Exodus 4:27-6:9
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Transcript
Good morning. My name is Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. Grab your Bibles. Go to Exodus chapter 4. Exodus is the second book of the Bible.
If you grab one of these blue Bibles that's in the little rack under the chair in front of you, it'll be on page 28. The big number is the chapter. The little Numbers are the verse. We're going to start in Exodus chapter 4, 27. So where we're picking up today, God came to Moses in the burning bush and said, Go.
You're going to go to Pharaoh. You're going to proclaim that he's to let my people go. And I'm going to drive you out. I'm going to bring the people out. And he's going to send Aaron with him and he's going to go. And where we get to start today, we get to see the first steps in Moses' obedience to this call.
Spencer said a couple weeks ago that it'd be like if God came to you and said, Pack up. Go to Russia. We have a message for Putin. You're going to go stand before Putin and you're going to declare that this is over. And it'd be like that amount of intensity. But Moses is going and we're going to see that as Moses steps out in faith, that immediately everything gets worse.
Just way worse. And it's a little bit surprising. Like that's not how we thought this was going to go. It's surprising to them. It's surprising to Moses that this is like, Oh, they were doing what you said to do. Why has it gotten worse?
And if we're honest, a lot of us feel like that in our walk with the Lord. Why is this so hard? Why, when it feels like what I'm trying to follow you, I'm trying to read, I'm trying to do the things that I'm supposed to do. Why is this so difficult? Some of you are like, I became a Christian because my life was a mess. And I had in my head that after I became a Christian, it would be less like that.
But it's still extremely hard. In some ways, objectively worse. And so we're going to see as Moses goes to the Lord and says, Why? Why is this working this way? Why have you done this? We're going to see that God answers him.
And God does not tell him why. He's not going to answer that question. Why it's worked out this way. But what God is going to tell him is why it's worth it to keep going. And so for us this morning, I hope that's what we get out of this. Is that we understand, maybe we want to get all the answers to why has it played out this way.
Why has it been this specific thing. But why it's worth it to keep going. So let's pray and let's study this together. Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you for your work of redemption among the Israelites. It gives us a tangible picture of your ultimate work of redemption from sin.
And we thank you, Lord, that you do work to redeem in the lives of your people. That you see them, that you hear them, that you know them, and that you come to save. We pray, Lord, that as we study this this morning, And that you would help our hearts be grasped by why it's worth everything to follow you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Chapter 4, verse 27.
The Lord said to Aaron, Go into the wilderness to meet Moses. So he went and met him at the mountain of God and kissed him. Okay, so that and kissed him part, I'm going to cover that first because that's weird for us. It just means it was a very warm reception. It's an Eastern thing, a Middle Eastern thing to kiss in a greeting. They're excited to see each other.
They're brothers. Aaron is a couple years older than Moses. It seems like Aaron was born in the Shifra and Pua era of Pharaoh saying, kill all the babies, and then Shifra and Pua, the midwives, being like, Hebrew women have babies too fast. That zone. And then Moses was born in the, okay, throw all the boys in the river zone because that was what happened with him, and he was adopted by Pharaoh's daughter. And so Moses grew up pretty much separate from Aaron, but he knew he had a brother.
Aaron knows of Moses. And God tells Aaron, go see Moses. And Aaron hadn't seen Moses since he killed a guy and ran away. And that's been years, 40 years or so. And so my first question when I read this, though, was how does Aaron just get to leave? Aren't they slaves in Egypt?
The text does not tell us, so I came up with two theories that I'm going to share with you now. Theory one, sneakiness. It's possible that God told him to leave, and so he just sneaked on out of there. I actually don't like theory one as much as I like theory two. Theory two, Aaron, this isn't a theory, we know this, is like 84 years old. So my second theory is that the Egyptians didn't care.
They were using slaves for manual labor. I think Aaron was past his manual labor days, and he was like, I'm out of here. And they were like, bye. Nobody minded. That's my second theory. All right.
Verse 28. And Moses told Aaron all the words of the Lord with which he had sent him to speak and all the signs he had commanded him to do. Throw the staff down, turns into a serpent, stick your hand in your cloak, pull it out. You have leprosy. Put it back. No leprosy.
He also has a sign where he can take water from the Nile and pour it out, but I don't think he's able to do that one here because I don't think they're at the Nile yet. But it's possible they traveled some. Then Moses and Aaron went and gathered together all the elders of the people of Israel. Aaron spoke all the words that the Lord had spoken to Moses and did the signs in the sight of the people. And if you'll remember, that's what God worked out with Moses, which is Aaron's going to speak on your behalf. And the people believed.
Can you all feel this? Moses gathers them, shows them this sign, all the elders, and they believe. And they worship. And I can imagine that this news spread through the Israelites. Israelites, I mean, I bet there were people that couldn't sleep that night. I bet there were those that went to bed and just thanked the Lord that he was answering their prayers, that they had been begging him.
I bet there were those that went to sleep and they were saying, Lord, I'm sorry, I had lost heart. I had lost faith. But thank you that you hear and that you redeem and that you work. And I bet among the Israelites, it felt like it's just something in the air, the way it feels before a storm, that there's something going to happen. I bet there was giddiness. And it was the first time they ever woke up to go be a slave where there was a little bit of movement in their step that like, ah, not much longer.
You know, when you put in your two weeks notice and that's the best two weeks you've ever had at work. That kind of a thing. That feeling. God's working. They worship. And I know that some of you, as you have placed your faith in Jesus, you've had that.
That I see it. I know who he is. And I believe. And something happens in you that you can't explain. And sometimes your friends try to ask you to explain it. You can't explain it.
That something is happening to the Holy Spirit that's working you. And there's this moment of belief for them and excitement for them. And then we move forward. Chapter 5. Afterward, so we don't know exactly how long, Moses and Aaron went and said to Pharaoh, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, Let my people go that they may hold a feast to me in the wilderness. Not be free forever.
That's not what they say. Let my people go that they may hold a feast to me in the wilderness. And they're going to say later to offer sacrifices. But it says, But Pharaoh said, Who is the Lord that I should obey his voice and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord. And moreover, I will not let Israel go.
I appreciate this response for two reasons. One, he says, Who? I don't know him. And also, No. I just like that he says, And moreover, No. And also, on top of me not knowing him, No.
You cannot go. But his questions, Who is the Lord and why should I obey him? Those questions are going to be answered for him. He's not going to like the answers, but Pharaoh will get those questions answered. Who is the Lord and why he should obey him? But he says, No.
No. Not obeying him. Don't know him. Get out of here. Then they said, The God of the Hebrews has met with us.
Please let us go a three days journey into the wilderness that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God, lest he fall upon us with pestilence or with the sword. They're saying, He's our God and if we don't obey, it might go poorly for us. But the king of Egypt said to them, Moses and Aaron, why do you take the people away from their work? Get back to your burdens. And Pharaoh said, Behold, the people of the land are now many and you make them rest from their burdens. This is how slavery works.
They are valuable to the Pharaoh for production. He says there's a lot of them and slowing down production is a bigger deal. Get back to work. And Pharaoh said, verse 6, The same day, that same day, so immediately, they go talk to Pharaoh and immediately, Pharaoh commanded the taskmasters of the people and their foremen, You shall no longer give the people straw to make bricks as in the past. Let them go and gather straw for themselves. But the number of bricks that they made in the past, you shall impose on them.
You shall by no means reduce it for they are idle. Therefore they cry, Let us go and offer sacrifices to our God. So I want to show y'all, yeah, let us go and offer sacrifices to our God. I'm going to make sure I hadn't jumped ahead of myself here. Let heavier work be laid on the men that they may labor at it and pay no regard to lying words. But I want to show y'all a picture.
This is a picture that was in a, these were on the walls of a tomb in Thebes. And it is pictures of people making clay bricks. So what they would do is they'd take, they didn't have stone to quarry, so they would take water, they had mud, they would make clay bricks. Straw was used, it's kind of like rebar, it helped it dry out and it helped it make more, made it more solid. So without straw, the bricks would break apart.
And you'll notice in a couple of the pictures, there's just a guy sitting holding a stick. Those are taskmasters. He's not working, he's just there to make sure you work. And so they would give the Israelites straw, they would bring it to where they were, give them straw to make bricks. And so now he says, well quit bringing them straw. They have too much time on their hands.
If they can have little get togethers where they talk about, hey, let's leave, they got too much time on their hands. So now, just quit giving them straw. And they still, but keep the same number of bricks. So if they had to make 500 bricks a day, they still have to make 500 bricks a day. But now, go get some straw and maybe you won't have times to get together and have little discussions.
Verse 10. So the taskmasters and the foreman of the people went out and said to the people, thus says Pharaoh, I will not give you straw. Go and get your straw yourselves wherever you can find it, but your work will not be reduced in the least. Okay. Moses and Aaron said, thus says the Lord. And they come out and said, you know, thus says Pharaoh.
It's a decree of a God. And if you're the people of Israel, one of those is having more of an effect on you right now. One of those feels more real. I don't know if you've ever felt that. You're like, I know what the Lord says, but man, does this feel more real. I know what he says, but this is the one that seems to work.
I know what he says, but this is the one that seems to apply to my life. That's the situation they find themselves in. Verse 11, go and get your straw yourselves wherever you can find it, but your work will not be reduced in the least. So the people were scattered throughout all the land of Egypt to gather stubble for straw. So they have to make bricks that hold together.
They have to have straw to do that. They don't seem to own a lot of land and people have already harvested the straw, so they're just running around wherever they can to find stubble just to try to piece this together. The taskmasters were urgent saying, complete your work, your daily task each day as when there was straw. And the foremen of the people of Israel, so they had taskmasters and then they had foremen. Foremen were Israelites over other Israelites to make sure the work gets done. The foremen of the people of Israel whom Pharaoh's taskmasters had set over them were beaten and were asked, why have you not done all your task of making bricks today and yesterday as in the past?
Moses and Aaron come and say, hey, God's visiting us. He's going to rescue us. Moses and Aaron go in front of Pharaoh. That same day, the rules come down that they're not going to get straw anymore and then it says, today and yesterday, they didn't meet quotas, so on that end of the second day, they're beaten. This happened quick. That the foremen are brought in and beaten by the taskmasters because they're no longer fulfilling what they're supposed to fulfill.
Now could you imagine being the foreman? For just a moment, God's visiting us. This is changing. We're going to be set free. Then they come and announce, y'all are wasting time.
You have too much time on your hands and now you've got to get the same amount of work done with less and that's hard and impossible. And then, as they fail, while people stand over them yelling, then two days in, they're beaten for it. Verse 15, then the foreman of the people of Israel came and cried to Pharaoh, why do you treat your servants like this? No straw is given to your servants, yet they say to us, make bricks. And behold, your servants are beaten, but the fault is in your people. Your own people is in your own people.
Verse 17, but he said, you are idle. He said, lazy. You got too much time on your hands. You are idle. That is why you say, let us go and sacrifice to the Lord. Go now and work.
No straw will be given you, but you must still deliver the same number of bricks. And the foreman of the people of Israel saw that they were in trouble when they said, you shall by no means reduce your number of bricks in your daily task each day. They leave and they said, well, we're in trouble. This is not going to work out for us. Verse 20, they met Moses and Aaron who were waiting for them as they came out from Pharaoh and they said to them, the Lord look on you and judge because you have made us stink in the sight of Pharaoh and his servants and have put a sword in their hand to kill us. Now from, Moses says, okay, Lord, I'll go.
I'll step out. If you remember at the burning bush, he said, please no. And he gave a bunch of excuses and then when God went through all of his excuses, he said, okay, you got through all my excuses, but also one more thing, please no. I have no more excuses, but please don't send me. And he sends him and Moses goes. Moses steps out in faith.
He goes before Pharaoh and it gets worse and then the people who he's coming to try to help look at him and say, may God judge you. They're going to kill us because of you. Verse 22, then Moses turned to the Lord and said, oh Lord, why have you done evil to this people? why did you ever send me? For since I came to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has done evil to this people and you have not delivered your people at all. Why? Why have you done evil?
Why has this gotten worse? You haven't delivered the people at all. Like you said you were going to deliver them, you hadn't done that at all. Like it's the opposite. It's worse. Ever since I came it's just gotten worse.
Have y'all ever thought this? Have you ever prayed this? Lord, why has this gotten harder? Why has this gotten worse? I thought this was going to be good. I thought you were going to bless.
I thought, I mean, I don't believe in the prosperity gospel. I didn't think I was going to be a millionaire and have a jet. I wouldn't be mad at you if that happened but I didn't think that was going to happen. But I didn't think it was going to be like this. I mean, it feels like I'm trying to fight uphill through briars and now there's a guy hitting me with sticks. Like I don't, it's gotten worse.
Why is this so much harder? Why isn't this easier? I've been following you for years now and it still feels like I'm in the same stuff. Why? And for Moses, Lord, I'm obeying. Why?
I did what you asked me to do. You haven't delivered at all. So chapter 6, God answers. And he doesn't answer that why. Why has this happened? He doesn't answer that.
But in his answer, I think he gives us why it's worth it. Why we should trust him. Why we should keep moving forward. In chapter 6, he says this, But the Lord said to Moses, Now you shall see what I will do to Pharaoh. For with a strong hand he will send them out and with a strong hand he will drive them out of his land. So it's interesting because right now Pharaoh's using his strength to keep them.
And God said, Watch. Pretty soon he's going to throw everything he has at getting rid of them. God spoke to Moses and said to him, I am the Lord. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as God Almighty, but by my name, the Lord, I did not make myself known to them. I also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan, the land in which they lived as sojourners. Moreover, I have heard the groaning of the people of Israel whom the Egyptians hold as slaves and I have remembered my covenant.
So this first part is an answer to Moses and then he's going to tell him what to say to the people of Israel but he says, I am the Lord and he talks about what he's done, who he is and what he's done and he talks about that he's remembered this covenant and he's going to fulfill his promises. In the next bit he's going to talk about the fulfillment of those promises. But I think that's part of the first answer we get, part of where we should start is who is he? What do we know of his character? What do we know of his nature? And we have a much more beautiful answer than Moses has when we sit and consider that.
Moses has that he fulfilled his promises to the fathers in some measure that he's working this out and that he's going to fulfill these promises now in Egypt but we actually know that he does fulfill these promises in Egypt and more than that he fulfills them eternally in Christ for us. That he loves us so much that he died for us. That's what we read earlier in Ephesians 2 that while we were still sinners Christ died for us that he loved us so that he would rescue us by grace. We start there but then here's what he's going to say to say to the people of Israel this is verse 6. Say therefore to the people of Israel I am the Lord and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians and I will deliver you from slavery to them and I will redeem you with outstretched arm and with great Acts of judgment.
I will take you to be my people and I will be your God and you shall know that I am the Lord your God who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. I will bring you into the land that I swore to give to Abraham to Isaac and to Jacob I will give it to you for a possession I am the Lord. And Moses spoke thus to the people of Israel but they did not listen to Moses because of their broken spirit and harsh slavery. They just couldn't hear it. They had a broken spirit and harsh slavery and there is really nothing worse than a broken spirit. And so my hope today is that even in the midst of wherever you are that you would be able to hear this answer.
That you would be able to hear what he says. When I was in seminary we they referred to a study I learned about a study where they had people tell a Bible story and then have to retell a Bible story. So you would listen to a Bible story and then you would retell it. And what were they studying? I don't know. Who's they?
Also don't know. But it's not important for this illustration so try to stay focused. What they did though was they did this with people in the United States and then they did this with people not in the United States that were more in it was either in Africa or kind of the Middle East India area but it was a very different culture. And so what I'm going to call is we'll just call it the West United States and we'll call it the East the not the United States. I remember like I said all the pertinent details. But they told them the story of the prodigal son and they had them repeat it.
And you don't need to know the whole story of the prodigal son. I mean for this illustration you don't. You should know it. It's good but you don't for this illustration. It comes from Luke 15. The main thing you need to know is that the prodigal son goes off and he does two things.
He has two problems. One is he wastes all his money and two there's a famine in the land. That's the problem he has. He wastes all his money there's a famine in the land. When the Westerners retold the story almost all of them remembered that he wasted his money. But only some remembered there was a famine.
Most of them did not. When the Easterners retold the story almost all of them remembered there was a famine and very few of them remembered that he had wasted his money. Now I don't know what they were studying but one of the things they found was that sometimes we only latch on to the things that seem to connect with us that make sense to us that we're excited about that we think about. Westerners understand wasting money. Maybe they've never really gone hungry never had to live through a famine never understood what that was like but they know about wasting money and the Easterners in this study didn't have a whole lot of connection to wasting money but they'd lived through some famines.
Now this is one of the only times I'll ever say this don't look at your Bibles just for a second don't look at your Bibles what does God promise that he's going to do? He says say this to the Israelites and he promises that he's going to do something what does he promise he's going to do? Get your answer in your head don't shout it out you'll ruin it for the rest of the class. I think that the majority of us remember he's going to set them free from slavery. He's going to get them out of the burdens of Egypt. If I had to guess what was the second most remembered thing is that he's going to take them to the promised land.
But there's a third thing that he says that I think we're likely to overlook. One of the reasons I think we're likely to overlook it is that as I was preparing this I kept overlooking it. And it's this you will be my people and I will be your God. And you see I think there's times where we read this and as Americans land of the free oh we got that freedom land land of the free home of the brave and it's like well it's land of the free home of the milk and honey but you were close. But you see the purpose of the freedom that he gives is not to get them to the borders of Egypt and say go live your dreams.
He sets them free that they might be his. He gets them away from Pharaoh that they might belong to him. I want to read this. I want us to see it. Verse 6 say therefore to the people of Israel I am the Lord and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians and I will deliver you from slavery to them and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great Acts of judgment. Amen.
He sets them free from slavery. There's a wonderful glorious thing that he's going to do and that he promises to do. Verse 7 I will take you to be my people and I will be your God and you shall know that I am the Lord your God who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians and I will bring you into the land that I swore to gifts he's going to give them land to Abraham to Isaac and to Jacob and I will give it to you for a possession I am the Lord but see what makes the freedom wonderful and what makes the land wonderful is that they belong to God. And how dare we fail to see how glorious and wonderful he is that he's actually what the point of the promise is.
The promised land is the promised land because he's there because he's making a people for himself. If you were in an orphanage and it wasn't a good one it was a rough place and someone came by to see you and they said one day I'm going to get you out of here. One day I'm going to get it lined up and I'm going to get you out of here. And you're not going to stay here anymore and you're not going to have to put up with this anymore and you're going to be free. And there's not going to be a day where you're laying and staring at this ceiling anymore and you're surrounded by these people anymore you're going to be free.
And one day they do it and they come to get you and they sign everything and they get it all worked out and they walk out holding your hand and then they look at you and say okay you're free best of luck to you and walk off. No the point of the freedom was so that you might belong to them. The point of the adoption was so that you might come live with them that you might belong to them and they might belong to you that they might share themselves with you and that's the glorious point of this promise here is that God says I'm going to make you mine. And if all we see is some of the stuff around it then it's possible in the midst of the difficulty we'll think is it worth it?
Because I'm pretty sure this other thing will give me some of the stuff. I mean I signed up so that my kids would behave. I started following you so that things would work out for me. I started following you because I thought it was going to make life easier. I started following you because I figured if I'd obey then I'd be married by now. I started following you because I figured this would happen or that would happen or I'd make work work out.
I don't know I didn't want you to I wasn't trying to think of you as like a lucky penny or something but I kind of I don't know. It just feels like you're not fulfilling the things. It feels like you haven't delivered at all. And if all we understand is that he's going to do some wonderful things for us but we don't understand that he's wonderful and that ultimately he's the prize and that heaven is only heaven because he's there. But if we understand that well it doesn't matter where he takes us because if he's at the end of that road it's worth it.
It doesn't matter how long it doesn't matter how much suffering it doesn't matter how much hardship the truth is Paul tells us that the suffering of this time are not worth compared to the glories that will be revealed to us that he's actually preparing for us an eternal weight of glory that only suffering works out in us and so that the more suffering to have the more we're going to carry a weight of glory that we cannot fathom because we're going to belong to him and he's going to belong to us and that's the point that he's redeeming a people for himself and praise God that he is. Praise God that heaven isn't just that weird rodeo place from Pinocchio where it's just like go do whatever the heck you want and that somehow it's just all the fun things that we could dream of because the truth is all of that is empty if it's not for him. If heaven isn't heaven without him and so we long for him we long for this day that he looks on us we long for this day that he sees us we long for this day that we're welcomed home and that is what we hold on to. Why does it play out like this?
Why do you have the struggle you have? Why do you have the pain that you have? Why do you have the hurt that you have? Why do you have some of the emptiness you feel? I don't know and I don't know if he's going to answer that but I know that if you get him at the end of it oh it's worth it that the suffering of this time pales in comparison to that day that Jesus Christ is reconciling the world to himself that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself and that no one comes to the Father but by Christ and that it's through Christ that we're forgiven and that we get the Father and that's the point.
Now this is how the Bible ends.