Let us turn to the Word of God
and turn into this chapter that we've just read, Exodus chapter
3. And I want to draw your attention
for a text to the words that we find here in verses 13, 14
and 15. Exodus 3, 13, 14 and 15. And
Moses said unto God, Behold, When I come unto the children
of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers
hath sent me unto you, and they shall say to me, What is his
name? what shall I say unto them? And God said unto Moses, I am
that I am. And he said, Thus shalt thou
say unto the children of Israel, I am hath sent me unto you. And God said moreover unto Moses,
Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, the Lord
God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac,
and the God of Jacob, have sent me unto you. This is my name
forever, and this is my memorial unto all generations." Considering
then these words, I am that I am, God's name, God's name, who is
it that comes here to reveal himself and to speak to Moses
where we are told. There at verse 2 the angel of
the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst
of a bush. So it is in fact the angel of
the Lord who declares himself as the I am that I am and We remember of course that the
angel of the Lord in the Old Testament is really a reference
to the person of the Lord Jesus Christ as he grants these various
manifestations to the saints of the Old Testament as it were
in anticipation of the fullness of the time when he would be
manifest in the flesh. Remember the words that we have
in In Matthew 1.25, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall
bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel, which
by interpretation is God with us. And this is the one then
who is appearing here. We read of him many times in
the previous book of Genesis, the opening book of Holy Scripture.
Remember how in chapter 18 of Genesis we read of those strangers
who were entertained by Abraham. Three strangers come to him.
And we discover as we read through chapter 18 into chapter 19 that
they, well two of them are angels. And the angels eventually go
to Sodom and Gomorrah there at the beginning of chapter 19. But the third one, the angel
of the Lord, continues with Abraham and speaks with him of the work
that God is going to do, that terrible judgment that he's going
to visit upon Sodom and Gomorrah. God will not do it except he
first come and communicate these things to his friend Abraham
and we read there at the end of Genesis 18 how Abraham stands
before the angel of the Lord and pleads for Sodom and Gomorrah
and by degrees he emboldens in prayer if there be 50 righteous
will the Lord God still destroy those cities and God says he
will not destroy for 50's sake and by degrees 45, 40, 30, 20,
10 or if there are ten souls and
God says he will not do it if there are ten righteous to be
found there in Sodom and Gomorrah but they were not such and so
the judgment came and those other two who departed they eventually
come to deliver Lot and his little family out of that destruction
that would fall upon those cities but It's Abram who stands before
the Lord, it says. He stood before the Lord. That
third one then was truly the angel of the Lord. And remember
when we come to the New Testament, in John 8.56, the Lord says to
the Jews, your father Abram rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it
and was glad. Abram saw the day of Christ.
How did he see it? Well, he saw the angel of the
Lord. And also, of course, subsequently
in Genesis 22, he sees the great truth of substitutionary atonement
in that provision that is made so that he doesn't destroy, he
doesn't kill his own son, Isaac, but there is that ram who is
to be offered in his room and in his stead. And so, when we
come across these references to the angel of the Lord appearing
in the Old Testament, we conclude that this is an appearance of
the Lord Jesus Christ himself. This is the one that we see here,
that one who comes to reveal God. As we said only the other
week, he is the word of the Lord. It is in and through the second
person in the Godhead that God truly reveals himself. the great I am that I am. And what does he say here at
the end of verse 15? This is my name forever and this
is my memorial unto all generations. And so tonight I want us to consider
the significance of these things, the name of God or the name of
the Lord. Now, we know that in the Godhead
there are in fact three persons. There are three that bear record
in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these
three are one. And thinking of God's character,
And how God's character really is to be discovered, it's to
be seen in the name. And so, I want us first of all
to consider something of the significance of this name that
belongs unto the Lord, the I AM THAT I AM. Names are very significant
as you know here in the Word of God. They tell us so much.
The name of the prophets is a part of the ministry that those men
exercise. Or even the children that are
born, or the children that they bear, are part of God's message.
You can think, for example, of the experience of someone like
Rachel. Remember how she was barren all
those years and then eventually Joseph is born. And even in the
birth of Joseph she has that promise from God that the Lord
will yet add another child, she's going to have another child,
and so she bears Benjamin. But there in Genesis 35 we're
told how, alas, she dies in childbirth, and as she expires she calls
a little babe Ben-Oni, the son of my sorrows, is the name that
she gives her child. But the father Jacob doesn't
use that name, rather does Jacob call him Benjamin, the son of
my right hand. How the name then, given even
to the child, is so significant. We see the same with regards
to the prophet Isaiah in chapter 8, where he He's favored as the prophetess
bears a child, and he's told to call the boy, Meher Shalal
Ashbas. The most peculiar name, Meher
Shalal Ashbas. And the margin tells us, it literally
means, in making speed to the spoil the hasteneth to pray.
And in fact, if you read Isaiah 8, you'll see that the name is
a message to the kings of Syria and of Israel. and they were
in league against the little kingdom of Judah. But God is
going to send judgment upon those who are in that confederacy.
He's going to send judgment upon Syria and upon Israel by means
of the Assyrians. They will come and they will
spoil them, making speed to the spoil. He hasteneth to pray.
God will appear on behalf of Judah. And it's interesting that
What we have there in Isaiah 8 is taken up in the New Testament
in reference to the Lord Jesus Christ. There in Hebrews 2, it's
quoted, where the prophet speaks of the children that God has
given to him, being for signs. The children that God has given
to him. And Paul speaks of the children that God has given to
the Lord Jesus Christ. there in Hebrews chapter 2. And
then also we can think of Elijah, who was the great prophet in
the Old Testament, and the name that he bears as he suddenly
breaks upon the scene amongst all the idolatry that was being
practiced by the kingdom of Israel, and his very name, Elijah, declaring
the Lord is God, Jehovah is God, Yah, Elijah, Job being the shortened
version of the name Jehovah. This is the God, even the Lord
Jehovah is the only living and true God. And then when we come
to the New Testament, concerning the Lord Jesus, how that Joseph
is told quite clearly there again in Matthew chapter 1, Thou shalt
call his name Jesus. for he shall save his people
from their sins. Jesus, the Greek form of the
name Joshua, salvation is of the Lord. And so here I want
us to consider something of the significance of this name that
belongs unto the God of the Hebrews. I am that I am. This is my name forever. And
this is my memorial unto all generations. Now, the name declares
to us a number of factors with regards to the very character
of God. First of all, it reminds us that
God is himself self-existent. He is self-existent. I am that
I am. Thus shalt thou say unto the
children of Israel, I am, ath sent me." The self-existent one. What does he say through the
prophet Isaiah? I am the first and I am the last,
and beside me there is no God. And again, he asks the question,
is there a God beside me? Yea, there is no God. I know not or He is altogether so different
to us because He is self-existence He always has been, always will
be He is not dependent upon any other, He is the Creator and
we of course are those who are His creatures and we are completely
dependent upon Him He is the one in whom we live and move
and have our being and that's true of all His creatures Apart
from God we would not birth. But He Himself is always self-existent
and we cannot begin to find Him out. Those questions are put
there in Job 11. Canst thou by searching find
out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty
unto perfection? It is high as heaven, what canst
thou do? Deeper than hell, what canst
thou know? The measure thereof is longer
than the earth and broader than the sea, says Eliphaz. Those
friends of Job, they do say some remarkable things on occasions.
Very remarkable is that he is that God who is unknowable, self-existent. Why? He is that God, of course,
who is the Eternal One, the I Am. And what we have here, when he
says that this is his name forever, it's the verb to be, as I'm sure
you're aware, it's the first person singular we say I am in
the first person you are in the second person and he is in the
third person and it is interesting because the very name Lord or
Jehovah as we have it is derived from the third person of that verb to be. He is. When
we address Him as Lord or Jehovah, we are simply saying He is. That's
our response, or should be our response, to what God says of
Himself. He says I am. We say He is. And He always has been. He was,
He is, He ever shall be. Yea, before the day Before the
day was, I am He. He says there in Isaiah 43, 13. Oh, this is that one you see who
is the Creator. Before the day was, He created
the day. In the beginning, God created. He is the one who created time.
He is the Eternal One. He is the Creator of all things.
Time is one of His creatures. How comforting it is for us to
remember that, especially at such a season as this, as the
year passes. We move out of this year of 2020
into the year 2021. We're so aware then of the passing
of time. I suppose really we should be,
day by day, aware of the passing of time. The days come and go,
the weeks, the months. When it comes to a new year,
how we suddenly realize The time is so hastening on, our lives
are so much on the wing, and yet God is that One who is the
Eternal One. He is the I Am, who always was
and always shall be, self-existent. He is also that One who is the
Unchanging God. And we see this in the words
that I've read here as I text these three verses, 13, 14, and
15. What does he say? What does he
say? In verse 14, I am that I am. And he is that to Moses as he
was to those spoken of in verse 15. He is the Lord God of your
fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God
of Jacob. And you see there in verse 15,
LORD in capital letters, it's the name I am, it's the He is. As He was the God of the fathers,
so He is also the God of Moses. And He is the God of those Hebrews
who were suffering so acutely in the cruel bondage that they
were having to endure in Egypt. How sorry was their plight! Verse
7, the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people.
which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of
their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows. And I am come
down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to
bring them up out of that land unto a good land, and a large
unto a land flowing with milk and honey. Or that we might have
faith to believe that God is able to do such a thing even
for us, to bring us out of all our troubles, all our difficulties,
all those things that distress us. and to bring us into that
good land, that large land, that land that flows with milk and
with honey. And our God here assures us that
we can never pray to him in vain. Why is God appearing for them?
Because they had been seeking his face. Remember what we're
told at the end of the previous chapter. Verse 23, there in chapter
2, it came to pass in process of time that the king of Egypt
died And the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage,
and they cried. And their cry came up unto God
by reason of the bondage, and God heard their groaning. And
God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with
Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God had
respect unto them, or the margin says, and God knew them. And
then immediately Moses is keeping the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law,
there in the backside of the desert. You remember how he fled
from Egypt. And he'd been there 40 years.
But now God hears their prayer, God answers their cry. And so what we have at the beginning
of chapter 3 is really an answer. It's the answer to their sighs.
An answer to their groanings. Maybe we think our prayers are
such poor prayers, and yet God hears, and God answers. What does He say? I am the Lord,
I change not, therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed. Oh, He is the same God, the Lord God of your fathers,
the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Or if we think in terms of The
history of our own nation is the God of the Protestant Reformers. He's the God of the Puritans.
He's the God of all those great saints who ever went before us. He's a living God. Remember how
the Lord Jesus Christ Himself answers those Sadducees when
they come and attempt, like the Pharisees, to catch Him out in
Matthew 22. The Sadducees come with their
clever questions as it were. They speak of a woman who's had
seven husbands. Whose wife shall she be in the
resurrection is their question. What does the Lord say? Ye do
her. Not knowing the scriptures nor
the power of God or that we might know the scriptures. The truth
of God's word, the power the omnipotence of God. Christ says,
For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in
marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven. But as touching
the resurrection of the dead, have you not read that which
was spoken unto you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, and
the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God
of the dead, but of the living. This is how God lives. why the Lord Jesus Christ himself
is the resurrection and alive is he not. And surely here we
are very much being directed to the Lord Jesus Christ when
we think of God as the unchanging one. You know the language there
in Hebrews 13, 8, Jesus Christ, the same, yesterday and today
and forever. He is the unchanging Lord. He
is that angel that appeared here unto Moses at the burning bush, in
the burning bush. The angel of the Lord appeared
unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush and he
looked and behold the bush burned with fire and the bush was not
consumed. Oh, what a remarkable sight.
This, as I said at the beginning, is the Lord Jesus Christ himself,
that one who reveals God. Remember what we said only on
the Lord's Day concerning those opening words of John's Gospel.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and
the Word was God. the Word was God, He is Divine
there's a declaration of His deity the Word was God but then
also there we're told the Word was with God and there's a distinction
you see there's obviously two persons there in the opening
verse of John's Gospel there's God and there's the Word And
yet the word himself is God's. There we have Father and Son. The Lord Jesus is that one who
comes to reveal the Father. He is that one who is ever the
revealer of God. And who is it who inspired John
to write those words at the beginning of his gospel? It was the Holy
Spirit. The Holy Ghost is there. All those holy men of God, they
spake as they were moved by the Spirit of God. He's another person
in the Godhead. But don't we see the Lord Jesus
Christ as that one who is clearly the revealer of God? Or what does the Lord Himself
say? If you believe not that I am
her, you shall perish in your sins, He says. There in John
8, 24. But literally, as we see, it
says there, if you believe not that I am. Here's in italics,
the pronoun has been introduced in the translation, it's not
there in the original. He literally says, if you believe
not that I am. And then at the end of that chapter
he says, before Abraham was, I am. And there's no pronoun
being introduced there. He is the I am. And we see it
time and again, I am the door by me if any man enter in he
shall be saved and go in and out and find pasture I am the
light of the world he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness
but shall have the light of life I am the way the truth and the
life no man cometh unto the Father but by me I am the resurrection
and the life whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never
die Or believe us how this? Do we believe these truths concerning
the Lord Jesus Christ? Here we see then something of
who God is. He is the Great I Am, He is the
self-existent God, the eternal God, the unchanging God. But what do we have here besides
learning something with regards to God's very character, the
sort of God that He is? we also have the promise of God the promise of God here is that
one you see who will come and deliver his people he is ever mindful of his word
of promise he always does the thing that he says that's a great
comfort is it not What are we told concerning His
Word? In Psalm 138, Thou hast magnified
Thy Word above all Thy Name. So we've said many a time, if
God's Word, if His promise fails, God Himself has failed. He is
no more the I Am that I Am. That's how dependable the Word
of God is. What a favour that we have the
Scriptures and we can come to the Word of God and read the
Word of God and pray over the Word of God and plead the promises
that God has given to us. He remembers His promises. Look at what He says here in
verse 15. God shalt thou say unto the children
of Israel the Lord God of your fathers the God of Abraham, the God of
Isaac, the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you." Now why was
it that God was pleased to do this thing? Well, as I've said,
it was because He heard their prayer, their cry, as we see
at the end of chapter 2. But if we go back further, we
see how that God had given a promise concerning this deliverance.
He'd given that promise to Abraham back in Genesis 15. There in Genesis 15 we have God's covenant. God makes
his covenant with Abraham. And what does he say in the course
of the covenant? Verse 13 in Genesis 15 He says
unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger
in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them, and they
shall afflict them four hundred years. And also that nation whom
they shall serve will I judge, and afterwards shall they come
out with great substance. And so it was, God says here,
you see, they're going to spoil the Egyptians at the end of the
chapter. This is the Word of God. This is the promise of God.
And doesn't Peter remind us that the Lord is not slack concerning
his promises as some men count slackness? God is not a man that
he should lie, nor the son of man that he should repent. Hath
he said it, shall he not do it? Hath he spoken it, shall he not
make it good? All we have this assurance. He's
magnified his word above all His name. And what has He done
in the Lord Jesus Christ? He has sealed that promise. The
Lord Jesus is the mediator of the covenant, the testator, He
has died. And all the promises of God in
Him are yay, and in Him there are amen to the glory of God
by us. I am that I am, he says. Oh, he is
faithful, he is true to himself and therefore faithful and true
to his words. I am that I am. I like the remarks made by Henry
Law. Henry Law was at one stage the
Dean at Goth Cathedral in the days when there were some great
men in the Church of England. and Spurgeon says of Law he wrote
a commentary really on the first five books of the Bible the Gospel
in the Pentateuch he called it and he sees Christ in all these
books of Moses and so Spurgeon in his remarks on that little
book says of Henry Law, Law abounds in Gospel law abounds in gospel
and when he comes to this name of God I am that I am this is
what law says this is what it means he calls they follow him
he sanctifies they are sanctified he blesses they are blessed he
gives life they live he gives glory they are glorified It's
all God, you see, I am. He's the one who does everything. He does everything. And yet,
here we see Israel in such a low, low place. Moses asks God, in
verse 13, what He is to say. Behold, when I come unto the
children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your
fathers hath sent me unto you, and they shall say to me, What
is his name? What shall I say unto them? Calvin remarks that their faith
had grown so rusty and so faint they didn't know the God of their
fathers. Or do we know the God of our
fathers? Do we make it our business to know the God of our fathers?
Are we concerned to know a little bit about church history and
the great and wondrous works that God has done? There's no
question about it. In these islands, God has done
great works, remarkable works. Throughout all the nations of
the British Isles, England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, every part, God
has done great works. And yet we seem to be so ignorant. This is where the children of
Israel had come, you see. They didn't seem to know what
the name of their God was. And so Moses is told he is to
tell them quite plainly that this is God's name forever. This
is my memorial to all generations. Oh, it's the same God that we
come to worship even as we come together tonight to seek His
face in prayer. They forgot. And we and ourselves
quickly forget. But God does not forget. He abides faithful. He abides
faithful. He cannot deny Himself. That's
our comfort. He is the unchanging Jehovah
and he says this is my name forever and it all centers in that one
who comes and reveals himself here in the burning bush the
angel of the Lord always the Lord Jesus Christ it's in the
Lord Jesus Christ that we have the full and the final revelation
of God Now it's interesting because later we read this in chapter
6 and verse 3 I appeared unto Abraham and unto Isaac and unto
Jacob by the name of God Almighty but by my name Jehovah was I
not known to them. Now God says, By my name Jehovah,
or LORD, and that's how that word is usually rendered in our
Authorized Version, LORD in capital letters, By my name of LORD was
I not known to them. And yet, what do we read in Genesis
18 verse 1? I referred to that, where the
angel of the LORD comes. Well, it actually opens with
this statement, The LORD appeared unto Abraham, is Jehovah appeared unto Abraham. How can we explain that with
what I just read here in Exodus 6 verse 3? Well, it's simply
this, that when it comes to the days of Moses and what God is
doing now, it's a greater, it's a fuller revealing of himself
than was given previously. But then ultimately, of course,
the fullness of that revelation of God doesn't come until we
have the New Testament. It's not until the coming of
the Lord Jesus Christ. God, in time past, spoke unto
the fathers by the prophets, but in these last days, Paul
says, He's spoken unto us by His Son. And no man hath seen
God at any time. The only begotten Son, which
is in the bosom of the Father, He hath revealed it. Or we might
say that this last year has been a strange, strange year, and
many will complain it's been such a miserable year. But you
know, it's been the year of our Lord, Allo Domini. It's been
the day of grace, the acceptable time, the day of salvation. We
are such a privileged people that we have this full and final
revealing of God in the person and the work of our Lord Jesus
Christ. He is the image. of the invisible
God, is he not? In him dwells all the fullness
of the Godhead, Bodileth, and this is the one that we come
to worship, we gather together in his name, we pray in his name,
or that we might be those then who will rejoice in all that
the Lord Jesus Christ is, and all that revelation that the
Lord Jesus Christ has given to us of that God who is the great
I AM, that I am. May the Lord bless his word to
us and help us as we come now to seek his face in prayer. Amen. But before we pray we're
going to sing the hymn 556. The tune is Trentum 73. The Lord proclaims His name,
and sinners hear His voice. His mercy ever stands the same,
and will in Him rejoice. His name is gracious still, and
freely He bestows the bounty of His sovereign will on all
who feel their woes." 556.