Let's look first at verse 51
of chapter 12. And it came to pass the self
same day that the Lord did bring the children of Israel out of
the land of Egypt by their armies. Now, can you imagine the experience
of this? They had been in Israel or they
had been in Egypt for 400 years in hard bondage, miserable lives,
and now the Lord is bringing them out. Try to put yourself
in their place. Can you imagine the electricity
that must have been in the air as they were marching out of
Egypt? How exciting. what anticipation they must have
felt for the future, what a miraculous deliverance they had experienced. Now, I can't imagine how exciting,
truly exciting this must have been. Chapter 14, verse 1, And
the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel,
that they turn not go in the direction which they thought
they were going, they were to turn and encamp before Pi-ha-hi-roth,
which means the place of the gorges, deep pits, between Migdol,
which means high tower, an inaccessible place, and the sea. over against Baal Zephon, which
means the place of winter, the place of destruction. That doesn't
sound like a very good place to go, does it? And yet, that's
where they're called on to go. And it was a disastrous place
for them. There was no access to retreat. As a matter of fact, it was a
strategic nightmare. They were put in a place where
if the Egyptians came back after them, there was nothing they
could do. They were stuck there with nowhere
to go. Now God speaks concerning what
Pharaoh will do. God has placed them in this terrible
place, so they would have thought. Verse three, for Pharaoh will
say of the children of Israel, They are entangled in the land. They are in a position where
they can't get themselves out. The wilderness has shut them
in. And God said, I will harden Pharaoh's heart that he shall
follow after them. And I will be honored upon Pharaoh
and upon all his hosts that the Egyptians may know that I am
the Lord. And they did so. This is what
I'm going to do to Pharaoh. So Pharaoh does exactly what
God determined for him to do. Verse five. And it was told the
king of Egypt that the people fled and the heart of Pharaoh
and of his servants was turned against the people. And they said, why have we done
this? That we have let Israel go from serving us. Now you'd
think they would have learned their lesson from now. But their
heart was turned. Who turned it? The King's heart
is in the hand of the Lord as the rivers of water. He turneth
it whither so ever he will. He turned Pharaoh's heart. Verse six. And he made ready
his chariot and took his people with him. And he took 600 chosen
chariots and all the chariots of Egypt and captains over every
one of them. And the Lord, hardened the heart
of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. And he pursued after the children
of Israel and the children of Israel went out with an high
hand. But the Egyptians pursued after them and all the horses
and chariots of Pharaoh and his horsemen and his army. And he
overtook them in camping by the sea, this impossible place where
God placed them beside Pihahiroth before Baal Zephon. Now Pharaoh did exactly what
his wicked heart wanted to do. But it was nothing more or less
than what God determined before to be done. That's clear from
that passage of scripture, isn't it? Pharaoh is God's pawn. He just doesn't know it, but
he is God's pawn. Verse 10. When Pharaoh drew nigh, the children
of Israel in this place where there was no retreat, they lifted
up their eyes and behold, the Egyptians marched after them. And they were sore afraid. And the children of Israel cried
unto the Lord. There was absolutely no place
for them to retreat. or to escape. And they were terrified. Now I've got a question. Should they have been terrified? After all they had seen, after
all God had done for them, after all the miracles they had experienced,
should they have been terrified? Now, you know, they shouldn't
have. With God, nothing shall be impossible. But they were
looking at things from a completely fleshly perspective. Have you
ever been there? Looked at things from a completely fleshly perspective. That's what they were doing.
And they were terrified. They saw no means of escape. So look what they said in verse
11. And they said unto Moses, Because there were no graves
in Egypt, hast thou taken us away to die in the wilderness?
Wherefore hast thou dealt thus with us, to carry us forth out
of Egypt? Now this is an expression of
their unbelief and their wickedness. Verse 12, look what they say.
Is not this the word that we did tell thee in Egypt, saying,
Let us alone. Don't bother us. Don't interfere
with us. Leave us alone. Leave us be. We're fine with things the way
they are. For it had been better for us to serve the Egyptians
than that we should die in the wilderness. Now here is the essence
of human sin. Let us alone. The absolute worst thing that
could happen to me or you is for God to just leave us alone. He doesn't have to do anything.
All He has to do is withdraw His hand and leave us alone. As a matter of fact, you want
to know what reprobation is? You see that in the Scripture.
God gave Him over to reprobate mine. You know what reprobation
is? It's God leaving somebody alone. That's all He's got to
do, leave you alone. If He leaves me alone, I will
most assuredly wind up in hell. Don't you know that's truth concerning
you? And yet, here they are saying, isn't this what we told you?
Leave us alone. Aren't you thankful the Lord
doesn't answer prayers like that? How merciful the Lord is. Look in verse 13. And Moses said
unto the people, Fear ye not. They were scared
to death, and it was a bad kind of fear. It was the fear of mistrust.
It was the fear of unbelief. Fear ye not. Stand still and
see the salvation of the Lord, which he will show to you today.
For the Egyptians whom you've seen today, you shall see them
again no more forever. The Lord shall fight for you. and you shall hold your peace. How merciful the Lord is. One
could see why he could have said, okay, have it your way. I'm gonna
leave you alone. Have you ever been there with
somebody you just had it with them? Go your way. It's okay. Door's open. But God is so merciful. He would not leave them alone. In mercy, he refused to leave
them alone. And Moses gives them another
word from the Lord. He says, fear not. Fear not. Now you know there's a good kind
of fear. The fear of God that's the beginning of wisdom. That
fear of God that makes a man afraid to look anywhere but Christ. The fear of God that makes a
man afraid of sin. There's a good kind of fear.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. This is maybe the
best description of a believer. A believer is somebody who fears
God. He truly fears God. There's a good kind of fear,
but there's a bad kind of fear. It's the fear of mistrust. It's the fear of unbelief. It's the fear of man. They were
afraid of men at this time, weren't they? At this time, they did
not trust the Lord to save them. So they were afraid. They were
afraid of Pharaoh's armies. They were being dominated by
the fear of man. At this time, they should have
known. They had no reason for fear, but they had it. How many
times through their history did they fall prey to unbelief? How
many times in your history have you fallen prey to unbelief? Here they are scared to death,
but God says, fear not. Now, if God says to you, fear
not, you really don't have any reason to fear, do you? He says
to these people, fear not. Look what he says next. Verse
12. Or verse 13, and Moses said unto
the people, fear ye not. And here's the next exhortation. Stand still. What are you doing when you're
standing still? Nothing. Nothing. What can I do to get out of this
mess? Nothing. What can I do to save myself?
Nothing. You know, The hardest thing in
the world to do is nothing. Isn't that so? But really, there's
no place they could move anyway. You know, we're in a situation
where the only way we can be delivered is by a miracle of
God. The only way we can be saved
is the divine intervention, the miraculous work of God, Him doing
something for me. Well, are you telling us to do
nothing? Wait a minute. What can you do? What can you
do? Come on. What can you do? What,
what strength do you have? What spiritual ability do you
have? You want to do something? Tell me what you can do. The
fact of the matter is we can do nothing. You ever been brought to see
that? You know, it's only when you stand still and do nothing
that you see you can do nothing. Have you ever seen there's absolutely
nothing you can do to save yourself? There's nothing you can do to
contribute to your salvation. There's nothing you can do to
make yourself more savable or more likely to be saved. There's
not one thing you can do. There's no sight. There's no
spiritual light. There's no understanding until
we stand still and do nothing. Stand still. Don't move. Don't do anything. It's only when you stand still
that you can see the salvation of the Lord. What he says. Stand still and see the salvation
of the Lord. Now that word, see, is the word
generally translated, look. It's quite often translated in
our scripture, look, look, look. Stand still, don't move, don't
do anything, simply look upon the salvation of the Lord. Now please listen to me very
carefully. The salvation of the Lord. I shall call his name Jesus.
We've already read that. For he shall save his people
from their sins. The salvation of the Lord. Jesus
Christ himself is the salvation of the Lord. Do you remember
the words of Simeon? Lord, now let us vow thy servant depart
in peace for mine eyes have seen thy salvation. When he saw the
Lord Jesus Christ, he saw God's salvation. Now, may God give
us grace. The only way we can look upon
His salvation is for Him to give us eyes to see and ears to hear.
But to look upon His salvation, Christ Jesus Himself is salvation.
Now, the first thing that comes to my mind when I think about
that, think about Christ, my salvation being in person, is
I think about union with the Lord Jesus Christ. united to
Him, one with Him. He said, before I formed thee
in the belly, that's before I had any physical existence. He said, Behold, I've loved thee
with an everlasting love. Now this blows my mind all together. I started thinking about this
today and it almost feels like my brain is going to cave in
trying to think about it. There's never a time when I didn't
have existence before the Lord Jesus Christ. There's never been
a time when I wasn't united to Him. There was never a time when
He didn't know me. I never began in His experience. Every believer has always been
one with the Lord Jesus Christ. Can I understand that? No way
I can understand that. Do I believe it? Yes, I do. And that's where all of our confidence
comes from. He is our salvation. Think of Him as standing firm.
Now, I don't know what took place before time began. The Bible
gives us some hints. He's called the messenger of
the covenant. We read of the covenant of peace
that was sealed with His blood. But somehow, I don't know how
this works, but somehow God the Father gave God the Son of people,
all of His elect, everybody who believes, everybody who sees
their need of Him. And He said, you agree to bear
their sin and to be their Savior. And He said, I'll And at that
time, everything that God required of me, He looked to His blessed
Son for everything, everything. You see how He is salvation?
Think of His incarnation when He became a man and He kept God's
holy law. That's my righteousness before
God. He is my salvation. You think of Him being nailed
to the cross. You think of Him bleeding and
dying. There's my sin payment. My sin
became His. He paid the debt. You think of
His resurrection. What's His resurrection tell
us? There's my justification. You think of His intercession.
Right now, there's a man representing me in glory, the Lord Jesus Christ.
There's one reason why I'm preserved. He keeps me. He prays for me. He's my Savior. He is salvation. And I'll tell you when we'll
finally have some glimpse of this. We can talk about it now,
but how much of what I said do you understand? We get a glimpse
of it. We get a glimpse, but with just
a little, it's so far above us. I like what David said, such
knowledge is too wonderful for me. It's high, I can't attain
to it. We can't grasp this, but I tell you, one of these days
when I'm perfectly conformed to the image of Jesus Christ
and I'm just like him, I'm gonna have some little glimpse of how
he himself is my salvation. Stand still and just look, behold
the salvation of the Lord. You know, this is what we're considering
right now is the most glorious thing we could possibly consider.
The salvation of the Lord. Christ Jesus is the salvation
of the Lord. And we're called upon to do nothing. Don't just stand there and do
something. No, don't do something. Just stand there. Do nothing. And behold, the salvation
of the Lord. your complete salvation in Him. Now look what he goes on to say
in verse 13. Moses said unto the people, Fear
ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which
He will show to you today. For the Egyptians, those ones
you're so afraid of, all your fear is about these Egyptians.
You've got no way to get out of this mess. You think you're
in trouble. Stand still, see the salvation of the Lord, which
He'll show to you this day. For the Egyptians that you're
so afraid of, whom you've seen today, you shall see them again. No more, forever. Verse 14, the Lord shall fight
for you and you'll hold your peace. You
keep your mouth shut. No objections. The Lord will
fight for you. Isn't that wonderful? The Lord
will As a matter of fact, we have an example of what all that
is in this very chapter. Look in verse, the Lord shall
fight for you. Look in verse 23. And the Egyptians
pursued and went in after them in the midst of the sea, even
all Pharaoh's horses, his chariots and his horsemen. And it came
to pass that in the morning watch, the Lord looked under the host
of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire into the cloud.
And he troubled the host of the Egyptians, and he took off their
chariot wheels, that they draved him heavily, so that the Egyptians
said, Let us flee from the face of Israel, for the Lord fighteth
for them against the Egyptians, if God be for you. And that's
what it means to have the Lord fighting for you. If God be for
us, who can be against us? What confidence There's no possibility of defeat.
There's no possibility of anything, but complete success. Verse 15.
And the Lord said unto Moses, and this is interesting. Of course,
it's interesting. It's the word of God. And the
Lord said unto Moses, wherefore cryest thou unto me, speak unto
the children of Israel that they go forward. And this almost appears
to be a contradiction, doesn't it? He says, stand still, see
the salvation of the Lord. And now he says, go forward.
You know what direction going forward was? The Red Sea. The water. Go forward into the
water. Now, their warrant for doing
this, it wouldn't have made sense to anybody. start marching into
the sea, but their word for doing this was the command of God. This was the act of faith. Hebrews 11, 29 says, by faith,
they pass through the Red Sea as by dry land, which the Egyptians
are saying to do. They tried to do it. And what
happened to them? They drowned. You see, when you
try to believe, you don't believe, do you? You don't try to believe,
you believe. When you try to believe, you're
not believing. The Egyptians were trying to believe. They
were trying to think that water was going to be held up. And
what happened to them? The scripture says they drowned. He said, go
forward. Now there's a time for asking. And there's a time for receiving. There's a time for believing.
There's a time for trusting. There's a time for acting. Go
forward. Don't retreat. Don't regress.
Don't stay the same. Go forward. Go forward in faith. Go forward in love. Go forward
in zeal. Go forward in obedience. Go forward
in growth. Go forward in works of faith.
Go forward. That's an encouraging command,
isn't it? Now, if God commands me to go forward and He enables
me to go forward, you know what I can do? Go forward. God says. Tell them to go forward
and here's the reason why they can go forward. Let's keep reading
in verse 15 and the Lord said unto Moses, wherefore Christ
down to me speak unto the children of Israel that they go forward.
But lift out thy rod. And stretch out thine hand over
the sea and divide it. And the children of Israel shall
go on dry ground through the midst of the sea. And behold,
I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians, and they shall follow
them. And I will get me honor upon
Pharaoh and upon all his host, upon his chariots and upon his
horsemen. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord when
I've gotten me honor upon Pharaoh, upon his chariots and upon his
horsemen. And the angel of God, which went before the camp of
Israel, removed He went from before them to behind them. And
the pillar of the cloud went from before their face and stood
behind them. And it came between the camp
of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel. And it was a cloud
and darkness to them, the Egyptians. But it gave light by night to
these, the Israelites, so that the one came not near the other
all the night. And Moses stretched out his hand
over the sea and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong
east wind all that night and made the sea dry land and the
waters were divided. And here's the act of faith.
And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon
the dry ground. And the waters were a wall unto
them on their right hand and on their left. Now, what must
this have been like? They're walking on dry ground
where the sea was. On either side, there's a wall
of water. And this they were sure of. The
only thing keeping them from grounding was the will of God.
They were, they, you reckon any of them questioned that? They
knew the only reason that they were preserved was the will of
God, a miracle of God. They knew the only thing that
kept them from being destroyed is the mighty power of God. Isn't that what faith is? You
know, you believe that, don't you? You believe the only difference
between you and hell is what God does for you. You believe
that. They walked through that Did that really happen? Of course
it did. Of course it did. Well, that's hard to believe.
It's not hard to believe. With God, nothing shall be impossible.
There wasn't any trouble for God. They walked through it on
dry land, which represents faith. Now, verse 23, I want you to
notice this. The Egyptians saw the same thing
and the Egyptians pursued and went in after them. They saw
the same thing Israel did. They saw the water standing up
in a heap. They saw the dry land before them. The Egyptians pursued,
went in after them to the midst of the sea, even all Pharaoh's
horses, his chariots, and his horsemen. They saw the same thing,
but they had no faith. They went in without being commanded
to. You see, God commanded the Israelites
to go. He never told the Egyptians to.
You see, faith begins with God's command, doesn't it? I love that
passage of Scripture. I've been thinking about this
a couple of weeks trying to make up my mind whether I want to preach
on it. Looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our
faith. Where'd my faith come from? The
Lord Jesus Christ. He's the author of it. He's the
cause of it. He's the originator of it. Do
you need faith? Ask Him for it. Ask the Lord
to give you faith. The only way you're going to
get faith is for Him to give it to you. That's the only way
you're going to have it. Ask the Lord for it. He's the author
and He's the finisher. He's the perfecter of our faith. Now verse 26, And the Lord said unto Moses,
Stretch out thine hand over the sea, that the waters may come
again upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots and upon their
horsemen. And Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea and
the sea returned to his strength when the morning appeared and
the Egyptians fled against it. And the Lord overthrew the Egyptians
in the midst of the sea and the waters returned and covered the
chariots and the horsemen and all the host of Pharaoh that
came into the sea after them. And there remained not so much
as one of them. Now obviously every one of them
were killed, but that means more than that. What's the name of
this city? It's the Red City. I don't have any doubt that that
represents the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And you know what's
said regarding our sins? There remains not so much as
one of them. Complete, full, free justification. Irreversible, irrevocable, complete. Believer, before the thrice holy
God, you have no sin. That's the truth. There remain
not so much as one of them. Verse 29. But the children of Israel. Walked
upon dry land in the midst of the sea. And the waters were
a wall unto them on the right hand and on their left. That's
the walk of faith. Verse 30 thus the Lord. saved
Israel. There's a brief summary of our
faith. The Lord saved Israel. Salvation is what? Of the Lord. The Lord saved Israel that day
out of the hand of the Egyptians. He did it that day And Israel
saw the Egyptians dead upon the seashore. And this is a statement
regarding the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. We were saved in
that day. Verse 31. And Israel saw that
great work, which the Lord did. upon the Egyptians. You know,
I feel quite sure not one of them thought this was a cooperative
effort. Not one of them thought they helped God out in this.
They knew this was the work of the Lord God Almighty. They believed
this. And Israel saw that great work
which the Lord did upon the Egyptians. Isn't that what we see when we
see God's salvation? We see the great work the Lord
did. And the people feared But this was a good kind of fear.
They feared the Lord. And they believed the Lord. And
they believed his servant, Moses. Now, when we see the salvation
of God that he's accomplished, here's what happens. We fear
God. We fear him. The reverence and awe and respect
of his majesty and his person. And we believe him. You know,
God can't lie. He can't lie. We believe him.
And notice it says, they believed his servant Moses. You know,
they had a hard time believing Moses. They were all the time
questioning him. And they're going to be questioning him plenty
more after this. This will be evidenced by believing
God. The one who brings the word from the Lord, you'll believe
what he's saying. Now, if I'm telling the truth, you'll believe me. If I tell you the truth, if I
tell you the truth of God and you don't believe me, it's not
me you don't believe. It's God you don't believe. If
I'm telling the truth, they believe the Lord and they believed his
servant, Moses. Now, what a blessing, what a
blessing to be saved by the salvation of the Lord. You might not have
much of what this world calls good and great. So what? Could you really care less? You
know the salvation of the Lord. Let's pray together.