Preparation for the Journey

[0:00] We're in chapter 12 this evening and remind you that last week God informed Moses that he has one more blow against Pharaoh that he's going to bring.

[0:28] ! And that will be the one that will cause him to drive Israel out of Egypt.

[0:39] This will be the final blow and it will accomplish what it was set out to accomplish. Remember, I think last week we looked at the idea of why God has done this the way he's done it.

[0:53] Instead of just right at the get-go dealing with Pharaoh causing him to let the people go. And the two basic reasons.

[1:04] One of them, of course, remember was that so that Pharaoh as well as the Egyptians can get a taste of the power of God so that they can some way somehow recognize that he is Jehovah.

[1:16] But then I think more so was the idea that Israel, the seed of Jacob, needs to see that he is Jehovah.

[1:35] They're God's people by sovereign design and they in bondage need to see and need to recognize and know that he is Jehovah.

[1:48] And that he possesses all of the characteristics seen in the name Jehovah. And so tonight we come to that point now where preparation for the upcoming journey is necessary.

[2:05] And that process then is ushered in. Chapter 6. Exodus chapter 6, verses 6 through 7 is a passage early on where God speaks to Moses and tells him what's going to transpire here.

[2:27] Those two verses say, Wherefore, say unto the children of Israel, I am the Lord, or I am Jehovah. And I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.

[2:39] And I will rid you out of their bondage. And I will redeem you with a stretched out arm and with great judgments. And I will take you to me for a people.

[2:51] And I will be to you a God. And you shall know that I am Jehovah your God or your Elohim, which bringeth you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.

[3:02] So, early on, as he begins the process of sending Moses to Pharaoh and dealing with him, he tells them the whole purpose and reason of what he's doing here.

[3:15] He's going to do that to prove a point and to cause Pharaoh to turn the people of Israel out from underneath the bondage they've been in for so long.

[3:25] But realize something. It's going to be something brand new for them. For most of them. All of them, really. They're going to leave Egypt and experience some things.

[3:43] Where are they headed to when they leave Egypt? Yeah. Canaan. The land of their inheritance. All right.

[3:54] That God has promised them. And so, that's where they're headed. So, they've got a long journey ahead of them. And so, there's some things that need to be done.

[4:06] Some preparation needs to be done. In order for that to take place, the people of Israel need to be consecrated to the Lord. And God gives instructions about that as we go along here.

[4:22] The reason and the necessity for the consecration is this. How long have they been in Egypt? 430 years.

[4:35] That's a few days. Amen. Don't know how many generations have come and gone in that 430 years. But it's been a long time.

[4:48] In that 430 years, think about what they've been exposed to. Now, I know they're in the land of Goshen. And we have seen in the latter stages of the plagues that God has put a separation between them and the people of Egypt.

[5:09] And not allowing Israel to undergo some of those last few plagues. But before all of this, before all of this with Moses ever comes to pass, realize what the people of Israel have been exposed to.

[5:28] They've been exposed to Egyptian customs, lifestyles. They've been exposed to Egyptian worship. Who knows?

[5:38] Who knows? Who knows the intimidation that's been there to be a part of all of that? But you've got to imagine there's something there in that.

[5:50] So having been exposed to all of that, they not only now need to have a severance from the land of Egypt, but they need to be severed from all of those things that they were exposed to through the generations that came from the people of Egypt.

[6:12] Realize something. They're no different in their generations than we are in ours. I'm looking around and not all, but the largest percentage of people here, I'm not going to say are old folks, but are senior saints.

[6:33] Amen? Yeah. And some of the things you see or we see today taking place in this generation of young adults even, and young people just astound us.

[6:50] So it gives us a good picture of how generations from generation to generation are influenced by the world that they're a part of. And not all of it's for good.

[7:03] Got to believe that took place with the people of Israel. Now, they have no place of their own to worship. Of course, we're not at Sinai yet.

[7:15] But they're away from their home, have been for over 400 years. And so they're going to have to have something change.

[7:25] Not just a severance from the land, but a spiritual severance from the nature and the customs and the worship of the Egyptians that have rubbed off on them.

[7:39] They need to become the people of God in a true sense. Now, that consecration was going to be accomplished at this point with the Passover feast that he's about to give them instructions concerning that we'll look at beginning probably next week.

[8:00] But they've got to be ready for all of that to transpire. Now, they're going to experience some things of God they've never experienced before.

[8:15] Yes, they've seen the miracles and the power of the plagues that have come. But there's some new things that are going to transpire here. Because remember in the passage we read a moment ago in Exodus 6, God shows that they're going to enter into a new relationship with him.

[8:37] A new relationship of grace, a new relationship of fellowship with him. So in order for that to happen, it's going to require something that changes within them.

[8:52] Interestingly enough, we see the same thing. When I was going through this the other day, last week in fact, a thought came to me.

[9:06] This is the exact same thing that Israel has to do whenever they enter into the promised land, Canaan.

[9:20] Go over to Joshua chapter 3. Afford me the pleasure to chase a rabbit here just a little bit.

[9:32] Joshua chapter 3. We see here a time of transition with the people of Israel.

[9:50] Moses, who they've known for years to be the leader that God has appointed to direct them, has now died. He's no longer on the scene.

[10:02] God has appointed someone else by the name of Joshua, a man that has the Spirit of God within him, full of the Spirit of wisdom, if you will, what Scripture says, appointed by God, ordained, if you will, by Moses prior to this time.

[10:22] Now, in the first chapter of Joshua, which we'll not look into too much, God gives Joshua now instructions about what he's to do.

[10:38] All right? He's going to have that daunting task of getting the people of Israel into Canaan. All right?

[10:49] Now, remember, they've been in Egypt over 400 years, but also remember what happened in the period from the Exodus to the time they finally come to Kadesh Barnea, where they go into the Promised Land.

[11:12] They end up wandering for 40 years, remember, because of their hard-heartedness, hard-headedness, rebellion against God, and so forth. And so now, they've come to this place.

[11:24] Take notice of what it says here in the first five verses of Joshua chapter 3. And as you look at this, consider this is the same type of thing, if you will, that he's looking at back in Exodus when they're preparing for the journey out of Egypt.

[11:43] Now, Joshua rose early in the morning, and they came from Shittim and came to Jordan, he and all the children of Israel, and lodged there before they passed.

[11:58] And it came to pass after three days that the officers went through the host, and they commanded the people, saying, When you see the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord, or that's Jehovah, your God, and the priest, the Levites, bearing it, then you shall remove from your place and go after it.

[12:18] Yet there shall be a space between you and it, about two thousand cubits by measure. Come not near unto it, that you may know the way by which you must go.

[12:29] Notice this, For you have not passed this way before. Joshua said unto the people, sanctify yourselves. Okay?

[12:40] There's the word. Sanctify yourselves. For tomorrow, Jehovah will do wonders among you. That word wonders in the King James is translated in the original extraordinary works.

[12:57] You know, it's almost as if he's saying, when you were in Egypt, you saw the things that God did. He said, you ain't seen nothing yet. Amen? Yeah.

[13:08] What you're about to see are the extraordinary works of God on your behalf. So, now, Joshua is going to lead them and direct them under God's leadership and God's direction through this process.

[13:29] In chapter 1, in the first 11 verses of chapter 1, you see where God commissions, Joshua instructs him, gives him promises. Here at the promises, I give you this land, all right, that you're on.

[13:44] No man's able to stand before you. As I was with Moses, I will be with you. I will not fail thee nor forsake thee. Be strong and of good courage.

[13:57] And then observe the word of God, meditate upon it, and don't depart from it. And the result of that is going to be success and prosperity for Joshua and the people of God.

[14:11] So, in verses 10 and 11, Joshua commands the people to prepare food for the journey and then will go in and possess the land. Now, the process began, remember, with sending spies into the land.

[14:29] Who remembers, who remembers what the spies did? Where'd they go? Rahab. Who was Rahab? She was a harlot.

[14:40] But she hid them, remember. Protected them because, no doubt, somebody saw them coming in, strangers coming into town and wanted to seek it out.

[14:52] Do you remember what it is that Rahab said to these guys? You're shaking your head. Yes, that's one of my favorite passages where he says, we have heard what your God has done in Egypt.

[15:08] Yeah. I know that you're going to take over this place. Only remember me when you come in. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that's such a tremendous thing there. We know, you know, this isn't done in the dark.

[15:21] We know what has happened here. You know, a thought comes to mind here. You know, as rebellious and sinful as Israel was in the midst of all of that, God still performed some tremendous things on their behalf.

[15:40] All right? And now, Rahab, a harlot, a heathen, knows of the renown, not of Israel, but of God, Israel's God, Jehovah.

[15:52] All right? And what God has done in and through and for them. You ever stop to wonder what kind of reputation Highland Park Baptist Church has in this neighborhood, in this area, in this town?

[16:09] Oh, I know people recognize the red shirts, and that's good, but what does our neighborhood know about Highland Park?

[16:23] What kind of reputation? Is it one that they know and they've heard and they've seen the work of God in the midst of it? That's a good question for us, isn't it?

[16:33] And always remember, the power of the church comes from the power of God resident in the people of the church. Amen? Yeah.

[16:44] Yeah. So, we need to scope that out in our own lives and see and be sure that the power of God is resident there. So, yeah, well, let's move on here.

[16:55] And so now, God's purpose is about to realize there's some things that Israel is going to see. Look in verses 10 and 11 of chapter 3.

[17:08] Here's some of the extraordinary things they're going to recognize or see. Joshua said unto the children of Israel, Come hither and hear the words of Jehovah your God.

[17:22] Verse 10, Joshua said, Hereby, in other words, from this point forward, you're going to know that the living God is among you and that he will without fail drive you out from before the Canaanites, the Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, and the Amorites and the Jebusites.

[17:45] All right? That's what God's going to do here. You're going to see that God is a living God and he's living among you, his people.

[17:57] and he's doing that, living with them, living amongst them, watching over them, and you're going to recognize, you're going to see that. Now, the important thing here is this.

[18:11] They're not just going to see it happen. All right? Not just going to see it happen. I'm trying to think of some monumental event here. Let's give an example.

[18:27] Crude example. I'll give you one now. Anybody here ever been to a space shuttle launch? You actually saw the launch?

[18:40] A few miles off, yeah. Good. I've always wanted, I love using you as an example. How many of you have watched it on TV at least once?

[18:54] Yeah, we all have. Yeah, cool thing to watch, to see it, to know it, that that happened, watch it on TV and hear all the commentary about it.

[19:04] But it's another thing to be present. What was the difference, Ted? A lot of difference. You can hear it and you can't describe it.

[19:18] Okay. A lot of difference in being on TV. It brought a thrill, didn't it? No doubt. A thrill in your heart when that thing lifted off and took off and broke the skies and just went out until you couldn't see it anymore.

[19:33] It's the first one after the Challenger accident. Oh, was it really? Oh, wow. And so what an experience. Israel here is not just going to see God work.

[19:47] They're going to experience that. All right? there's a vital aspect to the work of God and the people of God in being able to experience the work of God in our personal life, in the lives of other people, in the world around us.

[20:16] all right? To experience that is something that is vital for us. It's going to be vital for the people of Israel to see what God does.

[20:31] Now, you're going to see and acknowledge His presence, yes, but to experience now the fact that He is present among you and you know that by the things that He's going to do through you and for you and to you when He shows that He Himself is the true and living God to them.

[20:55] And again, even the plagues of Egypt, as we said before, the main purpose in stretching it out the way that He did is so that they could see and recognize and experience the reality of God's love for them and God's presence with them.

[21:13] All right? I know that the people of Israel were Jews, but they had to be Baptist Jews because they were hard-headed. Amen?

[21:24] It took a long, process for them to begin to understand some of these things. All right, so they're supposed to wait, they've rested for three days to wait for God's direction and provision, but also in that three days time, notice again in chapter 3, verse 5, Joshua said to the people, sanctify yourselves for tomorrow the Lord will do extraordinary wonders, extraordinary work in your presence.

[21:57] Sanctify yourself. The idea of sanctification there literally is to be holy, to be made holy. Same thing as consecrated, to be made sacred.

[22:10] it's the idea of being made, it's the idea of being brought to a point where you are qualified, let's use that word, qualified to worship and serve a righteous and holy God.

[22:31] All right? because realize they were in Egypt and now they're going to be in the presence of God, he's going to be present with them, they're going to serve him, they're going to worship him, and their heart must be right in order for that to take place.

[22:49] Now, get the idea when the first use of the word sanctify shows us in Exodus 29-21 when it says, Thou shalt take of the blood that is upon the altar and of the anointed oil and sprinkle it upon Aaron and upon his garments and upon his sons and upon the garments of his sons with him.

[23:15] He shall be hallowed and his garments, his sons and his sons' garments with him. That idea of the sprinkling of the blood is a sanctifying issue here to make them holy, consecrated, be able to serve God in the tabernacle if you will.

[23:37] So, overtones of spiritual holiness is written in this as well. In Exodus 29-37 that we'll see later on, seven days thou shalt make an atonement for the altar and sanctify it and it shall be an altar most holy.

[24:01] Whosoever touches or whatsoever touches the altar shall be holy. So, again, it's the idea of being made holy to be able to be used of God and to worship him rightly.

[24:14] Now, they'll be brought into a new state to be able to do that. And the idea here is it now when it's sanctified sanctified in that way by atonement that has been sanctified now is the possession of God and to be used of him solely in whatever manner or way or fashion that he deems fit to be used.

[24:41] Now, recognize this if you will. There's another emphasis of the word sanctify. And that is the idea of us being able to have a proper view of who God is.

[24:58] Put that in proper perspective. I'm sure if we had all of you write down on paper your view of God, tell me who God is, who you see him to be.

[25:15] It'd be interesting to see what the results are. But it's important for us. You know, how are those views formed and fashioned?

[25:31] It'd be interesting for us to recognize that in ourselves. Sanctification comes by the work of God and giving us a true image of who he is.

[25:44] Why is it so many times in Exodus in the plagues and the announcements of the plagues? Moses has always instructed, most of the time anyway, to announce that this is the work of Jehovah God.

[26:00] There's what Jehovah our God is going to do. This is what he says in order to get a proper perspective of who and a proper view of who he really is.

[26:14] So the only way you and I can get that proper view, well tell me, how can we get that proper view? How do we get the proper view of who God is and what he is?

[26:25] Scripture. Scripture. What else? I think like the Israelites back then, we get some personal experience, and once in a while God steps in, you say, this is God OK.

[26:41] What makes that impact even more powerful? My prayer for something to happen and be able to see what God is doing and then recognize it as us.

[26:54] OK. Always got to be careful about our experiences. What's the best way to determine whether or not our experiences have anything to do with the work of God?

[27:10] Go back to Scripture. OK. See how it aligns with what God's Word has to say. OK. That's why it's so important for us to know what the Word of God says.

[27:22] Not only about how He operates, the things that He does, but who He is, things He said, all of those things to put everything in perspective from what God is saved.

[27:38] All right. Now, and that's the thing that's absent from this generation that we live in. All right.

[27:49] Now, to have a proper view of God is a necessity so that, you know, having that proper view of God will motivate us then.

[28:00] What does it motivate us to do? having a proper perspective and a proper view of God, what does that motivate us to do? Oh, wow, that was an easy one, wasn't it?

[28:14] To obey Him. Yeah. To do what He says, what He shows us He wants out of our lives. That's the motivation. That's the proper motivation for that.

[28:25] Amen? Yeah. How many of you at some point, sometime, some days, wake up in the morning and you don't feel very spiritual?

[28:38] Amen? Yeah. What do you do about that? Pray. What do you pray? God, show me what you want me to do.

[28:49] Show me what I need to do. Do we always want to hear that, though? Not always, but I always pray every morning. And He shows and you go, oh, man.

[29:05] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, to recognize and realize that God is always the same.

[29:16] He never changes. All right? His plan today is the same as it was yesterday with the end result being the same. All right?

[29:27] Whether we in our humanity want to feel it or not, recognize it or not, God doesn't go on feelings. He goes on obedience. Amen? Yeah.

[29:38] He expects obedience from His people. And when we have that proper view of God, we will be obedient to Him no matter how we feel. Amen? Yeah.

[29:49] Exactly. Through the power of the Spirit of God, not in the flesh. Yeah. Got to be careful about not doing it in the flesh.

[30:01] All right. So, God desires His people to know Him, have a proper picture of who He is, and to be obedient to Him.

[30:14] Now, look over in Ephesians chapter 5 real quick. Apostle Paul gives us a great picture of the believer's sanctification.

[30:38] Ephesians chapter 5.

[30:56] Look at verse 25. We'll start there. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave Himself for it, that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that He might present to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.

[31:27] men to love their wives as their own body. He that loveth his wife loveth himself. And on down he goes here. In verse 32, he said, this is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church.

[31:43] That's the main focus there, he says. All right? Now, take note, if you will. Now, he loved the church and gave himself for it for this purpose, so that he might sanctify it.

[32:03] All right? Make it holy. Make it His. All right? And he looks at the believers compiled together as the church.

[32:21] But the idea here is when he sees us, prior to his death, when he saw us, he saw us as something worth giving himself for.

[32:38] I don't understand that. Can you? When what we were without Christ, sinners by nature, unloving, seemingly unlovable to that degree, he saw us as objects worth giving himself up, dying for.

[33:04] Yeah. God. And the reason is so that he could present it, the church to himself as his bride.

[33:24] Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to make a crude statement here, so forgive me for making it, but I think it proves the point.

[33:38] I don't care how beautiful a woman can be. I don't care how ugly she can be. You can put an ugly, I'm not going to look at any woman while I'm seeing this, because she's going to think I'm thinking about her.

[33:50] a woman can be as ugly as homemade soap. You put her in a wedding gown, do the makeover.

[34:04] I've not performed a wedding yet that the bride wasn't a beautiful bride. Amen. Same thing with babies in the nursery, in the hospital, newborns.

[34:16] It's a baby. Hey. Yeah. Yeah. God, Jesus saw us just the way we were prior to our salvation, and did that work to dress us up, clothe us in His righteousness, so that we could be presented to Him as His bride.

[34:47] Amen. And again, notice the reality here. I just love the way Paul expresses this because it's the truth of it. That He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of the Word, that He might present it to Himself, a glorious bride.

[35:12] Wedding takes place, usually the bride's dad walks her down the aisle or somebody walks her down the aisle, she comes front to the minister and everybody else that's up there, and they start the process, the ceremony.

[35:30] The time comes, preacher says, who gives this woman to be married to this man? And the dad, after the bride nudges him a little bit, I do, or my wife and I do, her mother and I.

[35:47] And He gives the bride to the groom. Jesus died willingly for us, separated us apart, made us holy, so that He could present us as His bride to Himself.

[36:09] I'm curious and I'm anxious to see how that's going to work out. Amen? My mind can go a long way with that, but it's speculation, so we've got to be careful with that.

[36:22] But for Him to present us to Himself as His bride, clothed in His righteousness. Yeah.

[36:37] Most of the time, not always, the bride's walking down the aisle, what's the groom doing?

[36:54] Crying, crying or grinning. What did I get myself into? When he sees her, he just, the emotions, you know, and a lot of the grooms cry because they're so overtaken by the bride.

[37:06] Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's never seen her that way before.

[37:19] Brand new introduction here. And he'll grin, smile. Think of Jesus. Wow.

[37:32] Having dressed us in His righteousness, takes us and presents us to Himself. Looks us straight in the face, grinning with the greatest smile we've ever seen, shaking his head yes.

[37:53] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I've told you the story before about our daughter that lives in Bozeman, Montana. how she was really struggling before Michael and her got married.

[38:09] She was really struggling with things, not being sure that this was the right thing. And the whole thing was she wanted to be sure that she was in the will of God.

[38:24] She didn't want to do anything to step outside the will of God. She hadn't latched on to the idea yet of how to know that exactly. She finally came to know that.

[38:36] So they called. They were in Fort Worth, right? Yeah. They were in Fort Worth going to seminary. And she called and said, Dad, here's what we'd like to do.

[38:48] We want to go ahead and get married. We've got that settled. We want to do it when we're home for Christmas, which is about two weeks away. all we want is five Christmas trees lit up with white lights and that's all up on the platform.

[39:12] Okay. We scurry around and get five Christmas trees about the same height. Get big stands for them because these are big, heavy. Yeah. And got the lights ready.

[39:24] And come time for the ceremony because we talked. before the ceremony. But come time for the ceremony, I didn't know what was going to happen. How many have seen the movie Runaway Bride?

[39:38] That thought came into my mind. Came time for the wedding vows. And this was going to be the kicker.

[39:53] Because I didn't know how this was going to work. they were standing right here in front of me. Had them turned toward each other. They had written their own vows. And I said, all right, Darla, repeat your vows to Michael.

[40:14] And they were holding hands like this, looking at each other. And she didn't miss a lick. I mean, not a beat.

[40:25] Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, with all the vows. He repeated hers. And I said, all right, quickly, kiss each other. Yeah, but the look, I'll never forget the look on their faces with one another.

[40:45] And repeating their vows. and making it a reality. What a joy that they had at that moment.

[40:59] And I did too. Think about, I don't know how this is all going to come down as far as him making us his bride.

[41:14] But it's going to be good. Amen? You talk about joy. That's going to be the most joyous thing we've ever experienced.

[41:26] And realize, it all comes through sanctification that Christ has provided for us when he died on the cross for us because he saw us as something that was worth dying for.

[41:41] So he could present us to himself. That's what Israel was to do in type prior to the exodus when they were to be consecrated to the Lord through the institution of this Passover feast.

[42:02] Now, we'll get into that next week and see the reality of what that was to be and what that was for and see the glorious things in that that God pictures.

[42:16] . Thank you.