Exodus chapter 33. Start reading
verse 9, and then I'll jump to verse 12-17.
Exodus 33, just to kind of bring us up to what's going on. And Moses, I'm sorry, and it
came to pass as Moses entered into the tabernacle, the cloudy
pillar descended and stood at the door. of the tabernacle,
and the Lord talked with Moses. So that's where we're at, that's
what's going on. Now in verse 12, and Moses said
unto the Lord, see, thou sayest unto me, bring up this people,
and thou hast not let me know whom thou wilt send with me. Yea, thou hast said, I know thee
by name, and thou hast also found grace in my sight. Now therefore,
I pray thee, if I have found grace in thy sight, show me now
thy way, that I may know thee, that I may find grace in thy
sight, and consider that this nation is thy people. And God
said unto Moses, my presence shall go with thee, and I will
give thee rest. And he said unto him, if thy
presence go not with me, carry us not up hence, for wherein
shall it be known here that I and thy people have found grace in
thy sight. Is it not in that thou goest with us? So shall
we be separated, I and thy people, from all the people that are
upon the face of the earth. And the Lord said unto Moses,
I will do this thing also that thou hast spoken, for thou hast
found grace in my sight. And I know thee by name. I know thee by name. Now we're going to look at specifically
verse 14. God speaking to Moses says, my
presence shall go with thee and I will give thee rest. I will
give thee rest. Now, although our Lord is speaking
to Moses in this passage, this promise This promise, my presence
shall go with thee and I will give thee rest. This promise
belongs to every child born from above and who are covered by
the blood of the Lamb of God. It's for all his people. But
I ask myself, what can we expect from these words? God's presence
shall go with us and he will give us rest. What can we expect?
from that verse. Well, at least four blessed truths
this morning for our help and comfort is what I see in there. Four things. Now I'm going to
give you the whole outline, just the brief headings. So take that
and then we'll look at each one in specific. He says in verse 14, my presence
shall go with thee and I will give thee rest. First, God's
presence for us shall guide us. His presence to go with us, it
will guide us. And he says he'll give us rest. And he does give
us rest from uncertainty for now and tomorrow. His presence
will go with us to guide us. Secondly, his presence will go
with us, shall guard us. Not only will he guide us, he
will guard us and give us rest from worry. These are all things
that we do every day from worry. Thirdly. God's presence for us
shall provide. Provide for us and give us rest
from fear and stress. And lastly, God's presence shall
go with us. To comfort us. And give us rest
or peace from sorrow, sadness and despair. So these are the
four points. And I thought it'd be better
just to read them out like that so we could kind of get a better,
because once I get going, I need to go slower. I need to give
the scriptures. I need to slow down. So like
I say, God's presence shall guide us, shall guard us, shall provide
for us, and shall comfort us. And he'll give us rest. from
worry, stress, fear, fear of death. Let's look at these four
things. Exodus 33, and we're looking
at verse 14. God said to Moses, my presence,
God of gods, the God of this Bible, the God who does not change.
The God at this point, the full canonization of the scriptures
was not realized. But we can look at this and take
this promise to ourselves. God's presence shall go with
us. And not only that, but he will give us rest. So we're gonna
look at these four things. What can we expect from these
words? Well, the first one, as I said,
God's presence for us shall guide us. It shall guide us and give
us rest from uncertainty. Uncertainty. Right now, we don't
know what's going to happen when we walk out that door and tomorrow. We're not to worry about tomorrow
because we don't know if we got it. Now, I did read something
that, again, you've got to be so careful with what you read,
what you hear, misinformation, incorrect information. So I just
happened to briefly saw it when I was looking for music. But
it said, a particular person said, World War III, it's going
to happen. It's going to happen. I don't know. But I know if God's
presence is for me, he'll guide me, and he'll give me rest from
uncertainty right now. and tomorrow. Think of these
people, think of these people in Exodus, where they are right
now. They're just coming out, come
out of Egypt. They're going to a place that
he's told them over and over again, I'm gonna give you the
land, you're my people, I'm gonna give you the land, Moses is telling
them this, and he's getting this directly from the Lord God himself,
I promise to your father Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. They don't know
where that's at. They've never seen it. They've
been enslaved for years and years and years. They're going somewhere
they've never been. They're not familiar with the
land. They're not familiar with the people. And they're not familiar
with the trials which are gonna be happening tomorrow. But looking
at this phrase, looking at but one passage of text The word
of promise from God who cannot lie, if you look at it straight
on by faith, this would ease a troubled mind and give hope,
peace, and consolation. In our journey here, if we'll
take it like the journey of the children of Israel in their pilgrimages
and their wanderings, our journey or our pilgrimage We look to
the unchangeable God in the person and the accomplishments of Christ
because there's nothing new under the sun. If it's been a trial
back in B.C., it's a trial in A.D. There's no difference. There may be different technologies. There may be different this and
that, but they're just trials. In the world, you'll have tribulation.
The world has not changed. It's gotten smarter, so it says. It's gotten wiser. It's gotten
more money. It's got all these things that the people, the world
go after. But as far as a believer, it's
not changed. The world does not like you.
The believer is not of the world. We got to live in the world,
pay taxes, do all these things. But we can have the same peace
and hope and solace that they had. Why? Turn with me to Psalms
25. Here we go. We start looking
at some passages of scripture because I can stand up here and
say these things. But if the Lord takes a passage of scripture
and places it in your mind and in your heart, You'll have this
guidance from God and he promised his presence to be with us and
give us rest. Give us rest. Psalms 25 and verse
5. David says, lead me in thy truth. Not just willy nilly, not just
like the Pentecostals. Well, I got a little bit of knowledge
and so everything I think and say and do, it's gonna be grace.
No, no it's not. You got the flesh. You have the
flesh, so lead me in thy truth. The reason why we do what we
do, or we should be, is because it's founded in the scriptures.
Not because the preacher says so, not because I believe a certain
doctrine, because the book says so. This says, this is our word,
this is our life, he is our life. Lead me in thy truth and teach
me. For thou art the God of my salvation,
on thee do I wait all the day. Psalms 48, Psalms 48. We're speaking about his presence being
with us to guide us, to guide us and give us rest from uncertainty.
Psalms 48 and verse 40. Psalm 48 verse 14, the last verse
in that Psalm. For this God is our God forever
and ever. He will be our guide even unto
death. When is that? Well, right now
until who knows when. Maybe tonight and maybe tomorrow.
It may be years down the road. But He will be your guide because
He's promised His presence forever. Psalms, I'm sorry, Isaiah
48. Isaiah 48. Isaiah 48 and verse
17. Isaiah 48, verse 17. Thus sayeth the Lord, thy Redeemer,
you personally, the Holy One of Israel. He says to you and
to me, I am the Lord, thy God, which teaches thee to profit,
which leadeth thee by the way that thou should go. Not our
own way, there's a way that seems right unto us, our flesh, even
still, but the ends are the ways of death, which we heard about
in Romans 8, but not when he's leading us
by the way that we should go. And I tell you this, we have
a more sure water of prophecy than they did. That's what scripture
says. We have the finished, the full
canonization of the scriptures. They did not. They did not. They had to walk by faith just
like we do. But we have less excuse We have the full word of prophecy,
the complete and finished book of Emmanuel. Secondly, when we
look back at the text in verse 14, and he said to Moses, and
he says to us, my presence shall go with you and I will give you
rest. He's saying, secondly, God's
presence for us shall not only guide us, it will guard us and
give us rest from worry. Rest from worry. how slow we are to see and to
trust our Redeemer, how quick we are to worry, to anxiety,
or to undue concern. I had to be reminded of this
this week. Most of the stuff that I worry
about It never happens. It never happens. That's why
I put that quote in there last week in the bulletin by Spurgeon or
whatever it was. You know, we don't need to, we
don't, don't concern ourselves, don't worry about troubles until
they actually happen. And then when they happen, trust
the Lord. That's what we need to do. That's, not only do we
have a pilgrimage as these folks did, but we have a daily battle,
a daily warfare with Satan, the flesh, and the world. Our enemies
are on every side and they are particularly within, well, within
us. Desiring for us, all three of
these, to remove our eyes from Christ, to remove our eyes from
the prize, glory, and to remove our eyes from the race. I don't
need to attend service. I'm too busy. Well, put your
busyness aside and gather together with the saints. I mean, it's
really not that complicated. We come up with so many excuses.
Let it go. Because the end result is you
are in a warfare, you're in a race, and there's a prize. Don't ever
forget that. Don't, may God give us grace
to not lose sight. We're only gathering a couple
days, a couple hours a week. What's the most important thing?
We know what the most important, the spirit knows what the most
important thing is. Now, I'm not the most important
thing. I'm just a tinkler. You know, I'm just, I'm just
here doing what the Lord has called me to take me down and
raise somebody else up. But what we are doing is more
important than we can realize. But I know this, if we're left
to ourselves, we will surely fall. But he's promised to defeat
every foe. 1 Samuel chapter 22. He is promised to defeat every
foe, and therefore we don't need to worry. First, Samuel chapter 22. Now, this, what's going on here
is all the priests of the Lord just got killed by Saul. Saul commanded this guy named
Doag to turn and slit every one of them, cut every one of them's
throat. But it's worse than that. Look at verse 19. And Noab, the city of the priests,
smote he with the edge of the sword, both men and women, children,
sucklings, oxen, asses, sheep, with the edge of the sword. He
killed the babies. This one guy escapes. This one
guy escapes because David's running for his life. One guy escapes,
Abathar, escaped and fled after David. And he told David, he
said, Saul has slain the Lord's priest and David is upset with
himself because didn't I know that day Doag the Edomite was
there that he would surely tell Saul and I have occasioned the
death of all the persons of thy father's house. So he's talking
to this father, to this son, to this man's, one of the sons
of Abimelech, the son of Ahithob. named Avatar, so it directly
affects him. But listen to what David, as
a type of our Lord, tells this boy, this man, young man. Abide
with me. Fear not. For he that seeks thy
life seeks my life. He that seeks my life seeks your
life. But with me, you'll be in safe guard. That means custody. What he's
saying is that you're my responsibility. You're my responsibility. And
didn't Jude tell us in Jude, unto him who was able to keep
you from falling and present you faultless before his throne
of his glory, that's guarding. He's taking care of us. And because these things are
so, we can sing. This Psalm that David, I won't
tell you to turn there, I'll just read it to you. We can boldly
sing these praises in Psalms 27, don't turn there, verses
1, 2, and 3. The Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom shall
I fear? The Lord is the strength of my
life, for whom shall I be afraid? When the wicked, even mine enemies
and my foes, come upon me to eat my flesh, they stumbled and
fell. Though a host should encamp against
me, my heart shall not fear. Though war should rise up against
me, in this I will be confident. What? The Lord's my light and
my protection. His presence is with us. Thirdly,
this passage in our text in Exodus 33 and Verse 14, my presence
shall go with thee and I will give thee rest. Thirdly, God's
presence for us shall provide for us and give us rest from
fear and stress. I don't know if anybody else,
but sometimes you worry about if I've got enough to make it
to the end of the month. Not in this country. Yeah, in
this country. What are we to pray? Give us
this day our daily bread every day. Every day, the Israelites
were to harvest the manna. If they took more than they were
supposed to, it bred worms. Kind of like storing stuff in
a freezer. It's cryovac, and you got it,
and then the cryovac gets, you're like, what happened? And then
you cook it, and it doesn't taste that good. How hard this truly is, to be
content with such things as we have been given. We want more. Why? It's just, you're burdened
with the care of more. Or you gotta get an alarm system,
or you gotta get better locks, or you gotta switch the locks,
or you gotta do this. Why? It's not your stuff. It's not my stuff. It's the Lord's stuff. And we
often get our eyes off of that and onto the stuff. What can't our great sovereign
take care of his own people? Are we not his children? He takes
care of us as our father. Are we not his bride? He takes
care of us as the perfect groom. Are we not his dear sheep? He's the chief shepherd. Are
we not his little flock? He takes care of us as the apple
of his eye. Perish the thought. No, take
no thought for tomorrow. Matter of fact, we're not to
be, in Matthew 6, you don't have to turn it, but we're not to
be like the Gentiles who worry about food and raiment and clothes
and all these things. This is what they worry about.
Because He will provide for us and gives us rest from fear and
stress. Turn to Isaiah 40. Believe what I say, but more
than that, believe what he says in his word. Isaiah 40 and verse
31, the last verse, Isaiah 40 and the last verse in this chapter,
But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength, they
shall mount up with wings as eagles, they shall run and not
be weary, and they shall walk and not faint. Psalms 34. Psalms 34 and verse
9. Psalms 34 and verse 9 Oh Fear the Lord ye his saints
For there is no want to them that fear him hmm Hmm there's
no want Man, I needed this I needed to get this done. Is it life
or death? I You know, you sell your house, you talk to the realtors,
people, unbelievers. I mean, you've got to do this
and that and spend $10,000 to get it all prepared. Why? Why? It's not ours anyway. And I'm not saying to be ignorant
with stuff. Be wise and responsible. You
know, we go way too far on the other side. We go way too care
about ourselves, our own situations. No. It says, there shall be no
want to them that fear him. And doesn't 2nd Corinthians,
you don't have to turn there, 2nd Corinthians chapter 12, Paul
said when he was upset about some things and the Lord said,
my grace is sufficient. My grace is sufficient. I have
to remind myself so often when I get nosy and look at this and
what about that person and this person and this and that and
the Lord rebukes me with that verse that I like and hate at
the same time. What is that to thee? Follow
thou me. What is that to thee? Follow
thou me. And I'll go one step further.
Our Lord bases his very name on our provision and help in
time of need. Is not one of the names of God,
Jehovah Jireh? The Lord, in Genesis 22, the
Lord will provide. That's what Abraham, you know,
Father, we got this, we got the offering, we got this, we got
all these different things, but where's the sacrifice? It's not your concern. the Lord will provide. So the
fact that his presence is with us will provide for us and give
us rest from fear and stress. And lastly, the fourth thought
about God's presence shall go with us. It'll comfort us and
it'll give us rest from sorrow, sadness or despair. We may be
broke, We may be poor, we may be stripped of many earthly pleasures
and things, but we will never be plundered or ravaged of his
heart, peace and mercy acknowledged. Like Bruce said this morning,
you know, everything may go south, but in that we will have peace.
And Matt read in James, count it all joy. What? What? You just quote that one verse
in James to an unbeliever and what do you mean? I gotta be
profitable, I gotta be, you know, I'm going to these insurance
classes and learn how to do all this and we have money and wealth
and everything. One stock market crash, it's
just gone. It's gone. Now what are you gonna
do? Now we're gonna live. Live by
faith, like we've always lived. We may be stripped poor of many things. Habakkuk chapter 3. Not in these United States. Not
in this. Not in Jackson. I don't know. I don't know. The grid goes down. We've got no electricity. Then
what are we going to do? And I'm not a gloom and doom. I don't,
you know, scare anybody to scare you. I can't scare anybody to
look at Christ anyway. That's not my issue. My issue
is trust Christ and all these things he'll add to you. Habakkuk chapter three, verse
17, 18 and 19, although And you could put this in, I
hadn't thought about it, but put it in modern language. Although
the fig tree shall not blossom. Apples, peaches, everything freezes. Neither shall fruit be in the
vine. Grape, this is a grape area. Grapes, they're not there. The labor of the olives shall
fail. The field shall yield no meat, no corn. Don't have much
on the shelves. Frigerators broke. The flocks
shall be cut off from the fold and there shall be no herd in
the stalls. No more barbecues, no more grilling. That'll solve that problem. Too
many, you know, we were talking the other day about food and
grills and this and that and getting rid of all of them. You
won't have to worry about it. That's the way it is. Here's
faith. Here's the new creature. Yet
I will rejoice in the Lord. I will joy in the God of my salvation. The Lord God is my strength.
He will make my feet like Heinz feet and he will make me to walk
upon my high places to the chief singer on my stringed instruments. We're going to talk about this.
We're going to sing about this. Matter of fact, we're going to
everybody together that can play and we're going to sing glory to
God. The whole thought of this in Exodus, our main thought,
is to take, wean the believer off of the things and stuff and
just mind-boggling stuff off of the world. It takes your attention,
it takes your mind, it takes my mind, my attention, and just
wipes, just take it off of that and concentrate on His presence
going with us and He'll give us rest. We got way too many,
I call, crutches, whatever you wanna call them, we got way too
many things occupying our minds. We need to be occupied with Christ
and Him crucified. Christ and Him crucified. Our lamp may be extinguished,
but the son of righteousness ever shines. And that shines upon each and
every blood bought sinner saved by grace. Are you a blood bought
sinner this morning? Our stream may seem to run dry,
but we have a fountain filled with blood, which is drawn from
Emmanuel's veins. And not only that, but scripturally,
Zechariah 13, there'll be a fountain open. Still fountains open for
sin and uncleanness, open for sinners. Open for sinners. That's kind of what we do when
we gather together. This church is open for business, it's open
for sinners. Comfort them, to help them. I
was trying to find a passage when Bruce was talking, when
Moses was talking to his father-in-law or some relation, he said, come
with us, we'll do you good. And I think about family that
doesn't know the gospel. Call in. Listen to the message. Where you're going, you're not
hearing anything. Or come. You know, we're not going to
bite. You know, I hear people, oh, they're not happy with this
church. They're not happy with that church. What's wrong? Just
come here. But you got two or three eyes,
or three or four eyes, you got two eyes, and you got another
head. It was a small building. See, people are all worried about
stuff and how it looks and to be seen of men. It is so hard
to find a sinner that needs the presence of God and needs rest. You know it and I know it. We've
talked to them. We've talked to them. So I ask, what will,
what can, what does support us in this overwhelming flood and
onslaught of sin and degradation? This is what supports me. God's
presence shall go with us and he will give us rest. We are
predestined to be made like our elder brother, the spirit of
just men made perfect. close turn with me to first john
chapter three first john chapter three now
this was what he said was based on promise they hadn't realized
it they hadn't left yet and so is this that's the thing
about faith it's substance things not seen and you try to tell
your children this and they don't understand just keep telling
them just keep telling them Keep telling your neighbors, keep
telling your friends, keep telling them, they don't see it. But
it's not through the eyes, it's by faith. Look at verses, 1 John
3, verse 2 and 3. Beloved, this is the believers,
now are we the sons of God. That's established, we're chosen,
elect, we're beloved. It does not yet appear. what
we shall be. We can think through sanctified
reasoning and the new nature, but we don't really know, but
we, we don't yet appear what we shall be. But we do know that
when he shall appear, we shall be like him for we shall see
him as he is. And every man, boy, woman, girl
that has this hope in him purifies himself even as he is pure. We, like Moses, why is all this? Well, if you kind of read the
other passages that I read in Exodus, it says because Moses
found grace in God's sight. That's the only way we can We
can see him as he is now, right now, by faith. It's because he
has shown us grace. It's not ourselves. To God be
the glory, and to all God be praise. Matt, would you close
us?