We see a way that God saves his
people. A way that they've never been
saved before. Israel. He saved us, opened a
new and a living way for us through our Lord Jesus Christ into the
holiest of holies through the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. And here in Exodus 14, God's
leading this new nation of Israel. And in doing this, we have a
typical, typical picture of God's dealing with his elect as he
saves them. And he brings them out. He brought
them out by covenant. Covenant with Abraham and the
promise he made to Abraham. And he brought them out. He brought
them out by covenant and by promise. And as we read and confronted
with these verses of scripture, They're standing here before
the Red Sea. We see how God deals with the
sinner. When the Holy Spirit comes, He begins to convince
the soul of three things of sin. First, because they don't believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. That's sin, not to believe on
Him. The second is, Judgment or righteousness convince
them of righteousness that they don't have one that there's only
one righteousness That's the Lord Jesus Christ and of judgment
Either you're gonna be judged or Christ gonna be judged and
when he convinced you of those three things of sin and righteousness
and judgment and Then he leads that soul into a true sense,
a true sense of its emptiness and its barrenness. And this
has to happen for anyone to ever appreciate salvation. We talked
about it this morning. I mean, God's got to bring a
man down to his emptiness and his barrenness for anyone will
ever, ever appreciate salvation and to be thankful for the grace
of God in our Lord Jesus Christ that saves a sinner. You realize
that you're nothing. And once He makes you nothing,
do you know how long you'll be a nothing? All the days you're on this earth. Before God. Before God. You all are something to me.
But when we stand before God, we're nothing. And we know that. And God leads Israel into the
wilderness. Why? To save them. To save them. Look here in verse
3. So they're here, they're caught
in this place. They're here in the wilderness
and behind them is a bunch of rocks and right in front of them
is the Red Sea. They're in a helpless condition.
This is what's going to happen. For Pharaoh will say of the children
of Israel, they are entangled in the land. The wilderness has
shut them in. And that's the way he looks at
them. They're there. They're shut in. There's no place
for them to go. They got the Red Sea in front of them. They
got wilderness behind them. And how in the world are they
going to get out of this situation? Well, God brings a soul, and
I keep the initial here, into this place, this helpless, helpless
condition. And the Lord led them to this
place. And that's like He leads a convicted sinner to come into
a place that he's got no way out except the Lord Jesus Christ. And they were caught. What does
it say? They were caught and In verse 3 there, they were caught
between the camp between the sea and Beelzebub before the
camp, and camped by the sea. And God brought them to this
place, made Pharaoh to run after them, just to show them, now
listen to me, His wisdom and power is saving them. They were brought to this awful
place where sinners are brought. Here's the enemy, God's broken
holy law. Over here is the judgment and
justice of God. Well, how in the world are we
here and there's that broken law and over here is the justice
and truth of God. How in the world are we going
to be safe between those two things? How's it going to happen? You know, I remember when I first
started learning the gospel, maybe some of y'all remember
when we was in that old building down there, the first couple
of years, all in the world I could preach on is how God could be
just and save sinners like us. And that's the situation they
were in. They're caught here. They can't
go this way and they can't go that way. And here comes Pharaoh. So if God's got His law, you
can't run back to it. And you've got judgment and justice
over here, you can't run into that. So what are you going to
do? You've got one place to go. And
that's what happened. Did God make a mistake? Now He
shows us our human inability. Did God make a mistake in leading
them into this trap? will say the enemy will say I've
got them they're entangled and I've got them shut in and I've
got them I've got them and all but look what happens this is
what happens look down verse 9 and 10 But after the Egyptians pursued
after them, all the horses and chariots of Pharaoh and his horsemen
and his army, and camped beside the sea, and when Pharaoh drew
nigh, the children of Israel lifted up their eyes and behold
the Egyptians marched after them and they were sore afraid and
listen now and the children of Israel done what only we can
do cried unto the Lord What else are they going to do?
What else are they going to do? Listen, they looked over there,
there's a railroad coming. Looked over here, there's a red
seed. Oh Lord, save me. Oh Lord, I
can't get out of this situation. Lord, save me. I'm caught here. I'm caught here. There's no way
I can get out of this. Who else are they going to call
on? Who else are they going to call on? But I tell you, they
only called on Him when they were sore afraid. When you get
sore afraid, sore afraid. The first message I preached
to Scott Richardson back in 1980, I guess it was. I gave him six
reasons why I believed I was one of God's sheep. And the first one was this, God taught me how he could be
just and justify a sinner like me. How can God do that? And I tell
you, whenever you get in this situation and you're caught,
you can't go back, you can't go forward. You can't go this
way, you can't go that way. You can't go back to your religion.
You can't go back to your profession. You can't run to the water. You
can't run to the law. This done convicted you. You can't run over here and say,
oh Lord, just please have mercy on me because I didn't mean to
do it. And there you are, you cry, I
caught, and you become so afraid. How can God have anything to
do with me? Here comes the enemy. I'm surrounded! How in the world am I going to
get out of this? Oh Lord! We're like Bartimaeus! Oh son
of David! Hush, hush, hush! When they told him to hush, he
cried to the Lord and said, O Jesus, my son of David, wilt thou have
mercy on me? And when those disciples were
in that ship and that storm come, our Lord Jesus Christ was laying
there. They woke him up. Carest thou not that we perish? We had stopped. The wind stopped. Oh my. I tell you what, all earthly
help and hope must be cut off before anyone will cry unto the
Lord. I mean it's got to be cut off.
Cut off. A soul has to be shut up to faith
and there's nothing else he can do. When the disciples was walking
with the Lord Jesus, And he said, no man can come unto me like
I told you, except the Father sent me to draw him. They said,
this is a hard saying, who can hear it? And they turned and
walked no more with the Lord Jesus. And he turned around and
looked at all his disciples. He said, I guess you're all going
to go away too then, huh? You're all going to go away.
He said, Lord, go away. Go away. Where could we go? Where could we go? You have the
words of eternal life. Where could we go? That's where
we come to. Peter was walking on the water
and said, Lord, if that's you, bid me come to you. The Lord's
walking on the water toward the ship. If that's you, Lord, Let
me come. Tell me to come. Come on. He stepped off that boat. You
know, he climbed up on the edge of the rail and stepped off on
the water. He was walking. He was walking
on the water. I'm telling you, just like Christ
was. A big old wave rolled over him. He started going down. He was in a helpless, hopeless
situation. You know what he said? Lord save me I perish That's
what's happening to these folks, huh, but oh my And I tell you
what look what the salvation of the Lord look at the salvation
of the Lord now. Oh They cried they cried under
the Lord now look down here in verse 13. Look at the salvation
of the Lord and Moses said unto the people It's the first thing
he said, fear not. Fear ye not. I tell you what,
you fear everything until you hear this from the Lord. Fear
not. Fear sin, fear self, fear flesh,
fear religion, fear carnal reasoning. Fear not. But then he said, stand
still and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will show
you today. When he says stand still, you
know, Psalm 46, it says, be still, be still and know that I am the
Lord. Stand still. Stand still. Cease from your works. Cease from your worrying. Cease
from your fear. Cease from your fear. You're
going to see something. You're going to see some salvation.
And he said, see the salvation. Listen to this. He said, see
the salvation of the Lord. Now I'll say this. I'll say this
and I know everybody here believes this. If they don't, they ought
to. If anyone ever sees and experiences salvation, it will be of the
Lord and the Lord alone. Ain't that right? You know what? Simeon saw the salvation of the
Lord. Abraham saw the salvation of
the Lord. Jacob saw the salvation of the
Lord. Jonah said salvation is of the
Lord. Everybody who's ever been saved
and experienced the grace of God, every single one of them
will say, the Lord saved me. Salvation is of the Lord. Anybody
here that God didn't save by himself? Anybody cooperate with
him? Anybody, did he ask for your
help? Did he ask you to cooperate?
Did he say that I will if you'll let me? No, no, no. He come just
like here. He told him to stand still now.
Just be still. Just stop. You wait. And you go see something. You
go see God save. You go see. And they, their salvation
was not of works nor of words. Look what it says in verse 14.
I love this right here. The Lord shall fight for you. The Lord shall fight for you.
He said, you know what you do? Just keep your mouth shut. Let
the Lord fight the battle. That's what he said. Hold your
peace. Just be quiet. Hold your peace. The Lord shall
fight for you and you shall hold your peace. Oh my. Those Pharisees, how they labored. Paul says, you know, I bear them
record that they have a seal of God, but it's not according
to knowledge. For they go about to establish
their own righteousness and have not submitted themselves to the
righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the
law for righteousness to everyone that believes. And men will labor
and they'll be zealous, but it'll absolutely profit them nothing. In fact, it'll make their combination
worse. Be still and see the salvation
of the Lord. And that's what, you know, that's
why this is the best thing anybody
can do. If they're not saved by the grace of God, God ain't
done nothing for them. Is keep under the sound of the
gospel. Keep under the sound of the gospel.
Stay under the sound of the gospel. That's the only way in the world
that God will speak to you. And God will instruct you and
teach you. And when one of these days you'll say, yep, I see it,
I see it, I got it. I understand it. I understand it. Did I tell you
all about that time over in Cherokee? There was a woman over there.
She'd been old, you know, Henry was. probably in his late 50s
then, early 60s maybe, 50s. But he asked Doris, they had
a meal over there in the evening, and he asked Doris, would you
get me a cup of coffee? Well, this woman heard him, you
know, asked Doris to get him a cup of coffee. She said, well,
she said to herself, why don't he get up and get his own coffee?
And she got mad and she left the service. I could tell you her name. And
she got up and left the service. Upset, mad, aggravated that a
man would ask another woman to bring him a cup of coffee. Sure,
he got fixed me a cup of coffee this evening. We split it. We drank out of the same cup,
off the same side. But that upset that woman, and
she left. She is upset. She said something
about it before she left. About halfway through the service,
she comes back through the door. She comes in the door. The pulpit
is up here and the door is there. She comes through that door.
She comes walking right down to the middle of the aisle and
walks to it about halfway between the last pulpit and the front. And she said, I see the Lord,
I've been so mean and I don't know the Lord and I've been so
hateful and I want you all to know right now that God saved
me. God used her getting mad over a cup of coffee to open
her heart. And she come in there and apologized
to everybody and asked God to forgive her and save her right
there in the middle of that service. And I tell you what, she changed
us like that. Nobody knew that till she told
it later Told it later. Oh God listen he works in mysterious
ways his wonders to perform So, you know, no matter what you
get upset about that may be the very thing that God uses Uses
to save you so it's seen the salvation of the Lord by presence
and by power now look down here in verse 21 and here's the salvation
of the Lord look how miraculous it is verse 21 and Moses stretched
out his hand over the sea and the Lord caused the sea to go
backward by a strong east wind all that night and made the sea
dry land and the waters were a wall under them on the
right hand on the left oh my They're caught! They're caught! And then God said, listen Moses,
lift up that. He said back up there in verse
16, lift up your rod, stretch it out over the sea. And he said,
you divide it. You divide it. And beloved, he
held that up, and the sea parted. I don't know, it had to part
a long, long way. The estimate is that there was
2 million Jews that came up out of Egypt. 2 million of them. And when you've got 2 million
people, you've got babies, you've got grannies, you've got grandmas,
you've got teenagers, you've got old folks, you've got middle
aged, you've got great big families, and then they've got to carry
all their stuff with them at the same time, their needens,
their clothes, their food. So here you've got 2 million
people. And God said he's going to seal
them down through there by fives. Oh, what a way of salvation.
And this is all of God's doing. The blood was shed in Exodus
12. The blood of the lamb was shed and put on the old door.
The blood of the lamb was roasted. That lamb was roasted. Roasted
in God's judgment and justice. That lamb was eaten. That lamb
was taken. And we eat the blood and drink
the blood and eat the flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ in the
gospel. And I'll tell you what, beloved, and after that blood's
been shed, and now they're going to walk on this ground after
the blood's been shed, and after the lamb's been eaten, and the
lamb's been roasted, it's time now to go out. And here they
go. And he saves his manifestus,
saving power, because the blood has been shed. Now their enemy's
behind, they've seen before how they're going to be saved. It'll
take a miracle. It's a miracle. It's an absolute
miracle. It's a supernatural act of God
himself. It'll take the supernatural power
of God. And I'll tell you something,
beloved, God saved them in such a way that he gets all the glory
and they don't get any. What? Listen. People talk about miracles. Miracles. They have a TV show
on one of these channels I've seen before called the Miracle
Network. The Miracle Network. Every soul saved by the grace
of God, wherever they are, whenever it happens, it's a miracle, a
supernatural act of God. It's something that only God
can do. Nobody else can do it. God has
to make the way he's got he's got that the blood's got to be
shed the lambs gotta be roasted the lambs got to in this folks
left there with their stuff the clothes on their feet ever all
their clothes and their feet on Shoes on their feet to leave
out of there And God saves us in such a way That he gets all
the glory. That's what he sung tonight to
God be the glory great things. He has done and Great things He hath taught us,
great things He hath done. And God is open for us, me and
you, for His people a new and a living way. Look with me at
Hebrews 10. I want us to look together at
this in Hebrews 10. Hebrews 10, talking about if we don't see that the salvations
of the Lord through Christ and because of Christ because of
the blood shedding and the Lamb but look what he said here in
verse 19 Hebrews 10 19 having therefore brethren boldness
in that word boldness in the margin means liberty freedom
freedom and liberty to enter into the holiest the holiest
there's two places in the tabernacle that was the holy place when
you come in the door 15 by 15 you went behind the bell that's
the holiest of all that's where the mercy seat was that's that's
where the cherubims were over the golden ark in the mercy seat
and beloved We don't even have to go through the holy way now.
We go straight into the holiest. And you know who our mercy seat
is? The Lord Jesus Christ. You know where the blood's at?
On the mercy seat, our Lord Jesus Christ. And God opened a way
for us through Him, and that's what He says. By the blood of Jesus, by a new
and a living way. The old way was going to the
Tabernacle going through the law offering sacrifice. That's
the old way By a new and living way which he hath newly made. That's what that consecrated
me newly made for us Through the veil, you know, you had to
go behind the veil to get into that holiest place Well, you
know what the veil wasn't Christ Let us in through through the
veil that is to say his flesh so we get to go into the holiest
place Because Christ's flesh was the veil and He took that
veil away. And so we get to go into the
presence of God. And then He said, let us draw
near with the true heart full of assurance. And let's draw
near. Let's draw near. The way through
the sea, this is the thing. The way through that sea had
to be maintained until the last soul got on the other side. You know, God's gonna maintain
the way until the last soul crosses over. And when that last soul
is brought in, mark her down boy, the red seed gonna fall
on all our enemies. Oh my, that's what our Lord Jesus
Christ That's why he said without me you can do nothing. And I
said this morning he said he should lose nothing but raise
it up again at the last days. There was people going across
there carrying babies. One or two day old babies. There
was old women going across there that barely could go. Old men,
middle-aged people, people just like us, all ages and kinds of
people. And it had to stay up there till
two million people went across there. And when that last one
set his foot over here on the promised land, God said, that's
it. There's no danger of the water
Come down upon them and drown them you sometimes think it might
but it won't I said our Lord said this when you go through
the water It shall not overflow Now look at saving faith here.
I've seen this new and living way look here to saving faith
look in verse 15 and and the Lord said unto Moses
wherefore cryest thou unto me speak unto the children of Israel
that they go forward that they go forward and then down in verse
22 and the children of went went into the midst of the sea he
said tell them to start they when they started across there
the first person to step in there stepped on dry ground And they
just kept coming and kept coming. Go forward! Here we go. Here we go. And that's what we do. We go
forward. We're going forward toward Christ. We're looking toward Christ.
Now I want to say a few things about this. They said, God said,
go forward. Don't stand here and look at
me. Don't stand here and think about it. Don't stand here and
wonder about it. Go. And they went. And they went. Beloved, it's
not enough to hear there is a way. That's not enough. It's not enough
to know that there's a way. It's not enough to look and see
the way. To even praise the way. to magnify the wisdom and power
of him who made the way. They had to go into the midst
of that sin. And that's what's got to happen
to anybody. You don't stand there and look
and say, boy, I'll tell you what, I enjoy this way. I like this
way. I like this gospel. I like what
these people believe. I like what everything's going
on here. But I'm telling you what, that ain't enough. You
know what you got to do? You've got to go forward. You've
got to come. Go forward to Christ. You've
got to enter in. Ain't that right? They just stood there. Oh Moses,
what's going to happen? Stand still and see the salvation
of the Lord. Next word was, go forward. Oh my. It must be entered. They went in. to the midst of
the sea. The enemy is hot on the trail.
And what I'm telling you is, lay hold on eternal life. Lay hold on eternal life. I remember years and years ago,
we come just about this close to going into business. And me
a preacher, you know, I come about that close. I had a business
opportunity come about that close getting in it. And I talked to
Scott about it. And you know what Scott said?
He said, you can't hold on to two things at the same time,
preacher. He said, I don't believe I'd
get a hold of that. If I got a hold of anything,
I believe I'd lay hold on eternal life. And that's it. And boy, I tell
you what, that saved me from making a mess. He told me that. You know you're a preacher and
said you can't hold on to two things at the same time. One
of them is going to have to be let go. He said let that go and
lay hold on eternal life. Never forget that. And I've laid
hold on it and still laying hold on it. Lay hold on eternal life. And
that's what I'm telling you. You know there's no condemnation
to who? Them that are in Christ Jesus, huh? Oh, then look at
this blessed, blessed protection. Verse 19 and 20. And the angel of God, which went
before the camp of Israel, removed and went behind them. Got up
and went behind them. An angel did now that made this
thing. He sat in front of them, he got up and went behind them.
and the pillar of the cloud which went from before their face and
stood behind them. And it came between the camp
of the Egyptians and the camp of the Israelites. And it was
a cloud and darkness to them, but it gave light to night by
these, so that the one came not near to another." And what a
place of safety. What a place of safety. Our enemies
This world is dark to them. The thing is dark to them. To
us, it's light. On one side, it's dark. The other
side, it's light. Paul said, if our gospel be hid,
it's hid to them that are lost. But those who are in the way,
those who are in the way, going through this wilderness here,
they're going to be protected. Who's going to protect them?
The angel of God. The angel of God, our Lord Jesus
Christ. It's called the pillar of His
presence. And there's such a difference
in us and in the world. Egypt, they see darkness, we
see light. Talked about election this morning.
You talk about election to somebody that don't believe it, and it's
darkness to them. But bright light to us. We talk
about the righteousness of Christ. Beautiful, bright light to us.
Darkness to them. Sins past, present, and future
gone. That's darkness to them. They
got to stop their own sinning. Oh my. Oh bless His name. They want war. We want peace.
They love darkness. We love light. They walk in darkness.
We walk in the light. And I'll tell you something.
God's people will be kept in this way. And the scripture says
they came not nigh to each other. Thank God He separated them.
He going to separate us one of these days. Oh, bless His name. Let me show you something else.
I'm going to wind it up. Look here in chapter 15 verse
1. After God saved them, took them
through the Red Sea, salvation to the Lord, going to fight their
battles for them, took them in, protected them, preserved them. Look at this psalm. Then sang
Moses. They got to the other side there.
Moses wrote a psalm. Moses wrote a psalm. I tell you,
it's something to sing about, ain't it? When the Lord saves
you. Then sang Moses. That's what the psalmist said.
The Lord hath picked me up out of an horrible pit, out of a
miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goads,
and put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God. Then
sang Moses and the children of Israel this song unto the Lord. And Spake, saying, I will sing
unto the Lord. Listen to this. For he talked
gloriously, gloriously. The horse and his rider hath
he thrown into the sea. And oh my. And the children of Israel, when
they got over there, look down here in verse 30, I want you
to see this real quick. I forgot about bringing this
in here. Thus the Lord saved Israel that day out of the hand
of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians dead upon the
sea shore. All of our enemies were dead. We won't have to face them again.
We ain't going to have to face our sin. We ain't going to have
to face judgment. And there ain't nothing coming after us that
could hurt us. They look back and all them folks they're scared
of, they're dead. All our sins are dead, gone. But oh, look at this song here.
And I'm just, that's verse 2 says this. The Lord is my strength
and song. He has become my salvation. He
is my God, and I will prepare Him a habitation in my Father's
God, and I will exalt Him. Not unto us, O Lord, not unto
us, but unto thy name be glory. Thanks be unto God, which always
causes us to triumph in Christ. Let me, you read this on your
own time. There are three thines in this song. 10 dows, 11 dyes, dime, dow and dyes. But guess what's not mentioned
in there? No me's. No me's. No me's in there. Thank God for salvation Oh Thank
God for salvation And I tell you beloved. I know I know it's
a miracle. I Know that my salvation is an
utter and absolute miracle