Now, if you'll take your Bibles
and turn with me to Exodus chapter 15, I just want to look at one verse
of Scripture tonight, the last verse in the 15th chapter of
Exodus. And they came to Elam, where
were twelve wells of water, and three score and ten, that is
seventy palm trees. And they encamped there by the
water. Now the way to Canaan out of
Egypt is through the sea and through the wilderness. That way to Canaan was opposite
A vast wilderness. You look at it on a map and it's
just a vast nothing. There's no cities out there.
There's no people out there. It's just nothing. It's just
a wilderness. And this wilderness that they
passed through was not the isolated experience of a day. They were
three days journey before they ever got to the bit of water.
in this wilderness. Now, this is a desert is what
it is. This is not just a country with
no gas stations. This is a desert. This is a hot,
burning, blazing sun, 120, 130 degrees, whatever it is over
there. Nothing out there but cactus, blazing sun. It wasn't the isolated experience
of a day, but it would be a 40-year journey. I know there's a significance
to that. I don't know exactly what it is. But I know there's
something, some significance to that 40 years they wandered
in that desert. Because he tells us 40 years,
over and over and over, all the way through the scriptures concerning
Israel's walk there. Now, I do know this. Conversions,
if you want to use an average age, The walk of that individual
from conversion in his mid-20s or early 30s is about 40 years. So I see a similarity there between
the walk of an average converted young man to the end of his days. I see some similarities there.
I don't see anything exact. And maybe I'm just groping for
things. But I see a similarity there
in our walk through this world. It's not the isolated experience
of a day and it's over and now you're there and everything goes
peachy dandy. That's not the walk of the believer.
The walk of the believer is through a wilderness. It's a wilderness. And as we go through this book
Study their journey. I want you to understand that
this wilderness is a picture of this world, not physically.
But spiritually, our walk is in a wilderness. There's nothing
here. Those around us that we attribute as living beings are
not living. They're dead in trespasses and
sin, spiritually. They're not dead physically.
They're not dead mentally. And God will hold us responsible
for those things that we do. But they're dead spiritually.
They're dead. And all the obstacles, all the
trouble, all the bitter pools and emptiness Israel faced in
their wilderness physically, we face in our journey through
this world spiritually. We go through the same thing.
We all drink from those bitter waters. We all come to the refreshing
times at Elam. And then we all have our journey
to Sinai and have to deal with that. I'm talking about your
spiritual walk. I'm not talking about men and
women who don't know God. I'm talking about Israel's walk,
Israel's journey. And you're not going to reach
Canaan in a day. But he tells us over in Hebrews,
talking about those people who journeyed there, he that endureth
to the end, the same shall be said. And this world is a hostile place. Its only light is the God of
this world. As that hot, relentless sun in
that desert beat, it was relentless. It just beat down on them, beat
down on them, beat down. You've been out here, I'll tell
you, it's no easy thing to work out here in the summertime if
you work out in that summer. I poured concrete down here when
they built I-49 and I sat out there in that hot sun pouring
concrete all day long every day and I'm going to tell you something,
you just about, you were sick when you went home. Just sick
from working that. But the only light is the God
of this world. And as that sun in the desert
was relentless, so is the prince of the power of the air with
that darkness that he calls light that is relentless. You can't do anything. You can't
go anywhere. You can't have any kind of a
conversation in this world except that dark light of the prince
or the God of this world. It's just relentlessly coming
at you, coming at you, coming at you. It comes at you and your
kids, at the school, at your work, at the grocery store, everywhere
you go. It comes at you. Everything in this world is affected
by His presence. And He's turned paradise into
a wilderness. Green pastures into burning sand. Springs and lakes have all disappeared. Fruits and herbs have been replaced
with cactus and thorns. And all the cattle and all the
sheep have been replaced with venomous reptiles. Everything
that's in that wilderness, now I want you to think about this,
God identifies with the curse on man. The snakes, the scorpions,
the drought, the thorns, everything out in that wilderness is something
that God identifies with His curse on man. Everything out
there. This world is a wilderness. It's
got nothing to offer to those who journey through it except
death and empty promises and certain doom. And it's filled
with vipers. We don't often think about that
when we think about Israel walking through that desert. But that
desert was full of scorpions and full of vipers. And on our
spiritual journey through this world, listen to this. These
are pretty reputable men that I'm quoting here by. This is
John the Baptist. There had not been a man greater
than John the Baptist born except the Lord Jesus Christ. This was
a man you could listen to. And he called these religious
men and women who came out there trying to find recognition in
his popularity as a minister of God, and he called them Vipers. Serpents. A generation. He said,
you generation of vipers. And then the Lord Himself said
to them. He said, O generation of vipers,
how can you being evil speak good things? Huh? He called them
vipers. Listen to this. Again He told
them. He said, you serpents, you generation of vipers, how
shall you escape the damnation of hell? This wilderness is filled
with venomous snakes. The Lord sent out His 70 to preach,
His 70 disciples. He anointed them and sent them
out to preach and gave them gifts. And they came back rejoicing
and they said, even the devils are subject unto us through His
name. They were rejoicing. And speaking
directly of the fall of Satan and his influence on men, here's
what our Lord said. He said, behold, he said, I give
you power to tread on serpents and scorpions. I give you power
to tread on serpents and scorpions and over all the power of the
enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you, but don't rejoice
in that. He said, you rejoice that your
name is written down in the Lamb's Book of Life. But he called preaching and defending
the truth before these irreligious men and this anti-Christ spirit,
he called that walking on serpents. Now I'm telling you, this life
is full of venomous snakes. It's filled with an evil light.
The Lord described it in Matthew 6. He's talking about this evil
eye that was filled with darkness. And He said, if therefore the
light that be in thee be darkness, how great is this darkness. Because
that's all there is. darkness. Satan has filled the
earth with his anti-Christ religion, his doctrines on the lips of
every nationality. You can't escape it by leaving
this country and going to another. This world is a wilderness and
those who are born in it are a wilderness in themselves. That's what the man of God discovers
first thing. It's not just that he's in a
wilderness, it's that he is a wilderness. It's a bunch of him is what makes
up this world. It's a wilderness, and he discovers
he's a wilderness. None good, none righteous, none
that understandeth, none that seeketh after God. All of them
gone astray. Man at his best state, altogether
vanity. My friend, you and I are sinners.
That's what we are. And I'll tell you, if you ever
find any hope and refreshing from God, that's how you're going
to find it, a sinner in a wilderness. That's it. Do you know that? Do you know that, or do you come
upon men like that Pharisee did, and you kind of look down on
them and say, boy, I'm glad I ain't like him? My, so. Do we look down our noses
at people? Do we, like the Pharisees of
old, look upon the public and say, we're glad we're not like
him? Well, before you do, you better know this. There's no
hope for a self-righteous man. No hope for him. Salvation is
for sinners. It's for men and women who've
got no hope in themselves. They have discovered they are
a wilderness to themselves. And those who took their journey
were apart from the presence and power of God, a wilderness.
That's all they were, was a wilderness. Everything that they knew, everything
that they come to know, everything that they come to do was a gift
of God's sovereign grace. Everything. At least, Israel came first to
the bitter waters. Now, there's two things he's
going to let you know on this journey. He's going to establish
them up front. There's two of them. Number one
is there's no sweetness in this land except for his cross. That's
what he taught them at the Bitter Waters. There is no sweetness
in all this wilderness. There's no sweetness except in
his cross. His cross not only sweetened
those waters, but it sweetened every step they took. It sweetened
every experience they had all the way through his cross. His
cross. And the second thing is that
He has places of refreshing. And that's what Elam is. God
can turn even those pools of bitterness into a sweet experience
of grace. And I don't want to re-preach
what I preached last week. I just wanted to bring that message
up to you and get us up to speed on where we're at tonight. Now
here's what this verse says. It says they came to Elam. And I looked at that, and looked
at that, and looked at that. And finally, I looked the word
up. I thought, well, maybe I'll get some help there. And I looked
that word up, and here's what it means. It's a place in the
desert. That's what it is. A place in
the desert. And I looked at it, and I thought,
well, that don't help much. And then I looked at it again,
and I thought, that's it. That's it. Here's the message
of evil. It's a place in the wilderness. A place. It doesn't mean much to the intellectual,
that man that sits in his study and And he looks for the deep
things of the prophets. And he looks for these future
prophecies. And he looks to see what this
word and that word means. And he's got all these things
and ties in from the old Hebrew and Chaldean to the Greek and
all those things. And he sits in his study. And
he looks at Elam. And it's a place in the desert.
And he don't get much help. He's not enthused with that.
It don't mean much to the intellectual. And it don't mean much to the
mystic. There's nothing in Elam except palm trees and whales.
There ain't no snakes eating snakes. There's nothing to suit
the mystic in this. It's just palm trees and whales. That's all it is. But boy, I
tell you what, it don't mean much to them, but it means everything
to that man who walks through the wilderness. It meant everything. I close my eyes and think of
what a wilderness is around me and in me, and I can't help but
glorify God for a place in the wilderness. Don't you? Huh? We have a place. A place. He said, come unto me. He's the
place. In this wilderness, there's nowhere
to go. He said, all you that are laboring and are heavy laden,
he said, come to me. Come to me. And that's what they
did. They came to Elam. It's a place
in the wilderness. Oh, I think Elam must have meant
a lot to those weary travelers. A million strong with livestock
and children, a company that stretched out, if they was 14
wide, they stretched out for 30 miles. Think about that. 30 miles, 14 wide, traveling
through a hot, dry desert. You think they didn't run when
they saw that oasis? Don't you think when they just
saw that faint glimmer of those palm trees waving in that hot
wind out in that desert, can't you imagine some of them breaking
into a run and heading for those trees? If there's trees there,
there's water. There's water. Oh, dry and thirsty. Burning under that hot eastern
sun, weary and tired. And then out of nowhere comes
an oasis, shade and water. Seventy palm trees. Do you know
how many elders was in Israel? Seventy. There was a palm tree
for every elder in Israel. How many whales was there? Twelve. Twelve. One for each tribe. Now seven, and all of its multiples,
any time when you're going through Scripture. Seven and all of its
multiples have to do with complete sufficiency and full satisfaction. That's what these 70 palm trees
spoke about. And then there's 12 and all of
its multiples speaks of the whole house of Israel. Any time you
see that number 12 or any of the multiples, How many people
did John see in glory? He saw 144,000. That's a multiple
of 12. And that 144,000, that's a definite
number, but it teaches us that God's chosen a certain people. But it stands for an indefinite
number of God's elect, a number which no man can number. And Elam represents the whole
sufficiency of God's grace to his elect. It's the grace of
God in Christ that makes a place in the wilderness. And this wilderness
has no place for life, no place of refreshment, no place to rest,
no place to go, no place to find joy and peace and hope. And its
terrain, it might vary a little bit, but its environment never
changes. There's no place in this world
except such a place as God in Christ is put there to find that
all-sufficient grace of God and that place is in Christ. You'll
never find it anywhere else. You're not going to find it in
an aisle or at a bench or in a decision or in a commitment.
You're going to find it in Christ. You're going to look to Him.
You're going to hear of Him. And God's going to open your
eyes and show you, here's the place. If you want a drink, here's
the water. That's what He showed. The only
water you're going to get other than these wells that God put
there for them, you're going to get it out of this rock. And
I'm going to give you the smitten rock, and it's going to produce
all the water you want, and it's going to follow you everywhere
you go. There's no place in this world except such a place as
God in Christ has put there. And this place in the wilderness
is represented in three ways. That's what I want you to see
tonight. There's three ways in which this Elam represents a
place in this world. First of all, this place of refreshing
is represented in the person and work of Jesus Christ. He
said, except you eat of the flesh of the Son of God and drink His
blood, you've got no part in Him. This is where life is. He
that hath the Son hath life. He that hath not the Son of God,
whatever else He's got, He has not life. There's no life there. There is no Elam apart from Christ. Even Mars' bitter waters were
nothing apart from His cross. And Christ is our Elam. And as
they came to Elam, we must come to Christ to find God's sufficiency
of grace. That's where you're going to
find it, in Christ. I was in religion most of my
life. I never found grace, did you? In all your conversations
growing up, in all your religious experiences, did you ever find
grace? No. You found religion. You might
have found some temporary happiness up there crying, peace, peace,
where there is no peace, and you found it. But that peace
didn't go inside and give you peace, did it? That peace was
always dependent on what you did, and you couldn't do anything.
And before you get out the door, the peace was gone. before you
can have a conversation next day, that peace has already been
torn apart. That peace is in Christ. It's
the Lord Himself that healeth thee. He alone is Jehovah Rapha. And it's the very wellspring
of His being and person that gives us this promised rest.
He is in Himself a well of water. He said, if you'd have asked
me, I ought to give you water that would have been within you,
a well of water springing up into everlasting life. There is no other to help us.
All of Adam's sons died in their father. All of his children sinned
and come short of the glory of God as in Adam all die. And dead
is the word. That's the word, dead. No other
word really translates or defines our condition. We're dead in
nature. We can't rise up out of it. We're
dead by legal condemnation, having the sentence of death in us.
We're dead in our understanding and reason. We cannot be taught. The carnal mind is enmity against
God. It's not subject to the word
of God or the law of God. Neither indeed can be. But there
was one appointed other father who is the fullness, in the fullness
of time, came into this world, made of a woman, made under the
law to redeem them that were under the law. And he's the redeemer,
the covenant surety. He's the law keeper. He's the
mediator. He is our Elam. He's our Elam. He said, I am the way, didn't
he? What do you need? Wisdom? God
hath made him to be unto us wisdom. What do you need? Righteousness?
God hath made him to be unto us righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption. I am the way. I am the vine.
I am the truth. I am the life. I am. Except you believe that I am,
you'll die in your sins. He's our Elam. So first and foremost,
Jesus Christ himself is our Elam. He's the place of rest in the
wilderness. And then secondly, our Elam in
the wilderness is represented by the church. Don't you see
a picture of that in Elam, in them palm trees and them wells?
Huh? Men and women take their journey
through this world. God led them to the sea. Where
are they going to find refreshment? Down the road at that church?
I don't think so. Where are they going to find
that sweet water in those deep wells? Those who have gone through
this wilderness experience, where are they going to find it? They're
going to find it in his church. That's where they're going to
find it. The church is the pillar and ground of the truth. You
know, there was an elam created, sustained, and preserved for
weary sojourners long before Israel got there. Long before
they got there. The elam didn't grow up in a
second. The elam was established over time. And where did God
establish this island? He established it in such a place
that Israel couldn't help but cross its path. And that's what
he does. That's why he raises up churches
like he did right here. You say, well, it looks to me
like he put this church in Little Rock. There's a whole lot more
people up there. There's a lot of people up there, but there's
not many elect. He raises his church up where
Israel is going to cross its path. And it can be to an advantage
of them. That's why he raises these churches
up. It's to advantage his elect. It's to refresh his elect. It's
to feed his elect. It's to give them rest. They
can come here and rest. If you don't find any rest down
here, they're going to give you things to do as soon as you come
through the door. We'll make you a Sunday school
teacher. We're going to make you this, make you that. They
don't even know you from the man in the moon. They've already
given you jobs. A lot of them by the third week
are teaching Sunday school. Pitiful. Pitiful. Weary travelers
can come here and rest. They can rest. Glenn and I can
lay back in the shade of them big palm trees and rest. Church is the pillar and ground
of the truth. And this Elam was created, sustained,
and preserved for those weary sojourners long before they ever
got there. And let me tell you something.
It was there when they murmured at Mayra's waters. It was there. It was there even before they
left to sea. Oh, what a precious oasis is
the church in this world. But again, I'm telling you this
not to the intellectual who sits in his study or the dreamer who
sees only in his sleep, but to the sojourner, to the soldier,
to that man who walks through the hot sands and has that wilderness
experience in his heart by the Holy Ghost, this oasis means
something to him, don't it? You know lots of the children
of God enjoy the church and don't even know why. I don't even know.
We've got folks in here right now who came here for six months
and didn't know why. Didn't know what they was hearing
that was so different. But something was different.
And we got some that still come on occasion and still hadn't
figured it out. God hadn't revealed it to them.
But they know there's something different here than there is
out there. Oh, Elam. What a refreshing from that parched
wilderness was those wells and ponds. And this was just a little
place. Just a little place. It wasn't
Canaan. But it's a little piece of it, wasn't it? It's a little
piece of it. It wasn't Canaan itself. And
yet there was a sufficiency here to satisfy the whole of Israel. Think about that. God led. There was enough sufficiency
in Elam for every man, woman, child, goat, cow, and sheep that
they had. That was enough there, enough
sufficiency. And the Church of God, as it's
revealed in this world, is relatively just a small group. Elam didn't
take up much real estate. It wasn't real impressive in
size. But it had wells. It had wells. There wasn't any
wells out there. They're just cactus and rattlesnakes.
Wasn't no wells out there. Bitter pools out there. Elam
had wells, and wells sufficient enough to supply all Israel. And each little assembly in Israel,
each little elam represents these small assemblies of the church.
It's a model of the whole. And it's sustained by the same
water. It's preserved by the same Lord.
There's no rest, no refreshment, no place to camp in this world
but in the church. In the church. And my friend,
the local church, our Elam to all God's weary sojourners. And
they're gathered in such a place that all of them experience it.
And then thirdly, here's the third way. We're talking about
how Elam is represented today in the spiritual sense in this
world. Our Elam is Christ. That's our rest. That's where
we're going to find the shade and the rest and the water. We're
going to find it in Christ. And it's represented in the church
because the church represents Christ. They preach Christ. And so it's represented in the
church. And then thirdly, Elam is represented
in the regenerating, renewing, converting work of the Holy Spirit
of God. He is the Comforter. We find
Elam in Him. And He's that invisible power,
and He's the presence that seals us with the promises of Christ. He seals us. He is the Holy Spirit
of promise. He's not the Holy Spirit of tongues.
He's not the Holy Spirit of gifts. He's the Holy Spirit of promise.
It's the promises of God that He lays on the heart that the
sinner embraces. They hang on to those promises
in Christ. All the promises of God in Christ
are yea and amen, Paul says. There's no nay in it. They're
all Yea, and Amen in Christ. All those promises. And the Holy
Spirit, He seals us with that hope and promise of Christ. He
causes us to hang on. He makes those promises so real. You think anybody in Israel had
any second thoughts about drinking water out of them wells? Boy,
they crawled up under them pine trees and drank their fill. Sat
up on those big palms. Well, what is this sealing? I
believe it's being brought by the preaching of the gospel and
the sweet experience of grace to embrace the promises of God
in Christ. Our Lord said, many are called,
but few are chosen. And those who are chosen are
sealed by His Spirit. You can hope in that promise.
The next guy, you talk about the promise, and he wants to
argue about election. He don't see election as the promise of
God, the open door of hope. He don't see that. He wants to
argue about his rights. He wants to argue about human
rights and all that kind of stuff. Not those who are sealed with
the Holy Spirit of promise. They see it as the promise of
God and embrace it. Many hear that external call,
and many leave Egypt's land, but Egypt never leaves them. spur-of-the-moment decisions
and deals and determinations, but they're never really convicted
or converted of God. And so Israel passes through
this land. And I'll tell you, a big multitude
of them are cursed of God in the end. He manifests their rebellion
the whole time. And then at the very end, he
said, as I live, saith the Lord, you're not coming in this land.
You're not coming into Canaan's rest. Salvation demands a new
nature, a new mind, and a new direction. Those are all things
that we can't do for ourselves. God has to do them. God has to
provide them. And no man has the heart to follow
God through the wilderness apart from this refreshing, renewing
wells of the Holy Spirit of God. You're not going to make it.
You just grit your teeth and follow up your fists and say,
I'm going to do this. You'll do it for a while. And
then you'll follow by the wayside. You're not going to do it. I'm
telling you right now, you're not going to do it if you don't
have the heart to follow God through the wilderness apart
from the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit refreshes you
along the way. Along the way. Jude said, we're sanctified by
God the Father, preserved in Jesus Christ, and called. called out of darkness, and called
out of despair, and called out of guilt, and called out of death,
and called out of Egyptian bondage, and were called to this refreshing
place called Elam. And it's the earnest. Elam is
the earnest of their inheritance. I tell you, Elam in the desert,
in the wilderness, is a little piece of canyon. It's the earnest
of their inheritance. It was just a foretaste of Canaan's
bounty. And Elam represents the full,
satisfying, all-sufficient grace of God for his elect. I'm talking
about his unfailing, special, distinguishing grace. And the
greatest evidence of our blessed inheritance is the earnest of
it made sweet to the soul in the deep, refreshing wells of
Elam. That's where you find it. And
then let's think about this as I close. It was just a little past the
pools of Mayra where they found Elam. If they could have just bore
bare their murmuring at the pool another day, one more day, they'd
have been in Elam. that have been in England. Oh,
I tell you, you think about that next time things fall your way,
and next time these crises come, and the sad news and the bitter
pools, whatever it is, you just think about this and know this
for sure, because we got the type of it right here. So I know
what's coming spiritually, but what came physically. And I know
not very far from that bitter pool is those wells and palm
trees and that rest, that blessed rest of England. We can just forbear our murmuring
at the pool for a day. Elam's right around the corner.
The most weary pilgrim has a resting place, and the saddest heart
is not without rejoicing. He's not going to let one go
by. Not one. And I tell you, were it not for
this experience in the wilderness, Kathy and I had never tasted
of the sweet wells of Elam. Father, bless the message tonight. Make it real to our hearts. Make us taste of it. Let us taste
it. Taste it in our soul, in our
minds, in our hearts, and in our soul. I ask you for Christ's sake,
amen.