Our Lord is the one that told
that parable of the two men that built their houses, one on the
rock and one on the sand. And that rock is Christ, isn't
it? Exodus chapter 5. Now, Exodus
5. This is more than just a fascinating
story. As with every story in the Old
Testament and all the Scriptures, the Gospel. The Gospel is here. Salvation. Deliverance. The deliverance
of God's people from bondage, from the law. We're going to
sing when this is over. And boy, I hope you're able to
sing it as never before. Free from the law. Oh, happy
condition. Deliverance for God's people
from the law out of bondage. Deliverance from Pharaoh, the
God of this world, ruler of this world. And God sent two preachers
to do this. You know that? God sent two preachers
to give the message of deliverance. And He does the same thing today.
He sends the prophets and apostles and pastors and teachers to deliver
My people. How's He doing? With His Word.
Pharaoh said, I'm not going to let them go. God said, yes you
are. It was all I could do not to... You know, I wanted... Chapter
6. You go home and read that. It's
all God says, I will, I will, I will, I will, I will. It's
wonderful. And so is this. They say the
gospel is the power of God, the Word of God. He created all things
by His Word. He upholds all things by His
Word. We're born again by His Word. We're convicted by His
Word. We grow by His Word. It's His
power. This is all that God told Moses
and Aaron to do. Tell them what I told you. Tell
Pharaoh what I told you." And they kept, you know, he's
not going to let you go. Yes, he is. Alright, God's people, Israel,
were working in and for the world. All Israel by at this time, all
of them had been born and raised in Egypt. Every one of them.
After Joseph, remember, all the sons of Jacob, there rose another
Pharaoh. This whole generation were born
and raised in Egypt. And all they knew was work, work,
work, work. Does that sound familiar? Work. All Israel was under the dominion
of Pharaoh, the God of this world, the most powerful man on earth.
Every single one of them were under him. 2 Timothy 2 talks
about every single son of Adam held captive by Satan, the God
of this world, until a stronger than him says, let my
people go. He's not going to. until He gives
the Word. And the Gospel is what does it.
Who does it? All Israel is working in and
for the world under hard taskmasters. We read that. Who sent these
hard taskmasters? God did. Who put Israel in Egypt? God did. God did. These taskmasters. We all have
them if you're still working Out there, you have a foreman,
don't you? You have a supervisor. Call him the boss. Big boss man. Taskmasters. They were Egyptians.
This is interesting. The officers were Jews, like
publicans. Publican. Taskmasters. Go to Ephesians 6 with me, real
quick. You know, every one of us work
in this world. Every one of us work for the
world, not believers. Very few work for a believer.
Hard taskmasters, so many of us, aren't we? Yes, we do. When I was a young man, I worked
construction down in Florida, and we were building a school
building out in the I thought it was in the desert. Nothing
but sand, you know. Egypt. And it was August. And it was 110 degrees in the
shade. Non-union job. About 1973 or
74. And the foreman had a whistle
around his neck. And you got 20 minutes for lunch. And buddy,
if you didn't have a shovel in your hand after 20 minutes, They
blew that whistle wrong. Strict, hard testimony. If you
didn't have a shovel in your hand, you were in trouble. In
fact, my friend that got the job with me, he started getting
sick. They fired him. They fired him. Not one brick shall be diminished.
All Israel. Ephesians 6, we all work in this
world. Verse 5, he says, servants be
obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh. Why are we in this world? God
put us there. Why do we have the job we have?
God gave us the job. Right? He said in 1 Corinthians,
let every man abide in the same calling where he is called. Didn't
he? He says, do it, verse 5, be obedient
with fear and trembling and singleness of your heart as unto Christ. Not with our service as men pleasers,
but as the servants of Christ doing the will of God from the
heart, with good will doing service as to the Lord. Lord, you gave
me this job. Don't let me murmur and complain.
Don't let me groan as if I've got it that bad. You gave me
this job. I don't deserve it. The least
of Thy favors I don't deserve. Lord, let me do this for Your
glory and honor. But get me out. I want to retire. I want to rest. All the world knows, brethren,
it's fact, isn't it? Work, work, work, work, work,
work. Isn't it? That's what this world's about. What were the
people building? What were they doing? Treasure
cities. Every one of them were building Pharaoh's treasure cities. What's that? Brothers and sisters,
this whole world exists to build things for our treasures, those
things we treasure, gold, silver, and houses, and lands, and food,
and clothes, and entertainment, and recreation, and treasures.
That's man's treasures. That's what we're working for.
That's what people work for. Spend their whole life work,
work, work, work, work. It's never enough, is it? It won't
end. It doesn't diminish. Man's desire
will never diminish. The tally of bricks will never
end. You know how many bricks it took to build those? They
were all made by hand. Don't you, our Lord said, don't
lay up for yourselves treasures on earth. Didn't He? What's left in Egypt of those
old treasures? Go over there and see those treasure
cities. They're not there. Those out in the desert you go
and you see those big sphinxes with half their face missing.
At one time everybody thought this is the greatest place in
the world. Now it's turning back to sand. That's everything in this world. The children of Israel began
to realize that. At first, oh, I love Egypt. The lands of Goshen. Ain't this a good place to be?
But God began to make their taskmasters
hard. And they began to be under burdens.
And God sent these burdens and these trials and these afflictions.
They were literally beaten. And they were, until they were
beaten down. And what did it cause them to
do? Groan and cry. And God heard their cry. And
what's God going to do? He sends two deliverers. One
deliverer, but the Word through these two men. Oh brethren. God began to deal with them through
His Word and make them groan because of sin. That's what God
does to all His people. We're in this world. We work
for it. We're just like the Egyptians. We work, work, work, work, work.
This is what I want. I want to make something of myself.
Well, I'm saying this. We've got some young people getting
ready to graduate and trying to decide what to do. We've got
people on a job. Should I get a degree? Should
I further my education? Should I do this and do that? Here's what you should not do.
You should not leave the gospel under any circumstances. Certainly
not to better yourself, because what you do is worsen yourself.
Okay? Do not leave the gospel. Do not
go where there's no gospel. There's no promise of your salvation. No. You hear me? I've seen it
happen too many times. But to get a degree is not easy. To further yourself and job and
all that. As unto the Lord, that you might
do what? Support the gospel. Support your
family. That's fine. It's not your treasure. These
people, that wasn't their city, was it? Ramses, that wasn't the
children of Israel's city. They're going to go to a city,
all right. Jerusalem. So the Lord begins to make His
people see that. This is all sand. And begins
to make them miserable. And sends hard taskmasters. And they're like Lot. You remember
the story of Lot? He was in Sodom. He liked it.
That's where he wanted to be. That's where he went. That's
where he chose to go, didn't he? In chapter 19. I love this
story. The Lord began to vex him. He was vexed. The righteous scripture
says that righteous man was vexed with a conversation with all
that was going around. And sister, when God sent two
angels to Sodom, you know where light was? Sitting in the gate. Blessed are they that sit at
my gates and watch at my gates. Why? He wanted out. And bless God, He sent these
two angels. What'd they do, Kelly? What'd
they do? Grabbed hold of Him! Because the world still had a
little pull on Him, didn't it? And bless God, He wouldn't have
sent the Gospel if He didn't intend to bring them out! Are
you with me? Whoo! You know, worship is somewhere
between a funeral and Pentecostalism. If you can't hear the Gospel
without wanting to do what I just did, I don't know. I'll do it
for you, okay? I don't want everybody doing
that. Seriously. We worship with fear and rejoicing. The Lord sent these two angels
and they laid hold of the Lord being merciful to him and brought
him out and set him outside. Let's sit here. And that's what he does to all
his people. So the Lord sends these hard testmasters, the vexed
history. The Lord sends His words, sends
trials. And Lord, all these trials and
troubles that God's people go through are of the Lord, and
they're good. They're His goodness. They're
His mercy. Or else we'd want to stay here forever. And the
greatest affliction He sends of all, the greatest thing He
vexes us with of all, is our sin. All right, now, let's really
start digging into the story, okay? Here's another meaning,
the surest, truest meaning. God's people are under the law. God's people are under religious
taskmasters. Before deliverance, before salvation,
all of God's people are under the law, and He's a hard taskmaster. It's Romans 7. Egypt was religious. Egypt was religious. They had
many gods. Didn't they? Many gods. In Exodus
12, God said, I'm coming down hard on all the gods of Egypt. That's what He said. I'm going
to destroy every single one of these gods of Egypt. And you're
going to know that I'm God. There's no way. And He did. The gods of this world, this
generation, 99% of professing Christianity don't know the God
of the Bible. 99% of professing Christians
have another Jesus. How do you know, preacher? Because
He's a God that cannot save. Isaiah 45 is where that's written.
They pray to a God that cannot save. I want you to let go and
let God. Let God save you. He's no God
at all if you have to let Him save you. Salvation is up to
the Lord. The God of the Bible saves us,
not vice versa. The God of the Bible chooses
us, not vice versa. The God of the Bible works all
things after His will, not vice versa. Any other God is not the
God of the Bible. It's another God, small g. He
can't save anybody. Anybody that believes in that
God is lost. Still in bondage to that ignorance and that blindness
and that religion under the law. There's people that actually
think, if I don't keep the Ten Commandments, I'm not going to
get to heaven. And they don't hear the law.
They don't hear it. Got a whole bunch of people that
I like, I love, I pray for them. They walk around, they wear these
hats and bonnets and beards and all that, and they're living
according to the law, the Levitical law. No, they're not. No, they're
not. So pick and choose laws. And you offend in one point,
you're guilty of it all. You can't pick what you think
you can keep and leave the rest. Oh, no. You don't want to be under the
law. And it's this serious. Paul said, if righteousness come
by the law, If acceptance with God comes by the law, if you
get to heaven by anything you do, Christ died in vain. He didn't need to come here.
He didn't need to come to bring you to God. You can get there
by yourself. Bless God, John, I can't wait to get through Hebrew,
but I'm going to go ahead and tell you. When he had by himself
purged our sins. And when you find that out, you'll
quit working. He'll rest. Now, all Israel was
in Egypt. I was going to turn to Isaiah
45 and show you. Oh, my. He said, I do this, I
do that. He said, what hath not the potter
power over the clay? That's the God of the Bible.
That's Romans 9 in there. Paul said, He does what He will. Whom He will, He heard not. That's
what we're seeing in it. He's going to deliver Israel.
He's going to harden Egypt. Harden Pharaoh. Now, all Israels
in Egypt working to rest. They work, work, work, work,
and then they go to rest. Working to rest. You remember
when you're out there. This is an older congregation.
Can you remember that far back, Ed? When you're working for leisure
publishing, work, work, work, work. Why? So you can go home
and rest. God says, rest. We started the
first of the week, didn't we? We came here the first of the
week and He says, now just sit down and rest. And hear the good news that it's
been done. It's like one lady said to a
Armenian. Big difference between your religion
and mine. Your religion consists of two letters. Do, do, do, do,
do, do. Mine's four. Done. Rest. Rest. Then go to work. But not to rest. You see? As unto the Lord. As unto the Lord. Israel, after
the Lord gave them rest, I'm getting to the very end of my
message, but Israel, after the Lord gave them rest from those
burdens, from those taskmasters, from being under Pharaoh, and
sent them, all they did for 40 years was sacrifice. Wandered, walking with one another, worshipping the Lord, didn't
they? They worshipped the Lord about every other day. Were they
doing anything? Just eating, drinking, playing? No. What were they doing? They were carrying those poles.
They were carrying those pieces of fabric. They were cutting
wood. It's all about the tabernacle,
you see. Works of faith, labors of love. Are you with me? That's what
they were doing. Worshipping and working as unto the Lord
to do the service unto His people, one another. They were serving
the Lord by serving His people. But they weren't doing it to
be God's people. They weren't doing it to rest. They were doing
it as unto the Lord because He'd given them rest. They couldn't
wait to get that tent, that tabernacle pitched. They wanted to stop. every Sabbath day. Stop. Let's
hear that again. But, you know, the law. Moses
and Aaron were sent by God with good news. A sacrifice. God has a lamb. He's going to
deliver us by the blood of a lamb without shedding of blood. There's
no remission of sin. God's going to deliver us from Egypt, from
our burdens. How? By His Word and by sacrifice. Is that it? That's it. Not you're
going to have to work. Not you're going to have to climb
Sinai. No. Moses said, I'm going to do that for you. Just believe. Is that it? Yes. Really? You reckon any of them
thought, this is too good to be true? Can't be true. No. God's good. God's too good for man to believe. Well, you know, John Chapman and I,
John came and I'm here, like Moses and Aaron, to tell you,
to give you the good news of rest in Christ. His work, His
sacrifice. All who trust Him. Now look at
verse 4 in our text. Verses 4 and 5. The king of Egypt
said to Moses and Aaron, you keep the people from their works.
Verse 5. You're making them rest from
their burdens. He was angry. Don't be talking to these people
about rest. Work! Tell them to put them to work,
Moses' heir, put them to work. No, we can't do that. Are you with me? Now do you know
what this is all about? Verse 9, he said, let more work
be laid on. No, not less, not rest, more
work. Labor therein. Don't let them
regard these vain words, all this talk of rest. That's not how we're going to
build these cities. That's not how they're going to further
themselves. Work! Moses said, no, we're not going
to do that. We're not going to tell anyone.
We're not going to lay heavy burdens on them. We're going
to try to lift these burdens. That's what the Pharisees did
then. They laid heavy burdens on the people. That's what men
preachers do today. That's what the law does. That's
what religion does. Listen, religion without Christ,
without the truth, It's a facade. It's fake. It's phony. No real
life in it. No heart. No God. Paul knew that. He was in it. Legal religion. Romans 10. Read it for yourself.
He said, I had a zeal for God and people have a zeal for God.
It's ignorant and they're going about to establish their rights
and work, work, work, work, work, work. He said, I know I did that.
He said, it's not going to get you anywhere. It's going to get
you damned. I heard the good news. Rest. So that's what Paul preached,
didn't he? Over and over again. Religion without Christ brings
people in. Listen to me. See if this wasn't
you. Religion without Christ brings
people in and keeps people by one, entertainment, and two,
activity. Brings people in by entertainment,
music, inspiring sermons, very little Christ. Certainly no talk
of a sovereign God and His will and His election of a people
and predestination by His grace and the blood and the righteousness. Inspiring sermons of who you
can be and what you can be for God and how far you've come. Social events. Lots of those. Lots of spaghetti dinner, you
know. Looks like they get tired of spaghetti. This is a fact. It's how you bring them in. Activity. Always doing something. Always doing something. Israel, for 40 years, they always
did one thing. Sacrifice. Sacrifice. Is that all you all do? Yes,
it is. Activity. Religion today, once
it gets people in, by attracting them, by bribing them, it gives
them something to do. Give them something to do, keep
them occupied, keep them interested, make them feel wanted and needed.
You're needed here because church can't be church without you. Isn't it? That's so. There's
a brother sitting in this room, probably more than one. who got
religion 35 or more years ago, joined a little church, I think
it was Baptist. 30 days later, I'm talking 30
days later, they made him adult Bible school teacher. Give them something to do. Keep
them, that's how you're going to keep them. See, there's no
substance. It's all a husk of religion.
There's no life in it. It's a facade of religion. If
you want to keep, bring them in. Make them feel special. Entertain
them. Bring them in that way with the
flesh, flesh, flesh, flesh. And you want to keep them, give
them something to do. They keep busy. They won't stop and think.
Won't read their Bibles. That's a fact. Anybody? Anybody happen to? But God's people. born of God. They're brought in one way, John,
usually, by the gospel. They see Christ and Him crucified.
They say Him. They fall in love with Christ.
You don't have to give them something to do to keep them. The gospel
keeps them. They're kept by the power of
God. They're kept by love shed abroad in their heart. Absolute gratitude and thanksgiving
for God's mercy. They heard a message of sovereign
mercy, sovereign love, sovereign grace, blood shed for rotten,
no-good rebels like they were, and they rejoiced. They heard
a message of freedom from the law, deliverance from the law. Born again by the Word, by the
Gospel. They need nothing more than that.
That's what brings them. That's what keeps them. God's
people. And they do one thing for the next 40 years of their
life. Worship the sacrifice. Worship the sacrifice. Well,
look at our text here. Verse 7. Don't give them any
more straw. Let them gather straw for themselves.
to do this building, work these works, build this building. Let
them gather it themselves. Brothers and sisters, is there
anything we provide for our salvation? Is there anything we do to build
this building that's called the Temple of God, the Church of
God, the Kingdom of God? Is there anything we do to add
to that? Do we bring with us anything? Oh, no. Well, who does it then? One man. If he doesn't build
the church, the house, we labor in vain. And it ain't straw. Did you notice what they kept
gathering? Stubble. They went out gathering wood,
hay, and stubble. To build what? It's going to
come down. Don't you love this book? You
want to be preaching this, don't you? The message is the same everywhere.
Wood, hay, and stubble. Rest God Jesus Christ is the
foundation, a sure cornerstone. Gold, He's gold, He's silver,
He's the precious stone on which our salvation is built. They
were gathering wood, hay, and stubble, weren't they? What for? It's all coming down. Look at verse 13. These taskmasters. Hates it.
Fulfill your work. Fulfill your work. These officers
of the Children of Israel, Pharaoh. They were under Pharaoh too.
They were working for Pharaoh. They might have thought they
were doing their own people some good like the publicans. They
weren't. They weren't. If someone hadn't heard this
story, let me tell it to you. My father was in religion long
before the Lord revealed himself to him. He was like Saul of Tarsus,
a zealous young Saul of Tarsus in religion. Southern Baptist
religion. Work, work, work, work. That's all he did. Zealous. Go
out and work. Win souls for Jesus. That's all
they did. And they had all those get-togethers.
They had all that entertainment. Choirs and quartets, and they'd
bring in the best, you know, the Jordanaires and all. Yes,
sir. Yes, ma'am. Biggest, largest Southern Baptist
Church in Eastern Kentucky. One thousand members! Okay? He's a young, zealous,
Saul of Tarsus. Preacher. Preaching zealously. Reading the Bible. Preaching
God's Word. Oh yeah, I'm Southern Baptist.
Blood in the book of the blessed hope. Isn't that what they say?
Isn't that what they say? You are in it. Is that what they
mean? No. It's just a saying. It's work, work, work, work,
work. It's not what he has done. It's what you do. Right? That's what my dad did. Okay. But God sent John the Baptist
to Ashland, Kentucky with a message. And he preached from Romans 8,
1950. Rob Barnard stood up. My dad's
on the front row. He was pastor of this large church
at the time. And Barnard said to my dad, he
said, young man, stand up. He stood up, he said, quote Romans
8, 28. And dad said, you know, nervous,
we know that all things work together for good to them that
love God. And he sat down. Barnard, dad said he thought
he was old at the time. He was only 40. And said Barnard looked over
his reading glass and said, that ain't all of it. Stand up and
tell it all. And dad never heard a man preach
to him like that. Command him with authority. Dad stood up. And we know that
all things work together for good to them that love God and
are called according to His purpose. And Dad said he never, no sinner
got that word purpose out of his mouth. Till Ralph Martin
went, Purpose! Purpose! Purpose! God does all things on purpose! He said, young man, learn about
the God of purpose, you'll know something about the God of the
Bible. Later on he said, you and your
pretty little wife go home and you open up Romans 8 and you
ask God to show you Himself. The God that does everything
on purpose. Not this bystander standing apart. Not this one hopes and wants
and wishes and sent Jesus as a last effort to save people.
No, the God that does everything on purpose. Saved people on purpose. Chosen on purpose. Christ came
with a purpose. Fulfilled that purpose. Finished
the work. Sat down at the right hand of
the majesty on high. The work is finished. And he's
just saying, well, that won't bring people in. Yes, it will.
That won't get people in. Yes, it will. Hebrews 4, and I'll close with
this. Hebrews 4, okay? Let's close with this. So, so
very much. in scripture that speaks of this
rest we have in Christ. Rest from works. So many scriptures
talk about works and grace. So many scriptures tell us that
you're not justified by works of the law. No flesh shall be
justified by the works of the law. You need to quit trying. That the law is bondage. That
the law is a curse. Those people in Egypt, they were
under bondage. Strict taskmaster. They were
under a curse. They could never fulfill the
tally of bricks. They could never get enough bricks
made. They'd no sooner said, well,
we got them made. We need more. Never. Never enough. I'm here to tell
you Christ is enough. Hebrews 4. Hebrews 4. You know, the first three chapters. What is Hebrews all about? Somebody
give me one word what Hebrews is all about. Christ. That's
right. It starts out with how Christ,
after He by Himself purged our sins. Chapter 1. Sat down at
the right hand of the Magistrate on high. And then from then on
it starts telling us what He did. Son over the house. I want all three perfected forever.
Them that are sanctified. He starts telling us. And so
chapter 4. He said, Let us fear lest a promise
be left us of entering into His wrath. His wrath. Are you reading
it with me? Don't take your eyes off that.
Any of you should seem to come short of it. The gospel was preached
to the Israelites. You know, they all didn't go
in. So what happened? Their hearts were still in Egypt.
They wanted to go back. They liked the cities on the
way. Not being mixed with faith and
them that heard it, we which have believed, verse 3, do enter
into rest. Stay with me. As he said, I have
sworn in my wrath that they shall enter into my rest. Although
the works were finished from the foundation of the world,
that is work of creation and work of Christ. But he spake
in a certain place, verse 4, the seventh day. in italics,
Sabbath, on this way. God did rest the seventh day
from all his work. There are people right now trying
to keep this day as a Sabbath, a Christian Sabbath. This is
not the Sabbath day. Yesterday was the Jewish Sabbath
day, yesterday. The Seventh-day Adventists all
think they keep the Sabbath. Every one of them. They think
you have the mark of the beast on you because you worship God
on Sunday. That's exactly what they believe, isn't it? I'm telling
you the truth. They think if you worship God
on Sunday, you have the mark of the beast on you. They've
got the mark of the beast on them. They are under bondage. They are under Pharaoh. They
are under the God of this world who has them bound to the law,
who has them bound under bondage to keep in the Sabbath. What's
the Sabbath all about? What's the last day all about?
The seventh day. The last day, when God finished
the work of creation. God rested. God never quit working. If God quit working, everything
died. But he said when God completed this work of creation, and before
that, long before that, he purposed salvation. It was ordered in
all things, and John, it was sure. And his mind had already
done. But creation was made and everything
in it. You're not to add one single
thing to it. God made it perfect. He looked
at it and said, it's good. My work is good. And it says,
God rest it. That means there's no more work
to be done. Don't let anybody... I think we ought... You think
you ought to what? What if somebody said... What
if one of the angels said, you left this out. Huh? That's what people trying
to keep the law saying. Christ didn't finish the work.
There's something left for me to do. God's angry with that.
He's angry with that. Faith is in Christ. Faith is
in Christ. Faith looks to Christ alone who
finished the work. All right? And the Sabbath represents
Jesus Christ. He's called the Lord of the...
What? Sabbath! Why? We rest in Him. We don't regard a day, we regard
a person. We don't rest in a day, we rest
in a person. We don't even rest in His finished
work, we rest in Him who finished the work. It's a person, he said. He said,
I finished. He said, it's finished. On the
cross, he said, last thing he said on earth, on the cross,
it's finished. He rose again to prove that it
is, that God accepted the sacrifice. He came back, God's pleased.
God's well pleased. It's finished. What's there left
to do? Rest. That's what this is saying. Verse
9 says, There remaineth therefore rest to the people of God. You
see, there's still people trying to keep the Sabbath day. Still
people under the law. Still people under the curse.
It's a curse. It's a curse. It's a curse. Work,
work, work, work. Bless God. In mercy and grace,
he finds some people in religion, he finds other people in the
gutter, he finds people here and there, to deliver them from
the hard taskmaster that is Satan, the god of this world, held captive
by him and his will, to deliver them from religion. Satan's seat
is religion. Oh yeah, he's running it, he's
running it. God lets him have it. He's got so many people under
his dominion. And they all think they're going
to heaven. Saved and sure for heaven as if they're already
there. Not because of Christ, but because of what happened.
The change they've made. My hope, we sung it. Can you sing it with me? My hope
is built on nothing less than Jesus Christ's blood and His
righteousness. Is that your hope? Is He your
hope? If so, That's solid rock. And I'm here to tell you, God
sent me to tell you, like He sent Moses and Aaron, rest. Rest. Finish. Okay, I want to go on. Come back Wednesday. Okay, let's
sing verse number 203.