Reading: Exodus chapter 4 verse 18 to chapter 5 verse 23.
Ill:
• Why is it that to stop computers, you have to click on "Start"?
• Why is the third hand on the watch called a second hand?
• Why isn't there mouse-flavoured cat food?
• Why does the sun lighten our hair, but darken our skin?
• Why doesn't glue stick to the inside of the bottle?
• Why don't you ever see the headline "Psychic Wins Lottery"?
• Why is "abbreviated" such a long word?
• Why is a boxing ring square?
• Why is it considered necessary to nail down the lid of a coffin?
• Why is it that doctors call what they do "practice"?
• Why is it that rain drops but snow falls?
• You know that little indestructible black box that is used on planes?
• Why can't they make the whole plane out of the same substance?
In life we soon learn that often there are more questions than answers:
• The more I study the Bible; the less I realise I actually know!
• And passages like the one this evening may well throw up more questions than answers.
Background:
• For forty years he has been hiding in the desert;
• Last time he tried to do something for God he failed miserably – he killed someone!
• Afraid for his own safety he ran away and hid in the desert.
• For forty years he has heard nothing from God.
• Then one ordinary day, God met with him – via a burning bush.
• Moses then came up with a list of excuses why he could not serve God anymore.
• But God answered each of his excuses;
• And God basically told Moses to trust him and go;
• And God would use HIM to set his people free!
• And that’s where we are picking up the story.
(1). Commissioned (verse 19-23):
Verse 19:
“Now the LORD had said to Moses in Midian, "Go back to Egypt, for all the men who wanted to kill you are dead."”
God knows our hearts, he knows our thoughts and he knows our fears.
• Remember when Moses had left Egypt forty years earlier;
• He left with a price on his head. He was a murderer on the run!
• He was probably listed;
• At the top of the Egyptians version of the top 10 most wanted list!
• And Moses had not forgotten that fact;
• And I think it must have been weighing heavy on his mind.
To go back on his own would have been dangerous enough:
• But Moses is now a family man headin’ west with his wife and kids;
• It was a dangerous situation to put himself, his wife and kids in!
• So God in his wisdom & grace relieves Moses of any fear from his past mistakes.
• Before he steps outside the borders of Midian,
• God informs Moses that way ahead is clear!
• The past will not endanger him; “All the men who wanted to kill you are dead."”
Verse 20:
20”So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey and started back to Egypt. And he took the staff of God in his hand”.
Ill:
• An elderly man stopped at a hearing aid centre and asked about prices.
• “We have them from £25,000 down to £1.50,” the salesman said.
• “What’s the £25,000 one like?”
• “Well it translates three languages.”
• “And what about the one for £1.50?”
• “It’s this button attached to a string,” said the salesman, pushing it across the counter.
• “How does it work?”
• “It doesn’t”. Said the salesman,
• But if you put the button in your ear and the string in your pocket,
• You’ll be surprised how loud people will talk.”
God did not have to talk any louder or clearer to Moses than he had done:
• In obedience to God’s word:
• Moses stepped out in faith.
• Midian was not much, but it still took some leaving:
• He had family there, he had a steady job, familiar surroundings, it was SAFE!
• Now ‘Faith’ in the Bible is always spelt ‘R.I.S.K.’
• God calls us to leave the familiar and safe and go into the unknown!
• And Moses and his family were about to go into the unknown.
• In obedience to God’s command Moses loaded up the donkey & headed out towards Egypt.
Application:
• Make this challenge:
• Is God calling someone here to service but you are holding back?
• Maybe it is a family ties, your employment, your familiar surroundings, or because it’s SAFE!
• Faith in the Bible is always spelt ‘R.I.S.K.’
• But remember (full time Christian work for twenty years now!)
• Faith or ‘R.I.S.K.’ is also the safest place you could ever wish to take!
• When God calls, he provides, he equips and his calling is always, always right!
• Hindsight will always teach you to obey is always best!
Back to the passage: The voice of God was clear to Moses:
• In verses 21-23 God says three things to Moses:
• (a). Verse 21a: Be sure to do the miraculous signs I showed you.
• (b). Verse 21b: Pharaoh will not listen to you (not exactly what a preacher wants to hear).
• (c). Verse 22: A message of warning and of terrible news.
• Moses knew that before he arrived in Egypt;
• His work would be difficult and that Pharaoh would oppose him.
Note:
• The little expression in verse 20:
• “And he took the staff of God in his hand.”
• Notice how the verse describes Moses’ staff.
• It was no longer the staff of a simple shepherd.
• In fact it doesn’t even belong to the shepherd anymore.
• It is now the property of God! “And he took the staff of God in his hand.”
• Something happened between verse 2 and verse 20 of this chapter:
• Ill: A miracle – the staff turned into a snake and back again (verses 2-4).
• For Moses this staff was a tangible reminder of God’s presence.
• And at this time in his life, Moses needed that!
Application: In a similar for us today:
• God takes possession of the things we use for his glory;
• Whether it be our voice in witnessing or singing.
• Our hands in acts of service;
• Our home when we open it up for hospitality of for home groups etc.
• We give those possessions to God;
• And he takes them and uses them for his purposes.
Ill:
• Place a have a scalpel in my hands, it’s merely a scalpel that could cause damage,
• But when you place that same scalpel in the hands of a surgeon,
• It turns into an object that can bring life.
• Put a golf club in any of our hands, and it’s merely a golf club,
• But when you place that same golf club in the hands of Tiger Woods,
• It allows him to be the best golfer in the world.
• A paintbrush in my hands might result in a pretty good picture (if it’s paint by numbers).
• But when a paintbrush was placed in the hands of Van Gogh,
• It turned into incredible works of art.
• Question: Why is it that the same instruments and the same tools;
• Can bring about such differing degrees of results?
• Answer:
• It simply depends upon who is holding them and how they’re being used.
• When we give those possessions to God;
• He takes them and uses them for his purposes & glory.
(2). Chastening (verses 24-26).
“At a lodging place on the way, the LORD met {Moses} and was about to kill him. 25 But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son's foreskin and touched {Moses'} feet with it. "Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me," she said. 26 So the LORD let him alone. (At that time she said "bridegroom of blood," referring to circumcision.)”.
Ill:
• University student with the letter ‘K’.
• “You don’t know how confused I am!”
• Verses like these can appear to be very confusing;
• They are uncomfortable and at first reading don’t make much sense.
• It might seem to us an over reaction from God, to kill Moses.
• After all, wasn’t Moses doing what God wanted him to do and heading out for Egypt?
• The answer is yes;
• But Moses has forgotten something very important and God is about to remind him!
Verse 24: We are not given the full details:
• Maybe Moses became seriously ill.
• It would appear that God somehow incapacitated Moses;
• Both Moses and Zipporah his wife appear to known what the problem was;
• With Moses out of action it was up to Zipporah to circumcise the boy.
• Why she touched his feet with the foreskin – beats me;
• I don’t know (see ??? later)
POINT IS THIS:
• How can Moses lead Israel,
• If he was failing to lead his own family in the ways of God?
Circumcision was an important part of the Jewish faith:
• Every Jewish male (without exception) was to be circumcised.
• It was one of God’s most important commands.
• Moses would have been well aware of that fact,
• That God had commanded Abraham and his descendents (Genesis chapter 17).
• That God wanted his people;
• To be marked out by this physical sign, as being different from the Gentiles.
• Yet Moses for whatever reason;
• Had neglected to have his own son circumcised.
• By ignoring it, Moses’ son was outside the covenant (agreement, promises) of God.
• This was not a trivial thing but something very important indeed!
• How can Moses lead Israel,
• If he was failing to lead his own family in the ways of God?
Application:
• What about us?
• Is there an area in our lives that needs some attention?
• If we neglect to do with it, it won’t go away;
• And will hinder us from making progress in our walk with God!
Quote:
“For want of a nail the shoe was lost,
For want of a shoe the horse was lost,
For want of a horse the rider was lost,
For want of a rider the battle was lost,
For want of a battle the war was lost!”
• What about us?
• Is there an area in our lives that needs some attention?
• If we neglect to do with it, it won’t go away;
• And will hinder us from making progress in our walk with God!
Although Moses’ obedience was forced:
• It stayed God’s wrath and saved Moses’ life!
• And put him back online to be the greatest leader Israel would ever have.
(3). certainty (verses 27-31).
“The LORD said to Aaron, "Go into the desert to meet Moses." So he met Moses at the mountain of God and kissed him. 28 Then Moses told Aaron everything the LORD had sent him to say, and also about all the miraculous signs he had commanded him to perform.
29 Moses and Aaron brought together all the elders of the Israelites, 30 and Aaron told them everything the LORD had said to Moses. He also performed the signs before the people, 31 and they believed. And when they heard that the LORD was concerned about them and had seen their misery, they bowed down and worshiped.”
Ill:
One stormy night an elderly couple entered the lobby of a small hotel and asked for a room:
• The clerk said they were full;
• And they would probably find so were all the hotels in town.
“But I can’t send a fine couple like you out in the rain,
would you be willing to sleep in my room?”
• The couple hesitated, but the clerk insisted.
• The next morning when the man paid his bill, he said,
“You’re the kind of man who should be managing the best hotel in the United States.
Someday I’ll build you one.”
The clerk smiled politely.
• A few years later the clerk received a letter containing and an aeroplane ticket;
• The letter invited him to visit New York.
• When the clerk arrived, his host took him to the corner of 5th Avenue and 34th Street,
• Where stood a magnificent new building.
• “That,” explained the man,
• “Is the hotel I have built for you to manage.”
• The man was William Waldorf Astor,
• And the hotel was the original Waldorf-Astoria.
There are four words that every Christian should never forget:
• 'God keeps his word'.
• He will not tell us one thing and do another!
• He will never use the expression that we often use;
• "Oh well, promises are meant to be broken".
• God traffics in truth!
• God keeps his word, always!!!
In these verses we see several promises fulfilled:
(a).
• In verse 14 God promised Moses he would send him Aaron.
• In verse 27 that promise was fulfilled Aaron came.
(b).
• In chapter 4 God promised Moses that the people would listen to him.
• In verse 29 that promise was fulfilled.
(c).
• In chapter 4 God promised Moses that he would do miraculous signs.
• In verse 30b that promise was fulfilled (“He also performed the signs before the people”).
(d).
• In chapter 4 God promised Moses that they would believe his message.
• In verse 31 we read: “And they believed.”
When God calls us to do something – he always keeps his side of the bargain:
• When you face a tough job and you are afraid that you will fail,
• Remember Moses.
• God keeps his promises,
• No matter how you feel or how people respond.
(4). conflict (Chapter 5 verses 1-23).
Ill:
• When the Russian city of St. Petersburg,
• Was being laid out early in the eighteenth century,
• There was a very large rock;
• That was in the path of one of the principal avenues that had been planned,
• And bids were solicited for its removal.
• The bids submitted were very high.
• This was understandable because at that time modern equipment did not exist;
• And there were no high-powered explosives.
• As officials pondered what to do,
• A peasant presented himself and offered to get rid of the boulder;
• For a much lower price than those submitted by other bidders.
• Since they had nothing to lose,
• Officials gave the job to the peasant.
The next morning he showed up with a crowd of other peasants carrying shovels.
• They began digging a huge hole next to the rock.
• The rock was propped up with timbers to prevent it from rolling into the hole.
• When the hole was deep enough,
• The timber props were removed and the rock dropped into the hole below the street level.
• It was then covered with dirt,
• And the excess dirt from the hole was carted away.
• It’s an early example of what creative thinking can do to solve a problem.
• The peasant did not operate on the same logic as the other bidders for the job.
• The peasant’s way of working was unique;
• And it was very, very successful.
Moses is about to discover that God does not work our way:
• We choose option 1, 2 or 3 to solve the problem.
• God often reveals another option, another way of working.
When Moses and Aaron arrived in Egypt things started fine:
• They arrived riding the crest of a wave of confidence;
• They had received the full support of the Hebrew elders.
• Who had affirmed all their plans saying;
• “We believe in you, Moses, we stand behind you;
• We believe God has not forsaken us,
• We believe God will work through your leadership to get us out of slavery”
• They had also performed miracles and spoken powerfully.
• They were rested and ready to bring freedom to the people.
• But then they ran smack into a stubborn, arrogant, and cruel Pharaoh.
• Who started a chain of events that went from bad to worse!
Suddenly they hit an unmovable object
(1). Problem 1: Pharaoh (verses 1-9).
• When Moses stood before Pharaoh in verse 1:
• Pharaoh probably could not believe his eyes and his ears.
• As these two ‘nobodies’, two foreigners, two dishevelled ex-shepherds;
• Threw down ultimatums before him
• Moses did not make a polite request;
• It was a simple declaration, a command in fact: “Let my people go!”
Pharaoh must have been thinking:
• Didn’t you know who I am?
• He was the ‘Lord’ of Egypt. He was a living deity!
• He was worshipped throughout the land.
• Colossal structures and sculptures bearing his name dominated the landscape.
• What this man said was law and there was no-appeal.
• He held life and death in the casual snap of his fingers.
• He was the most powerful man on the planet;
• And there was a name for anyone who messed with him – victim!
As you and I might have guessed if we had been there:
• Pharaoh was unimpressed, unmoved and unconvinced by Moses and Aaron;
• He certainly was not intimidated by them, amused – may be!
• Not only would he refuse to let the Israelites leave Egypt (verse 4)
• But he would cruelly make their work more difficult (verse 7-8)
• He ordered them to not only produce the same number of bricks as before;
• But now they had to find their own straw as well – he increased their work load.
Moses and Aaron’s plan had hit a snag:
• Their announcement had received an unbelieving response from a proud Pharaoh;
• Any hopes for an immediate deliverance were dashed.
• And as a result of upsetting Pharaoh;
• The ‘knock on effect’ would cause Moses to be in conflict with his people.
(2). Problem 2: The Israelites (vs 20-21).
“When they left Pharaoh, they found Moses and Aaron waiting to meet them, 21 and they said, "May the LORD look upon you and judge you! You have made us a stench to Pharaoh and his officials and have put a sword in their hand to kill us."”
• Before the Israelites heard the terrible news that they needed to find their own straw;
• And keep their production the same.
• The Bible had already told us how they felt;
• They were already sighing, groaning and crying out because of the workload.
• What Pharaoh asked for was not just difficult – it was impossible:
• The Israelite slaves just could not do it!
• Nobody could do it;
• As a result the foreman were beaten without mercy (verse 16-17).
They soon put 2+2 together;
• And figure out the reason for their extra work;
• Was down to the visit of Moses and Aaron when they saw Pharaoh.
• The Israelites blamed Moses for the extra work they were having to do.
• How that must have hurt Moses.
• For forty years he had longed to help his people;
• And now they were worse off than when he came and he was the reason why!
Moses did not understand what was happening to his people any more than they did;
• So he did the only thing left for him to do;
• He complained to God.
(3). Problem 3: God (verse 22-23)
“Moses returned to the LORD and said, "O Lord, why have you brought trouble upon this people? Is this why you sent me? 23 Ever since I went to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has brought trouble upon this people, and you have not rescued your people at all."”
Moses was not some super saint of the Old Testament:
• He was a human being just like you and me;
• He was subject to the same drives and impulses, highs and lows,
• Ups and downs that we all face.
• He too crawled out of bed every morning and put his sandals on one at a time
He had taken God a his word:
• He had stood before Pharaoh,
• And repeated, almost word perfectly, what God had told him to say.
• He said the right words, at the right time, spoken in the right way.
• And it had all seemed to work out wrong!
At this time in his life Moses had no where else to go:
• He had no personal friends in Egypt.
• His wife and kids returned back to Midian (see chapter 18 verse 2)
• Jethro was tending sheep back on the old range.
• Brother Aaron was apparently clueless.
• So Moses sought out the one who had commissioned him in the first place.
• He turns to God and pours his heart out!
He asks God life’s most common question:
• The question we all ask when things don’t work out.
• ‘Why?’ (Verse 22) “Why have you brought trouble upon this people?”
Now if you want the answer to that question:
• Come back next week!
• If you can’t then go home and read chapters 6 & 7.
• What I will say is this - God does not criticise or scald Moses for asking that question;
• He just says “Wait and see!”
Ill:
• The great New England preacher Phillips Brooks;
• Was noted for his poise and quiet manner.
• One day a friend saw him feverishly pacing the floor like a caged lion.
• “What’s the trouble, Mr. Brooks?” he asked.
• “The trouble is that I’m in a hurry, but God isn’t!”
Final application:
There are four words that every Christian should never forget:
• 'God keeps his word'.
• He will not tell us one thing and do another!
• He will never use the expression that we often use;
• "Oh well, promises are meant to be broken".
• God traffics in truth!
• God keeps his word, always!!!
ill:
Twice a year we change time.... well our watches anyway.
• We put them forward or backward by one hour.
• A reminder that the whole of our lives revolve around time.
• But God doesn't operate in the realm of the clock:
• He is not restricted to a calendar or a diary, God is in no hurry!
• In fact the promises of God:
• Are fulfilled more by our obedience, than by our calendars.
And if we are waiting for God to fulfil his word…..remember that …..
Ill:
• We see only the individual pieces of a jigsaw.
• God sees the whole picture.
Ill:
Lazarus.
• Jesus did not just want to do a healing;
• He wanted to raise the dead!
• But for him to do the greater and be glorified;
• Mary & Martha had to keep trusting him, when their lives did not make sense.
