YouTube video sermon
Exodus 13:17-14:14
As always, let me invite you to take your copy of God’s Word and turn with me to Exodus 13. It’s rather humorous, some of the things that I think about in preparing sermons. For example, like all of you, I’m out driving to the hospital this week and, inevitably, I come upon the dreaded orange road sign and brake lights. The ubiquitous orange safety cones and flashing arrows indicating that the road narrows and traffic has come to a stop.
Now, there’s a part of me that says, “Well, good, they’re finally putting our tax dollars to use and fixing this road.” But then, you get to the spot and realize they’re just patching a 20’ section, and you think, “At least, traveling 60 mph, when I hit that spot, in the future, the drive will be smooth for 3/10’s of a second.” Well, maybe you don’t think that, but I do. I know… It’s probably more likely that some of you are thinking, “I wish the *&#$ in Columbia would fix the &@%* road the right way.” Then you smile and wave as you drive by. But that’s a sermon for another day.
Seriously, though, I came upon several of those road construction places this week, and it got me thinking about the importance of roads – good roads. If asked to list the greatest inventions of ALL time, most of us would probably include on that list the wheel. I mean, don’t you know that guy/gal is wondering where their royalties are? But the paved road rarely gets its fair share of love. The wheel (yay). The pneumatic tire (even better). But the road (nah).
And then, I ran across this from Jim Forest and his book The Road to Emmaus: Pilgrimage as a Way of Life:
Roads are the circulatory system of the human race and the original information highway. From times long before the written word, roads linked house to house, town to town, and city to city. Without roads there are no communities. Roads not only connect towns but give birth to them. They pass through all borders, checkpoints, and barriers, connecting not only friend to friend but foe to foe. Far older than passports, the road is an invitation to cross frontiers, to start a dialogue, to end enmity. Each road gives witness to the need we have to be in touch with one another.
Roman roads tend to run straight, but in many cultures, roads take many turns as they search out fords, avoid marshes, find higher ground, touch wells and pubs, and seek holy places.
Roads are life giving. They provide the primary infrastructure of social life. Without them, there is no commerce. Without roads and the delivery systems they support, we would starve.
Roads mark the way to safety. Paths tell the traveler how to get around a chasm or find a ford to cross the river. They point the way through marshes and around quicksand. Roads not only take us toward each other but, when we need to be rescued from society, they lead us to solitude.
And what we’re going to discover this morning – at the end of Exodus 13 and the beginning of Exodus 14 – is a road that is long and winding and never seems to end. (In fact, fun bit of trivia this morning. What was The Beatles last number one hit before they disbanded? The Long and Winding Road.) An entire generation of Israelites (except for Joshua and Caleb) will die and never get to the end of the road that begins here in Exodus 13-14.
17 When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them by way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near. For God said, “Lest the people change their minds when they see war and return to Egypt.” 18 But God led the people around by the way of the wilderness toward the Red Sea. And the people of Israel went up out of the land of Egypt equipped for battle. 19 Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for Joseph had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear, saying, “God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones with you from here.” 20 And they moved on from Succoth and encamped at Etham, on the edge of the wilderness. 21 And the LORD went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way, and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light, that they might travel by day and by night. 22 The pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night did not depart from before the people.
1 Then the LORD said to Moses, 2 “Tell the people of Israel to turn back and encamp in front of Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea, in front of Baal-zephon; you shall encamp facing it, by the sea. 3 For Pharaoh will say of the people of Israel, ‘They are wandering in the land; the wilderness has shut them in.’ 4 And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will pursue them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, and the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD.” And they did so.
5 When the king of Egypt was told that the people had fled, the mind of Pharaoh and his servants was changed toward the people, and they said, “What is this we have done, that we have let Israel go from serving us?” 6 So he made ready his chariot and took his army with him, 7 and took six hundred chosen chariots and all the other chariots of Egypt with officers over all of them. 8 And the LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he pursued the people of Israel while the people of Israel were going out defiantly. 9 The Egyptians pursued them, all Pharaoh’s horses and chariots and his horsemen and his army, and overtook them encamped at the sea, by Pi-hahiroth, in front of Baal-zephon.
10 When Pharaoh drew near, the people of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they feared greatly. And the people of Israel cried out to the LORD. 11 They said to Moses, “Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us in bringing us out of Egypt? 12 Is not this what we said to you in Egypt: ‘Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians’? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.” 13 And Moses said to the people, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. 14 The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.”
“Father, thank You that because of Your faithfulness to Your Word and to Your people, we have this record of triumph that we now turn to. We pray that You will help us to both understand what the Bible says and what it means and why it matters. For Jesus’ sake. Amen.”
God didn’t take the Israelites down the most convenient road. God didn’t take them down the fastest road, the nearest road, or the easy access road. It was a road that was long, it was winding, it was a struggle, it was difficult, there were hardships, there was suffering along the way, and yet it was the road that God had determined that the Israelites needed to go down. And the way He did that for them is the way He does that for us.
The road you’re on, this morning, may be long. It may be winding, there’s difficulty, there’s struggle, there’s some suffering along the way, but God intends to pour out His blessing upon you on this road – in this journey. Now, most of the time, when we’re on that kind of road we tend to think, “This can’t be God’s will because it’s too hard, it’s too painful, and God must be withholding His blessings from me.” No, that’s not true. Most of the time our vision is blinded by the difficulty that we can’t see the blessings. The same was true for Israel. They couldn’t see how God was blessing them, and using them, and doing something in them.
All they could do was murmur and complain and grumble, and that’s exactly what we do. And we don’t know where God is leading – that’s the thing, “How do I follow God when I have no clue where God is leading me?” Now the Israelites knew they were eventually going to end up at the Promised Land, but they had no clue as to how God was going to lead them there, and it seemed as though God had made a mistake. And this morning, I want to give us three principles about following God down the road He’s leading us on.
God Never Consults With Us About The Course
Look back at verse 17, “When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them by way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near. For God said, ‘Lest the people change their minds when they see war and return to Egypt.’”
God knows what lies ahead on the road that you’re presently on. In the words of the great theologian, Tim Allen, God “sees to infinity and beyond.” (Toy Story). God can see all the way to the end of the road that you’re on. You and I can’t do that. We have no clue what tomorrow holds. We have plans for tomorrow. We have plans for the coming week. Some of you are so organized in your routines that you have plans for tonight. Listen, we may never make passed this afternoon.
Not only does God know what lies ahead on the road we’re presently on, but God can see the end of every other possible road that we haven’t even taken yet. God knows every twist and turn, bump and hole on every road and every possible alternative that we haven’t even taken. There’s absolutely nothing that we can do, there’s no choice that we can make that will stump God. For all of eternity, God has never once said, “Oh, wow, I didn’t see that coming.”
But here’s the really good news, God knows what road is best for you at any given moment. Notice that God did NOT lead them by the way of the Philistines, although that was closer. Why? Because God knew there was war that way and it would be too much for them. “The way of the land of the Philistines” would later be called the “Via Maris,” or the “way of the sea.” It was a very popular trade and transportation route because it essentially followed the natural boarder of the Mediterranean Sea and the land. And because it was popular and easy, it was also guarded.
The Philistines and the Israelites would bump heads many times over the next several hundred years, but at the moment Israel is just coming out of slavery and they’re carrying Egyptian spoils. Remember the gold and silver and all the herds and the unleavened bread and all the other stuff they ran out of Egypt with last week? Yeah, they’re not presently in any kind of condition to wage war. God knows this, and so to offset their present weakness of not being militarily prepared He doesn’t send them that way.
God also wants to demonstrate their need to depend on Him. If they take the northern route, the easy route, the closer route, the faster route, and they do get through, then God knows they really haven’t learned to depend on Him. And we’ve seen that happen in our own lives. All of us, at one time or another, took the easy route, the fast route, the closer route, and perhaps someone else took the harder route and they learned so much more. They grew more. They appreciated life more. They learned to live on less. They learned to differentiate between an inconvenience and a real crisis. They learned how to pray. They learned how to depend on God.
If you doubt this, then just think about how many times you contrast the present generation with the wartime generation of the 1930’s-1940’s. “Oh, our kids today get so much more than we ever dreamed. Oh, this present generation doesn’t know what real sacrifice looks like. Oh, our young people don’t know what real work looks like.” We say those things, why? Because, in many cases (not all) the present generation has had it easier. God wanted Israel to depend on Him, rather than themselves and God wants the same for us. God wants us to depend on Him, and if we’re always taking the easy road, the fast road, the closer road, how much will we really learn to depend on Him.
If you’ll go back and re-read this section, you’ll never read where God turned to Moses and said, “Hey Moe, what do you think we ought to do here? Should we go left or should we go right?” God never consulted Moses about the course that God wanted the Israelites to take, and to my knowledge God never did that in the rest of Scripture either. God never said to me, “Hey Lee, can you come up with a good idea about how I can save your soul from the pit of hell?”
No man ever sat up in bed at 4AM in the morning and said, “Hey, you know what, I’ve come to the understanding that I’m a sinner. I need to be saved and I need a Savior in order to be saved, and it needs to be a man so that he can understand my condition and my temptations, but he has to be God at the same time because I need a perfect sacrifice. And then, if he’s God, then he’ll be able to take my sin and put it on himself and take his righteousness and put it on me. Yeah, that’s it! That’s the salvation I need!” No man ever dreamed that up. That’s the gift of God.
God never consulted you or me or Adam or Abraham or Moses or David or the Disciples or Paul or anybody about the course of salvation. And you say, “Pastor, why are you turning everything to Jesus? Aren’t we supposed to be looking at the Old Testament and the Exodus?” Yes, but don’t you see that Exodus is a salvation story. And God doesn’t consult with Moses or Aaron or Miriam or anyone else about how He’s going to save them. It’s the same with our salvation in Jesus Christ.
God Never Checks With Us About His Direction
Look back at Exodus 13:20, “And they moved on from Succoth and encamped at Etham, on the edge of the wilderness.” The way of the Philistines was to the north, this was exactly the opposite direction. Now, look at Exodus 14:1-2, “Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘Tell the people of Israel to turn back and encamp in front of Pi-hahiroth, between Migdol and the sea, in front of Baal-zephon; you shall encamp facing it, by the sea.’”
Have you ever been on an airplane when it turned around and headed back to the airport? Everybody gets the willies. Everybody gets nervous. “What’s going on? Why are we turning around?” The Israelites knew something wasn’t right. And in the midst of that, God gives Moses some instruction, “Hey Moe, you’re going to camp facing a place called God of destruction (Baal-Zephon).” Can’t you hear Moses, “Um, God, I think we passed a Motel 6 back there on the desert highway. You know, they’ll keep the light on for us, and hey, You won’t even need to do the pillar of fire thing.” Can’t you hear Moses? And you begin to wonder if God knows His own directions.
But notice Exodus 14:3, “For Pharaoh will say of the people of Israel, ‘They are wandering in the land; the wilderness has shut them in.’” Ahh, now we’re beginning to see what’s going on. God’s creating a trap. God’s using this odd back and forth to draw Pharaoh and Egypt into a pursuit. You say, “Well, that’s not really nice of God.” Listen to this, from Isaiah 55:8-9, “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, declares the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.”
God is creating a trap for the Egyptians, but it gets better than that. For what purpose is God doing this? Look at verse 4, “And I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and he will pursue them, and I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his host, and the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD.” In fact, two more times (vss. 17-18, which we didn’t read), God draws attention to His glory. That’s what the entire book of Exodus is all about – God’s glory. The direction that God has you going, and the road that God has put you on is ultimately about His glory. It’s about God getting glory out of whatever happens to me in this life.
Do you understand that God has something better for you at work than a paycheck every two weeks? It’s His glory. Do you understand that God has something better for you in your marriage than just the two of you fighting it out until the end? It’s His glory. Do you understand that God has something far better for you with your abilities and gifts and talents than just drawing attention to yourself? It’s His glory. There are times that the direction of our life doesn’t make sense. It certainly didn’t make sense to the Israelites (although we’re able to see it). And yet it brings Him glory.
Listen to Romans 11:33-36 (and we’ll move to our final point), Paul writes, “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and how inscrutable His ways! ‘For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been His counselor?’ ‘Or who has given a gift to Him that he might be repaid?’ For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be glory forever. Amen.”
God Always Calls Us To Walk By Faith
A faithful and obedient follower of God will follow the course and direction that He establishes. Yes, but how do I do that? Look at Exodus 14:10, “When Pharaoh drew near, the people of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they feared greatly. And the people of Israel cried out to the LORD.” The Israelites saw Pharaoh and the Egyptians and they were afraid and they started complaining, “We were having such a wonderful time back in Egypt. Moses, didn’t you see how good we had it back there? Why did you bring us out here to die?”
Now, notice what Moses says (vss. 13-14), “And Moses said to the people, ‘Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.’” The Apostle Paul would say, “We walk by faith and not by (what) sight” (1 Corinthians 5:7). That’s what Moses is saying here. Stop looking at the Egyptians with your eyes and start looking to the LORD by faith.
There’s something right in the middle of these verses (I skipped over it), and it’s just screaming, “Have faith! Have faith! Have faith!” Do you know what it is? Look at Exodus 13:19 (it’s the bones of Joseph), “Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for Joseph had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear, saying, ‘God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones with you from here.’” Joseph had faith that God would be with the people of Israel and when that time came Joseph wanted his dead bones carried out of Egypt. And I’m not just saying that because it proves the point that God always calls us to walk by faith. I’m quoting Hebrews 11:22 that says, “By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones.” How in the world could Joseph know that, when the actual event was over 400 years later? He had faith. And we need to have faith, too.
If you’re here this morning and you’ve never placed your faith in Jesus Christ, now is the time to do that. In just a second Ray is going to lead us in a closing hymn, and if you’ve never trusted the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, then you just step out (as everybody begins to sing) and you come see me.
There are others of us here this morning and we’ve been on a long and winding road. The directions just don’t seem to add up. The road has been difficult and painful and we’re not exactly sure why God has brought us out to this desert to die. Today, we’ve been reminded that God’s course and His direction are always leading to His glory. Maybe you just need to pray for God’s forgiveness as you’ve doubted His goodness and mercy and grace and love along the journey.
Maybe you’re here this morning and God has placed you on the road of becoming a member of this Church. You’ve been sitting on the sidelines enjoying the worship and the fellowship, but you know that God wants you to be an official part of the congregation.
However, God is moving you, would you come. Let’s pray: