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We come now, gentlemen, to what I regard as the fourth major part, section, or movement of the book of Exodus, which, as I understand it, begins at chapter thirteen and verse uh seventeen. It will deal with the other major element in Israel's liberation. As we said this morning, in the Passover, they were delivered from the wrath of God, and they were brought out of Egypt. Now, in this section of the book, they are delivered from going back into Egypt and falling, after all, under the oppressive power of Pharaoh. We shall find also that they are not only, um, saved from slipping back under the power of Pharaoh, but they are saved from the Egyptian mentality that they had developed in the course of their long national stay in that country, and saved also from the slave mentality that had built up in them during those long years. It is noticeable in this fourth section, which records the early days of Israel's freedom from the land itself, how from time to time they expressed their preferences and gave the impression that they found this experience of being liberated anything but pleasant, almost so painful as to be unbearable, to the point where they would prefer to have been left in Egypt. Look, if you care, to chapter fourteen. This is Israel when they turned round and saw Pharaoh and his chariots pursuing after them. fourteen eleven: And they said unto Moses, because there were no graves in Egypt, hast thou taken us away to die in the wilderness? Wherefore hast thou dealt thus with us to bring us forth out of Egypt? Is not this the word which we spake unto thee in Egypt, saying, let us alone, that we may serve the Egyptians? For it was better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness. At least these people didn't find liberation immediately pleasant. And it is a thing that we should ponder, perhaps, in our preaching of the gospel to people. Not all people find the results of being saved straightway and immediately comfortable and pleasant. To preach to people that upon being converted, their life is going to be a heaven of undiluted, unmitigated, uh, and uninterrupted joy is, of course, to lead people, uh, with a false gospel. Can result in severe emotional and spiritual struggles. Here the people were saying that life in slavery was better than death outside it. Or look again, would you, to chapter sixteen and verse three. And the children of Israel said unto them, Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, when we did eat bread to the full, for you have brought us forth into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger. Slightly different preference this time. Yes, if we had to die, we were going to die eventually in Egypt, but bad as dying is, you know, it's at least made a bit comfortable if you'll buy the fresh pots with your cucumbers, onions, and such like things. You've got to die, better to die with that te- lovely, enjoyable food than to die of starvation in a wilderness. And eventually, according to chapter seventeen, they got to a point under another trial that came their way of striving with Moses, chapter seventeen, verse two, of tempting the Lord, of accusing Moses of having brought them out of Egypt on purpose to kill them. Verse three. And in their bitterness, they said in verse seven, is the Lord among us or not? They came to doubt whether there was anything in this business of redemption at all. And the often repeated promise heard from Moses' lips that if they believed and stepped forward, the Lord would be with them and among them. They were on the verge of concluding that was a lot of nonsense and imagination run riot and no reality in it whatsoever. The path of deliverance was not, uh, immediately smooth for the people of Israel, nor is it for many a convert in the present. We noticed early on, let us just notice it again, how, from a literary point of view, this section is bound together. It begins in thirteen seventeen, eighteen following, by saying that it came to pass when Pharaoh had let the people go, that God led them not by the way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near, for God said, lest peradventure the people repent when they see war and they return to Egypt. So God led the people about by the way of the wilderness, by the Red Sea. God taking steps so that they should not immediately see war and be discouraged by it. Though the last story in this particular section at seventeen eight following, the record of an occasion when Israel were called upon to fight, and the Lord announcing that he would have an unending war with Amalek. Write it in a book, he says, that I will utterly blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven. And here, God called on Israel to fight. You notice, therefore, the balance that this, uh, particular part of Exodus is to put before us. When Israel first came out of Egypt, having been nationally slaves for four hundred years or so, they were in no mood or mental attitude to fight a war against anybody. They were still brow beaten and broken, and the sight of an enemy in front might have been disastrous. So they were not called upon to fight. The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall merely hold your peace. That's glorious, as we shall see in a moment. But then, on the other hand, that couldn't be the only the the the part of their redemption. It couldn't be the final story. That slave mentality that was with them still, so that they couldn't fight and daren't face an enemy and daren't stand up to an enemy, that had to be got rid of eventually. Eventually, they would learn- have to learn how to fight. And not just stand there and let go and let God. Mm. But they would have to learn, uh, to take up arms themselves and fight their enemies. It is not the purpose of salvation, ladies and gent- uh, gentlemen, to, uh, leave us morally and spiritually maimed as mere spiritual infants who can do nothing for themselves and who just rely on God to use us as robots. God is determined not only to save us from our external enemies, but from our internal enemies and remake us as responsible men. And he will call upon us to fight the good fight of the faith. And as Joshua did to his com- captains, to call upon us to put our feet on the necks of the enemy and ourselves put to death those spiritual enemies that would stand in our way. Now, first we begin at the beginning of the section with the story of God's deliverance of Israel at the Red Sea, or as the learned call it, the Reed Sea. Though in all possibility, the bit that they crossed over hadn't got any reeds in it, as one very clear commentary pointed out. But it was called the Reed Sea because other parts of that same sea had reeds in it. So anyway, well, you choose what you like, Red Sea or Reed Sea. Trial being learned sometimes, isn't it? Anyway. The story is told is exceedingly graphic. They were on their way, and God had turned them to go this way and the other so as not to meet enemies, when looking back, they saw Pharaoh drawing nigh. The Egyptians, with all their chariots and tanks, were coming up across the desert behind them. And when they heard it, they were sore afraid. And the children of Israel cried unto the Lord. Oh, you fool, Moses, they said. We told you it was a nonsense scheme, even beginning to think we could ever be free of Pharaoh. Cursed the day that they had believed Moses and trusted him and come out. But as they looked back, here came the Egyptians in their massed might. And surely we shall find some compassion in our hearts for the Hebrews and their reaction at this stage. Better to have been in Egypt and survived than to seek our liberty and die in the wilderness as a consequence. We are told, aren't we, that when people are confined in concentration camps and other such things. Their prime objective is not always to get their freedom. Their prime objective is to survive. They will study every grimace on the face of their jailers. They will train themselves not to appear to object to anything, lest the officers that oppress them should take exception even to the way they look. The whole major objective is not so much escape as survival. And it had been imprinted on their minds and on their backs and bodies by the lashes of, uh, ten thousand taskmasters. The very sight of an Egyptian coming up behind them reactivated those memories. They could already feel the lash that they thought would now come down upon their backs once more. And in their sense of helplessness and bitterness, they cursed Moses for bringing them out. Yes. Sometimes when people get saved nowadays, and they know themselves forgiven, yet the bondage of sin has marked their psychological makeup, hasn't it, very deeply, and they despair of ever being free. There was a pretty young lady in Northern Ireland at one stage. Her story was this, that she and her boyfriend and some others were on drugs. One morning, she and her boyfriend woke up sitting in the chairs where they had gone off, to find that their friend was dead in his chair from an overdose of drugs. They ran away, the police caught up with them. Eventually, the young lady was put in prison. She had to share a cell with an older woman, and the older woman was in the cell and in the prison for having murdered her mother. A bright twosome they made. When the young lady eventually came out of prison, somebody took her to some meetings arranged by a Christian organization called Prison Fellowship. And the young lady was saved. In the months that followed, some of us used to go around to have a Bible study with her on Saturday nights. Not just to have Bible study, but also just to be with her when the old craving for the drug came over her. I know of another man who many worked on, and I happened to be there when eventually the Lord opened his eyes and he was saved. For his salvation, he was a besotted fool, he was. His house literally a hovel. He got converted. He eventually became man- uh, foreman, if not manager in his factory. He was not without his abilities. But in the early days after he got saved, the tormenting time was when the clock began to come up to ten at night, which is the time when pubs in respectable era are supposed to shut. I say supposed. A- a- and the feeling would come over him that it was now or never. If he couldn't get the beer now, what would he do? How would he survive? And his friends used to go and sit with him to help him face the enormous craving inside him. And it has appeared to many such that the whole thing of being free from the domination of sin is an impractical idea. Yes, they can believe in forgiveness, but deliverance from sin's power, the psychological wounds and inhibitions of the years, how can it be done? What a wonderful story this is of the grace of God saving ex-slaves. When they shouted out in their panic, God told Moses to tell them, look, you won't have to fight. The Lord will fight for you, and he will save you. Tell them to be still and see the salvation of the Lord. And what use would our gospel be if all we could offer people would be forgiveness of the guilt of sin? If we couldn't also tell them of a gospel that could deliver them from the power of sin. You know the story of how it was done, eh, at the historical level. Moses was told to stretch out his rod, the sea parted, through a wind Israel went over. And then the Egyptians tried to do the same, but Moses was told to stretch out his rod once more, the wind ceased and blew the other way, the waters came down on the Egyptians, and they were drowned. Let's go immediately to the, to the interpretation, the application at least, that the New Testament puts upon this thing. And first of all, one Corinthians chapter ten. Says Paul to the Corinthian Christians, I would not, brethren, have you ignorant that how, how that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea, and were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and did all eat the same spiritual meat, and did all drink the same spiritual drink, for they drank of a spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ. And the first thing we ought to say about Paul's observation there that is that Paul isn't indulging in allegory, still less in unlawful allegory. When he says that they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them and ate of the spiritual food, you'll see, uh, he is talking straight literal talk. For the history book is, uh, exceedingly clear that on this occasion when God saved them, one great part of their salvation is this, that the pillar of cloud went before them by day, and at night it was a pillar of fire. And the night when the Egyptians came up behind, the cloud of God's presence moved back behind Israel to stand, how vividly and poignantly, between them and the pursuing enemy. When the God who had stretched himself out of their door, over their doors, to prevent the destroying angel entering into them and killing them, now put himself between them and the enemy to bear the brunt of the enemy's attack. The simplicity of the Hebrews' narrative may not, uh, please us altogether as sophisticated theologians, but there it is, I have to report it, that in the morning the Lord looked out of the cloud to s- uh, survey the Egyptians to see how they were getting on. I like that simplicity. Yeah, because I'm a simple soul, and while you gentlemen are sophisticated theologians, never forget that in your congregations you have simply- simple souls like me, and they can't understand terms like immanence, can't even spell it, some of them, a- a- a- and transcendence, you'll say. And they won't be doing any harm to holy writ nor to the glory of the divine person if you dare to repeat the story that the Lord looked out of the cloud. I can see him doing it, can't you? Look at these Egyptians. Ha ha. And was the Lord in that cloud? This is a more serious matter of faith, or is this mere religious myth, an empty story? I dare to believe, gentlemen, it means what it says, the Lord was in the cloud. And as the cloud overshadowed them as they went into the sea, they were not only being baptized to Moses. They were being baptized, covered with the cloud of the very presence of the Lord. That's not myth, that's not allegory, that is historic fact. I am proceeding sim- by simple analogy, simple repetition, when I say that that part of our Christian salvation that is being delivered from the power of sin involves the very same principle. Here it's applied at one level by Paul in the passage I have mentioned, one Corinthians ten. He says, know you not that your fathers were baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea? Vivid, isn't it? There was the sea, there was the Egyptians, here were the Israelites in between. The question was, how do you escape the domination of Pharaoh, who's there to bring you back? And the answer is Moses standing there with his rod and the sea split. Now you have your choice which you will follow. Will you follow Pharaoh back to Egypt, or will you follow Moses, God's appointed savior at this moment? The only way to escape Egypt and Pharaoh's domination was to be baptized to Moses. We should not forget, should we, the simple, straightforward significance of our Christian baptism either. For at its simplest level, it proclaims a basic principle of salvation. If I would escape the domination of sin and the slavery of Satan. The only way it can be done is by accepting another master, captain of salvation and Lord. And my public expression of that is to be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Somebody says, but I don't see the point of it. Well, never mind, if the Lord commands it. And it becomes the first step, doesn't it, of obedience and commitment to him. For liberation for Israel did not mean that free from the bondage of Pharaoh, they were now free, they were now at liberty to chart their own course and go where they would. The doctrine of salvation is that to escape the dominion of the evil Lord, they must accept another captain of their salvation. That ties to Moses. And the analogy is simple. We're set free to, to accept our blessed Lord, captain of our salvation. But then, of course, when it comes to the matter of baptism, Paul enlarges on the same, doesn't he, in Romans chapter six, which perhaps is one of the principal passages in the New Testament that talks about delivering us to bondage. Let's look at it again briefly, familiar though it is. In the epistle to the Romans, from the second paragraph of chapter five onwards, that is from five twelve, Paul turns to deal with the wreckage of sin. In the early chapters of Romans, Paul puts before us two reasons why people need to be saved. The first of them he gives us in Romans chapter one. We need to be saved because we stand as unregenerate people under the wrath of God. Our first need is to be saved from the wrath of God. And Paul shows us how and comes to the great climax of that part of his epistle in chapter five, verse nine: Much more then, being now justified by his blood, shall we be saved from the wrath of God through him. Guaranteed salvation then, absolutely sure and certain. If we have been justified, then it is much more certain that we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Christ, through his death on our behalf. But now in verse twelve, Paul begins to discuss with us another reason why we need to be saved. Saved not only from the wrath of God, but from the wreckage consequent upon Adam's disobedience and fall. And that initial disobedience of our first parents has brought three dominions, three slavish dominions, says Paul. There is the dominion of sin. One man's disobedience, sin entered into the world, and death by sin. And the verse in chapter six that we're about to consider comforts us by the thought that sin shall not have dominion over you. Therefore, let not sin reign in your mortal body. By the very terms that are being used, you sense the slavery, the tyranny that Adam's sin has introduced among us. Not only the tyranny and slavery and dominion of sin, but the tyranny of death likewise. Death reigned. Oh, our blessed Lord, we are comforted to know, now that he is risen again, death has no more dominion over him. And if you say, but why can't that state stat of sa- sad state of affairs be relieved by introducing people to the law, and the brief answer to that is, according to chapter seven, that the law itself forms another dominion. For man cannot keep it perfectly, therefore it condemns him to death, so far from solving his problem, it but magnifies his slavery. How are we to be delivered from this bondage to sin, to the law, to death? Chapter six is therefore going to use the, uh, language of baptism. But let us now go to chapter six verse fourteen to see the first step in this deliverance. For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law, but under grace. Here is the secret of breaking the dominion of sin. And it seems to me that we are wise to recognize that the reason that is given is not always clear to many a convert. I say this thing to you as no difficulty to you, gentlemen, but to remind you what some people in your congregations are thinking, even when you're being very clear in your exegesis. We sometimes have to spell things out more simply than we think we have to. How is it a reason that sin shall not have dominion over us because we're not under law? I take it that Paul is referring to the principle of law. Hebrew for law, we know, is Torah, and Torah basically, etymologically at any rate, means instruction. But the law of God is more than instruction, isn't it? God's holy law did not come alongside us and say, gentlemen, now, uh, this is a moderately good idea. You love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and see how you get on. I mean, I should do it that way if I were you. That's not the principle upon which law works. Law says, thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, mind, soul, and strength, and thy neighbor as thyself, and if you break it, says the law, I curse you. Well, I could never gain heaven by being under that law, could I? Since even if I kept it seventy five percent, which is about my limit on my best and holiest days, that wouldn't be enough. But suppose as a believer, struggling to get free from the habit of sin, I were now, now under law as a principle. How should I fare? I picture to myself waking up in bed one Monday morning, and there is the apostatized law standing beside me. And the law leaning over my bed says, wake up, Gooding. I wake up. Now get out of bed, Gooding, and start. And this is the program. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, mind, soul, and strength, and thy neighbor as thyself. And if you come short, I shall curse you. What would you do if you were me? Well, I think some of you would get up and have a go because you're sizably holy. I couldn't, knowing myself, I would say that's useless. And if I were under law, that would be the end, wouldn't it? There's no good my saying, oh, law, oh, I'm sorry, law, I made a mistake. Uh, I'll be better later on. The law said you won't have any better on. We'll say you've broken the law, must suffer its penalty. God, in his mercy, has not only forgiven our guilt and saved us from the wrath of God, but now the first secret of, uh, uh, uh, being released from the dominion of sin is we're not under law, but under grace. And when, as a believer, I fall and fail, it's not the end. I can get up and have another go. Praise God. And if you say to me, but you're making light of sin in the believer's life, no, I'm not. But I am saying that God has paid the expenses of my spiritual education in advance. There is no possibility of belittling the importance of a believer's sin, but God has foreseen it and his holy son has paid the penalty of it. Therefore, when we sin, we can confess it, and he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But how, let us ask our passage before we leave it, how did we get out from under the law? The way we have got out from the dominion of the law is that we have died to it. How? And when? Well, Paul explains, you'll see, and it is this. We died with Christ, he says. And pray, what does that mean? Well, he explains nine, ten, and eleven: knowing that Christ, being raised from the dead, dieth no more, death hath no more dominion over him, for the death that he died, he died unto sin once, but the life that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Even so reckon you also yourselves to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God in Jesus Christ. Passage is telling us that we died with Christ. When Christ died, we died. It is saying that we died in the same i- manner as he did. As Jesus died to sin once, so we die to sin once. In what sense, therefore, did Jesus die to sin? Was it that he was constantly faced with sin and battled daily with a struggle against sin, sin, which was a fearful struggle, and at last, thank God, he was allowed to die, and that put an end to the struggle, and he died to sin. Well, it's almost blasphemous to mention the possi- the the possible interpretation, isn't it? Jesus died to sin, legally died to sin, and bore its penalty and died once and for all. It is in that sense we are asked to reckon ourselves to be dead to sin. Or if we are dead to sin, it is simply because we died with Christ. He died once and for all. How many times did we die then? Well, once for all. Now that he lives, he lives in- unto God, the death hath no more dominion over him. We are in that sense to reckon that we too have been raised from the dead to walk in newness of life. You'll say, but what has all this legal thing? I wish you wouldn't emphasize legal things so much, you see. You know, surely we ought now to be talking not about legal things, but about tactical things. Yes, but gentlemen, legal things are important, aren't they? Even in practical living. He that has died has been justified from sin. And the term so upset some commentators and early translators that they didn't translate it literally. But it is justified, for Paul is still thinking in legal terms. How is that practical? Well, let me reminisce, as is the privilege of old men. I remember hearing from my father in my boyhood, and that goes back some many years, how that in that part of England in those far off days, when country Suffolk men would be supporting the bar in a country pub, down in the town, you'll see. In would come the colour sergeant recruiting men for, uh, His Majesty's army, you'll see. And in those days, uh, the recruiting sergeant would offer some Suffolk country bumpkin a shilling, and he, half blotter with drink anyway, took the shilling, not really knowing what it was. But when he became sober tomorrow, he found he had accepted the Queen's shilling and was now in the army. If now he tried to run away, the law would be after him and he would be in prison. So off to the army he had to go and was, uh, driven round the drill square, you know, by this sergeant. So imagine to yourself this country Johnny, like me, from Suffolk, you see, and he's ar- in the army. And his aunt Emma Liner comes home from America, you see, and inquires after him and finds he's in the army. And taking pity upon the poor man, she goes along to the authorities and buys him out of the army, as you could do in those days, and she pays the price, and the man is legally freed, you see. Yeah? And he's walking down, uh, the s- town center one day, when here comes the sergeant major. And he said, what are you doing here? Who told you to come out here? Get back, will you? When he runs back as hard as he can run. Because poor country fellow, the long conditioning of his reactions by the old sergeant major has not yet been broken. And back he goes to the exercise square. And here comes Aunt Emmalina and said, what are you doing here, old boy? Well, he says, the sergeant major told me I got to come. But no, you don't have to. I've bought you out, you're legally free. Oh, what a gospel message. And when his satanic majesty, all those hidden complexes that years of sinning have produced in our basic psychology, tempt us to think that we can't be free, and we must yield and obey them. There's nothing else we can do. Oh, what a wonderful thing it is to hear the gospel, that we are legally free. And we can stand clear, knowing ourselves forgiven, in spite even of our fallings and failings as believers. This is where our freedom begins. We symbolize it, don't we, in baptism, buried with Christ, raised with Christ. And of course, there is the second part of it. Raised to walk in newness of life, that is not the expression of a wish, that is the symbolizing of a fact. Not only are we legally quit, but God has given us new life in union with Christ, and with it new powers and the grace of his Holy Spirit. If that is so, just let us notice one or two other things. When they got, uh, to the other side and saw their enemies dead and that they were at last free, they broke out in spontaneous singing to the Lord. And that is a common reaction, isn't it, when people realize not only they have been forgiven of the guilt of the past, but they sense the reality of the Savior's power to deliver them from the domination of sin. The reality of salvation provokes in them the instinctive assurance, yes, we shall at last arrive in our glorious inheritance and be brought into the eternal dwelling place of God. But there's another little piece to the story just after they had stopped singing. That is verse twenty two of chapter fifteen. Moses led Israel onward from the Red Sea, and they went hither and thither, and they found no water. And at last they came to water, but, uh, at Mara, but it was bitter, and they could not drink it. And the Lord showed them a tree which, being cut down and cast into the waters, made them sweet. And there he proved them. And said, if thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, and wilt do that which is right in his eyes, and wilt give ear to his commandments, and keep all his statues, statutes, I will put none of the diseases upon thee which I have put upon the Egyptians, for I am the Lord that healeth thee. Backed home by the demonstration of our Lord's healing powers, he promised the people that he would not put upon them the plagues and diseases that he had recently put upon the Egyptians. But you'll see that promise was in fact conditional, wasn't it? If they would keep his, hear his voice and do his commandments. If, on the other hand, they didn't hear his voice and they didn't do his commandments, then they might expect from this very announcement that God would deal with them and the consequences could be painful. And you know, this too is a lesson that we need to learn, and in fact, Paul, in his epistle to the Romans chapter six, and the final paragraph, enforces it, doesn't he? What is conversion? Well, says Paul, you once yielded your members as servants to sin and unrighteousness. What is salvation? What is conversion? It means taking those members and yielding them to God that you might serve God. That is true conversion. Whereas we serve sin, now we serve God. Whereas we use our members to serve sin, now we deliberately use our members to serve God. For do be warned, says Paul, that if you constantly yield your members to sin, you become the slave of the person or the thing or the habit to which you constantly yield your members. And if as believers you yield your members to sin, you will enslave yourself. Here Paul is talking of consequences, as God is talking to the Israelites about the consequences of sin. Keep my word, keep my commandments, and I will not put upon you the diseases and plagues I put upon the Egyptians. Break my commandments, and there will be consequences and all kinds of plagues. That is still true, isn't it? And it is, uh, appeared to me over many years that we evangelicals need to be careful how we preach the gospel. On the one hand, we must preach that there is no penalty, there is no condemnation for them that are in Christ Jesus. All penalty is past, is gone, Christ has paid it. There is therefore no, now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. There is no penalty, but there are consequences. If as a believer, I will drink methylated spirits before breakfast every day and a whole bottle full. I can argue as much as I like, well, there's no penalty. You know I'm redeemed, Christ has paid the penalty. That fact won't stop the consequences of drinking a bottle full of methylated spirits before breakfast every morning. God is not mocked, says Paul to the Galatians. Whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap. It is true of us, as of anybody. And if as believers we abuse our freedom and disobey the law, and we sow to the flesh instead of sowing to the spirit, we shall of the flesh reap. It is a balance of the truth that we do very well to remember constantly, and to remember to teach it. Lest believers grasping the gospel that there is no penalty fall to the other extreme and think that they may sin with impunity. That may not discourage anybody. We'll see if God, uh, tells me to sow a field of wheat, and I say to myself, yes, but I could make a lot more money sowing a field of barley, and in disobedience to the Lord, I sow the barley. And when it comes up towards harvest, I see what I've done, and this is barley. And I get down on my knees and I confess my disobedience, and I beg the Lord's pardon. He will pardon me, won't he? And then I say, Lord, please change this barley into wheat. You suppose he will? No, what a man sows, he reaps. What a solemn thing as we take our decisions in life, isn't it? We shall reap what we sow. Oh yes, those sad consequences of former disobediences, they can't perhaps be removed, but when we are truly contrite and repentant, God can use those very consequences and turn them to our perfection in holiness, our further training. The law remains. What we sow, we reap. Keep my commandments, said God to the delivered Israelites, and I will not be obliged to put plagues upon you. Break them. And And consequences consequences. must inevitably follow. The Lord give us wisdom to know when to apply the one message and the other in our ministry of the gospel. According to the narrative of Exodus, there were three other lessons that God taught Israel in this particular part of their desert progress. One lesson was a major one. It comes in chapter sixteen, a lesson associated with the down-to-earth matter of our daily, uh, food. Two other lessons, uh, not e- either of them so important perhaps, but important in their way, in chapter seventeen, Israel's experience at Masar and Meribah, and then their experience in the war against Amalek. We have time only to deal with these things briefly. Excuse the fact that I, I, my exposition must of necessity be inadequate. The first lesson, therefore, was a lesson about our daily bread, our daily work. The story is that how Israel, as they went through the desert, were fed by God by the device of his raining down manna bread from heaven upon them. You'll say, sir, that's a delightful story, but who could believe it? And wouldn't life be marvelous if God did that kind of thing now? I mean, all you have to do to go out in the morning and open your mouth, and God rains your sausages and bacon down from him, and, uh, you, uh, thus are fed, and you don't have to work, and you're free to just to enjoy yourself. That would be a kind of a paradise, but surely it is so unreal as we couldn't believe it. But you're not reading the same story as me, perhaps. That bit about their not having to work, that, that isn't true, is it? Because though God rained down manna miraculously upon them from heaven every day, they had to work and work quite hard to collect it. It was a very small thing, and it lay upon the ground, and early in the morning they had to go out and gather it, and because it was very small, it would take a lot of gathering, and knees to nose, bending down on a sun becoming hot was wearying work. And then when they collected it, they had to take it home and grind it and cook it and bake it and fry it, and I don't know what. There wasn't all that difference between that and going down to the supermarket and loading your trolley and bringing it all home and then cooking it and baking it and preparing it and so forth. There was a lot of work in it. You'll say, but for all that, the source was miraculous, you'll say, uh, this manna coming down from heaven, that would bit was miraculous, surely, yeah? But what about you? You eat your shredded wheat or your cornflakes or whatever they are, tell me, how did that come to be in your earth, that ear of corn? Do you know anybody that can make an ear of corn? I haven't heard of them yet, unless there are a few Egyptian magicians around. So that the very basic thing of our survival, our daily bread and food, for that we are still dependent upon, forgive the extended use of the term, this yearly miracle. The growth of a plant, the production of wheat and barley at the end of a stalk, a process that we still cannot ourselves, by ourselves, produce. Number one point. Why did God feed them thus? First of all, he allowed them to hunger much to their, uh, displeasure, and then he fed them in this way, giving them the manna, and later on, so Deuteronomy tells us, he explained to them why he did it. He suffered them to hunger and then fed them with the manna that man shall learn that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. This was the lesson being taught. Their idea of food, as so they expressed it to Moses, was the flesh pots of Egypt. That was the Egyptian way of looking at eater. Now they had to be taught a different attitude to their very daily bread and the matter of living. Still, it is a basic question, isn't it? What is happening when we sit down to our breakfast and eat our muesli or our cornflakes? What is the significance of that in life? For the atheist, it's a... Well, it can be enjoyable if the muesli is good, of course. But then, as far as he concerned, is concerned, his food is a battle against impersonal nature. When he sits down, apart from his dear wife, he has nobody to thank. Sitting by himself at a table with his cornflakes, and all he has is cornflakes. You can't thank impersonal nature for it, can you? She's not there to be thanked. She doesn't listen anyway. Seeing he doesn't believe in a God or creator and doesn't believe that the food comes from a divine hand anyway. He sits alone with his cornflakes. And what's wrong with that, you say? Well, listen to our Lord repeating Deuteronomy. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. And that is not God being stingy and peevish, saying, you shan't live at all if you don't listen to my word. No, this is the Lord pointing out the dimension of daily life, the lovely dimension of our daily food. Life would you live? Well, you'll need the old cornflakes to keep your physical frame going, but there's a bigger dimension even to eating cornflakes than eating cornflakes, isn't there? And that's to sit at the table eating your cornflakes and remembering that the cornflakes ultimately come from God. So that my eating of my daily food is an experience of God and God's generosity. Miss that dimension to your daily bread, and you've missed the most significant part of living and food. And I'm not sure how long God is prepared to put up with it. You see, suppose for some reason or other you decided that I was a bit of a lonely figure and you would invite me home to dinner and, uh, uh, honor me with your friendship. And you prepare a beautiful banquet, and you invite me to come and sit at your table, and the hour comes, and I sit down, and you put me in the position of honor by your side. And as I begin, uh, the soup, you'll say, you'll say, uh, Mr. Gooding, it's been a, a, a very pleasant day, hasn't it? And I take no notice. Hmm. Say, not very well brought up, that man. Uh, a little bit later, as we come to the feet, the fish dish, you'll say, uh, um, um, uh, where did you go on holiday this year? Uh, and I bury my mouth in the fish, and I take no notice. So there's something wrong with this chat in the head. A bit later, as we come to the suite, you'll say, have you read any interesting books recently? And I lift my mouth from the suite and wipe the cream away, and I said, look here, there is something I'd like you to know. I think this food of yours is gorgeous, and the presentation here is exquisite. And you know that Rembrandt you have on the wall there, I think it's the last word of aesthetic perfection. I enjoyed it immensely, but as for you, I want to tell you straight, I am not interested in you. In fact, I very much doubt if you exist. What would you do? You will probably say, do you know what that is on that door over there? That's a handle, and that's the way out. And the great creator that yearly performs and sustains his miracle to provide me with my cornflakes and invites me to come and sit at his creatorial table, to eat my food and to begin to learn what life is. He gives me physical substance, but in the very giving it holds out his hand that he might introduce himself to me as my friend and lead me on into his friendship, so that that friendship shall become permanent, that when the cornflakes have disappeared forever, I shall live with God. All the wonder, but if I should turn round and eat the food and not be interested in the giver, how long will God put up with it? And millions of men and women thus rob themselves of that dimension of the ordinary basic thing of life. So God taught Israel the significance of daily bread, and to it, according to our passage, he linked his repetition of the command to keep the Sabbath, so that they were told that ordinary days when they went out, they were to gather enough for one day, not to attempt to hoard it. Contrary-wise, on the Fridays, so to speak, they were to gather twice as much because on the Saturday there would be no manna. On Saturday they would have to rest, and therefore God would supply them twice as much on Friday so to tide them over the Sabbath day, linking their food to the observance of the Sabbath. Why so? Because on the Sabbath it was God's invitation to cease from work necessary to produce or to collect the food and sit back and contemplate the Creator. That is the first and basic, uh, consideration of the Sabbath, is it not? To sit back and contemplate that God is Creator. How we do injure our soul if we allow work to become so, such a driving force, filling our complete time of our life that we've no time to sit back and contemplate our creator. Then lot work becomes a slavery that God never intended it to become. Of course, I know that when man fell, God put upon him the rigors of a much more difficult working life, with thorns and thistles to contend with. And the very warfare, it's no good, it it's no good our pretending that life is a completely a gentleman's occupation, is it? It's a struggle and a hard struggle for many. But that said, it's not meant to be a servitude and a slavery. And God therefore invites us, may commands us, from time to time to sit back and contemplate him as our creator, and it will lift the burden and save life from becoming a drudgery. And the other thing that happened was this. Different people had different abilities. Some gathered more, some gathered less. But, uh, as the New Testament points out, it all came out to the same thing in the end, and he that gathered more had, uh, not, uh, too much, and he that gathered less had enough. You say, was that a miracle? I think it was a miracle of God's grace in their heart, perhaps. But learning it came from God and that there would be a supply tomorrow, they were not afraid to share. That's a transformation, isn't it, of our attitude to daily work, our attitude to the profits that accrue from daily work. Let me lose the sense that the food comes from God. And let me get it into my head that it only comes as a result of my cleverness and strength at work, then my work will turn into an unholy competition. So was God beginning to teach his people then the new attitude to daily work that should transform the attitude that once they had when they were in the slave labor camps of Egypt. Two other lessons were taught them according to chapter seventeen. Two shorter stories this time, and we shall notice what they have in common from a literary point of view. In the first event, they eventually called the name of the place Masar and Meribah because of the striving of the children of Israel and because they tempted the Lord. The naming of the place at the end of that story, that they might preserve in their memory the significance of what happened there. And then the second story, Moses built an altar, verse fifteen, and he called the name of it Jehovah Nissi, the Lord is my banner, the Lord is my military standard. That once more they might record the significance of what had happened there. When we look at those two things, we shall find there is a difference. In giving the place the name Masar and Meribah, they were recording a discovery that they had made about their own selves, their own wicked and rebellious hearts. You'll say it must have been a terrible surprise to them when they thought about it afterwards, when they had stood on the further banks of the Red Sea and s- had watched their enemies drown in the Red Sea and ex- had experienced the delivering power of God, they sang till their very lungs were fit to burst. They felt that heaven was so near, another little effort and they would already be into their great inheritance. We heard them talking about how God would lead them in, and God had in fact somehow brought them to his habitation. A few weeks down the road, and they were questioning whether there was anything in this business of God at all. And they were striving with the Lord and striving with Moses to the point where they talked of stoning Moses. It teetered on the edge of an outright rebellion. I think it must have been a horrible surprise to them thereafter when they contemplated what they had done. But you see, that is the pathway of holiness, isn't it? Why did God lead them through this difficult wi- wilderness and allowed them to go hungry and then allowed them to go thirsty to prove what was in their hearts? That God might know them and that they might come to know themselves. How shall I ever become holy if I'm never made to face myself. Becoming holy is not an automatic process, is it? Becoming holy means that God has to allow me from time to time, or even to force me to face myself and to face my weaknesses and to face my nasty temper and my rebellion. I'm not the holy man I think I am sometimes. Catch me at my prayers in church, catch me singing, and listen to what I'm saying, you would think I was the greatest saint on earth. Catch me next Monday week, when things have gone wrong at work, and you'll discover what is still inside. How shall I ever be holy if God doesn't allow circumstances to come round that make me face myself and my weakness and my rebellion, so that then I have a chance to repent a bit, and then to seek the grace and power of the Holy Spirit to deliver me from it. So So Israel. Israel came to this difficult circumstance by God's own leading. They took their journeys according to the commandment of the Lord. And this indeed it was that made it so difficult to bear. You'll see, I imagine at least, that if they had set forth at this stage in their own self-will, choosing their own path. When the water ran out, they would have said to themselves, well, there's nobody to blame but us because we, we chose this way. But it wasn't like that. They took their journey by the commandment of the Lord. They actually believed that the Lord was leading them, and wasn't he supposed to be leading them to a veritable paradise, a land flowing with milk and honey? They took their journey according to the commandment of the Lord, and that journey under his direction led them to thirst so painful that they became all confused about this business of the Lord's leading. I wonder, have you noticed a little thing, uh, at least about those of us who are weaker? We relate some glorious circumstance. We say the Lord must have been in that. And then we record difficulties and trials. My brother, my sister, is it the only mark of the Lord's leading that things go well? Or can it not be sometimes that life's desperate trials, they also are the leading of the Lord? Ah, but when by the Lord's leading they came to this difficult place and ran out of water, then the disappointment sparked the hidden rebellion, and they strove with Moses, and they strove with God, and they tempted the Lord and said, is the Lord among us or not? It wasn't that there and then they got down on their knees and had a united prayer meeting and said, we don't know how this thing has happened to us. Perhaps we're out of the will of the Lord. Let's seek the Lord. Perhaps the Lord isn't able to show us the grace of his presence because we are displeasing to him. Where have we gone wrong? Let us repent. No, no, no, no, no, no. They came defiantly to Moses. They said, look here, Moses, we've nearly had enough of this. We very much doubt, Moses, whether there's anything in this business at all. Talk of salvation, talk of the Lord's presence, talk of the Lord's leading. Look where we are now. Listen to those cows bellowing their heads off because they've run out of water. Look at our wives and little children and their lips beginning to crack because there's no water. You see, you're talking about the leading of the Lord. We very much doubt, Moses, whether the Lord is innocent among us or not. So saying, they flung down the challenge to God and put God himself on trial. They tempted the Lord. One of the meanings of that term is this, that you tell God to his face, now look here, God, you'll do this, and if you don't, I shall not believe you anymore. You'll come up with the water. Or we're not prepared to follow you anymore. Tempting the Lord is a very serious business, isn't it? What is more to say? Let us remember it in the times when we're tempted to think that God doesn't love me today. Look at my circumstances. Oh, my brother, if God doesn't love you today, he never has loved you and never will love you. For a God that would love me yesterday and forget to love me today, that God is useless. In fact, he doesn't exist. So they rebelled. The interest now lies in how the rebellion was cured. It is a dramatic story, and if at this point late in the day my imagination gets the better of me and carries me away, you are so generous-hearted, you I'm sure you'll forgive me. God said, confronted with these rebels, said he to Moses, gather the people together. And I will come down and stand upon this rock. And you, Moses, take the rod with which you smoke the river, that gate rod of judgment, and smite. You say, I can see what's going to happen now. God is coming down to hold court. He stands on the rock. Now comes the executor of his judgment with the rod that turned Egypt's waters to blood. He'll stop these rebels mouthing their complaints against him. Moses' rod will be lifted over their heads, and who can tell what disaster will fall upon them? No, gentlemen. God collected the rebels, stood upon the rock. Moses said he, take your rod of judgment and smite. The rock on which I stand. You'll say, well, all there was in natural say it is a geographical factor, uh, feature of the desert, and, uh, some recent soldiers have found it out again that, uh, you'll suddenly find water bubbling out of rocks in the middle of the Sinai Peninsula, you know, and, uh, all God was doing was standing up there on the rock, and he says, Moses, just tap it there, and out the water came, and that's, uh, you know, no miracle at all. Yeah. Well, not knowing that, if I'd have been Moses, I would have been a bit afraid to take a s- a big rod and smite the rock on which God stood, wouldn't you? Saying, sorry, God, just a minute, I want a little water. Let me tell you all, if on one of these occasions they erected a great platform in Hyde Park, and Her Gracious Majesty came and stood upon the platform, and somebody came out of the crowd with a big stick and started to hit the platform, what would you suppose the police would say about that and its significance? Go on, smite the rock on which I stand, says God. I didn't know there was any water in it. You might as well. What do you think you've been doing with your tongues? What do you think you've been doing murmuring against me? Smite the rock upon which I stand. Neither murmur you, says Paul. How hard an injunction that is sometimes to follow, isn't it? For neither murmur you. Pray, consider how our murmurs sound in heaven. They challenge the very throne of God. And Moses lifted up his rod and smote the rock, and out of it gushed the water. Here's where I get more fanciful than ever. And how does God cure our rebellions and simultaneously provide us with the water that we need and the guarantee that we shall have the water that we need all the way through life home to glory. And the answer is this. He who spared not his own son. Yes, Jehovah lifted up his rod. And the wonder of the story is that the rod fell, not upon the rebel, but on God incarnate. While we were still sinners, yes, while we were enemies kicking God in the shins, we were reconciled to God by the death of his. Is not that the way God heals your wounds, brushes aside your murmuring, and convinces you in this sorry desert of a world with all its pain and suffering and perplexity. But God loves you still. You are taught to argue that he that spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him freely give us all things? And our supplies, as we walk through life's desert, are then seen not to depend upon the chance geographical location. The guarantee of our supplies of what we need are guaranteed by the blessed cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, where the rod of God's judgment fell upon his son. And he that spared not his son, how shall he not with him freely give us all things? And you know, when you come through an experience like that, it's not a bad policy to name it, is it? Lest we forget. Do you know when Israel got to the end of their journey and were about to go into the promised land, Moses exhorted them to remember, and not just remember all their victories, but to remember how foolish they had been. There is good psychology in the exhortation forgetting those things that are behind. It's no good consuming yourself with fruitless regret, is it? But on the other hand, it is a wise thing to remember. Remember how in times past, when things were difficult and I came to the verge of murmuring against God, and then God intervened and showed me his love and, uh, subdued my en- enmity, and I came through. Mark it, mark it in your diary, mark it in your memory, mark it on your heart, mark the very spot on life and put across it, this is where I rebelled and And God God pulled proved himself himself. by the renewed sense of the love of Calvary, that the next time it comes round, you may call upon the help of memory to say what God did in the past, he will do again. But now the final lesson of this particular part of the book. Then came Amalek, says the historian, with, uh, vigorous turning from one subject to another, but I'm not quite sure it was turning to another, because if you start rebelling against God, you'll only have to turn around and you'll find the arch rebel themselves behind you volunteering to join in. For the Amalekites were that tribe in the desert that constantly opposed the progress of the Israelites across the desert, opposing the purposes of God, therefore, and trying to destroy the Israelites. It was at this precise moment, then came Amalek. Great rebel Amalek, opposer of the purposes of God. It was a good job he didn't arrive five minutes earlier, wasn't he? When the Israelites were still murmuring and striving with God and tempting the Lord. Mercifully, at this point, they got over it. But now they must be told that they have to turn round and fight. Not now stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, let go and let God. No, no, no, no, no. This time they must be taught to fight, to face the enemy, to face the old enemy that would oppose the purposes of God in Israel's progress across the wilderness, and learn themselves to fight that enemy. And so must we. It's not that the Lord automatically works certain victories in me and reduces me to a machine. I must fight. I must take my side with God. I must fight the slanders and insinuations of the enemy against God. I must learn to fight. God is not content to leave me a slave. He wants to develop me into a freeborn son and a warrior for God. But what provision would he make for his people as they fought? There was first Moses, good old Moses, up there with the, uh, rod in his hand and holding up his hands. What do you think that is a picture of? Take your pick of the many suggestions, you'll see. Uh, you'll see some people say he was interceding. He was good at that, was Moses. And some people say, no, he's a symbol of the law. Praise God for Moses and his law, holding up his holy hands in defiance of the Amalekites, the enemies of God. I need both Moses' intercessions, don't I? And I need his warnings, strengthening me in the battle against sin. Yeah. I need Moses with his rod. To nerve me to the fight by the commandments of God's holy law, and certainly I need his intercessions. But then Moses has gone home to glory long since, and we have a greater than Moses, both to exhort with his holy law and to intercede by his gracious intercession aloft on high. Down on the plain there was Joshua, captain of salvation, to lead the hosts of Israel. And you say, you typology boys, you're hopeless. What are you going to say Joshua is? Well, I'm going to say he represents Christ as well. There you are, you say, well, it all comes around to Christ. Isn't that arbitrary? No, gentlemen, that's that's fact. And I have the blessed Lord aloft, and I have the blessed Lord with me, captain of my salvation, down here on the desert, in the thick of the battle. And the final encouragement is this, that the battle is not my battle ultimately, it is the Lord's. They called the place thereof Jehovah Nissi. The Lord is my military standard. The Lord is my banner. I know the final words of the story are difficult in Hebrew, and various translations are have been suggested. So let me content myself with this. The Lord has sworn, write it in a book. The Lord will blot out the memory of Amalek. The Lord will eventually obtain the final victory, for the war is the Lord's. And the standard, the colors under which I enlist is not my standard, nor my colors. It is the Lord's war. He conducts it, but he invites me to join up under his military standard. Comforts me with the assurance that if so I do, the ultimate victory is assured. This is the second part of Israel's deliverance from Egypt. Thank God there was not just one part, salvation from the wrath of God. There was a second part, salvation from bondage to Pharaoh, salvation and deliverance from sinful attitudes and from Egyptian principles of living.