Brethren, let's turn back now
to Exodus chapter 3. Thank you, Brother Robin. Exodus chapter 3. We know that salvation is entirely
of the Lord. We saw in that text before, in
our text today, We saw God chose a people by Himself according
to His grace. Christ redeemed those people
successfully by His blood. And God the Holy Spirit shall
call each one to life and faith and keep each one and not want
to be lost. Salvation is of the Lord. But
God chose to use means to call out His people. He chose to use
means to call out His people. What will the means be that God
uses? What will be the means that will
best magnify His glory as the Savior of His people? And this
means is the best way to magnify because God chose it. That's
how I know God chose it. What means will magnify the glory
of God's sovereignty and His working all things for His people? What is it that's going to glorify
God's Word which never returns to Him void but always accomplishes
the thing whereunto He sent it? What is it that's going to glorify
God's sheer immutable promise that He's made in covenant to
His people. What's going to magnify that
word, that glory? Will God just speak and break
their bands asunder and bring them out? He could certainly
do that, but do you know that wouldn't magnify His glory as
much as the means He's chosen? Will He just send forth His angels
and do it? No, that would be too impressive
to the eye of man. God has chosen the best means
to magnify His glory and the salvation of His people by choosing
the means that this world considers foolish. He has chosen to do
it through the preaching of the gospel of the bloody cross on
which Christ was crucified. And He has chosen to use sinful
men who are no different than those He is calling out. That
shows you the whole work is of God. The whole work is of God. For after that in the wisdom
of God, the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the
foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. You look at
your calling, brethren. There is not many mighty, there
is not many noble that are called. God has chosen the foolish things
of the world. Why? To confound the wise. God has chosen the weak things. You know those things we are
talking about is you and me, who He saved and He is using
to spread His gospel. He has chosen the weak things
to bring to nothing the mighty. He has chosen things that are
despised by men and things that are absolutely nothing to bring
to nothing things that are. Why? That no flesh shall glory
in His presence. This is the only means by which
no flesh is going to glory in His presence. Most men will sit
there and they'll listen to the Word and they'll say, well, you're
just a man like I am. Why should I believe you? You're
right. I'm just a sinner like you are.
And you'll never believe what I'm preaching unless God gives
you a heart to do it. And that shows you it's of Him
and not of us. I am a sinner. What keeps me here? What keeps
me stayed on Christ and keeps me searching His Word? I can
tell you it is certainly not of me. God brings a message here
for you each week in spite of me. I can guarantee you that.
This is the best means of glorifying God's absolute sovereignty in
the salvation of His people. Right here. But what qualifies
His preacher and His people that He is going to use for this work?
What qualifies us for this work? Well, I want to show you that
today in God's dealing with Moses. As He sanctified Moses and consecrating
Him for this work to go forth into Egypt and declare His Word,
we see exactly what qualifies God's people for this work. Alright,
Exodus 3.10. He said to Moses, Come now therefore,
and I will send thee unto Pharaoh. that thou mayest bring forth
My people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt. And Moses said
unto God, Who am I? Who am I that I should go unto
Pharaoh and that I should bring forth the children of Israel
out of Egypt? And God said, Certainly I will
be with And this shall be a token unto thee that I have sent thee
when thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, you
shall serve God upon this mountain." God will receive no sinner, God
will save no sinner, and God will use no sinner until God
has made us to believe. that God alone is all our sufficiency
in all things. He will not receive a sinner,
He will not save a sinner, and He will not use a sinner. So
we've been brought to see God is our only sufficiency in all
things. That's what we see here. First,
we must be humbled to behold and acknowledge our own personal
nothingness. Look at the text. He says, Moses
said unto God, Who am I? Now God didn't rebuke Moses for
saying this. And that tells us this is a heart
of humility. At the age of 40 when he was
in Egypt, Moses was eager and full of zeal to be God's deliverer
for his people. And at that time he had high
thoughts of himself, high thoughts of his ability. He had high thoughts
of his social standing, and high thoughts of his intellectual
strength, and high thoughts of his ability to rebuke, and lead,
and deliver God's people. He had high thoughts of self.
And God made him fall on his face. God made him fall on his
face. God will never receive us, and
He'll never save us, and He'll never use us so long as that's
our spirit. He never will. We must first
be brought down to the dust. Christ said, I didn't come to
call the righteous. I didn't come to call men who
think they're good and righteous and worthy to be saved. I didn't
come to call men like that. I came to call sinners. And God's
got to make us know we're sinners. And those are the ones He'll
receive. Now, it's 40 years have passed. And here's Moses answering
in a very different way. Who am I? His heart's been broken. He's been taught something of
himself. He's been made contrite. He's been made to know his sin
and his inability. Who am I? Now brethren, that's
exactly the kind of spirit that God will receive. That's the
kind of spirit He'll save. And that's the kind of spirit
He'll use. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. You
mean God's not wanting me, my grand, wonderful works? A broken
spirit. The sacrifices of God are a broken
spirit. A broken and a contrite heart,
O God, Thou wilt not despise. You know why? That's the only
heart that's going to praise Him and glory in Him and trust
Him. That's why that's the sacrifice
that God's pleased with. That's the only heart that will
come in Christ alone. That's why God's pleased with
that spirit. So those, I'm telling you, those
greatly used of God have very low thoughts of themselves and
very high thoughts of God. I'm not just saying that just
as a statement. That's so, brethren. I know that
personally. I've got very low thoughts of
myself. I wish I had lower thoughts of
myself. But I've got high thoughts of God. We've got to be brought to the
place where we say, not my will, Lord, but Thine be done. That's
the definition of meekness. Not my will, Lord, but Thine
be done. And then secondly here, we must be made to acknowledge
we are no match for our enemy. We've got to be made to acknowledge
we're no match for our enemy. He says there, who am I that
I should go unto Pharaoh? Moses knew he couldn't. He was
no match for Pharaoh. He couldn't overcome Pharaoh.
And we've got to be made to see we can't overcome our enemies.
The first enemy we have is Satan, the devil. You and I can't overcome
him. We cannot overcome him. We were
in bondage to him. We couldn't overcome him. But
Christ can. Do you remember that demoniac,
that man possessed with the devil at Gadara? When Christ came to
that man, that man was living among the dead. That's what every
one of God's elect people do when Christ comes to us. We're
living among the dead, among the tombs. Just crazy wild men,
just like that man. When Christ got finished with
him, they saw him seated and clothed and in his right mind
and praising the Lord. He wanted to go with the Lord.
That's what Christ can do. You and I, we're no match for
our sin. That's a bondage that's too heavy
and too burdensome for us to solve. We can't free ourselves
from it. Number one, the law's got to
be satisfied. We've got to be justified. Our
sin's got to be put away before the holy, unyielding law of God. I can't do that. And number two,
we're corrupt. Everything about our flesh is
corrupt. We've got to be created entirely new in righteousness
and true holiness. Don't let a man ever separate
those two things in the message he preaches. If he preaches one
without the other, he's diminishing the glory of God because Christ
accomplishes both. What He's done for His people
before the law, that's Christ our righteousness. And what He
does in His people in creating us anew is Christ our holiness,
our sanctification. And He is both and must be declared
as both. We couldn't give ourselves that.
We couldn't do it for ourselves and we can't do it for anybody
else. And then death. We're certainly no match for
death. No match for death. You hear
men talk about, well, he died, but they brought him back. That's
never happened. That's never happened. His heart
might have stopped, but he didn't die. If a man dies, he's dead. You ain't bringing him back.
Because no man can do that except God. Except God. God, He said, I say unto you,
he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting
life and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from
death to life. So, we've got to be made to see
our own personal nothingness, and then we've got to be made
to see, I'm no match for my enemies. I'm no match for my enemies.
I can't take on the enemy. And then thirdly, we must be
made to acknowledge the work of salvation is a work we cannot
accomplish. He says there, who am I that
I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt? The mission that Moses was sent
on resembles the mission of all God's truly called and sent preachers
along with the local church with whom he ministers. We are all
witnesses together, united together to spread the Gospel of Christ. That's what we are here for.
And that's what Moses was sent to do. Now you think about it.
It's been 40 years since Moses was in Egypt. He don't even know
any of his brethren there now and he wouldn't recognize any
of them now. God sent us forth to our brethren, to God's elect,
to His lost sheep. And we don't have any idea who
they are. Not any. Not any. So this thing of salvation is
not going to be by our hand, is it? We don't even know who
the elect are. Only God does. And then, not
only that brethren, but Moses didn't have any power to make
them believe the Gospel. When he went the first time to
them and he thought, surely they are going to hear this message.
What happened? Their heart was so full of hatred
for God and for Moses, they said, who made you a judge over us?
And they rejected Him. And that's the case with us,
brethren. We can't make a man hear the Gospel and believe God.
Oh, it's easy to make a man Give up certain sins and join a church
and do religious activities. Scare him real good with hell. Give him an hour to walk down
and work on his emotions and give him an altar to bow to and
a prayer to pray and some works to do and he'll do it. And you
got yourself a beautiful whitewashed sepulcher full of dead men's
bones. Twice dead. But only God can convert a sinner.
Only God can make the word effectual in the heart so that He makes
His child a new creation. Only God can do that. No preacher
can do it. No church can do it. Only God
can do that work. The things which are impossible
with men are possible with God. Now this is something, brethren,
we are going to have to be made to see. We are going to have
to be made to see who I am. I am personally absolutely nothing. God's not getting anything from
me by saving me. I'm not adding anything to God.
God's given me everything. And I've got to be made to see
I'm no match for my enemies. I cannot conquer one single enemy. And I've got to be made to see
that this thing of salvation, of saving myself and God's people,
is something that I can in no way accomplish. I can't even
contribute to it. Fourthly, we've got to be made
to believe our only sufficiency is God. Our only sufficiency
is God. He says there, this is how God
answered Moses. He said, certainly I will be
with thee. Certainly tells us, brethren,
It's guaranteed. And that tells you that our success
in going forth and calling out His people through the Gospel
is guaranteed. Certainly. Certainly. Now brethren,
who am I? I'm nothing. I'm absolutely nothing. But God has said, certainly I
will be with thee. I can't overcome my enemy. Who
am I? I'm helpless to overcome the
enemy. But God said, certainly I will
be with thee. I have absolutely no power to
contribute to salvation or accomplish salvation. Not for myself and
not for God's people. But God promises, certainly I
will be with thee. I have absolutely no sufficiency
in myself whatsoever. But God has promised, certainly
I will be with thee. Now brethren, does that apply
to you and me today? That's exactly what our Lord
Jesus Christ says to us. When He called His disciples
and He sent them forth into the world, He said this, All power
in heaven and in earth is given to me. As the God-man, as the
mediator, He had all power as God, but now He has all power
as God and man. All power. And He says, so go
forth into this world preaching my gospel, making disciples of
men, teaching them everything that I've taught you. And lo,
I will be with you always, even until the end of the world. That's
our confidence because He's our sufficiency and our only sufficiency. Sufficiency in what? He is our
sufficiency when it comes to our righteousness. We don't contribute
anything to righteousness. He is the sufficiency of our
righteousness. He's the sufficiency of holiness
of heart. We don't contribute anything
to holiness, brethren. Holiness is not stopping doing
some things and starting doing other things. Holiness is Christ
formed in you. Christ our holiness, whereby
you're given a new heart, a new character, a new spirit that
despises yourself, abhors yourself in dust and ashes, and looks
to God and adores Him and says, Glory to God in the highest alone. That's holiness. to be made to
walk after Him and follow Him and trust Him. And He is all
our sufficiency for that work. Christ is all our sufficiency
to be our guide. You and I don't know what we
need to do. We don't know what step to take. We don't know where
to go from one day to the next. If you would have asked me when
I was 18 years old, graduated from high school, If I ever thought
I would be in New Jersey, I would say, of course not. Never entered
my mind. Who guided me? I look back at
that path I took and it is like the children of Israel in the
wilderness, just all over the place. But God was my guide. He is the sufficiency of His
people in guiding us every step we take. And He is the sufficiency
of our strength. We can't do anything spiritual
of ourselves because we were dead in sin. Christ is our strength. He is our power. He opens the
door and no man can shut it. And He shuts the door and no
man can open it. He is our strength. And Christ the Lord is our wisdom.
We don't have the wisdom for this work. We don't have the
wisdom to speak a word in Caesar. Christ is our wisdom. We don't
have the wisdom to know and understand the Gospel until Christ enters
in and puts us in our right mind like He did that demoniac. Christ
is our consolation and our comfort. And don't you need that? Think
how often the heart is broken and how often you just bow down
and if it was not for Christ, you would just be in utter despair. over your sin and over all these
things we are talking about here. Nothingness and your inability
towards your enemies and your inability in salvation. You would
just be in despair. Christ is your consolation. He
is your comfort who comes to you and says, Comfort ye, comfort
ye my people. Speak ye comfortably unto Jerusalem
and tell her that her warfare is accomplished. Because I have
rewarded her double for all her sins. I have made her righteous
and holy. And I am keeping her. And she
is not going to lack anything. Here is our comfort and our consolation.
Turn over to Isaiah 41 just a moment. Isaiah chapter 41. Listen to this brethren. It is
so comforting. Isaiah 41 verse 10. Fear thou not. Why? Fear thou not. What does our
text tell us? Look at the next word. For I
am with thee. I am with thee. Be not dismayed,
for I am thy God. I will strengthen thee. Yea,
I will help thee. Yea, I will uphold thee with
the right hand of my righteousness. Look at Isaiah 43. Look at verse
1. Isaiah 43, verse 1. But now thus
saith the Lord that created thee, O Jacob, and He that formed thee,
O Israel. That's who you and I are by grace.
We're Jacob in our flesh and Israel in the new man. What does
He say to us? Fear not, for I have redeemed
thee. I have called thee by thy name. Thou art mine. And when thou
passest through the waters, I will be with thee." You see that? I'll be with thee. And through
the rivers, they shall not overflow thee. Why? Because He says, I
will be with thee. And when you go through the fire,
you won't be burned. Why? The flame won't kettle upon
you. Why? He says, I will be with
thee. For I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Savior.
I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Saba for thee. I
gave people since thou wast present in my sight, thou hast been honorable
and I have loved thee. Therefore will I give men for
thee and people for thy life. And so the Hebrew writer tells
us this, let your conduct, everything you do, say, think, let your
conduct in this world be without covetousness. We ought never
complain about something that we don't have. We ought never
say, well, I just wish I had that. That's covetousness. To desire and want something
you don't have and envy somebody else that's got it, that's covetousness.
He says, let your conduct be without covetousness and be content
with what you have. Because He has said, I will never
leave you and never forsake you. That is another way of saying,
certainly I will be with you. I will never leave you and I
will never forsake you. So that we can boldly say, we
can say with assurance and all boldness, the Lord is my helper. I will not fear what man shall
do unto me. That's the only way we can say
that, is for Christ to be our sufficiency. Now get this and
believe it. In everything, Christ is our
sufficiency. Paul said, not that we are sufficient
of ourselves to think anything of ourselves, but our sufficiency
is of God. We are, we are, let me ask you
something. If you got a clay pot that you
put the dirt in, you put the seed in, you grew the plant,
watered the plant, there it is, this beautiful plant. Sitting
in this, just this old ugly clay pot. Anybody going to walk in
and say, woo, that's a beautiful clay pot? No, they're going to
walk in and look at the beautiful flower that's been produced by
your hands. Well, we have this treasure in
earthen vessels, in a clay pot. God came and He put the seed
in, He worked the ground, He sent the rain, He blessed it,
and He brought forth a brand new child created in righteousness
and holiness that is His making alone. When we have this treasure
in this old clay pot that the excellency of the power might
be of God and not of us. so that He gets all the glory
for what He did and not us. Not us. So we've got to be brought
to this. You know, until we're brought
to see our nothingness, we're going to brag that we're something,
that we're somebody. This is a church where everybody
is a nobody. We're going to be brought to
the place where we can't conquer our enemies, can't do one thing,
free ourselves and conquer our enemies. We can't save ourselves,
we can't save anybody else. And lastly, as we go forth to
the work of the Lord, we must be made to hope only in the sure
promise of God. Now look here, he says, this
shall be a token unto thee. God didn't have to do that. I'm
going to give you a token. I'm going to give you something
to remember, to assure you and show you that my word is immutable. It will not change. I'm going
to give you a token. that I have sent thee. This is
how you are going to know I have sent you. When thou hast brought
forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this
mountain. How do you know you sin of God?
How do you know you sin of God? What is our assurance, brethren,
that this is truly a church of God that God is working in and
calling His people out? How do we know that? He's given
us a token that we may know that we've been said of the Lord.
How? He's called His people out and
He's united us with them right here in the local church which
is His holy mountain. And we're able now to worship
Him together. I didn't do that. You didn't
do that. God did that. And that's our
assurance that we've been sent of God. That's what He's telling
Moses. You get the picture. Here's Moses.
Remember back there earlier it said this was the mountain of
God. This was horrible. This is what later will be called
Mount Sinai. Here they are in the mountain
of the Lord. That's why it's important. In
the mountain of the Lord. And God says, I will send you
forth into Egypt and you shall deliver My people. And here is
a token to you that I have sent you. When you are done delivering
My people, you and My people shall come right back here and
you will worship and serve Me in this very mountain. Brethren,
that is exactly what... And they did that. They came
there and they built an altar there and they sacrificed offerings
there. Worship God there, just like
God promised. Now that's what Christ did for
His people. That's what He accomplishes for
His people. He stood in the mountain of God in Heaven's glory with
God the Father. And God the Father said to Him,
I want you to go into this Egypt, and I want you to deliver My
people. And when you've gone and accomplished His work, here's
a token, an everlasting covenant promise to you. You're going
to come back to this holy mountain with all My people, and you're
going to worship and serve Me in this holy mountain. That's
what the prophet said in Micah 4.1 and in Isaiah, almost the
same wording in both. In the last days, that's what
we're in. In these last days God has spoken
to us by His Son. We're in the last days. It has
been since Christ came the first time. The last days. We'll be till the end, till it's
over. In the last days it shall come to pass that the mountain
of the house of the Lord shall be established in the top of
the mountains. When did that happen? That happened
when our Lord Jesus Christ cried out, It is finished and ascended
to the right hand of the Father. His house was exalted in the
top of the mountain above all the hills. And He started calling
out His people and assembling His mountain, establishing His
mountain. The local church below and the
saints in heaven were the mountain of God, His church, His people.
You've not come to the mountain that quaked and was on fire and
you cried out and said, I need a mediator. You've come to Mount
Zion. the mountain of God. You've come
to the God, our Savior, the church of the firstborn. You've come
to Christ, the mediator of the covenant, whose blood speaks
better things than that of Abel. When we hear Him as He speaks
from heaven through this gospel, that's where we've come to, the
mountain of God. And what will be the result when
He establishes the mountain of God? Scripture says, And it shall
be exalted above the hills, and people shall flow unto it. Now,
no ifs, ands, or maybes about it. His people shall flow into
His church. It's going to be by His power.
By His power, because Christ came down and He came into this
Egypt and He accomplished the redemption of His people and
He ascended to the Father. And right now, because He called
us, we're assembled together and we're striving together for
the faith of the Gospel. We are striving together to spread
this Word and waiting on Him to call others out just like
He called us out. Don't you see the wisdom of God
in that? When I look at what I am and
how I would certainly fall away in a heartbeat if it wasn't for
His sovereign hand holding me always, I see how sovereign God
is. I've heard men argue that God
doesn't use means because He's sovereign. Well, what shows His
sovereignty better than to be able to say, I'm going to send
you pastors after my own heart which shall feed you with knowledge
and understanding, and then doing it! And letting nothing stop
Him. And blessing it to the hearts
of His people who couldn't hear otherwise, and calling them out,
and bringing them together, and making them to worship together
in this Holy Mount. Brethren, this is a sure token
to you and me, because you are willing to suffer with Christ,
you are willing to suffer for His sake, you love His gospel,
you believe His gospel, you worship together in this mountain. This
is a sure token of God. And I will tell you something
else about this. He told Moses, you are going to return to this
mountain with My people. You know, the truth of the matter
is, when God chose His people in eternity, before the world
was made, and He predestinated us to the adoption of children
by Jesus Christ Himself, in the mind and purpose of God, all
His people were in that mountain, in Christ, right then. And then
we came forth in Adam, and we fell, and came into bondage in
Egypt. And Christ comes, and saves us,
and delivers us, and carried us back where we started. to
God in eternity. Isn't that good news, brethren?
Isn't that good news? You see, this is our work of
faith. This is our labor of love right here. It is to assemble
a bunch of nothings, to preach our mighty God, as we wait on Him to call out
His people. And we've got a good hope through
grace. Think about this. Think of what we're doing. Just
like Moses was sent to deliver God's people out and bring them
to the mountain of God to worship and serve God. That's what God's
using us to do. We have no power to do it. It's
all of God. But that's what He's using us
to do. Isn't that amazing that He's
given us this work to do? And He's supplied everything
we need, all the power, all the wisdom, all the mercy, all the
grace, everything. Or else we could not do anything. That is such a... That's a weighty
responsibility. That's a weighty task He's given
to us. But He has given us the promise
that certainly I will be with you and you won't fail. You're
coming to this mountain. All my people are coming to the
mountain and going to worship me. That's our good hope, brethren. That's our good hope. We're going
to all one day, we're going to that final mountain. We are going to the top of the
mountain. We are going to glory with Him. We are going to worship
God with all His elect people. And none of us are going to glory
in ourselves. We are not going to say we did anything. We are
going to glory in our Redeemer only. Because He did it all. He is the Alpha and Omega. He
is the beginning and the end. He is the author and the finisher
of our faith. He is all our salvation. Now I pray God would make us
to see our nothingness and acknowledge it. That He would make us to
see we cannot overcome our enemies. That He would make us to see
that we cannot work the works of salvation. That He might make
us see God in Christ is all our sufficiency in all things. and
that He might constantly keep us looking to the hope God's
given us. That when we get discouraged
and we don't see people coming in and we don't see people confessing
Christ and what have you, don't get discouraged. Don't get discouraged. God said, My people all shall
be brought and they're going to all worship Him. That's a
good hope, brethren. I pray God will bless it now.
Amen. All right, brethren. Eh.