If you would, turn with me again
to Exodus chapter 5. Are any of you discouraged? You know, we believers often
find ourselves that way, especially when things don't go the way
that we'd hoped. That was certainly the case with
the children of Israel That was the case with Moses and Aaron.
Moses had gone into Pharaoh and told him that God had demanded
that he let God's people go. And the result is the same today. You tell someone about the sovereign
God of heaven and earth and they are unmoved pretty much for the
same reason that Pharaoh was unmoved. They either. say or
think to themselves, who is the Lord that I should obey him,
that I should believe or fear him? I know not the Lord, the
sovereign God of whom you speak. I'm not gonna obey his voice.
I'm not gonna believe his word. I'm not gonna trust his son.
Why? Because they're ignorant of the
one true God. Pharaoh confessed his ignorance
of God. He said, I know not the Lord.
And it's out of, ignorance of who God is that makes this still
so today. People don't know God. They're
not going to obey His voice. They have no fear of God. They
have no knowledge of Him being a holy God, a just God, a God
who requires perfection. He's been portrayed by preachers
as a little pygmy, wanna-do God that's trying. If you can only
do something if you let him, can only save you if you give
him your heart. People don't know God. And that's
why the gospels must be preached. Sinners need to know the God
who saves. They'll never bow or obey. unless
they know him. And where there's no knowledge
of God, I can assure you of this. There's absolutely no fear, no
reverence, no respect of God. Our Lord said, fear not them
which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul, but
rather fear. And that word means revere, reverence,
respect him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Sinners will never fear God until
they see first what they are and what they deserve and then
who God is and what God will give those who know not Christ.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And as we saw the
last time, not only had this proud and haughty king refused
a reasonable request, really, to let God's people hold a feast
under their God, but he gave orders to have additional burdens
laid on them. Chapter five, verse seven, Pharaoh
said, you shall no more give the people straw to make brick.
As heretofore let them go and gather straw for themselves,
and the tail or the quantity of the bricks which thou did
make heretofore, you shall lay upon them. You're not gonna diminish
off thereof, for they be idle, therefore they cry, saying, let
us go and sacrifice to our God. And this didn't do anything but
discourage them. This did nothing but discourage
God's servant. Why would God purposely delay
their deliverance? Why would God make their condition
worse than before? Well, the first answer is that
God's going to prove the salvations of the Lord. God is gonna show
the people of Israel that they had nothing to do with this,
the salvations of the Lord. And the second answer is the
same as the first. God's gonna teach his people
that it's not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but
of God that showeth mercy." God's gonna show Israel, God's gonna
show Moses, God's gonna show Aaron, that for this same purpose
that he raised up Pharaoh, that he might show his power. God's
power and declare His name, God's name, throughout all the earth.
God's gonna make His power known, the scripture says, by enduring
with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath, like Pharaoh,
who are fitted to destruction. And the main reason that God
delays His deliverance here is that He might make known the
riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, His people. He heard their cry by reason
of their taskmasters. And he, God, determined that
he was going to save them. And it's for this reason that
he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of
mercy which he had prepared aforetime unto glory. Paul said, even us.
I'm glad he added that. Even us. whom he hath called, not of the
Jews only, but also of the Gentiles." God endured Pharaoh, that's a
good way to put it. God endured Pharaoh with much
longsuffering to accomplish his purpose of mercy to his elect
people. God simply endures the wicked. And one day he'll endure them
no longer. True salvation always glorifies
God. I think we've learned that, haven't
we? The quickest way to know if a man is preaching false doctrine
is to sit back and listen to where the glory is laid. Who
gets the glory? Does God or does man? That's
a telltale sign. If you hear a man start talking
about God has no feet, but your feet, and God has no hands, but
your hands, and no mouth, but your mouth, no ears, but your
ears, that preacher is glorifying man. He's not glorifying God.
And you and I are the ones who have no ears to hear, no eyes
to see. And you and I are the ones who
has no understanding, not God. This is a message of deliverance
from bondage. That's what the gospel is. How
God delivers sinners from the bondage of sin. Are you interested? Obviously, there's many who aren't.
Are you interested in liberty from slavery? Well, that's what
will ultimately glorify God. God's deliverance of sinners
from the power of sin. Every attribute of God's character,
now listen, Every detail of his decrees, every vessel of honor
that he creates by his hands glorifies him. He gets all the
glory. God delays his deliverance to
teach and convince his people of their utter inability to deliver
themselves. God exposed the weakness of the
people. He exposed the weakness of His
preacher. And God exposed the power and
the unwillingness of the God of this world that His name,
that God's name might be declared throughout all the earth. And
when all is said and done, there'll be no doubt as to who God is.
When all is said and done, when God folds the four corners of
this earth up, there'll be no doubt about who God is. There's
some doubt now, but there won't be then. Yet instead of trusting
God and believing His word, the people and Moses became discouraged. It's easy to do. It's easy to
become discouraged. Pharaoh, in verse eight, he only
mocked them. He said, you're idle, you're
lazy, you seem to have so much time on your hands, and since
you do have all this time to go and do sacrifice unto your
God, then you've got time to make bricks without straw. That's
pretty much what he said in verse 18. He said, go therefore now
and work, for there shall no straw be given you, yet shall
you deliver the tale or the quantity of bricks. And as we said last
time, any sinner who thinks that they can be saved from the whip
of God's holy justice through the works of the law are doing
nothing more than endeavoring to make bricks with no straw.
It's impossible. To do. No sinner can be justified
by the works of the law. It's impossible to do. For by
the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. Galatians 2.16. You can't build
a perfect righteousness with bricks. It won't stay together.
For what the law could not do, it was impossible. And that it
was weak through the flesh, God sending his own son in the likeness
of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh. Give up any
hope, any confidence that you have in working out a righteousness
of your own. You can't do it. It's like making
bricks without straw. They were discouraged. God's
people in Israel were discouraged that they had to make bricks
without straw. Look at verse 19, and the officers of the children
of Israel did see that they were in evil case. After it was said,
you shall not minish ought from your bricks of your daily task.
You gotta make the same amount of bricks that you did before
without straw. And because of these additional
burdens placed on them, these officers, these taskmasters,
were between a rock and a hard place. These officers were go-betweens
who went before Pharaoh, the master, and Israel, the servants.
I think these taskmasters very well picture preachers of the
law, those who preach salvation by the works of the law. The
message of these taskmasters was always the same, let's make
bricks. Gotta make more bricks. We got
the quota in today, we gotta get the quota in tomorrow. Let's
make bricks. And it's the same with those
men who preach salvation by man's will and by man's work and by
man's way. Let's do something. We've got
to do something to appease God. They think it makes God happy.
They think it makes men worthy. So let's make bricks. And when
you tell them that you can't have straw to make bricks, which
is impossible, they get pretty upset. When you tell men and
women that they cannot appease God by a work of righteousness
that they do, they'll get upset. It's obvious that these officers
were not true shepherds. Look at verse 20. And they met
Moses and Aaron who stood in the way as they came forth from
Pharaoh. And they said unto them, the
Lord look upon you and judge. because you've made our savor
to be abhorred in the eyes of Pharaoh and in the eyes of his
servants to put a sword in their hand to slay us." Now, notice
what they're saying here. The Lord look upon you and judge,
they said. Judge here is a very strong word. It means to punish, condemn and
execute. The Lord look upon you and destroy
you for what you've done, they said. Notice their accusation. They said, you've made our savor,
you've made our odor to be abhorred in the eyes of Pharaoh. If you
preach the true gospel to folks, they'll tell you that it sours
the smell of a Christian. The gospel of doing makes us
smell good. Pharaoh likes it when we work.
Your kind of preaching makes the sinner look bad. You make
us look bad to the world. You make us look bad to those
who profess to believe. You make us look bad in general.
And what a picture of harling preachers we have here, concerned
only about themselves, these officers of the people, concerned
only about their reputation, serving in religion for their
own gain. Modern day religion's all about
what men are doing for God, and true religion is about what God
has done for sinners in Christ. Now Moses and Aaron had only
done what God had told them to do. Beloved, you do what God
commands you to do, and folks desire to judge you in wrath.
And this was so discouraging to Moses. For people to wish
you harm for telling the truth? That's discouraging, isn't it?
It's discouraging to me, but we must never let our discouragement
do to us what it did to Moses. For in verse 22, we read, now
look at this. And Moses returned unto the Lord
and said, Lord, wherefore hast thou so evil entreated this people? Why is it that thou has sent
me? Have you ever felt that way?
You ever feel that you're being evilly treated? You know, people
say that they are, and they blame it on the devil, but the devil
is nothing more than God's pawn. God uses Satan for his own purpose. Paul said, and all things are
of God. Even the desire of Satan to sift us as wheat comes from
God, who said, hast thou considered my servant Job? Now, I understand
that God is behind every trial. I understand that God is the
first cause of all things, and I'm glad he is. I'm glad that
nothing comes to pass unless God says so. Nothing comes to
pass unless God allows it. But I believe there's a great
lesson for us to learn here. Whenever things don't come to
pass the way we think they should, and that's gonna happen a lot,
We should never entreat, that word means charge. We should
never charge the Lord with evil. May we never place the blame
on God. Why? Because if we belong to
him, we know that he's working everything together for our good. Every single thing. Only God
could do such. After losing everything he had,
after losing all his possessions, all his children, do you remember
what Job said? He said, naked came I out of
my mother's womb and naked shall I return. The Lord gave and the
Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
And the scripture says in all this, Job sinned not nor charged
God foolishly. Can you imagine losing everything?
even 10 children in one day, and making such a statement as
that, that's faith in God, that's believing God. But Moses here
charges God foolishly. Have we figured out yet that
all the old patriarchs, all the way down, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob,
Moses, David, all of them, are sinners just like we are. Moses
said, now look what he said. He said, for since I came to
Pharaoh, I came to Pharaoh as you told me to. I did what you
required me to do. I went into Pharaoh and I told
him what you told me to say, to speak in thy name, he said. You told me to tell Pharaoh that
you sent me and you told me what to tell Pharaoh. You told me
to tell him that you were behind this. God said, let my people
go. And said, ever since I've done
that, he has done evil to this people. He said he didn't know
you. He said he wouldn't obey you.
And you're the one that sent me, and you're the one that told
me what to say. So this is all because of you.
He said, neither hast thou delivered thy people at all. Why, Pharaoh's
made it harder on them, and you've done nothing. It's one thing
to attribute everything that comes to pass to the power, purpose,
and providence of God, but in no way is it right, proper, or
wise in any way to call into question the outcome of God's
sovereign counsel. God knows what's best for his
people. We don't know what's best for us. God does what's
best for his people, always. God works all things together
for the good of them that love him, right? So our prayers and
our confessions should be, Father, not our will, but thine be done.
That's what Moses should have said. Our prayers should be even
so, Father, it seemed good in thy sight. You know, I was thinking
today that there's no believing mother or father that could find
any joy whatsoever, find any pleasure in their children calling
into question their authority and counsel as a parent. No believing
mother or father could, because a caring parent wants nothing
but what's best for their children. You show me a parent that didn't
want what's best for their children and they're not a loving, caring
parent at all. For their children to protest
their authority as a parent and their motivation as a parent
to do their children good would be a great sin. How much more
so is it with God and us? That's why the word of God says,
children, obey your parents and the Lord for this is right. Children,
obey your parents in all things for this is well pleasing unto
the Lord. Now I want you to think about
and consider just for a few minutes this serious accusation that
Moses makes against God Almighty. The very God that had his hand
upon Moses as a child. You remember the story, Pharaoh
determined to drown all the male children under a certain age.
The very God that kept him from being drowned in the Nile. The
very God that led him to Pharaoh's daughter. The very God that enabled
him to, scripture says, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's
daughter. The God that enabled him to suffer
affliction with the people of God, then to enjoy the pleasures
of sin for a season. The God who protected him when
he committed murder. The God who spoke to him through
a burning bush, the God who called him to be the deliverer of Israel,
this is the very God that Moses accuses of being evil. He questions
God's authority. He questions God's right to be
God. He charges God with foolishness.
He questions God's purpose and he says, you haven't done anything
that you said you'd do. This may be one of the greatest
examples of unbelief found in the scripture. And that's what
unbelief does. Unbelief entreats God with evil. Unbelief says that God's evil.
You hear it all the time. I heard someone say not long
ago, a God that doesn't love everybody is evil. A God that
didn't die for everyone is evil. God is unrighteous to have loved
one and not another. There's unrighteousness with
God for loving Jacob and hating Esau. That's what people say. God doesn't have the right to
save whom he will. God doesn't have the right to
choose one and pass by another. That's not fair, they say. God
is not fair. Is there unrighteousness with
God? They say yes, if that's your God, your God is unfair,
your God is unrighteous. People want a God they can control.
God says only those who will let them save him, they say.
And you preach an almighty God and people will say your God
is my devil. Unbelief entreats God with evil,
charges God with evil. Moses here basically called God
a liar. You can interpret it how you
want to, but he didn't think that God was going to do anything
that he originally said he was. And yet God had done exactly
what he said he'd do. He told Moses before he ever
went, he said, I'm gonna harden his heart and he will not let
the people go. And that's exactly what Pharaoh
did. And immediately Moses and the people of God get discouraged.
And to make matters worse, Pharaoh said, you've got so much free
time on your hands, then you can make bricks without straw. And they just fell to pieces.
Moses said, ever since I came to Pharaoh to speak in your name,
he's done evil to this people. Did you notice that Moses puts
the blame on God, just the same as Adam put the blame on Eve,
and Eve put the blame on the serpent. when sin came to the
world. Moses told God, neither hast
thou delivered thy people at all. You said you would, but
you haven't. This is your fault. And secondly,
unbelief calls into question God's power, purpose, and providence. Moses in unbelief said, why hast
thou sent me? You said I was the deliverer.
Through me, deliver your people. You haven't delivered your people
at all. They were worse off now than they were before, Moses
said. Moses called God's power and purpose into question. He more or less said, you're
a sorry God. These are some serious, I mean
serious, accusations and allegations. Oh, what a dangerous thing for
a sinner to question God's authority. And we do it every day. We do
it every day. We grumble, we complain about
many things. Sometimes they're little things.
Sometimes they seem like big things, but all of them are of
God. That's what Paul said. All things
are of God. They're all of God, whether we
like them or not. So let's don't charge God foolishly
when we don't like the outcome. He is always looking out for
our soul's best interest. All the promises of God in Him
are yea and amen in Him. So let's believe what He says. Let's trust in what He promises.
Here, Moses has one little setback and he just goes faithless. Let's
wait on the Lord while trusting in Christ. But even when we don't,
like Moses didn't, even when we say and we think untrue things
about God, even when we doubt His promises, even when we get
discouraged in the way, God knows our frame and God remembers that
we're dust. The Lord is merciful and gracious,
slow to anger. So thankful that he's slow to
anger. And he's plenteous in mercy. Aren't you thankful that
God is plenteous in mercy? We need plenty of mercy, don't
we? How fully we see God's grace
on this occasion. What Moses said was worthy of
God killing him. But instead of killing him or
even chastening Moses, God renews his commission to him. He does
so by revealing himself further in grace. Look at verse one of
chapter six. Then, when, after all that we've
seen in chapter five, then the Lord said unto Moses, Now shalt
thou see what I will do to Pharaoh. For with a strong hand shall
he let them go. And with a strong hand shall
he drive them out of this land." God didn't even answer. God didn't
even respond to the impatient skepticism of Moses. God simply
reaffirmed to Moses his immutable and omnipotent purpose. God told
him, he said, Pharaoh might insist that he's not gonna let Israel
go, but I'm declaring to you that he will. Now shalt thou
see what I will do to Pharaoh. And not only would Pharaoh let
them go, but as we'll see, and as we already know, Pharaoh would
drive them out. That's what he says here in verse
one. Not only would Pharaoh let them leave, Pharaoh's gonna be
anxious. When God gets through with him,
Pharaoh's gonna be anxious for him to leave. Why? For the scripture
saith unto Pharaoh, even for this same purpose have I raised
thee up. Paul told us in Romans 9, that
I might show my power in thee. We're gonna see God's power in
Pharaoh. And we're gonna see that God's
name will be declared throughout all the earth. Now, the lesson
here for us, I think, is that the next time that you and I
find ourselves a bit discouraged about something that God sent
our way, let's remember, That whatever it is, God sent it for
our good and God sent it for His glory. And when it's all
said and done, we'll see that God did it. We'll see that God
did it for our good. And we'll see that God did it
for His own great namesake. That's the way God does things.
And it's just so easy for us to wonder why this happens and
why that happens. And we're always asking ourselves,
why, why, why, why? It's really not for us to know. All that we should concern ourselves
with is the fact that God works all things together. All things,
all things. The things that we think are
good, the things that we think are bad. The things that we don't
know or understand. That's a lot of things, a lot
of things. And he makes them all work together
for our good. And in the end, I like to think
about the end. His will and his purpose in the
matter of the salvation of his people, that's what this is about,
the deliverance of God's people. His will and his purpose in the
matter of the salvation of his people will be accomplished just
as he determined it would before the foundation of the world.
God's never caught off guard and God's never caught by surprise.
Everything happens just the way that God ordains them to happen.
So, by God's grace, I'm gonna try not to be discouraged. To
be discouraged is nothing less than an act of unbelief. It really
is, that's all it is. By God's grace, I'm going to
endeavor. I'm gonna try. I'm gonna make
it my business to shut my mouth when I start to grumble. By God's
grace, I'm going to trust in the finished work of Christ for
me. That's my only hope of deliverance.
The only hope Israel had of deliverance was that God would deliver them.
That's the only hope we had. And by God's grace, I'm gonna
endeavor to believe God, whatever He says. How about you? God help
us to do so. God help us to do so.