That's a fairly new hymn to me
and I sure do like it. If you will, let's turn back
again to the book of Exodus and tonight to chapter 14. Exodus
chapter 14. And the Lord spake unto Moses,
saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, that they turn and
encamp before Pahaharoth, between Migdal and the sea, over against
Belzephon, before it shall you encamp by the sea. For Pharaoh
will say of the children of Israel, They are entangled in the land.
The wilderness has shut them in. And 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. 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? And he made ready his chariot,
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 a high hand. But the Egyptians pursued after
them, all the horses and chariots of Pharaoh and his horsemen and
his army, and overtook them in camping by the sea beside Baharoth
and Belzephon. And when Pharaoh drew nigh, the
children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians
marched after them, and they were sore afraid. And the children
of Israel cried out unto the Lord, 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 us
with us to carry us forth out of Egypt? Is not this the word
that we did tell thee in Egypt, saying, let us alone, that we
may serve the Egyptians? For it had been better for us
to serve the Egyptians. than that we should die in the
wilderness. And Moses said unto the people,
fear you not, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord,
which he will show to you today. For the Egyptians whom you have
seen today, you shall see them again no more forever. The Lord
shall fight for you and you shall hold your peace. And the Lord
said unto Moses, Wherefore, Christ, thou unto me, speak unto the
children of Israel that they go forward. Lift thou up 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 I, 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 have gotten me honor upon Pharaoh,
upon his chariots and upon his horsemen. The angel of God which
went before the camp of Israel removed and went 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, but it gave light by night to these,
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, made
the sea dry land, and the waters were divided. And the children
of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground,
and the waters were walled unto them on their right hand and
on their left. And the Egyptians pursued and
went in after them to the midst of the sea, even all Pharaoh's
horses and his chariots and his horsemen. And it came to pass
that in the morning watch the Lord looked, unto the host of
the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and of the cloud, and
troubled the host of the Egyptians, took off their chariot wheels,
that they drove them heavily, so that the Egyptians said, let
us flee from the face of Israel, for the Lord fighteth for them
against the Egyptians. 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. The
waters returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen and
all the host of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them.
There remained not so much as one of them, but the children
of Israel walked upon dry land in the midst of the sea, and
the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand and on their
left. Thus the Lord saved Israel that
day out of the hand of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians
dead upon the seashore, and Israel saw that great work which the
Lord did upon the Egyptians. And the people feared the Lord
and believed the Lord and his servant, Moses. The crossing of the Red Sea,
according to Hebrews chapter 11, was by faith. Hebrews chapter 11 and verse
29, we read, by faith. They passed through the Red Sea
as by dry land, which the Egyptians are saying to do, were drowned. We're reminded that faith is
very, very important. You know, the apostles, they
prayed one day to the Lord Jesus Christ, increase our faith. And that's something that all
of us, I'm sure, pray it one time or the other, asking the
Lord for more faith, for without faith it is impossible to please
God. I want us to thank, first of
all, tonight that Israel was directed to this place, this
place where they are entrapped. They are entrapped here. Verses 1 and 2 says, And the
Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel,
that they turn and in camp at this particular place. Now last
week, we saw that God sent the pillar of cloud and pillar of
fire, and the main purpose for that pillar was to guide them. We looked at that as a picture
of God the Holy Spirit who is given to every child of God to
guide us. But now we see that God guided
them into a place that would cause Pharaoh to see that they
were entangled, entangled or entrapped. They were shut in
according to verse three. For Pharaoh will say of the children
of Israel, they are entangled in the land. The wilderness has
shut them in, shut them in. And what we know is true at the
place where they were, There were mountains on both sides
of them, and they were craggy mountains that could hardly be
scaled by anyone. And before them, of course, is
the Red Sea. The point I'm making is God guided
them into this place. It was a place where they were
entrapped and tangled. Now, as I looked at this this
week, I thought, why would God direct his people into this place? Why would he do that? It's obvious,
isn't it? God directed them. The pillar
of cloud, the angel, moved and directed them into this particular
place. Why would God do that? Well,
we know this about God's ways. We know several things, but one
thing we know about God's ways, the scripture says, for as the
heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your
ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. We know that about
God's ways, don't we? His ways are higher than our
ways. Most likely, none of us, if we
had been in that position to guide them, into the wilderness,
they could have gone into the wilderness immediately. But no, God guides them into
this place where they would be entangled in the wilderness. We also know this about God's
ways. His ways are past finding out. Romans chapter 11, verse 33. His ways are past finding out. Many times we are perplexed,
aren't we? The Apostle Paul admitted that
himself, perplexed. And we are at things we see,
God's providence and God's ways. His ways are past finding out. But considering what the Apostle
Paul wrote in Romans 15 about the Old Testament, he said this. For whatsoever things were written
aforetime, that's the Old Testament, whatsoever things were written
aforetime, in other words, before he took pen in his hand to write,
these things that were written aforetime, which we have in the
Old Testament parts of our, part of our Bible, whatsoever things
were written aforetime were written for our learning, for our learning. And there's so much, isn't there,
that we could learn here from this passage of scripture. Already
mentioned faith, how important faith is. And faith cometh by
hearing and hearing by the word of God. How important it is to
hear the word of God and to ask the Lord to increase our faith.
For as I mentioned, the scripture says in Hebrews 11, without faith
it is impossible to please God. And the Lord told that one man,
if thou canst believe, all things are possible, if thou canst believe. That's just one of the many lessons
we can see here when Moses tells them to go forward. Yes, but
the sea's there. There's no way we can walk upon
the water. By faith, the writer said, by
faith they pass through the Red Sea as by dry land. For whatsoever things were written
aforetime were written for our learning that we through patience
and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. Why, I ask myself
this question, why would God direct his people to this particular
place where God knew they were going to be entangled in the
wilderness and he knew that Pharaoh would know that? Why would he
do that? Well, I've got six thoughts tonight,
six thoughts, six possible reasons that I can think of. I know there's
many more, but reason number one, I thought about this. Reason
number one, to teach or impress us. These things were written
for our learning. To teach or impress us of the
danger of sin. You say, how do you see that?
The danger of sin. Well, what would cause Pharaoh
to assemble his 600 chariots and pursue Israel after all that
he had experienced? After those 10 plagues that God
brought upon him and his nation, what in the world would cause
this man to pursue after Israel? He must have just buried his
son, his firstborn. It must have come from the funeral
of his firstborn, and here he has this idea to pursue after,
after the Israelites. Well, what sin could it have
been in Pharaoh that would have caused him to do something that
is beyond reason, beyond reason that he would do this? Well,
let me mention three. Was it pride? Was it the sin
of pride to teach us about the sin of pride. You know, this
sin is so common. This sin is so common to you,
it's so common to me, it's so common to God's people. Pride,
and God, it's one of the six things that God says that he
hates, of proud look. And this man was raised to power,
to authority, and most people, when they are put in a place
like that, they do Fight against being proud and haughty. Was that what caused him the
sin that maybe prompted him to assemble his army and tear off
after these Israelites? He knew he couldn't fight against
God. God had already showed him that. You know, the Apostle Peter tells
us that God resisteth the proud. He resisteth the proud but giveth
grace to the humble. We should never, we should never
outgrow this testimony, the testimony of the Apostle Paul and the testimony
of every one of us here tonight. I am what I am by the grace of
God. The only difference between me
and Judas Iscariot is the grace of God. And the same thing's
true of you. We should never outgrow our testimony. My friend used to say, proud
of face, You know, your countenance, the
way God's made you, he made you the way he would have you. And
if he made you to be very handsome or very beautiful, what did you
have to do with that? What did you have to do with
that? Pride of face, pride of race,
but he would always say the worst pride of all is pride of grace. pride of grace. Oh, was it the
sin of pride that caused him to act so foolishly as he did? Or was it the sin of greed? Greed. Greed or covetousness. It's a far too common sin because
the Apostle Paul said covetousness is idolatry. And these Israelites,
they had been their slaves to Egypt. No doubt they had brought
a lot of wealth by their forced labor, a lot of wealth to Egypt
and to Pharaoh, and now they were gone. You know, we as God's
children, we have a great promise to counter this particular sin
of covetousness or greed. We have a number of promises,
but one promise in particular is found in Hebrews. Be content
with such things you have. Be content with such things you
have. Why? Why should a believer be
content with such things that we have? For, that verse goes
on to say, for he has said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake
thee. I'll never leave thee. You know,
one of the devotionals this week, David, said in the Psalm, Thou art my portion, O Lord. And the author, Charles Spurgeon,
he's pointed out, all the gold in the world cannot compare with
having God as your portion. When you're laying on your deathbed
fixing to go out into eternity, it doesn't matter how big your
bank account is. It doesn't matter how many acres
of land you own or anything else. Greed, covetousness. No, be content with such things
as you have. Or maybe it wasn't the sin of
pride, the sin of covetousness, was it the sin of anger, envy,
jealousy? You know, in Proverbs, we have
this text, he that is slow to anger is better than the mighty,
and he that rules his spirit than he that taketh a city. He
that rules his spirit. Pharaoh didn't rule his city,
did he? His spirit ruled himself rather. His spirit ruled him. Job 5 and verse 2 says, for wrath
kills the foolish man, and the envy slays the silly one. Envy, jealousy, anger. Well, that may be one of the
reasons that God brought them here, to warn you and I about
sin. We see what happened to this
king and all of his army. How they were drowned in the
sea. Sin ends in death, as the scripture
says. Always it ends in death. One kind of death or the other.
Another reason, reason two, to teach or impress us about seeking
good advice. About seeking good advice. You notice here in 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, his servants said to Pharaoh, why have we done
this? That we have let Israel go from
serving us. Now these servants that are saying
this are the same servants, if you look back, look back. few pages to chapter 10 and verse
7, they're the same servants who advised them, let them go. And now, why have we done this? Pharaoh's servants said unto
him, how long shall this man be a snare unto us? Let the men
go, that they may serve the Lord their God. Knowest thou not yet
that Egypt is destroyed? The same ones who advised him
to let them go are now asking him, why did we do this? Why
did we do this? One of the Proverbs, Again, tells
us, in the multitude of counselors, there wanteth not safety. Or in the multitude of counselors,
there is safety. When we need wisdom, and we do,
we do every day, right? When we need wisdom, advice,
what should we do first of all? Ask God. Ask God. In James chapter 1, we have that
wonderful promise. If any man lack wisdom, let him
ask of God, which giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth
not. But let him ask in faith, nothing
wavering, for a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways. And we see these servants here,
they were unstable, right? One day they're saying, let him
go, and then the next day, Why did we let them go? When we need
wisdom, first of all, and we need it continually, first of
all, we should ask God for the wisdom we need. And when we believe
that we need to seek the advice of some other person, some man
or woman, then let's ask advice of a godly man or woman. Don't ask advice of someone that
you know will tell you exactly what you want to do. That's usually
what we do. That's a mistake here. And I
think that may be one reason that we see God led them into
this place, entangled, to teach us, to show us. When we need wisdom, let's ask
of God. When we seek advice from a man
or a woman, let's ask someone that is a godly person, who walks
with the Lord, who has fellowship with God, who will speak the
truth to us. Reason number three, to teach
or impress us with God's wisdom. With God's wisdom. Think about
it, their situation looked hopeless. It looked hopeless. They could
not turn and run because if they did, they would have run right
into the chariots of the Egyptians. A few of the young people maybe
would have been able to scale the walls of those mountains,
but the nation itself, the men, women, and children would have
been destroyed. Their situation looks hopeless. It looks helpless. And do you
think even including Moses. Do you think there was one person
out of the million people there who would have ever thought the
way we're going to get out of this, God's going to open a way
through the Red Sea? I don't think so. I don't think
so. Look back or look ahead in Exodus
chapter 34 to teach us or impress us with God's wisdom. Exodus chapter 34, in verses
six and seven, when the Lord passed by before him, before
Moses, and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious,
long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy
for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and
that will by no means clear the guilty. We've got a problem here. Don't we? We've got a problem
here. God will by no means clear the
guilty. Is anyone here not guilty? Of
course not. We're all guilty. We've all sinned
and come short of the glory of God. Well, we see the wisdom
of God in providing his son to be our substitute, to be our
savior, taking our sins upon himself that we might take his
place as a son of God, an adopted son, yes, but still a son. Oh, the wisdom of God here at
the Red Sea when God There's no way out. And the same thing
is true about a sinner being saved. There's no way but God's
way. And man could never have come
up with a plan or the scheme of redemption. It's the wisdom
of God that is manifested. and sending his son to take the
place of his chosen people. So that blessed is the man to
whom the Lord will not impute sin. Well, if God doesn't impute
sin to us, who does he impute that sin to? To his son, right? For he hath made him to be sin
for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. Reason number four, to teach
or impress us with God's power. God's power here. Is there anything
too hard for the Lord? God caused, we read here, a strong
east wind that night. And the text in Hebrews tells
us that it was by faith that they passed through the sea on
dry land. This has caused some good writers
to believe that when they started off, the first column there,
Moses and Aaron, no doubt, that the water was still there. And
when they took their step, the waters began to part. It wasn't
like they were on this side and then the waters opened up and
they could see all the way across. How would that have been faith?
No, it was by faith they walked across on dry land. But we see
the power of God in this. Just porting, just porting the
waters, but causing the land to be dry. See, God's power,
don't we? Again, is there anything too
hard For the Lord, when Moses spoke in verse 15, and the Lord said unto Moses,
wherefore cry sound to me, speak unto the children of Israel that
they go forward. but lift thou up 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. We see God's wisdom and we see
God's power here demonstrated to us. Reason number five, to
teach or impress us again with God's amazing grace. What was
special about these Israelites? Look at what they did in verse
10 and 11, how they conducted themselves. Did they show any
faith in God? Not at all, not at all. And when Pharaoh drew nigh, the
children of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians
marched after them, and they were sore afraid. And the children
of Israel cried out unto the Lord. Now that would have been
well if they'd cried out in prayer, help us! But that's not their
cry. No, their cry is one of murmuring. Notice what they say. And they
said unto Moses, Because there were no graves in Egypt, hast
thou taken us away to die in the wilderness? There's nothing
there but unbelief. There's nothing there but unbelief. Wherefore hast thou doubt thus
with us, to carry us forth out of Egypt? And notice that next
verse. Is not this the word that we
did tell thee in Egypt? You remember when Moses came
into Egypt with a message from God, he gathered the elders together
and spoke unto them and they were thrilled, they were happy. But then when God gave that first
plague, remember what Pharaoh did, he increased their workload. And immediately they began to
murmur and complain. But you know, they had more excuse,
if we could use that word at that time, because at that time,
God had only turned the water into blood. But now, at this
point, notice the 10 plagues that they had observed, seeing
God work time after time after time, and experiencing God separating
them from the Egyptians. When there was darkness that
you could cut, think darkness among the Egyptians and their
place, There was light among the Israelites, and the same
was true of the hail and the fleas and the flies, I believe
it was, yes. Was there anything special about
these people? If we continue on through, we're
going to see that this is one of the things, you know the scripture
says, harden not your heart as in the provocation. What's that
mean? 40 years they provoked God. And there's a verse in Numbers
that tells us God said 10 times. There was 10 plagues and 10 times
they have provoked the Lord by their unbelief, their idolatry,
by their murmuring and complaining. And so God said, none of this
generation right here that sees God open the Red Sea and allow
them to go through, none of them except, was it two men, are going
to enter into the land of Canaan. The rest, the rest are gonna
die and be buried in the wilderness. Now is the day of salvation,
that scripture says. Don't provoke the Lord. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the message, isn't it?
Well, here's the last thing, the sixth reason to teach or
impress us that God will do, he will do all he purposes to
do. He will. In Isaiah chapter 14,
verse 24, we read, the Lord of hosts has sworn, saying, surely,
as I have thought, so shall it come to pass, and as I have purposed,
so shall it stand. Now, if you notice here, in chapter
14 of Exodus, verse 4, Paul, God said, I will harden Pharaoh's
heart, and he shall follow after them, and I will be honored I
will be honored upon Pharaoh and upon all his hosts." God
had purposed that his wisdom, his faithfulness, his power,
his justice would be honored in the destruction of Pharaoh
and his army. And that's exactly what we see.
in verses 27 and 28. 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. Waters returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen
and all the host of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them. There remained not so much as
one. God purposed to be honored in
the destruction of Pharaoh and his host. Let me close with this. Notice that last few words there. There remained not so much as
one of them. Not one soldier, not Pharaoh,
not any soldier, any chariot driver remained. And that is
what has taken place with the sins of God's children. Not one
remained. Not one remained. They've all
been put away by the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. Just as
not one of Egypt's army remained, so not one of the sins of God's
people remained. They're gone. They're gone. May the Lord bless this word
to all of us here tonight. What lessons may we learn from
this part of the word of God, all parts of the word of God? You know, on the day of atonement,
let me mention this. To picture the atoning work of
Christ, it took two goats, right? One goat had to be sled. had to be killed and his blood
sprinkled. The other goat had to be the
scapegoat and carry the sins away, to picture the work of
the Lord Jesus Christ. So here in Egypt, the Passover,
the blood was shed, but also we see the power of God in delivering. Both are necessary, both the
blood and the power of God in saving a sinner. Well, I pray
the Lord will bless his word to all of us here this evening.