Exodus chapter 15, and I want
to begin reading down in verse 22. This is somewhat of a continuation
of our study last week, but we'll look at this completely different
this week. Exodus chapter 15, and let's
begin here in verse 22. Then here at the Red Sea, God
had given them a great deliverance. They had sang His praises, and
now they are going on into the wilderness. Verse 22, Exodus
chapter 15. So Moses brought Israel from
the Red Sea, and they went out into the wilderness of Shur,
and they went three days in the wilderness and found no water.
And when they came to Myra, they could not drink of the waters
of Myra, for they were bitter. Therefore the name of it was
called Myra. And the people murmured against
Moses, saying, What shall we drink? And he cried unto the
Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree, which when he had cast
into the waters, the waters were made sweet. There he made for them a statue and
an ordinance, and there he proved them. and said, If thou wilt
diligently hearken to the voice of the Lord your God, and wilt
do all that which is right in his sight, and wilt give ear
to his commandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put
none of these diseases upon you which I have brought upon the
Egyptians, for I am the Lord that healeth thee." The reason
we study these Old Testament types and prophecies and pictures
is because the scripture says that whatsoever things were written
aforetime were written for our learning. That we through patience
and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. The children
of Israel are examples. Sometimes they are bad examples.
Paul warns us of following their example on murmuring. They were
bad to murmur. But other times, they're good
examples. And we study them to learn from them. And as I said
just a minute ago, here in the 15th chapter, you remember last
week, the Lord had delivered this people, and boy, they were
happy. They were a happy people. They
saw all their enemies drowned in the Red Sea. Sank to the bottom. And they began to shout and sing
the Lord's praises, the horse and his rider, as He thrown into
the sea. And they sort of mocked their
enemies. Look down in verse 9. They let us in on the attitude
of Pharaoh and his soldiers. In verse 9, the enemy said, I
will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide and destroy. My
lust shall be satisfied upon them. I will draw my sword. My hands shall destroy them.
I tell you, Satan better be careful how much he brags, doesn't he?
He is awful presumptuous sometimes. It seems like when you get real
presumptuous, it is just about the time the Lord is ready to
take him down. And verse 10, Thou didst blow with thy wind,
and thy sea covered them, and they sank as lead in the mighty
waters. The Lord has no difficulty destroying
His enemies, does He? He just blew. He just commanded
the wind to blow. And they were covered. They were
covered. And then they begin to sing His
praises because of it. Now, this is the way you and
I are, is it not, when the Lord first saves us? We're so happy
because we saw our sins drowned in the blood of the Lord Jesus
Christ. We've been delivered from our sins. We've been delivered
from our guilt. We've been delivered from the
bondage of Satan. And what do we do? Well, we sing. For the first time, in the history
of this people, they sang. This is the first recorded song
that we have in history. And you know when the Lord saves
us, that's the first time in all our life that we begin to
sing. Oh, we sang with our lips before then, but we never sang
with grace in our hearts to the Lord, did we? But when He saves
us, that's when we begin to sing unto Him. And really and honestly,
you and I should never stop singing His praises. But they didn't
stay here long. As soon as they'd finished the
song, off they went into the wilderness. And that's the way
you find the children of Israel. If you want to read about their
traveling, sometimes read over numbers, and I'm telling you,
this was a traveling people. They didn't stay in any place
long. They traveled. And that's the way it is with
the Lord's people. They're always on the go. When the Lord calls them, They're
not too bad to stand idle. When the Lord called James and
John, they left their father and the ship to mend the nets,
and they followed the Lord Jesus. When He gave blind Barnabas his
sight, the Scripture says He followed Jesus in the way. And
when He cast the devils out of that gathering, He said, you
go tell your family what I did for you. So the children of God
are always on the move. We've got a race to run, haven't
we? We've got a path to walk. We've got a heaven to gain. We've
got a faith to contend for. We've got a world to overcome. We've got sin to lay aside with
all of its weight. We've got a course to finish.
And we just don't have time for a lot of idleness, do we? As
children of God, we're always, always on the move. And the book
of Exodus is about the deliverance and the journeying of the children
of Israel. And that's why we look at these
things, because we learn from them. In their deliverance, we
can find certain aspects of our deliverance. And in their journeyings,
we can find certain aspects of our journeyings. And the way
God taught them is the same way today He teaches us. And that's
what we want to see tonight in our text. Here in verse 22. The
first thing we want to see this evening is the first thing the
Lord taught the children of Israel. One of the first things He taught
them when they got up past the Red Sea and they went out in
the wilderness. This is the first thing that
He taught them. And let me say it like this. Egypt was behind
them. There was no going back. They
may think sometime to go back. But there was no going back.
Between Israel And Egypt, there was this mighty sea. You don't
read where a single one of them went back. They did not go back. And in front of them was the
land of promise. And they were stuck between those
two places. The place where they were brought
out of bondage from and the land of promise. They were out here
now in this wilderness. All that was there was sand and
mountains. As far as I know, a blade of
grass wouldn't hardly grow in this place, except a few oases
that they found along. And what the Lord was going to
teach them, first and foremost, that it was Him that was to sustain
them in this journey. It was Him that was to utterly
sustain them in this journey. He was going to bring them to
utterly depend upon Him for all their substance. Now, that's
what we have here in verse 22. Look at this. So Moses brought
Israel from the Red Sea, and they went out into the wilderness
of Shur, and they went three days into the wilderness and
found no water. They found no water. Now, here's the way the Lord
teaches us to trust Him for everything that sustains us. He brings us
to see, He teaches us that there is nothing in this world that
can provide our needs but Him. There is no water. There is no
water of life in this world. It must come from heaven. Listen
to what David said in Psalm chapter 63, O Lord God, Thou art God,
Early will I seek thee, my soul thirsts for thee, my flesh longs
for thee in a dry and thirsty land where no water is." There
was no physical water here for them to drink. Three days journey
and there was no water. And David said, there is no water
in this wilderness. There was no physical water for
them And in this wilderness that you and I are walking through,
that we're taking our journey through, there's no spiritual
water. There was no water for them to quench the thirst of
their body. And in this world, there is no
spiritual water to quench the thirst of our spirits. It's not
there. Look here in chapter 16, in verses
1 and verse 3. And they took their journey from
Elam, and all the congregation of Israel came into the wilderness
of sin. Here's another wilderness. And
between Elam and Sinai on the fifteenth day of the second month
after their departed out of the land of Egypt. And look in verse
three. They murmured again in verse
two. Verse three, the children of Israel said unto them, Would
to God we had died in the land at the hand of the Lord in the
land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did
eat bread to the full, for you have brought us forth into the
wilderness to kill this whole congregation with hunger." Now
they have no bread. First time they went, there was
no water. And now the next wilderness they come into, there was no
bread. And what is the Lord teaching
these Israelites? Well, He's teaching them this.
If you have water and you have bread, it's got to be given you
by Me. By Me. And it's going to be miraculous. The Lord even opened the rock.
He split the rock of Flint and rivers of water come gushing
out to give them water. He sends them bread down from
heaven. They ate angels' food. So what's
He teaching them? He's letting them get thirsty
that they may know the water that you need is not here in
this wilderness. I'm going to have to provide
it. And the bread that you need, it's got to come from Me. You've
got to be fed with manna from heaven. And what's He teaching
us, brothers and sisters, as He leads us? He teaches us the
very same thing, doesn't He? That the water we need for our
souls doesn't come from nature. It doesn't come from this world.
And the bread of life doesn't come from this world. It doesn't
come from the flesh. But where does it come from?
It comes from heaven. It comes from God Himself. In
40 years they wandered in this wilderness and the Bible says
that their clothes rotted not on their backs, neither wore
their shoes out. Forty years, their clothing and
their shoes, God sustained them. As far as I know, they never
had any new clothes to change into. You and I talk about perseverance. We talk about eternal security
and all the different phrases we use. But this is something
each of us has to learn ourselves from the Holy Scriptures and
by experience. And what we begin to learn is
something we did not know before. And what is it? Those things
that are needful to sustain and nourish our new life does not
come from nature, it does not come from this world, but it
comes only from God. Our new life is heavenly and
can only be sustained from heaven. Now that's a difficult lesson
to learn and you didn't know that when the Lord first saved
you. You was running every place trying to sustain yourself and
sustain by all kinds of means before the Lord brought you to
realize, I'm going to have to sustain you. I'm going to have
to sustain you. The Lord Jesus said, we are in
this world But we are not of this world. The new life that
we have is not of this world. And that which sustains this
new life and nourishes this life is not of this world. Christ
said, I have chosen you out of the world. And as heaven-born
people, we are on our way to our birthplace. For we were born
from above. And we're headed there to the
country of our nativity. And we are sustained and nourished
by food and drink that come from that place of our nativity. Now
isn't that so? That's what the Lord has to teach
us. And sometimes He makes us hungry in our souls. Sometimes
He makes us thirsty in our souls. to make us realize and know that
the very One who gave us new life to begin with is the only
One who can sustain this new life within us. Brother Walker
preached that wonderful message last Sunday evening on, It is
finished. And I thought about that this
week. Accomplished redemption. And that's one of the things
we feed upon, isn't it? That's our food and our drink.
Accomplished redemption. It's food for our souls. It's
drink for our souls. It's clothing for our souls. It keeps us warm on the cold
nights and protects us from the heat in the daytime. It sustains
us. It sustains us. And as we learn
this lesson, we will depend upon God to supply us and we will
seek Him for that supply. Can somebody quote Philippians
4.19 to me? I bet most of you could if I
started. But my God shall supply all your needs according to His
riches in glory by Christ Jesus. That's what we have to learn.
And He takes these means to teach us just like He did with these
people. And if they had ran into wells
of water, and ran into all kinds of food to sustain them on their
way, then know this, they would have never had to depend upon
the Lord to supply them in that wilderness. That's what He does
with us when He saves us. We stay there for a while, we
sing His praises, we bless Him for saving us, and then He heads
us out into this wilderness, and there's where He begins to
teach us. And the Lord Jesus said, say not, what shall we
eat? What shall we drink? What shall
we wear? That's what these Israelites
always talked about. What are we going to drink? What
are we going to eat? What are we going to wear? We
learn He's going to sustain us. He's going to give us our drink.
He's going to give us our food. He's going to give us our clothing. Verse 23. Here's another lesson
that we learn. Look in verse 23. Chapter 15,
And when they came to Myra, they could not drink of the waters
of Myra, for they were bitter. Therefore the name of it is called
Myra. The Lord was weaning them from
trusting in the creature for their health and their nourishment. They had water. They found water. But you know something? They
can't drink it. They can't drink it. Why couldn't
they drink it? It's too bitter. You can't drink
bitter water. It's bitter to them and it will
be until God blesses it to them. What's he teaching them? There
are things of this world that can be a help to us and can be
a comfort to us when these things are used and enjoyed through
the Creator. We can enjoy the creatures. We
can enjoy the things of God when we enjoy them under God. But when we attempt to enjoy
these things and to take confidence and strength from them apart
from the Creator, then these things become bitter. They become bitter. Wayne sent
me a beautiful picture this week. I think it was Monday of a mountain. He talked about a beautiful mountain. And said a fella charged a pretty
penny to drive across his property just to park there at the base
of that mountain and look at it. And I can imagine he gets
a pretty penny for that because that is a beautiful, beautiful
place. Majestic mountain. Snow all over
the top of it. And I thought about that thing
and I thought, boy, what would it be to have a big mansion sitting
right there at the bottom of that majestic mountain? and have
your back porch screened in for the summertime and enclosed for
the wintertime, sit and drink your coffee and eat your meals,
looking at that mountain. But you know something? The only
way you could enjoy looking at that, if you looked at it in
the light of the majesty of Him who created it. The world can
sit there and foam over that thing and look at it forever.
But the children of God, He weans from these things. He brings
them to the place where it finally means nothing, just an old, cold
mountain, until they look at it in the light of Him that made
it. Those big salmons, Wayne, that
you talk about, man, I'd love to get my teeth in some of them.
But you know how we would enjoy something like that? When we
sit down and eat those big salmons, knowing they come from the hand
of our Heavenly Father. This is our Father's world, and
He's provided us with these things, and we enjoy them in that light. We have all sorts of things in
this world that we can enjoy if we'll enjoy them in the light
of enjoying them under God who made them. our families, our grandbabies, our children,
our jobs, our vacations, our cars, everything that we have,
we can enjoy these things when we enjoy them at the hands of
Him who graciously gives these things to us. But if we don't
enjoy them by enjoying Him first and then through Him, what happens?
I'm bitter, don't I? Bitter water. And we say, oh,
those waters that used to be so sweet have become bitter. Why, I wonder. Why, I wonder. Did we begin to enjoy the creature
without enjoying the Creator? Oh, they got there to this water.
And they thought, man, this is water. We need water. We got
some water. And God said, I'm going to teach
you something. You're not going to enjoy this. You're not going
to enjoy this until I make it a blessing to you. And you know
it's not only this way in the physical realm, but it's this
way in the spiritual realm. All the means that God provides
for us of worshiping Him and learning of Him, you know something,
if we begin to look at those means and trust in the mere means,
they became so empty and bitter to us. Oh, I hope none of you
have ever seen the same boy, old Bruce. I know, bless his
heart, he's going to say something. Boy, he's going to help me. There
was a lady one time, she had heard of Spurgeon and she had
the opportunity to travel through London. And she was going through
London and she'd been praying for the Lord to give her a blessing.
She just felt like she needed a blessing so bad. She thought,
well, I'm here close to the tabernacle. I've heard of this man by the
name of Spurgeon and I'm going to hear him pray. And she went
in there and he preached, and oh, the Lord blessed her. And
she made mention when she went out to him how the Lord blessed
the message to her heart. And she was away for a while,
and on her way back home, she said, Oh, man, I'm going to stop
and listen to that man again. Oh, what a preacher he is. Oh,
I'll get a great blessing out of here in Spurgeon. And she
went in and didn't get a thing out of what he said. And she
told him so on the way out. She said, the first time I came
through here, all this happened. But now this time, she said,
I'm leaving as empty as I was when I came. And he said, lady,
could I ask you a question? He said, when you came here the
first time, what was your motive for coming here? She said, I
was seeking the Lord for a blessing. I wanted Him to bless me. He
said, what was your motive for coming the second time? She said,
to hear you. He said, that's your problem.
That's your problem. You come trusting in Spurgeon.
You come thinking it's spiritual. And God is weaning you from such
a thing. And He does that to us, doesn't
He? He does that to us. How often does He wean us, brothers
and sisters, even from saying, I'll go to His Word and I'll
be helped there. We may go to His Word, but we'll
have no help there if He don't open our hearts to it. And we'll
say, we'll go to the worship service. We'll have some help
there. Well, if He lets us. If He gives
us grace, if He makes it a blessing to us. But He weans us from trusting
in the means. All the time we thank Him for
the means. All the time we use the means. But He weans us from
trusting in those means and begging Him to bless the means. Bless the means. Thirdly, look at this. Here's
another lesson. And it's connected with the first
two. And it's this. It's found here in verse 25. And they cried unto the Lord,
and the Lord showed him a tree. Moses cried to the Lord, and
the Lord showed him a tree, which when he had cast unto the waters,
the waters were made sweet. They learned this lesson. Not
only does the Lord have to sustain them, And He weans them from
trusting in whatever means He may use. And now they learn something
else. They're going to be sustained.
They're going to be blessed. And it's going to be through
the cross. Always through the cross. He showed Moses a tree. Notice here it wasn't just any
tree. It says He showed him a tree. A tree. It was a particular tree. I wonder sometimes if this wasn't
the very kind of tree, the type of tree, that the Lord Jesus
Christ was crucified upon. I don't know that. I don't know
if it would be anything worth to us if we did know that. But
it was a particular tree. And it wasn't one that Moses
saw, or would have saw, or could see. Because he said here, he
showed him a tree. It was something that he pointed
out to Moses and let him see it. Now, what's this tree about? Well, turn it over to a couple
of places. Look in Deuteronomy chapter 21. Moses wrote about
a tree over in Deuteronomy chapter 21 and verse 22. Look at this, Deuteronomy chapter
21, verse 22, page 241 in your book. Verse 22, If a man have committed
a sin worthy of death, and he be put to death, and you hang
him on a tree, there's the tree. His body shall not remain all
night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that
day, for he that is hanged is accursed of God. And you hang
him there for this reason, that by land be not defiled, which
the Lord thy God giveth thee for inheritance." If a man has
committed crimes worthy of death, you are to hang him on a tree.
You are to crucify him. And that way the land will not
be defiled. Now what in the world does that
have to do with the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ? Well,
look over in the New Testament and it's explained to us. Look
in Galatians chapter 3. Look in Galatians chapter 3 and
look in verse 13. Young people, if you have your
Bibles, your few Bibles, it's on page 1268. Look in Galatians 3. Paul is going to quote Moses'
verse. Look at this. Christ, the Lord Jesus Christ,
the Son of God, has redeemed us from the curse of the law. Do you ever feel all this guilt
in your conscience? You've done something bad. You've
done something wrong. You've done something Contrary? And you are guilty? You are condemned
in your conscience? That is the work of this law.
That is what this law does. It exposes our sins. It judges
us. It makes us feel our guilt. It
makes us fear before God. He is going to frown upon us. We are going to be cursed. What
causes that? Christ hath redeemed us from
the curse of the law. How did He do that? Being made
a curse for us. Look what He says. He quotes
Moses first. For it is written, Cursed is everyone that hangs
on a tree. Somebody has got to bear the
curse. Or the land will be defiled. The only way God can smile upon
the land is for the cursed person to be hung upon a tree. But Jesus
was not cursed. He had no sin for the Lord to
curse Him. But He bore our sin. And taking
our sin, He bore our curse. And now, God doesn't look upon
us as being defiled. But for Christ's sake, He looks
upon us as being holy and accepted in Him. And he says in verse
14, that the blessing promised to Abraham might come on the
Gentiles, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through
faith. There's the tree that they throwed
into these waters, and it made the waters sweet. Moses didn't
plant the tree, did he? It was already there. He just
had to have his eyes open. To see it. And you and I have
nothing to do with obtaining redemption, do we? It was accomplished
2,000 years ago. But here's what we do need. We
have to have our eyes open to see Him who accomplished redemption. Because we can't see Him. We
can't see Him. We need God the Holy Spirit to
open the eyes of our understanding to see Him. to see that He's
accomplished redemption. And as we see, as we see Him,
as we see this redemption accomplished, what does that do? That sweetens
those things which before were bitter to us. You know, if you've been on this
way very long, I think probably you realize this, I realize this
as I get older, that some of the things that I used to bear
so easy, it's not very easy to bear anymore. You find you're
getting that way as you get older. You know, things that used to
be, whether it's a blessing or not, you could go on and live.
But boy, I tell you, as you get older, as you get older, These
things become more of a burden to you, and sometimes you feel
like, boy, life has got so bitter. My job has got so bitter. My
family's got so bitter. This has got so bitter. And that's
got so bitter. I just can't enjoy it like that.
But here's what you have to do. Here's the only way these bitter
things can become sweet. And that's to bring this cross.
Right down in the midst of where we live. Right down in the midst
of our bitter water. And when you do, I don't understand
this, but I know this, this works. When you bring this accomplished
redemption down in the midst of your troubles and your sorrows
and your bitterness, you know what it does? It sweetens it. It sweetens it. Let me show you
two or three scriptures right quickly, and I'll close. Look
in John chapter 20. You can let go of Exodus. We're finished there. But look
in John chapter 20. Look in verse 18. John chapter 20 and verse 18.
This is after the Lord Jesus had raised from the dead He appeared
to Mary Magdalene, spoke her name, revealed himself to her,
and he sends her with a message to his disciples. Well, his disciples,
you remember what his disciples were doing. They were in an upper
room. They were hid out, scared to
death, and they were mourning and weeping. The Bible says they
were mourning and weeping, Mark 16 and verse 10. And Mary Magdalene
in verse 18 came and told the disciples that she had seen the
Lord and that He had spoken these things unto her. Then the same
day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors
were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the
Jews, I mean they were in a despicable condition in their mind. They
could not enjoy anything. You talk about bitter waters. Jesus came and stood in the midst
and said unto them, Peace be unto you. And when he had so
said, he showed unto them his hands and his side." And what
was the effect? Then were the disciples glad
when they saw the Lord. Where's the fear? Where's the
mourning? Where's the fear? They couldn't
enjoy life itself. But suddenly it was all wiped
away. And what took it away? He showed
them His hands and His side. I don't know exactly how that
works, but I know it works. Let me show you another Scripture.
Look over in Luke chapter 24. A very familiar passage. In verse 17. This is where these
two were on the road to Emmaus. They thought for sure the Lord
Jesus was gone forever. We thought surely it was Him
that should redeem Israel, they said. And the Lord begins to
walk along with them. They don't know Him. And here
in verse 17, here's the way He begins this conversation with
them. And He said unto them, What manner of communications
are these, that ye have one to another as ye walk, and are so
sad? Why do you have these long faces? Why is your heart so burdened?
Why can't you enjoy life anymore? Well, they went on to tell him.
We thought this Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ who should redeem
Israel. Well, look in verse 25. And he said unto them, O fools,
and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken!
Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into
His glory? That's the tree. That's the cross.
His sufferings and His glory. And beginning at Moses and all
the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the
things concerning himself. And they drew near unto the village
where they went, and he made as though he would have gone
farther, but they constrained him, saying, Abide with us, for
it is toward evening, and the day is for spent. And he went
in to tarry with them. And it came to pass, as he set
it meet with them, he took bread, and break it, and blessed it
and gave to them, and their eyes were opened, and they knew Him. And He vanished out of their
sight, and they said one to another, Did not our hearts burn within
us while He taught with us by the way, and while He opened
to us the Scripture?" And I want to quote one more Scripture.
It's Clarence's favorite Scripture, I think, sometimes. In Isaiah
26. 3, Thou wilt keep him in perfect
peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee. Thou wilt keep him in perfect
peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee, because he trusteth in
Thee. Here's our part, brothers and
sisters. If He's brought us and given us grace to do, here's
our part, to trust Him. Trust Him. Stay our minds upon
Him. Here's His part, and I think
He'll perform it very well. Thou wilt keep Him in perfect
peace. Now, if it was us trying to keep
ourselves, we couldn't keep ourselves in perfect peace. We can't obtain
peace for a moment of time. But He can. And He can keep us in this perfect
peace even in our most bitter hours and trials. Thou will keep them in perfect
peace. Bring the cross of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Bring this accomplished redemption. Bring this sin atonement. Everything
connected with Him and His work. Bring it right down in the midst
of your bitter water. And you'll see. You'll see. The waters that were before so
bitter you could not drink of them will become sweet. May God
help us to do it. Any questions?