MOSES AND THE TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD,
VERY BAD DAY
Exodus 5.1-7.7
S: Change
C: Trust in God
Th: Movin’ On Up!
Pr: WHEN YOUR CAUSE SEEMS DARK, KNOW THAT GOD IS BIGGER.
Type: INDUCTIVE
I. WHAT A MESSAGE! (5.1)
II. WHAT A RESPONSE! (5.2-14)
III. WHAT A STINK! (5.15-21)
IV. WHAT A FAILURE! (5.22-23)
V. WHAT A GOD! (6.1-7.7)
PA: How is the change to be observed?
• Realize that God will often act differently than we think He should
• Run to God when you are in trouble; don’t run away.
• Stick to God’s plan; He will prove Himself faithful
Version: ESV
RMBC 02 March 08 AM
INTRODUCTION:
1. Bad days are no fun!
Have you had days like that?
When nothing seems to go right…
One of my favorite children’s books describes this kind of day.
The book is titled: Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day…
I went to sleep with gum in my mouth and now there’s gum in my hair and when I got out of bed this morning I tripped on the skateboard and by mistake I dropped my sweater in the sink while the water was running and I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
At breakfast Anthony found a Corvette Sting Ray car kit in his cereal box and Nick found a Junior Undercover Agent code ring in his cereal box but in my breakfast cereal box all I found was breakfast cereal. I think I’ll move to Australia.
In the car pool Mrs. Gibson let Becky have a seat by the window. Audrey and Elliott got seats by the window too. I said I was being scrunched. I said I was being smushed. I said, if I don’t get a seat by the window I am going to be carsick. No one even answered. I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
At school Mrs. Dickens liked Paul’s picture of the sailboat better than my picture of the invisible castle. At singing time she said I sang too loud. At counting time she said I left out sixteen. Who needs sixteen? I could tell it was going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
I could tell because Paul said I wasn’t his best friend anymore. He said that Philip Parker was his best friend and that Albert Moyo was his next best friend and that I was only his third best friend. I hope you sit on a tack, I said to Paul. I hope the next time you get a double-decker strawberry ice-cream cone the ice cream part falls off the cone part and lands in Australia.
There were two cupcakes in Philip Parker’s lunch bag and Albert got a Hershey bar with almonds and Paul’s mother gave him a piece of jelly roll that had little coconut sprinkles on the top. Guess whose mother forgot to put in dessert? It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
That’s what it was, because after school my mom took us all to the dentist and Dr. Fields found a cavity just in me. Come back next week and I’ll fix it, said Dr. Fields. Next week, I said, I’m going to Australia.
On the way downstairs the elevator door closed on my foot and while we were waiting for my mom to go get the car Anthony made me fall where it was muddy and then when I started crying because of the mud Nick said I was a crybaby and while I was punching Nick for saying crybaby my mom came back with the car and scolded me for being muddy and fighting. I am having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, I told everybody. No one even answered.
So then we went to the shoestore to buy some sneakers. Anthony chose white ones with blue stripes. Nick chose red ones with white stripes. I chose blue ones with red stripes but then the shoe man said, We’re all sold out. They made me buy plain old white ones, but they can’t make me wear them.
When we picked up my dad at his office he said I couldn’t play with his copying machine, but I forgot. He also said to watch out for the books on his desk, and I was careful as could be except for my elbow. He also said don’t fool around with his phone, but I think I called Australia. My dad said please don’t pick him up anymore. It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
There were lima beans for dinner and I hate limas. There was kissing on TV and I hate kissing. My bath was too hot, I got soap in my eyes, my marble went down the drain, and I had to wear my railroad-train pajamas. I hate my railroad-train pajamas. When I went to bed Nick took back the pillow he said I could keep and the Mickey Mouse night light burned out and I bit my tongue. The cat wants to sleep with Nick, not with me. It has been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. My mom says some days are like that. Even in Australia. [Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 1972]
Well…
2. Moses has had plenty of bad days.
At forty years old, he thought it was time to fulfill his roles as the deliverer of the Hebrews.
But his attempt to do so, ended with murder.
Then as he sought to resolved a dispute between two of his Hebrew brothers, he was not respected as a judge.
So he ran away, and settled down far away in Midian.
He has a wife and kids, but now, at eighty years old, God has called him back to Egypt to fulfill his role as a deliverer.
He does not want the role.
He thinks he has had enough bad days in Egypt.
OUR STUDY:
But God finally convinced Moses, and he has returned to Egypt.
He has showed himself to the Hebrew leaders.
He shows them the signs of the staff turning into a snake, and the hand becoming leprous and then becoming whole again, and everyone is excited.
The Hebrews are rejoicing.
God has not forgotten them.
Moses says that God is going to get them out of this bondage.
Everyone is on a spiritual high.
They are pumped, and Moses probably thinks that he is invincible.
So he goes to Pharaoh with a message.
And…
I. WHAT A MESSAGE! (5.1)
…it is.
3. “Let my people go!”
Afterward Moses and Aaron went and said to Pharaoh, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Let my people go, that they may hold a feast to me in the wilderness.’”
“Let my people go!” will be the repeated theme of these men.
It was a message that was not meant to pacify.
It was demand.
It was controversial.
It was a claim that God owned them and wanted them back.
And…
II. WHAT A RESPONSE! (5.2-14)
…they get!
Through Moses and Aaron, God was addressing Pharaoh about his responsibility as a leader.
It is an opportunity for obedience.
Pharaoh is receiving the grace to get into right relationship with God.
You know, the same is true of us.
God extends His grace for us to receive.
He gives us the opportunity to recognize our sin.
It is an opportunity for obedience.
But so often, too often, people reject God’s offer, just like pharaoh.
But Pharaoh said, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord, and moreover, I will not let Israel go.”
It is a scornful refusal.
It is arrogant.
It is a statement that…
4. Pharaoh will have no competition.
He does not accept the word of Moses and Aaron.
He refuses because he is god in this land.
He is the one that is worshipped.
What he said was law and there was no appeal.
Life and death were in his hands.
So as far as he was concerned, the Hebrews were his.
He will not let them go.
They belonged to him.
For Moses, this became the beginning of a horrible, terrible, no good, very bad day, for…
5. Pharaoh accuses the Hebrews of indolence.
But the king of Egypt said to them, “Moses and Aaron, why do you take the people away from their work? Get back to your burdens.” And Pharaoh said, “Behold, the people of the land are now many, and you make them rest from their burdens!” The same day Pharaoh commanded the taskmasters of the people and their foremen, “You shall no longer give the people straw to make bricks, as in the past; let them go and gather straw for themselves. But the number of bricks that they made in the past you shall impose on them, you shall by no means reduce it, for they are idle. Therefore they cry, ‘Let us go and offer sacrifice to our God.’ Let heavier work be laid on the men that they may labor at it and pay no regard to lying words.”
Pharaoh accuses them of being lazy.
The Hebrews are just slackers, with, apparently, way too much time on their hands.
They are thinking of having a party!
It is time they think of doing some work!
So…
6. Pharaoh gives them an impossible task.
They have to collect their own straw, which was very time consuming, and still fulfill the same quota of bricks.
This was impossible.
Nobody could do it.
When the Hebrew foremen are beaten by the Egyptian taskmasters for not fulfilling the quota, they appeal to pharaoh, but it is to no avail.
Pharaoh is full of defiance to their objections.
Oh…
III. WHAT A STINK! (5.15-21)
…this was.
Just as hope was awakened, the opposition becomes stronger.
Just when deliverance seemed nigh, oppression was increased.
And…
7. Guess who gets blamed? Moses.
Oh what a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day this is.
After the foremen appeal to pharaoh unsuccessfully, they take it out on Moses.
“You!!!”
“You are the one!”
“This is all your fault.”
“You are responsible for this misery.”
“You have made us a stink to pharaoh.”
For Moses, his disappointment certainly turned into disillusionment.
Where had he gone wrong?
He had spoken the right words, at the right time, and in the right way.
But now things are worse.
Now his fellow Hebrews are saying, “Take a hike preacher.”
“We are not listening.”
“We don’t care what you have to say.”
IV. WHAT A FAILURE! (5.22-23)
…Moses felt like.
All of sudden, it is very lonely at the top.
Have you ever felt that you were misunderstood?
It hurts, doesn’t it?
And it does not matter who it is – a boss, old friend, close relative, neighbor, or spouse.
It is painful.
The anger.
The accusations.
It hurts to the bone.
ILL Leadership (S)
J. Oswald Sanders has said:
The leader must be one who, while welcoming the friendship and support of all who can offer it, has sufficient resources to stand alone, even in the face of fierce opposition, in the discharge of his responsibilities. He or she must be prepared to have ‘no one but God.’
Moses is alone.
His personal friends are in Egypt.
His wife is in Midian with the boys.
And he barely knows his brother Aaron.
So, Moses goes right to God, and says…
8. “The plan is not working!”
Then Moses turned to the Lord and said, “O Lord, why have you done evil to this people? Why did you ever send me? For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has done evil to this people, and you have not delivered your people at all.”
“This is not how it was supposed to work, Lord.”
“I told you that I was not the guy back at that burning bush.”
“I am not cut out for this type of thing.”
Moses feels the failure.
But here is the interesting thing.
It seems that the Lord does His most ideal work when things are impossible and we feel entirely unqualified.
When we are at the end of ourselves, it is then that God proves Himself faithful.
V. WHAT A GOD! (6.1-7.7)
…we have.
God says to Moses, “Don’t just look at the circumstances…”
You see….
9. “The plan is working!”
What I really like here is that God does not chastise Moses for being discouraged.
Instead, He encourages him to stay with it.
Loosely translated, I think God’s discussion with Moses went something like this…
“Moses, we are on track.”
“This is my plan!”
“You see, old pharaoh there, has been reading too many of his own press clippings.”
“Get this – he thinks he’s god.”
“But there is only one God. Me.”
“And I’ve hardly started – I am just warming up.”
“Even you, Moses, have not yet seen my power.”
“Here this, when I am through with him, he is going to be pushing you out the door!”
God always wants our eyes on Him, no matter how difficult the circumstances, nor how easy the times.
We are to do it daily.
We are to do it constantly.
“I am the Lord. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty, but by my name the Lord I did not make myself known to them. I also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan, the land in which they lived as sojourners. Moreover, I have heard the groaning of the people of Israel whom the Egyptians hold as slaves, and I have remembered my covenant. Say therefore to the people of Israel, ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from slavery to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment. I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God, and you shall know that I am the Lord your God, who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. I will bring you into the land that I swore to give to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. I will give it to you for a possession. I am the Lord.’”
Notice the words of God in that passage.
They are summarized by…
10. “I am and I will.”
“I am Yahweh.”
“I I am.”
As a name, that is profound.
This personal name, along with El Shaddai (meaning God Almighty), communicated to them that He was the God of action, power, and compassion.
They were His people.
He was their God.
The descendants of the patriarchs were going to see the faithful performance of God in a ways their fathers had not.
God was not oblivious to them.
He was not indifferent.
He had purpose.
He would deliver.
He would set free.
They were objects of His care and favor.
They were going to enjoy life.
It was going to happen.
CHALLENGE:
11. Realize God acts differently than our expectations.
It is very annoying to me that God does answer the way I have prayed.
He so often does not answer me the way I want him to.
I believe that I am praying the right way, but that does not seem to make any difference.
It seems clear that God defies our definition of Him.
That being so, I have discovered that He does not work according to our plans.
He is not obligated to work according to our time schedule.
He works how He wants.
He works when He wants.
He works where He wants.
And over the years, I have learned to be glad.
Because He sees what I cannot.
He sees what I will not.
He sees why what I want will not work.
He sees the expanse of time.
He sees how we are going to get to the place we are going.
He always has the big picture in mind.
So, in the detail of the present, we trust Him.
Because He is working, even if it does not make sense to us now.
We trust that some day, we will understand, when our perspective is broadened.
In the meanwhile, when trouble comes, be careful how you run…
12. Run to God when you are in trouble; don’t run away.
So often, when the world presses in, we lose perspective.
We blame God, when we should hold on to Him.
We are tempted to give up…
We are tempted to say it was all a hopeless dream…
We are tempted to think it was just a fad…
Because the prospects have become thin…
Our hope has burned low…
We have been disappointed…
Our dreams are dying…
The walls are closing in…
The heart is breaking…
The prognosis is grim…
When that is happening to you, do what Moses did.
Run to God.
Don’t run away.
Because there is good news in all of this.
The hurt is going to go.
It is not staying.
So…
13. WHEN YOUR CAUSE SEEMS DARK, KNOW THAT GOD IS BIGGER.
We can trust God, because…
He is timeless, unbound by time.
He has never lost control, nor is anything beyond His touch.
He is unchanged in His perfections, He is not tossed about like a toy on the waves.
He is unchallenged in power.
There is no power that can defeat Him.
He is unmatched in knowledge.
He cannot be outwitted or outthought.
He always works for our ultimate good.
He is compassionate, loving, gracious and kind.
He is no fool, always discerning the wisest path.
He is a steady friend, always reliable, never failing in His loyalty to His own.
No matter how dark your circumstances, God is bigger.
There is nothing beyond His ability.
There is nothing that escapes His notice.
There is nothing that puts you out of the reach of His love.
ILL God (S)
In C.S. Lewis’ second volume of The Chronicles of Narnia, Prince Caspian our young heroine Lucy meets the God figure, the majestic lion named Aslan in the enchanted land of Narnia. She has returned a year later in earth time, but the children discover that everything has changed radically, that thousands of years have passed in Narnia since their departure. But after a series of difficult events, Lucy finally spots Aslan in a forest clearing, rushes to him, throws her arms around his neck, and buries her face in his mane.
The great beast rolled over on his side so that Lucy fell, half sitting and half lying between his front paws. He bent forward and touched her nose with his tongue. His warm breath came all around her. She gazed up into the large wise face.
"Welcome child," he said.
"Aslan," said Lucy, "you’re bigger."
"That’s because you’re older, little one," answered he.
"Not because you are?"
"I’m not. But each year you grow, you’ll find me bigger."
Citation: R. C. Sproul,
"On Narnia Time,"
Men of Integrity (1-30-04)
Aslan is on the move once again in our midst.
God is here.
And He is bigger.
He is challenging us to return to His purposes.
He is challenging us to become a people that relentlessly reach out to those that do not know Him.
So, let’s…
14. Stick to God’s plan, for He will prove Himself faithful.
For Further Study: Psalm 56:8; Isaiah 46:10, 55:11; John 16.33; Acts 17.30; I Corinthians 6.20; Colossians 1.13-14;
James 1.2-5
COMMUNION:
I Corinthians 11:27-32:
Anyone who eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Master irreverently is like part of the crowd that jeered and spit on him at his death. Is that the kind of "remembrance" you want to be part of? Examine your motives, test your heart, come to this meal in holy awe. If you give no thought (or worse, don’t care) about the broken body of the Master when you eat and drink, you’re running the risk of serious consequences. That’s why so many of you even now are listless and sick, and others have gone to an early grave. If we get this straight now, we won’t have to be straightened out later on. Better to be confronted by the Master now than to face a fiery confrontation later.
THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson.
I believe that God gives us continual opportunity to confess and repent of sin.
Though it is not fashionable to speak of sin today, God does want us to treat it seriously.
He wants us to know that sin that is unconfronted and unconfessed hurts the body of Christ.
If you have sin that you feel is private and you are unrepentant, God will hold back His blessing from us a church, because we are a living unity – a body.
What each one of us does, both for good and for ill, affects the others.
So as we work on our needs to refocus on our core values, our structure, our worship, and most importantly, our outreach, God’s blessing can and will be held up because individual members of the body of Christ refuse to confess sin.
We will be unable to move on up to our own Promised Land if we will not agree with God about our sin.
You do not need to fear death today because Jesus has paid that price.
But you make fun of His sacrifice if you do not take your sin seriously.
So, for the next few minutes, we are going to be quiet, and pray, and if you have sin to confess, I encourage you to take care of it right now.
Let’s not lose God’s blessing because we are too stubborn to deal with sin in our lives.
We are united together because of the work of Jesus.
Those of us that know Jesus are invited to share in the elements of the table.
If you do not know Jesus, that is, you have not received Him as your Savior and Lord, you do not trust Him with your life, that is, you have not been changed by the message, just let the elements pass by.
Please wait until the time comes when you do have that personal relationship with the Lord Jesus.
We practice “communion” because we are to remember the death of the Lord Jesus.
We take the bread to remind us that it was by the body of our Savior that our salvation came.
He died in our place.
He became our substitute.
We take the cup to remind us that it was by the blood of our Savior that our salvation came.
He died for our sins.
He became our sacrifice.
Being led in prayer by TROY let us take a moment and thank Him for favoring us with his mercy, love and kindness.
(Prayer)
The apostle Paul writes, "The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me."
Let’s partake together.
RICH will now come and lead us in prayer.
Again, the apostle Paul writes, "In the same way, after supper he took the cup saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me."
Let’s partake together.
Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
BENEDICTION:
New Members are dismissed
Reception
Miller and Ugandan jewelry
How did Jesus do outreach?
Now to him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy—to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.
RESOURCES:
SermonCentral
Boyd, Shelton A Terrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
Hamby, John When a Day Goes from Bad to Worse
Vasicek, Ed When Failure Is a Step toward Success
Other:
Gispen, Willem H. Exodus. Translated by Ed M. van der Maas. Bible Student’s Commentary. Grand Rapids, MI: Regency Reference Library, 1982.
Lewis, C. S. Prince Caspian. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc., 1951.
Pink, A. W. Gleanings in Exodus. Chicago: Moody Press, 1981.
Ramm, Bernard. His Way Out: A Fresh Look at Exodus. Glendale, CA: Regal Books, 1975.
Swindoll, Charles R. Moses: A Man of Selfless Dedication. Great Lives from God’s Word, vol. 4. Nashville: Word Publishing, 1999.
Viorst, Judith. Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day: Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing, 1987.
