All right, if you would, open
your Bibles again with me to Exodus chapter three. I titled the message this morning,
What is His Name? Last week, we looked at what
is your name. Today, I want to look at what is his name. I'd
say everyone here is familiar with the birth of Moses. Moses
was born at a time that the Egyptians were killing all the Jewish babies. They were afraid that the Egyptians
were getting too strong and too many, so they were killing all
the Jewish boy babies. So Moses' mother, when she gave
birth to him, saw he was a son. She hid him in a little basket
in the reeds, and Pharaoh's daughter found Moses, fell in love with
that cute little baby boy, and she took him, raised him as her
own son. Moses, the son of slaves, was
raised as the grandson of Pharaoh. You think of that. And they hired
Moses' own mother to be his nanny. God caused Pharaoh to raise and
educate the man who would come and deliver Israel from Egypt. I just love that. I love that
God's providence and accomplishing his will, only God could do something
like that. Caused Pharaoh to raise the man
who would destroy Egypt. And when Moses was an adult,
he was raised under Pharaoh, and his mother told him who he
was, I'm sure, and told him about the Lord. Moses was educated
and was a powerful, powerful man. He decided now was the time
for him to deliver Israel. He saw an Egyptian who was abusing
one of his brethren, one of the Israelites, and Moses killed
him. He's not going to put up with
this. He thought now all Israel's going to follow me, you know.
But they didn't. They didn't. Moses found out
he could not deliver Israel in his timetable by his own wisdom,
by his own strength, by his own way. And Moses fled Israel in
shame. Went across the desert by himself.
And one day he came across a well. There's a group of girls there,
a group of sisters. They were the daughters of Jethro.
He ended up marrying one of those Daughters. He had to have something
to do. Wasn't in Egypt anymore. He didn't
think, well, I'm not going to be the deliverer of Israel. My
mother must've been wrong. I need a job. So his father-in-law
gave him a job. He kept his father-in-law's sheep.
He was a shepherd. At the start of Exodus chapter
three, Moses has been a shepherd for 40 years. 40 years. And that is when Moses
met the Lord. Moses saw a bush that was burning,
but was not consumed, and he met the Lord in that burning
bush. And the Lord tells Moses, now you go back to Egypt. Now's
the time. You go back to Egypt and you
lead my people out of Egypt. And Moses said, Lord, you got
the wrong man for the job. Something's not right here. I'm
not your man. Who am I to do such a great thing? I tried this once and failed
miserably. You got the wrong man, Lord.
So he says in verse 11, And Moses said unto God, who am I? That I should go unto Pharaoh
and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of
Egypt. And look over again, chapter
four, Moses still arguing the point here in verse 10. Moses
said unto the Lord, oh my Lord, I'm not eloquent, neither heretofore
nor since thou has spoken unto thy servant, but I'm slow of
speech and slow of tongue. Now, at one point in his life,
Moses wouldn't have said that, would he? 40 years ago, he wouldn't
have said this. 40 years ago, Moses had to be
one of the most educated men in all the earth. This man was
a statesman. He was an orator. He operated
in the highest levels of the most powerful nation on earth
at that time. Now 40 years has passed. He'd
been out in the wilderness on the backside of a mountain for
40 years talking mostly to Jethro Sheep. Moses had forgotten how
to speak. It took God 40 years to whittle
Moses down to size, didn't it? And Moses said, I can't speak. I'll just stammer around and
nobody will listen to me because I'm not smooth. Who am I? And you any preacher worth his
salt thinks that every single time he gets up to preach Who
am I? How can I possibly Get up and
talk to God's people. How can I possibly with this
fleshly tongue with this failing mind? How can I possibly? Talk about the eternal God to
souls going into eternity How can I possibly do that? How can I possibly talk about
the name of the eternal God? Wonderful, counselor, the mighty
God, the everlasting father, the prince of peace. How can
I talk about that name? That name that's above every
name. How can I possibly talk about
the salvation of souls accomplished by the son of God? How can I
possibly do that? And when I have the opportunity
to hear somebody preach, I think the same thing. How can I possibly
hear? How am I ever going to hear? How can I hear the name
of the Lord and believe Him and trust Him? How can I possibly? How can I? I thought as I'm going
through the lesson this morning, but God, just felt like I floundered
around in the deep end, you know? How can I possibly? And then
Moses asked a very good question. If I'm gonna go, what am I gonna
tell him your name is? Verse 13. Moses said unto God,
behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and I shall
say unto them, the God of your fathers has sent me unto you.
And they shall say to me, what's his name? What shall I say unto
them? Now this is a fair question.
If I'm gonna go tell somebody, now you listen to me. You believe
me. You believe what I'm telling
you. And you follow me. You trust me. I'm going to take you somewhere.
You follow me. I'll take you where we're supposed
to go. They're going to say, who are you? They're going to
ask the same question I just asked a minute ago. Who are you?
Why should I listen to you? Who sent you with this authority? If you look over in chapter five
of Exodus, you know, Pharaoh asked the same question. Exodus five verse two. And Pharaoh
said, now I know he's asking this in a different tone and
a different attitude, but it's the same question. Who is the
Lord that I should obey his voice to let Israel go? I know not
the Lord, neither will I let Israel go. Who are you? Who is
this that sent you? The authority that you have came
from the one that sent you. I mean, did Jethro send you?
Did your wife send you? Who sent you? And then God reveals
his name to Moses. In verse 14, God said unto Moses,
I am that I am. And he said, thus shalt thou
say to the children of Israel, I am has sent me unto you. God says his name is I am. And
all the many different names of the Lord, they all mean something. They mean something, describing
his character. In the Old Testament, people's
names often meant something. Jacob, chief. That described
Jacob, didn't it? Your name means something. And
even today, when you hear someone's name, you think about the character
of the person that you know. God would warn our young people
that you take care of your name. Your name is your reputation.
You take care of your reputation. You conduct yourself well. Don't
act like a fool. Conduct yourself well. So when
people hear your name, they think of a kind and an honest person.
a hardworking person. Don't conduct yourself so when
people hear your name, they think about a horse's hind end. Conduct
yourself better so when people hear your name, it means something
good. It means something good. I'll give you two examples. Two
names. Adolf Hitler. Everybody here got an image in
your head, didn't you? Just all sorts of evil and wickedness
and meanness That's what that name means, isn't it? And then
I thought of the name Abraham Lincoln. Boy, you immediately
got a thought in your head, didn't you? Here's a man who would protect
the union at all costs. He'd protect liberty, he'd protect
freedom at all costs. See, those names mean something
about the character. See, your name means something
good. Conduct yourself well. Well, in the same way, the name
of our Lord God describes who God is. It tells us what God
is like. I want to know the name of the
Lord. And ask what is the name of the
Lord is asking this. Who is the Lord? And how does
he save sinners? That's what the name of the Lord
tells us, and that's what I want us to look at. And I don't just
want us to know. How academically? What is the Lord's
name? Like we could fill in the blank,
you know, his name is Jehovah Sidkenu. His name is Jehovah
Jireh. I want us to consider this. We go through this, the
name of the Lord, his character. Do I know him? Do I know his
name? Do I trust him? That's what I
want us to know. Now, the one speaking to Moses here out of
the burning bush, he said, his name is I am. This is none other
than Christ our Savior. Look over at John chapter eight
and I'll show you that. This is a pre-incarnate appearance
of Christ our Savior. I know it's him because this
is the name he took to himself. John eight, verse 24. I said therefore unto you that
you should die on your sins. For if you believe not that I
am. Now you'll notice that word he is in italics, it's been added
by the translators. Our Lord didn't say I am he.
He said if you believe not I am, you'll die in your sins. Look
over verse 58 in the same chapter. Jesus said unto them, verily,
verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am, I am, this
is my name. He's telling them I'm God. I'm
the eternal God, and they knew exactly what he was saying. Look
at verse 59. And they took up stones to cast
at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple, going
through the midst of them, and so passed by. You know, they
understood, that's why they're taking up stones, because he
made himself to be God. You may ask them one time, what
are you trying to stone me for? Is it for my good works? And
they say, oh no, it's not for your good works. They say, it's
because you being a man make yourself to be God. They understood,
and he said, my name is I Am. The Lord Jesus Christ, the savior
of his people, is God. I don't think we can say that
too often. It's not like he's God. He's
not a light version of God. He is God. I love thinking about
that, because if he's God, Chris, he can't fail. He cannot fail
to save those he came to save. He's God. And this is our Lord
Jesus Christ, the savior, speaking to Moses, And when he tells Moses
his name, he reveals to Moses how he saved sinners. And that's
what I want us to look at now. Do I know his name? Do I know
God's character? Do I know how it is that he saved
sinners? So first, what is the name of
the Lord? What's his character? Well, the Lord is self-sufficient.
That's his character. Look at Exodus three again, verse
one. Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law,
the priest of Midian, And he led the flock to the backside
of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Oreb.
And the angel of the Lord, this is the angel, the messenger of
the Lord, the pre-incarnate appearance of our Savior, 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. And Moses said, I will now turn
aside and see this great sight, why the bush is not burned. Now
Moses saw there was a bush on fire, The fire kept burning. He expected that fire to go out. It was probably a small bush.
He expected the bush and the fire to burn out. But the fire
didn't burn out. The bush was not being consumed
by the fire. The fire burning in that bush
did not need the wood to be fuel. It wasn't burning up the fuel.
It wasn't burning up the wood. See, the Lord was in the bush.
The fire, his Shekinah glory, I don't know, it was a fire of
some sort. And the Lord was in the bush giving us a picture
of who he is. Our God is self-sufficient. He's in need of no one. He's
in need of nothing. The Lord does not need you and
me to do something to help him accomplish his will. He's self-sufficient. Now that can be hard for us to
understand because that is the polar opposite of you and me,
isn't it? We are so totally dependent on God. We need the Lord to give
us our very next breath. I mean, you think that the most
easy thing in this world to do is breathe. Until the Lord doesn't
give you the next breath. I mean, we need him to breathe.
We need him for the next heartbeat. There's not one person you're
thinking, telling your heart to beat. It just does. We need
the Lord to give us the next heartbeat. We need to give him
us life and health. We need him to give us food and
water. You and I can't live for a nanosecond without God. Not
a nanosecond. Well, this bush was showing God
is self-sufficient. It burned and was not consumed.
But you know, that's also a picture of how God saved sinners. The
fire and the wood. This is a picture of Christ and
his deity and his humanity. The fire is a picture of the
deity of Christ. You know, fire is a picture of
the whole holiness, the holy justice, the holiness of Christ,
that light to which no man can approach unto. The fire is also
a picture of God's judgment against sin. That's what the burnt offering
show. When they offered a burnt offering,
that fire that burnt up that offering, that's God's judgment,
his wrath against sin. And the wood is a picture of
the humanity of Christ. Scripture calls him a root out
of a dry ground. Well, by the time Christ was
born in Bethlehem, David's house, that big tree, was just a twig
sticking up out of the desert ground, wasn't it? It was there. It was a twig. It was just a
root sticking up out of dry ground. That's our Lord Jesus Christ.
He's both God and He's man. The Son of God, the Son of man.
This is heavenly arithmetic. It won't work any other way.
He's 100% God. and 100% me. And do you know
that's the only way sinners can be saved? It's by the God-man. He's got to be God so he's holy,
can satisfy God. And he's got to be a man so he
can be our representative, take our place as our substitute.
Only the God-man can save sinners. And that's what he's showing
at this burning bush. And it doesn't say this, but the meaning
of the word, you can look it up, tells us. This is a thorn
bush. It wasn't just any old bush,
it was a thorn bush, specifically. Now, why a thorn bush? Well,
you know, thorns are pictures of the curse of sin. Thorns didn't
start growing until Adam's sin, did they? God said, cursed is
the ground, Peter said. Thorns and thistles show up,
bring up to you. Thorns are a picture of the curse of sin. Well, the
Lord Jesus Christ, the sinless, holy Son of God, came in the
flesh. He obeyed God's law perfectly.
He established perfect righteousness. And then when he went to Calvary,
he was made sin for his people. They didn't just put any old
wreath upon his head, did they? When they were mocking him as
king? No, they put a crown of thorns on his head. They probably
thought, because it'll hurt when we push it down on his head.
That's what they thought. God gave that to us as a picture.
This is the Savior bearing the curse of sin, bearing those thorns. He bore the curse of sin. When
our Savior was made sin for His people. Again, you know what
went through my head? Who am I to talk about this?
How can this stammering tongue talk about something so marvelous?
When the Son of God was made sin, He bore everything that
sin is, with the exception of committing it. He bore the guilt
of sin. That's why the Father put Him
to death. He bore the guilt of sin. He bore the shame of sin. He said, I'm not able to look
up. His greatest shame wasn't hanging naked on a hunk of wood
for people to mock at. He was naked before his father.
He bore the shame of sin. And he suffered everything that
sin deserves. He suffered the punishment of
that sin. And probably the worst punishment
for our Savior, the worst thing that he had to endure was his
father separated himself from his son. God's son is the son of his love. Read about that in Proverbs chapter
eight. He was daily with his father,
daily his delight. And Calvary, the father did not
give mercy and grace and his loving smile to his son. He turned
his back on him and gave him all the wrath that a holy God
has against him and poured it out upon his son. At Calvary, Christ our Savior
was made to be the burnt offering for the sin of his people. He
burned under the fire of God's wrath against sin. But now here's
the question. Scripture says our God is a consuming
fire. If our God is a consuming fire,
why wasn't the Lord Jesus consumed by the fire of his father's wrath?
Huh? Why wasn't he consumed? Our God's
a consuming fire. The Savior was not consumed.
You know why he wasn't consumed? It's because of his holiness,
because of his righteousness, because he, even though he was
made sin for his people, he is still the sinless sacrifice.
And normally all the sacrifices offered under the law that were
burned, normally the fire did consume the sacrifice, didn't
it? Just consumed it down to ashes. They disposed of the ashes
later on. But when Christ was sacrificed
for sin, The fire didn't consume the sacrifice. Christ, the sacrifice,
consumed the fire. Christ suffered under the fiery
wrath of his father, his father's hatred of sin. He poured that
fire out upon his son until sin was gone. And when sin was gone,
the fire quit. When sin was put away under the
blood of Christ, the fire quit. The sacrifice consumed the fire,
That's why the father can save his people. There's no fury left
in me. I poured it all out upon your substitute. Your substitute
exhausted it. So there's no fury left for you.
All that's left for you is mercy and grace and forgiveness. And
when sin was gone and the fire went out, then Christ gave up
the ghost. See, the fire didn't make him
die. It didn't take away life from him. The fire went out because
sin's gone and Christ gave up the ghost. It wasn't taken from
him. He gave up the ghost. And he died because the law demands
death for sin. Christ died. But he was not destroyed,
was he? His body was not consumed. He
died, but his body did not see decay. Three days later, he arose
from the grave in glorified flesh. Now, the scars were still there,
the scars from the nails in his hands, in his feet, the scar
from the spear in his side, the scars from the crown of thorns
on his head. but he was raised in glorified
flesh. You know why he didn't stay dead? All the sin that was
charged to him was gone. See, sin is the reason for death.
Where there's no sin, there can't be death. So he was raised from
the dead as proof positive. His sacrifice put away all of
the sin of all of his people. Now God is just when he forgives
the sin of his people. Christ died for you. The Father
is just and right to be merciful to you, to forgive your sin and
to accept you. That's the gospel of the burning
bush. That's how God saves sinners. All right, number two. Now, what's
the Lord's name? What's his character? The Lord
is holy. I've heard preachers say that
God's main attribute is his love. I mean, they're brethren of mine.
You know, the men I love, they make a good case for that. But
I tell you what, I have to say this. God's main attribute is
his holiness. God is holy. That's his character. Everything he does must be holy.
Verse four. And when the Lord saw that he
turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of
the bush and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, here am I. And he
said, draw not nigh hither. Draw off thy shoes from off thy
feet. For the place whereon thou standest
is holy ground. Now take off your shoes, Moses.
Now taking off your shoes at that time, it was a sign of humility
and a sign of reverence. Moses could approach the bush,
couldn't he? This is where God is. He could approach God. But
it had to be in humility. It had to be in reverence. And
the same thing's true today. You and I, we can approach God. We can come to God, but only
in reverence, only in humility and worship. Really, it's an
amazing thing that Almighty God allows sinners to approach him.
That's got to be in our humility, but he allows it. If we come
to God confessing in our humility, there is nothing about me God
would accept. There's no merit in me that would make God accept
me. The only way I can approach God is to come in Christ, in
the merit of Christ, in the person of Christ. You know, if you come
that way, you'll be accepted. Come with that humility, with
nothing in me that will make God accept me, but there is in
Christ. I'm coming in Him. God accepts you. You can come
right to His very throne. Another thing taking your shoes
off meant at that time was shame. Remember the near kinsmen? He would not redeem Ruth. He
was the near kinsman. He had the right. He had the
ability to do it. He had the money to do it. But
he said, I'll mar my inheritance. I can't split my inheritance
up that way. And he took off his shoe and walked home. I don't
know if it was one shoe on, one shoe off, or it was barefoot.
I don't know. But the reason he did that was shame. I could
have redeemed her. I was a near kinsman. I should
have redeemed her. But I didn't. That's my shame. Taking off your
shoes means you're shamed. I tell you what, come to God
in your shame. Don't try to clean up first so
you think I look better and God will accept me because I've cleaned
up, made myself look better. Come to God in all of your shame. He'll clothe you. He'll take
the shame away. But we gotta come in our shame.
It's shameful that I don't do something that would please God.
Everything about me, my sin, my nature, it's shameful. Coming
in my own name, it's shameful. If I come to God that way, He'll
accept me. He'll accept me. Then it used to be thought of
as a person, if they walked around barefoot, that's a poor person,
isn't it? A hillbilly going around like,
you know, barefoot, a little orphan auntie or something, you
know? And that way, Loretta Lynn described it, Nicole Minor's
daughter. In the summertime, we didn't have shoes to wear.
She said that's how she's describing her poverty. This is so amazing. If we approach
God in our poverty, bankrupt, penniless, come to Him in our
poverty, pleading that Christ is our all, God will accept us. Now, if I come pleading Christ
plus my little penny I got, you know, my little bit of goodness
I got, He won't accept me. But if I come empty, bankrupt,
poverty stricken, I don't have anything but Christ, that's how
poor I am, God will accept you. And then this is just me. I don't
know if this is you, but this is me. I think of Barefoot as
being comfortable. A lot of our little ones, they
take off their shoes all the time, I think. I understand.
Boy, as soon as I got home, I'd take off my shoes. I mean, I
just go around the house barefoot, my stocking feet all the time.
It's barefoot, that's comfortable, isn't it? We had Henry and Doris over our
house one time, and we'd had dinner, and we were sitting there
talking. And Henry kicked off his shoes and put his feet up
on the coffee table. And James said, I'm so glad he
did that. He felt comfortable. Just take his shoes off and just
sit and talk with him. It's just comfortable. Do you know a sinner can comfortably,
confidently come before the throne of grace, pleading nothing but
Christ, pleading just faith in Christ. You can come comfortably
before almighty God. The only explanation for that
is God's grace. God's grace. Now look over to
Exodus chapter 34. I told you now God's main character. God is holy. He's holy. He's just, he can't look on sin. He will by no means clear the
guilty. Exodus 34 verse six. This is
another time God passed by Moses proclaiming more of his name
to Moses. And the Lord passed by before him and proclaimed,
the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering
and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands,
forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. And that will by no
means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon
the children and upon the children's children, unto the third and
to the fourth generation. And Moses made haste and bowed
his head toward the earth and worshiped. Now, can somebody
please explain to me how it is God can forgive sin, forgive
iniquity, forgive transgression, but also never clear the guilty? How's that possible? Well, the
only thing he can be talking about there is the sacrifice
of Christ. At Calvary, the father made his
son, I mean his son, the son of his love, made him sin for
his people. I don't know about you, but I would make allowances for
my children. I would. If, I don't know how
long ago it was, Holly had called her mama, she had a bad day at
work, and then a block from my house, I had a rolling stop. There was a stop sign. It was
night after dark, you know. And the policeman in the center
gave me a ticket. And I think, can't you just let her go? I
mean, I know you've got to stop at a stop sign. But somebody
else's child, I said, yeah, give him a ticket. Not mine. You know,
I want to make allowances for my baby, you know. The father
is holy. And the greatest evidence of
it that I can think of is this. When he made his son sin for
his people, He made his son guilty. He did not clear the guilty.
He put him to death by his own hand. It was the father that
thrust the sword of justice into the heart of his fellow. The
father put his son to death because his son had been made guilty
and the father would not clear him. He slaughtered him. And
now, because the sacrifice of Christ has put away all of the
sin of all of his people, The father is just and right and
holy to forgive sin and inequity because it was paid for by the
blood of his son. Now you come to God pleading
for mercy based on the merit, based upon the sacrifice, based
upon the blood of Christ and the father, the holy father will
accept a sinner like you and forgive you. Isn't that something? Oh my goodness, that just makes
my hair stand up on end, my spine tingle. That's the Lord's character,
he's holy. He made it so that he is holy
and right to forgive the sin of his people. Number three,
what's the Lord's name? What's his character now? The
Lord God is a covenant God. Verse six, back in our text here. Exodus chapter three. Moreover,
he said, I'm the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of
Isaac and the God of Jacob. And Moses hit his face for he
was afraid to look upon God. And you know why the Lord appeared
unto Moses at this time, at this exact time and told Moses, now's
the time, Moses, 40 years ago wasn't, now's the time you go
deliver my people Israel from Egypt. You know why he's doing
this? Because this is what God promised he'd do. See God's a
covenant God. A covenant is a promise. God
promised Abraham, Your descendants are going to go down into Egypt
for 40 years, 400 years. And after that, I'm going to
bring them out. Well, 40 years ago, it was only 360 years. What
time was it? Now is the time God promised
he would deliver Israel. And he's doing it. Because God
always keeps his promise. This would be a good thing for
us to keep in mind. God never reacts to what men
are doing. You know that. God doesn't have
to always see, oh, they're doing this. I got to make a slight
correction here, kind of like an autopilot on a plane. Now I guess they got autopilots
in cars, too. I don't know if I ever trust one of those, but
they got them. And it just sees, oh, because of the wind conditions
or different conditions, I need to go a little right. I need
to go a little left. I need to speed up. I need to slow down a little
bit. Constantly making corrections to keep that thing on course.
God doesn't have to make corrections to keep his purpose on course.
He doesn't react to what men are doing. Men are doing what
God determined before to be done, what He purposed for men to do
from before the foundation of the world. So everything God
does is just fulfilling His covenant, His promise to save His people
by His grace. And you know why God saves His
people? We keep preaching the gospel, the Lord reveals Himself
to some poor soul, and they say, I see. I believe. I believe. I want to confess Christ in baptism.
I believe this is the way He saved me. His death, His burial,
His resurrection. You know why God revealed Himself
to that poor soul? He promised He would. He promised
He would. And God's covenant, the fact
that God always keeps His promise, that's our assurance of salvation.
We could never be confident of salvation if our salvation had
to depend on our works to earn it Never could, we can be confident
of death. We can be confident of damnation,
but we can never be confident of salvation. Oh, but if our
salvation is conditioned, is based upon the promise of God,
you can be sure of that. You can be sure of it. I don't
care how dark the hour, you can be sure of it because God always
keeps his promise. That's the assurance of our salvation.
All right, fourthly, what's the Lord's name? What's his character?
the Lord's the deliverer of his people. Verse seven. And the
Lord said, I've surely seen the affliction of my people, which
are in Egypt. I've 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 onto a good land and a large onto a land flowing with milk
and honey under the place of the Canaanites and the Hittites
and the Amorites and the parasites. and the Hivites and the Jebusites.
Now therefore behold, the cry of the children of Israel has
come unto me. I have also seen the oppression wherewith the
Egyptians oppressed them. Come now therefore, and I will
send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people,
the children of Israel, out of Egypt. Now you take comfort in
this. God's people who are tried, suffering
in deep waters, you take comfort in this. God always sees his
people. Always. He sees our afflictions.
He sees the need of His people. Wherever you're at, whatever
it is you're going through, the Lord sees you. The Lord sees
you. He knows. And He's just waiting
the right time to do something about it. He's just waiting.
So you cry to Him. And you keep waiting on Him.
He hears. He sees your affliction. He hears your cries. Keep crying
to the Lord. He always hears. Always. He's
just waiting for the right time to answer. Isn't this the way
our Lord taught us to pray? About that woman with the unjust
judge? You keep crying out to the Lord.
You keep calling on Him. He'll hear you. He'll hear you. You know, that kind of prayer,
we keep crying on the Lord. We keep crying to Him. We keep
crying to Him. We keep looking to Him. You know,
that's a good prayer. Because that kind of prayer honors
the Lord. It shows our total dependence
on Him. I'm not going anywhere else. I didn't cry to the Lord
for a while and that didn't work, I'll try something else. Now
I keep crying to the Lord because I've got nowhere else to go.
I've got no other hope but Him. He hears. He sees. And people call Moses the deliverer,
don't they? But that's not so. The Lord's
the deliverer of His people. I know He uses means, but there
in verse 8 He says, I am come down to deliver them. I'm going
to do this. The Lord delivered Israel from
Egypt as a picture of how he delivers his people from the
bondage of sin. The Lord delivered his people
to that Passover land, didn't he? Boy, when the firstborn was
killed in the house of all those Egyptians, didn't have blood
on the door, didn't have a lamb sacrificed for that firstborn,
they thrust Israel out, didn't they? They said, we don't want
you here anymore. The Lord delivered his people to that Passover land. Well, that's a picture of how
God delivers his people from sin. It's by the name of God,
suffering and dying in their place. Having his blood applied
to our hearts, justice is satisfied. There's been death in this home.
So God passes over, spares. That's how God delivers his people
from their wrath. They're delivered. The Lord delivered
his people by paying the redemption price for their sin. There's
a price on their head, and the Lord paid it. There's a price
put on their head by God's own law, God's own justice, and God's
the one who paid it. A friend of God, the Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ died for you to pay your redemption price.
You're going free. The law can't hold you anymore.
You're going free. The price has been paid. And
by his power, the Lord's going to deliver his people. from trials
and afflictions and suffering, he'll keep delivering them time
and time again until it's time to bring you home. Now you take
comfort in this. I've never really seen this before,
but I read this this week and it applies to this passage. If
you're one of God's children, you're going to endure the fire
of trouble, trial, tribulation, but that fire is not going to
destroy you any more than it destroyed that bush. The fire
will burn off some dross. It'll hurt some. It'll burn off
that dross. But you want to get rid of the dross anyway, don't
you? But it'll never destroy you. The master refiner will
deliver you. He'll deliver you when it's time.
He's the deliverer of his people. You just keep looking to him.
Keep calling to him. He hears. He sees. Then here's
the last thing quickly. What is the Lord's name, his
character? He's eternal, unchanging. Verse 13. And Moses said unto
God, behold, I am come unto the children of Israel, and shall
say unto them, the God of our fathers, your fathers, has sent
me unto you. And they shall say to me, what's
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 has sent me unto you. Now the old timers called the
name I am, the isness of God, the isness of God. God always
is. He is. It's not, you can't really
say God will be this or God was this. He always is. He's always the same. God dwells
outside of time. So he's unaffected by time. The
Lord is today what he always was. He just is. And God will
always be what he is right now. He is. He's unchanging. His personality
never changes. His purpose never changes. The
events of our lives do not affect the Lord or change him in any
way. He's the one that ordained for
them to happen. They don't come to him as a surprise. He ordained
for these things to happen before the foundation of the world.
So they're not going to change him. Nothing that ever has happened
on earth changed the Lord's mind. God created man, put him in the
garden and he fell. And I guess you can't get any
worse than dead. You can't get any worse than totally depraved.
But it seems, by the way we look at things, men just keep getting
worse and worse and worse and worse and worse and worse, finding
new ways to sin, new ways of depravity, new ways of debauchery. Nothing that happened in time,
may God say, I've lost my patience with this. I'm not gonna send
a redeemer for thee. Now in the fullness of time,
Christ came and he died for his people. put their sin away. And
as much as we hate our sin now, nothing we do will make God cast
us out because the price has been paid. See, that's the assurance
we have of our salvation. Our God does not change. What
did he say? I am the Lord Jehovah. That's
my name. I am the Lord. I change not. Therefore, sons of Jacob are
not consumed. I don't know about you, but that's
the Lord I want to know, and that's the Lord I want to trust,
and I hope we do. Let's bow together. Father, how we thank you for
this revelation of your precious name. How we thank you for this
revelation of how it is you save sinners in justice and mercy,
in truth and grace. Father, how we thank And Father,
I beg of you that you would take the stammering words of the preacher
and take your word and make your people hear your word, not the
words and ideas of a man, but hear your word. Take your word
and apply it to the hearts of your people. Fathers, for your
glory, for the glory of Christ our Savior, it is for our good,
but Father, for your glory, would you get glory in revealing your
name to us here this morning. So we leave here believing, trusting
in, and loving in that precious name. It's in the name of our
Lord Jesus Christ. For his glory and his praise,
we pray. Amen. All right, Sean.