Exodus chapter 23, let's read a passage here from verse 20,
beginning with verse 20. Behold, I send an angel before
thee to keep thee in the way and to bring thee into the place
which I have prepared. Beware of him and obey his voice. Provoke him not, for he will
not pardon your transgressions. for my name is in him. But if
thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak, then
I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an adversary unto
thine adversaries. For mine angel shall go before
thee, and bring thee in unto the Amorites, and the Hittites,
and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites,
and I will cut them off. Thou shalt not bow down to their
gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works, but thou shalt
utterly overthrow them and quite break down their images. And
ye shall serve the Lord your God, and he shall bless thy bread
and thy water, and I will take sickness away from the midst
of thee. There shall nothing cast their young nor be barren
in thy land the number of thy days, I will fulfill. I will send my fear before thee,
and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come. And
I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee. And
I will send hornets before thee, which shall drive out the Hivite,
the Canaanite, and the Hittite from before thee. I will not
drive them out from before thee in one year, lest the land become
desolate, and the beast of the field multiply against thee.
By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until
thou be increased and inherit the land. And I will set thy
bounds from the Red Sea even unto the Sea of the Philistines,
and from the desert unto the river, for I will deliver the
inhabitants of the land into your hand. And thou shalt drive
them out before thee. Thou shalt make no covenant with
them, nor with their gods. They shall not dwell in thy land,
lest they make thee sin against me. For if thou serve their gods,
it will surely be a snare unto thee." The Lord speaks in verse
20 of that place that he had prepared for his people. And I've thought of all of the
places in the Word of God where we see this. And the Lord has
prepared a place for us. He's bringing his people to himself. It's a familiar picture. In our
study in Genesis, we see that because of the wisdom and authority
of Joseph, picturing that of our Lord Jesus Christ, there
was a place where the famine had no power. And Joseph said
to his brethren, Father, you come live in Goshen. Come here
and live in a place by me and I'll nourish you. Before God
ever made a man, he prepared a garden for him to dwell in.
God's always had a place for his people. A wonderful place,
a place where there's no lack. A place of provision and protection
and peace. God said to Moses, there's a
place by me and I'll put your feet on a rock and I'll cover
you there with my hand And from there, you'll see my glory. My
Lord Jesus Christ, just before he left this earth, said, I go
to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place
for you, I'll come again and receive you unto myself. What's
this place? Why is there always a place?
What is the place that where I am? There you may be. That's what's pictured in all
of these places. The garden, paradise. It was
fellowship with God, the favor of God. That's the place that
God has prepared for his people. And that spiritual truth is seen
here in our text. Paul said in Hebrews 11 9, by
faith, Abraham sojourned in the land of promise as in a strange
country. Even once they got to that place
that God had promised on earth, Abraham said, I'm not at home
here. That's just an earthly place that pictures another.
He sojourned in the land of promise, but he said, this is a strange
country. And dwelt in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs
with him of the same promise, for he looked for a city which
hath foundations. There's no city here on this
earth that has a real foundation. The foundations of this earth,
no matter how mighty, are going to crumble. He's living in the
place promised that we're talking about now and said, I'm looking
for another place that has foundations, whose builder and maker is God. So these Israelites were traveling
to a promised place, a blessing and favor, a land flowing with
milk and honey. Not just the necessities, bread
and water. That'd be fine, wouldn't it?
I like to have some milk in the refrigerator, don't you, sometimes? And some honey in the cupboard.
Isn't that wonderful? God provides for us bountifully. And what a picture of that spiritual
place where we'll dwell with him forever. Paul said, I have
a desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better.
A place with golden streets and gates of pearl would be hell
without Christ. We're going to be with him in
this whole process of bringing his people to himself. God said
this, I'm going to send an angel before you. We've already come out of bondage.
We already have God with us in a sense. He goes with us. He
takes care of us and protects us and provides for us. And we
have some promises from God, but he's bringing us to himself,
to his very presence. And he said, I'm going to send
my angel before thee. This is the angel of the covenant.
There are many angels that God sends to to protect his people
and to care for them and to watch out for them. That's clear in
the scripture. They all do his bidding, but
this is a single angel. This is one angel. And this angel
has prerogative to forgive sin. You don't have to say of a created
angel, he won't forgive your sin. Everybody knows an angel
can't forgive sin and everybody, most people, Anybody in their
right mind knows that a man can't forgive your sin, except one. The Lord told that group of people
that day, I did what I did before you today so that you would know
that the son of man has power on earth to forgive sin. They
said, nobody can forgive sins but God only. They were right
about that. And he revealed his power to forgive sin. This is
the angel of the covenant, the Lord Jesus Christ. And you know
what? All through this life, you and
I are following the Lord Jesus Christ. He's going before us
in every sense, in every way that somebody can go before somebody.
He's going before us all the way. Where are we going? To God.
We're going to God. We're going to the very presence.
Listen to 1 Peter 3.18, For Christ also hath once suffered the just
for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh,
but quickened by the Spirit. He died the just for the unjust. He went before us in that. You
say, well, Chris, there's many men who died before our Savior
died. No, that's not right. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the
lamb slain from the foundation of the world. No child of God
has ever died from Moses to Tommy Robbins that our Lord has not
already gone before and won the victory over the grave and has
already conquered death and pulled its stinger out before you ever
got there. Our Lord is the firstborn among
many brethren. He is before all things, the
scripture says. He is the alpha as well as the
omega, the beginning and the end. He is the head of the body,
the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead,
that in all things He might have the preeminence. It's all about
Him. He is who He is to His people
that He might be glorified and have preeminence, and we're in
on it. Because He's glorified, we're glorified. Look what God said to them next.
My angel will keep you in the way. Keep you in the way. There's a way to God. Everything
else is not the way. Turn not to the right hand or
to the left. There's a way. Lord said, I'm
just going to be with you a little bit longer. I'm going to go.
I won't be with you here. But where I'm going, you know
where I'm going. And you know the way. I am the way. I am the truth. I am the life.
Christ not only is the way to God, but he keeps us in the way.
He keeps us in himself. He said, no man shall pluck them
out of my hand. I believe in the perseverance
of God's saints. And God's people are safe and
secure. And there's nothing that can
separate us from his love And we're safe and secure under his
precious blood safe, though the world's may crumble. We will
persevere because we are preserved. Kept by the power of God unto
salvation. First Peter one five. You think
the power of God can keep it unto salvation? unto salvation. That's also in our text. In verse
20, he said, behold, I send an angel before thee to keep thee
in the way and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. He's gonna bring us all the way
in. Christ is both the author and
the finisher of our faith. Your faith's not gonna fail because
he intercedes like he did for Peter and not Judas. and because
he's the author of our faith. Anything that you come up with
will fail every time, but Christ is the author of our faith and
he'll finish it. He that hath begun a good work
in you will perform it until the day of Christ Jesus. Spurgeon
said, if Christ brought me all the way to the door of heaven
and left me to take only the last step into the kingdom, I
would perish right there. He's got to bring us all the
way in. And he does, he's going to bring you in to the place
I've prepared for you. Verse 21 in our text, beware
of him now and obey his voice. We've said so many times, the
gospel always comes with a warning, doesn't it? Always in the scripture,
beware lest that come upon you that the prophet spake and said,
hearing you won't hear. Obey His voice, provoke Him not,
for He will not pardon your transgressions." Now in the next verse, if He
says, if you hearken to His voice, then your enemies are His enemies. But if not, He will not pardon
your transgressions, for my name is in Him. Now this verse may
be a surprise to you. Christ will not pardon our transgressions,
then we're cut off. Well, if you're thinking that,
I have one thing to say to you. Obey his voice. Obey his voice. Obey his voice. Provoke him not,
for he will not pardon your transgressions. If you obey not his voice. What
is this obedience? Obedience to the law? No, we
have no hope of measuring up to God's legal standard. By the
deeds of the law, Paul called it right. by the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit. There shall no flesh be justified
that way by you keeping God's law. No, it says obey his voice. Obey the voice of the angel of
the covenant. What did Christ come saying?
Thou shalt not and thou shalt know. He said come to me and
you'll have life. He didn't come teaching law,
but preaching the gospel of peace. That's what God said he would
come doing. Deliverance to the captive. sight to the blind,
given sight to the blind and obey his voice. Can you hear
his voice? What does the voice of Christ
say? Come unto me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and
I'll give you rest. Obey his voice. This is what
God the Father said from heaven in Matthew 17 5. While our Lord
was speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them. and
behold a voice out of the cloud which said, this is by beloved
son in whom I am well pleased. Hear ye him. This doesn't just
mean listen up. It means hearken unto him, attend
unto his words. It means obey him. That's what
God said from heaven. The same thing he said back here.
You obey the voice of the angel of the covenant when he says
you come and you'll find rest in me. Not in the law. There
wasn't any rest or peace at Sinai. There was only fear and trembling
there. Turn to Hebrews chapter three. We're talking about obedience
to the gospel. Hebrews chapter three, verse
six. But Christ, as a son over his own house, whose house are
we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope
firm unto the end. I wanted to read that verse to
establish who we're talking about here, the Christ, the son over
his own house. Remember he said, the kingdom
of God is like a householder who planted some good seed. He's
a householder and he's made us householders under him here,
but he is the son over the house of God. And we are that house. Wherefore verse seven, as the
Holy ghost saith today, if you will hear his voice, Harden not
your hearts as in the provocation in the day of temptation in the
wilderness. Don't harden your heart here.
The opposite of hearing is hardening, rejecting, refusing. When your
fathers tempted me, proved me and saw my works 40 years, wherefore
I was grieved with that generation and said they do all way air
in their heart. And they have not known my ways,
verse 11, so I swear in my wrath they shall not enter into my
rest. He will not forgive your transgressions. If you reject
Christ, there's no more sacrifice for sins. There's nothing but
a certain fearful looking for of judgment. He's your only hope. There's none other name under
heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. You reject
Christ, you're gone. There's no forgiveness for sin
outside of Christ. Take heed, brethren, verse 12,
lest there be in any of you an evil heart of what? We're not
talking about obedience to the law here. We're talking about
faith. To reject the voice of the angel of the covenant who
is preaching the gospel of peace, of justification, of reconciliation
to you is to harden your heart in evil unbelief in departing
from the living God. but exhort one another daily
while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through
the deceitfulness of sin. For we are made partakers of
Christ. If we hold the beginning of our
confidence steadfast unto the end, while it is said today,
if you will hear his voice, obey him now, beware of him, obey
him. Harden not your hearts, as in
the provocation, for some, when they had heard, did provoke.
Howbeit, not all that came out of Egypt by Moses, not all of
them, never all of them. There's always a remnant, according
to the election of grace. But with whom was he grieved
forty years? Was it not with them that had sinned, whose carcasses
fell in the wilderness, and to whom he swore that they should
not enter into his rest? But to them that were unable
to keep the law, no. That would have been everybody.
Them that believe not. So we see they could not enter
in. What do we talk about Sunday morning? The cause of unbelief. The cause of unbelief. Romans
16, 25. Listen to this. Now to him that
is of power to establish you according to my gospel. and the
preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery,
which was kept secret since the world began, but now is made
manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to
the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations,
talking about the gospel through all that, made known to all nations
for what? For the obedience of faith. Obey his voice. Obedience to the law and the
obedience of faith are two completely different things. Obedience to
the law is something that no sinner has ever done. None are
doing it right now and nobody's ever going to do it. The righteousness which is of
the law requires the sinner to perfectly obey all things that
are written in the law to do them. The obedience of faith
is that laying hold of Christ by faith, coming to Christ as
commanded in the gospel. When he says, come unto me, he
that believeth shall not be condemned, but shall have everlasting life.
That's the obedience of faith, which is accomplished by the
irresistible, drawing, life-giving power of God. With regard to legal obedience,
man is left to himself, but faith is the fruit of the Spirit. Christ is the author of faith,
Hebrews 12.2. Faith is the gift of God, Ephesians
2.9. And here is the lesson of our
text. There is no forgiveness of sin apart from faith in the
Lord Jesus Christ. God loves everybody. No. The
love of God is in Christ and in him alone. And we experience
it by faith in him. Christ died for everybody. No.
Do you want to know if he died for you or not? Believe. The
command to us is believe, not investigate as to whether you're
one of the elect or not. Where are you going to start
looking? It's not written in this book whether you're one
of his elect, but the message that we're to believe, the gospel
of the Lord Jesus Christ, is what this book is from start
to finish. And the command to the sinner
is believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Obey the voice of the
angel of the covenant. Did he die for me? Believe on
the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. And then God
said in our text, my name is in him. God's name in scripture, everywhere
it's mentioned in scripture, speaking of his name, it's talking
about his character, his attributes. And what is this teaching? My
name is in him. My character is in him. My attributes
are in him. God was in Christ, reconciling
the world unto himself. My name is in him. In Christ dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead in a body. Is God sovereign? Christ is sovereign. He said, as the Father hath power,
so he hath given unto the Son authority to give life to whomsoever
he will. All power is given unto me in
heaven and earth. Is God merciful? Our Lord Jesus Christ is mercy. Is God almighty? What manner of man is this that
even the winds and the waves obey his will? He has power on
earth to say, thy sins be forgiven. And they are. My name is in him. Jehovah Sidkenu
walked on this earth, was made flesh, and dwelt among us, the
Lord our righteousness. My name is in him. Jehovah Jireh
was born of a woman, made under the law that he might redeem
them that were under the law. God will provide himself a lamb. My name's in him. dealing with,
that's who came down here. God said also in verse 22, listen,
but if thou shalt indeed obey his voice and do all that I speak,
then I'll be an enemy unto thine enemies. Are you interested in
that? Do you have any enemies tonight?
I'm not talking about some man that did you wrong. That's nothing. You got bigger enemies than that,
whether you know it or not. And I do too. I'll be an adversary
unto thine adversaries. Who are my enemies? Sin, in other
words, me. I'm my own worst enemy. My sinful,
wretched nature, myself, is my enemy. I can't overcome my sin. I can't put it away, but he did.
Thank God my enemy is his enemy. In the body of his flesh, through
death, our Lord died to present us holy and unblameable and unreprovable
in his sight. He's conquered my enemy, the
old me, the hell-deserving, God-hating me. Hebrews 9.26, now once in the
end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice
of himself. This is salvation. We need our
enemies to be God's enemies or we're in trouble. We're in trouble
we can't get out of. Is Satan my enemy? I like that
song we sing, One Little Word, and he's going down. My Lord
Jesus became the adversary of my enemy, Satan. Hebrews 2.14,
for as much then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood,
his little children are flesh and blood, subject to trouble,
to problems, subject to the enemy. He also himself likewise took
part of the same, that through death he might destroy him that
had the power of death, that is the devil. He became what
we are, yet without sin, that He might destroy our enemy and
deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime
subject to bondage. Is death my enemy? That's the
last enemy He'll destroy. When death is destroyed, when
you go to sleep and wake up in his
arms or when you come up out of your grave and I don't care
whether you were burnt or buried you're coming up out of there
if you're his he made you out of dust to begin with he can
make you out of dust again you reckon either way whether you
die or when the world will say he died but the lord said he's
asleep and wake up in his arms or whether
he calls your name and you come up out of that grave and meet
him in the air. Either way, turn to first Corinthians
15. I'll tell you this, you'll know
when that happens that all your enemies are no more because he
said that's the last enemy of yours I'll destroy. There won't
be any more after that. 1 Corinthians 15 verse 50. Now this I say, brethren, that
flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, neither does
corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I show you a mystery.
We shall not all sleep, but we'll all be changed. You may not die
before he comes back, but you're not going to be like you are
now. And neither are those who do die before he comes back.
We're all going to be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling
of an eye, at the last trump, for the trump shall sound and
the dead shall be raised incorruptible. Oh, I hate that about me. That
makes me so familiar with language like this that I can't hear it
anymore. Don't you hate that about yourself? Do you hear what
he said? For this corruptible must put
on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when
this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal
shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass
the saying that is written, what happened when you were raised
incorruptible? What happened? Death was swallowed
up in victory. Whose victory? Well, let's read
on. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin, and
the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth
us the victory. The victory is mine, but I didn't
win it. It was given to me. How? My Lord
Jesus Christ. Our Lord Jesus Christ, all of
my enemies are his enemies. Thank God. For as by one man's disobedience
many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many
be made righteous. Moreover, the law entered that
the offense might abound, but where sin abounded, grace much
more bound. That as sin hath reigned unto
death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal
life by Jesus Christ our Lord. He has won the victory, and us
in Him. Turn back to our text, verse
25. Let's look at Exodus 23, verse 25 through 28. We'll read
these together. And you shall serve the Lord
your God, and he shall bless your bread. Now you listen to
this. He'll bless your bread. He'll bless your water. He'll
take all the sickness away from the midst of you. There shall
nothing cast their young nor be barren. Your cattle are going
to be born healthy. In thy land, the number of thy
days I will fulfill. I will send my fear before thee
and will destroy all the people to whom thou shalt come. And
I will make all thine enemies turn their backs unto thee. They're
not gonna be scared of you. I'm gonna send my fear before
you. And they're gonna turn their
backs on you, but not because they're scared of you. Because of me. And I will send hornets. Everything. Does a verse of scripture come
to mind when you read this? We know that all things work
together for good. To them that love God, to them
who are the call according to his purpose. Everything is going
to work for your good. The hornets, your cows, the ground
will be rich and full of nutrients so that your bread is blessed,
you'll have water, everything. I will not drive them out from
before thee in one year, lest the land become desolate, and
the beast of the field multiply against thee. Do you see the
point there? It's a huge, vast land. And if it's vacated immediately,
then everything just goes to waste. You're going to have to
start all over from scratch. All their crops and stuff will
die. No, you're going to be eating
something that you didn't even plant. I'm gonna do it little by little.
And if they vacate quickly, then wild beasts will come into the
city and you'll have to fight them. No, it's not gonna happen
that way. But little by little, I'll drive
them out from before thee until thou be increased and inherit
the land, until you're ready, until it's time. What does this
teach? What's the spiritual teaching
here? Did you ever wonder why God didn't just take us to glory
when he saved us? Why do we still struggle with
these enemies at all? He's already conquered them.
I have no doubt about that. They have no power at all over
us. We're like our Lord in that.
He said, you could have no power at all over me, except my father
give it to you. Why then? It's for your good,
just like it was theirs for their good in the text. He did it for
their good. It was the best way for them.
He could have done it that other way. I don't understand that. How is it for my good that I
have to struggle with all these things? You don't need to understand.
Did you understand everything your parents made you do when
you were little? Or all the times they said no?
Did that make sense to you? Yeah, me neither. Because I didn't
know anything. I didn't realize that they lived
to take care of me. To protect me. Because they loved
me. They wanted to see me happy and
blessed. Verse 31 in our text. And I will set thy bounds from
the Red Sea, even unto the sea of the Philistines, and from
the desert unto the river, for I will deliver the inhabitants
of the land into your hand, and thou shalt drive them out before
thee. Thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor with their gods. Now he said this already a time
or two, in the same passage, so we'll talk about that. But
then also, they shall not dwell in thy land, lest they make thee
sin against me, for if thou serve their gods, it will surely be
a snare unto thee. Now, two final thoughts. There's
no place for false gods. You shall make no covenant with
them, no compromise, no agreement. We have no tolerance for, can
abide no compromise with, have no respect for, have no desire
to cooperate with those who preach a false gospel. We are absolute
bigots. That's a bad word, not in this
case. A bigot is someone who has no
tolerance for anybody that disagrees with them. That's exactly what
I am when it comes to, because they're not disagreeing with
me. They're disagreeing with God. He said, leave them alone. Got no covenant with you. No
cooperation. No joint effort. And then look
at this too. This was a blessing to me in
closing. My land. They're not going to live in
your land. You see what's happening here? These people have been
living in this land for how many years? How many decades? How
many centuries maybe even? And God said, I'm going to give
that land to you. and they're not going to live in your land.
Well, wait a minute. We're taking their land. No,
they're living in your land. Our Lord Jesus Christ said, the
meek shall inherit the earth. That's us. That's his people.
Fear not little flock for it is your father's good pleasure
to give you the kingdom. He's going to destroy this sin-cursed
earth and make a new heaven and a new earth and it's yours. And
they're not going to live in your land. It's mine. They're not going to live in
it. Nothing shall enter in that defile. And all through this life, that's
what he's doing. He's bringing us to him. And he sent the angel
of the covenant before us. He was born before us, He lived
before us, and He died before us, and He rose from the dead
before us. And He's entered into that holy place, not made with
hands, for us, to offer His precious blood for our sins. And we'll
follow Him there. In eternity, we're already seated
in heavenly places with Him, in Him, because of Him. And I
don't know about you, but I'm looking forward to experiencing
that. Thank God for the angel of the covenant who went before
me, in whom is the very name of God. And thank God that he
counted all my enemies, his enemies, and conquered them. And it's bringing me to where
he is.