you, like he used Moses, there's one truth we cannot forget. Oh, there is one truth that you cannot forget. Here's the truth What happens, and that's right.

Lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it. Whose staff was it? He says your staff. It belonged to Moses, right? Go to Isaiah ten twenty six.

This is important for us to highlight. Isaiah ten twenty six. God is speaking about judgment against a nation and he's he is bringing confirmation of how he's gonna do it. And in Isaiah ten twenty six, he says something so specific and so beautiful about what we're reading here in Exodus 14. Isaiah ten twenty six, look what the Lord says.

What the prophet says rather about the lord. And the lord of hosts will wield against them a whip as when he struck Midian at the Rock Of Oreb, and his staff will be over the sea and he will lift it as he did in Egypt. So whose staff is it really? God's staff. So whatever God has put into your hands as a gift, as an ability, is not really yours.

It belongs to him. It's his staff. Whatever God uses your hands for is not really you. It's God's hands through you. That's what we're seeing here in Isaiah.

He says your stuff, but then he says, you know, it's really mine. I take all the credit once again. I take all the glory. Yeah. You might have had that stuff your whole life.

You might have been really skilled in that stuff, but it's ultimately mine. What a beautiful truth. Yeah, yeah.

I have a question. Is that stuff, like, is it a picture, that when Moses faced a problem, God gave me the stuff, and now these days when it becomes a God gave us the bible, it's like Is it a picture of that?

If you really wanna get specific, the staff is a symbol of authority. Yeah. So we if we were to look at this rightly, this is about leadership using their authority, rightly. When we move on later on in numbers and we we see the rebellion of Korah, they use the staff as a picture to see who really has authority, and it was Aaron's staff. Right?

And so it's a picture of authority more than anything, about a leader exercising his authority at the right time. But it's ultimately God's staff. And we can also see it as what God has given us. Remember Moses had that staff his whole life when he was, you know, being a shepherd, and God says take that staff, throw it, and watch it turn into a snake. And we talked about how God uses the simple things in life and makes them supernatural.

And here it is again, God using Moses, a simple stick, to split open the sea. But Isaiah tells us it's his staff. It's mine. Verse 18. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord when I have gotten glory over Pharaoh, his chariots, and his horsemen.

So who really needs to know that he is God? The Egyptians. So in light of all that we've just said, what does that say about us concerning God getting glory? Because it wasn't for the Israelites directly, though it was something for them as a memorial. But we need to understand that the trials and tribulations and tests that you and I go through will stand as a witness for the people around us.

Did you hear that? The Red Sea that you face, the opposition that you experience, God will use that as a testimony to receive glory and for other people to look at your life and say, Surely this person serves a living God. So this is one of the reasons why he brings him to the Red Sea. When you come to the Red Sea and I do something miraculous, the Egyptians will know that you serve a living God. When you face an impossible situation, you face a circumstance, you face a transitional period in which you don't understand how it's gonna work, guess what?

It's not just for you to know that He is God, it's for the people in your life and around you to know that he is God. So bring it on. I want God to be glorified in my trials and tribulations. And you and I should desire the same thing. And so he says, this is what's gonna happen.

Verse nineteen and twenty, we touched on this last week, this pillar of cloud moved from before them and stood behind them, coming between the host of Egypt and the host of Israel. And there was this cloud and the darkness, and it lit up the night without one coming near the other all night. So the presence of God protected them from the rear, that they would not see them, it was hazy, it was foggy, they would not be able to come to them. And it was dark for them but it was light for it was light for the Israelites. So we know what happens.

Moses stretches forth his staff. Moses goes up and he sees this and they're walking through and it's a wall to the left and a wall to the right. If we scroll down here to verse 26, and the Lord said to Moses, stretch out your hand over the sea that the water may come back upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots, and upon their horsemen. So Moses stretched out his sand over the sea and the sea returned to its normal course when the morning appeared. And as the Egyptians fled into it, the Lord threw the Egyptians into the midst of the sea.

What can we say about those things? In light of God's vengeance and justice.

Yeah, Tim. God does not leave us alone in the middle of our hardships, but through through the difficult times, God is still standing with us.

Yes, absolutely. Go back to Exodus chapter one and remember in verse 22. You don't have to turn there, but just remember. King pharaoh did something to the Israelites. What did he do specifically?

He threw babies into the water, Into the Nile. And what does he do to the very people that did that? He throws him to the bottom of the Red Sea. God is so specific. God is so just.

God is so detailed. God is so so involved. And we see in verse 29, but the people of Israel walked on dry ground through the sea, the waters being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left. When God leads our lives, he enables us to walk through situations that would cause other people to drown in if they were to walk through the same circumstance. When God leads our lives, he makes the ocean dry ground.

But to those who are rebelling against him, that think that they can do the same, will ultimately be destroyed. In other words, when God leads our lives, we can rest assured that he will take us through it. He will take us through things that other people cannot even dare to think that they can walk through without him. That's what happened. That's the contrast.

The Israelites walked through it. The Egyptians were overcome by it. That impossible situation so to speak. That thing that seemed like you could not walk over, that's right. Without God you can't.

And so with him, we stand as a testimony. With him, we can do things that other people could not even think of doing. He is God. And people don't have God, they don't have the Lord leading them, they are overcome by the Red Sea. You and I walk through the Red Sea in Christ.

Verse 30, thus the Lord saved Israel that day from the hand of the Egyptians and Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore. Israel saw the great power that the Lord used against the Egyptians, so the people feared the Lord. They feared the Lord. Oh, he is real. Oh, yes.

When God takes you through a situation that you never thought you can go through, you're gonna fear him. When you realize that God did it, when you realize that what you just experienced was not mere coincidence or happen stance, it was God almighty, the creator of all things stepping into your life and doing something, you will fear him. You'll fear him. And they believed in the Lord and the servant Moses, and this is the best part, I think, well not the best part, one important part, that it caused them to do something in chapter 15 verse one. Then Moses and the people of Israel sang this song.

They sang as a response to the goodness of God. They sang as a response to his deliverance. They sang in the response of his power. So many Christians have lost that song. So many have forgotten what it's like to sing in response to the goodness of God and not because the worship leader is telling you to do it and begging you to sing.

Worship leaders should not beg people to sing. The people should come in with a revelation of the goodness of God already, and their hearts should be bursting forth. That Moses and the people of Israel sang this song, not about the Lord but to the Lord. That he is good. And this is what we're gonna explore next week.

But can we do the same thing that they are doing here? Can we sing to the Lord for his goodness? And by faith maybe you're not through that situation that you're facing. But there is one thing you did pass if you're a true Christian, because this is a New Testament picture of baptism. And God delivered you from the world, and you crossed the Red Sea, you were baptized into Christ, you were baptized in water.

When you were baptized in water, it's a symbol it's a picture of pharaoh and all of his devils and all of his henchmen being buried underneath that water, and they no longer have authority in your life. That's why baptism is so important. It's a declaration of something. And I believe it's a statement to the devil himself. You lost your authority to me.

When I go into this water and come out, I'm not your man. I'm not your woman anymore. You're going in there. That's exactly what happened to Pharaoh and all his henchmen. They were going in and they're never gonna have that authority over his life.

Now, he says you're never gonna see the Egyptians again. Does that mean that they're never gonna experience warfare again? Oh, no. Because in Exodus 17, they're introduced to another group called the Amalekites. And they're gonna be introduced to another group.

And usually those attacks come with great moments in God. When they drank from the water, that's when the Amalekites came. And so just because this chapter is closed, does not mean that problems go away. You might go over this problem right now, but once again, there might be another trial, Mother Tribulation, but ultimately, people of God, it's for his glory. It's for him.

It's for the Egyptians to know that he is the living God. And you and I, all we have to do is stand firm, and we stand firm because we don't fear, and we just watch the salvation of the Lord and say, God, I can't wait to see how you're gonna get me out of this one. I can't wait to see how you're gonna come in and bring glory to your name through my life. So where's the despair? Where's the discouragement?

When we are set up with those things, God's gonna give glory. When all things work together for our good and all things are going well in our lives, we give him glory. In all things, we give him glory. And so would you stay with me? Because we're gonna sing to him.