Moses and the Great I AM: Stories of Redemption in Exodus

Praise the Lord. Amen. Are you ready for the Word? Stand with me this morning. We’re going to turn in our Bibles to a new book in the Bible. Well, not new, but a new series. Exodus chapter 3. Exodus chapter 3. The title of our message this morning is Moses and the Great I Am, but we’re beginning a new series entitled Stories of Redemption in Exodus. I want to read Exodus 3. I’m going to read the first 15 verses, and then we’re going to turn over in our Bibles and read John 8 58 and 59. Exodus chapter 3 verse 1. Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire, it did not burn up. So Moses thought, I will go over and see this strange sight, why the bush does not burn up. When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, Moses, Moses. And Moses said, here I am. Do not come any closer, God said. Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground. Then he said, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. At this Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at God. The Lord said, I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I’ve heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I’m concerned about their suffering. So I’ve come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey, the home of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them, so now go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt? And God said, I will be with you, and this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you. When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain. Moses said to God, suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you, and they ask me, what is his name? Then what shall I tell them? God said to Moses, I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites. I am has sent me to you. God also said to Moses, say to Israelites, the Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob has sent me to you. This is my name forever, the name you shall call me from generations to generations. And then if you’ll turn to your Bibles with me to John’s Gospel, chapter 8. I’m gonna read just two verses. John 8 verse 58. Very truly I tell you, Jesus answered, before Abraham was born, I am. At this they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself, slipping away from the temple grounds. Will you pray with me? Lord God, thank you for your word, and thank you for the great stories in the Bible. Lord, we know they’re more than just stories. They’re divinely inspired records of how you have worked in human history to form a people, to work out your plan of salvation. Lord, thank you for the story of the Exodus, and thank you for how it points to Jesus, our Savior, who sets us free from sin and gives us a new life of meaning and purpose and satisfaction. Lord, speak to our hearts today. Speak to us about your holiness. Speak to us about your great name. And Lord, redeem us. Redeem us, Lord. We are needy for your mercy, for your grace, and for your redemptive work in our lives today. We give you all the glory in Jesus’ name. Amen. You may be seated. God bless you. And so we’re gonna be in Exodus chapter 1 through 4 this morning and focused on this powerful story of how God revealed himself, revealing his holiness and revealing his great name there as Moses encountered God at the burning bush. But first, the backstory. I want us to think about the backstory of what took place in Exodus chapter 3. Exodus records the central story of the Old Testament. It’s a continuation of Genesis and all the promises that God gave to Abraham and to Isaac and to Jacob. But now in Exodus, we get to see and read how God, as a Redeemer and Rescuer, sets his people free from slavery and leads them into a spacious land, the Promised Land. As the Exodus story begins, if you look at chapter 1 verse 6, Joseph and his generation have died. And according to verse 8, there’s a new Pharaoh, there’s a new king in the land who doesn’t know Joseph. Israel is flourishing and multiplying. Chapter 1 verse 9. One of the things you’ll notice in the story of Exodus is repeatedly, and I believe Moses wrote this, I believe Moses wrote this sometime after the Exodus or even some of it during the Exodus events, but Moses wants us to know, he wants you to know that God is keeping his promises. Now the Bible tells us that the Israelites were enslaved for 430 years. You ever feel like in life God’s a little delayed? But here’s Moses writing the story of the Exodus and again and again he’s telling us as a part of the backstory that Israel is multiplying, Israel is flourishing. I mean they’re slaves! But we see it in these chapters more than once. Moses wants us to understand that God is keeping his promises. God is fulfilling the promise that he made to Abraham and to Isaac and Jacob. Do you ever feel like in your life sometimes that it’s like God you seem delayed or you see it seems like you’re not showing up right now and and I want you to know with Moses Moses wants you to know God’s still working. Even if God delays, we may think it’s a delay, 400 years of slavery? That feels like a delay. But do you know during those years you never read anything in Scripture about God’s people wanting to turn away from him or worship false idols. God used that season of slavery to bring discipline and order to his people. God used that time in their life, that time of suffering. So sometimes we feel like God’s delayed but God’s working. He’s working out his promises and so we see that in places like chapter 1 verse 9 and many other other places in these first few chapters. Moses wants you to know as we read this story God is fulfilling his promises to Israel even though they’ve experienced this setback in this time of slavery. God, what we learn in chapter 2 is God is going to work through a person. Isn’t that amazing? God works through people. God works through you and me. When he begins to work out his plan of salvation, he doesn’t do it all by himself. He does it through his children. He does it through his people. In fact, God chooses a people, a nation, a family, a clan or a tribe, not just so they can be blessed and say, okay, it’s done. No, God chooses you or chooses me. God chose Moses. In chapter 2 we read about his miraculous providential birth. God chooses people to work through you so that he can accomplish his plans in you and with you. There’s just a couple of things in the backstory that I want to point out in chapter 2. Chapter 2 is all about Moses, his birth, and how God was at work even as he was being born at a time when the nation of Israel was in slavery. Pharaoh was working against the plans of God, but Moses somehow was saved and if you don’t know that story you’ve got to go read that. There’s some really neat twist in chapter 2 of how God is providentially working so that Moses can be prepared as a deliverer. I want to just real quick read verses 11 through 15 because here’s something I found very interesting. Moses at one point goes out to see his people even though he’s being raised that as an Egyptian and he takes their part and he kills an Egyptian. Let me just read in verse 11. One day after Moses had grown up he went out to where his own people were and watched them at their hard labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people. Now let me just say that Hebrews 11 and Acts chapter 7 in the New Testament tell us that Moses here really was trying to act like an avenger and self-defense and trying to be a deliverer. That’s go read it Acts 7 Hebrews chapter 11 and if you’re ever wondering how to interpret the Bible make sure you interpret the Bible with the Bible because sometimes we can read things in the Bible and if you try to interpret the Bible with YouTube or you try to interpret the Bible with modern culture you’re gonna get really confused because it’s gonna go in a million different directions. So before you ask YouTube what this means make sure you ask the New Testament what this means. Verse 12 looking this way and that and seeing no one he killed the Egyptian and hit him in the sand. The next day he went out and saw two Hebrews fighting. He asked the one in the wrong why are you hitting your fellow Hebrew? The man said who made you ruler and judge over us? Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian? Then Moses was afraid and thought what I did must have been come come known and then as you read the rest of the chapter he flees and spends 40 years in the desert being trained by God to become a deliverer. But here’s my takeaway and again I encourage you to read Acts 7 and Hebrews 11 so you get the New Testament takeaway from that experience. But my takeaway from that this morning is often when God calls us to be used by him we will try to accomplish the deliverance we will try to accomplish God’s plan in our own strength and it doesn’t work. And that was what I see Moses doing. His heart may have been right he may be even at that point was sensing God’s call in his life to be a deliverer to be someone who was gonna be a part of seeing the Israelites who have been enslaved now for 430 years to see them set free but he tried to do it on his own and it didn’t work. The people themselves even said Moses who do you think you are? Moses needed to make to do it in God’s strength. He needed to wait on the Lord. What I hope we’ll see from all of Exodus as we work our way through we’ll have six or seven messages. I wish we could come to church every day so that I could just preach one chapter at a time but with our current schedule of only coming together on Sunday mornings I would be in Exodus for the rest of a long time. So we’re just gonna preach seven messages out of the book of Exodus but it’s all gonna be about redemption. God is a Redeemer. God loves to rescue and in Israel’s story God comes down on many different occasions but here God comes down to meet Moses at a burning bush and if you look in Exodus chapter 3 verse 8 there’s this word rescue it says so I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians. That is a word that connects with redemption. Our God is a Redeemer. He wants to and the actual meaning of Redeemer is someone who buys back what was theirs for the original purpose. That’s what God does in the gospel. That’s what Jesus does in our lives. We are his. We were created by God. We belong to God but this dark world and the sin of our flesh and the and the culture starts to get a hold of our life and takes us the wrong direction but God runs us down. God chases after us and he rescues us because he loves us. That’s the gospel. That’s the message of the New Testament. God loves you so much that he’ll run you down to chase after you so that you can experience freedom from slavery. Freedom from the bondage of sin and darkness and all those things that will destroy your life. God wants to redeem you. God wants to rescue you. God wants to restore you and to regenerate you. All of those are redemptive words. So I’m looking forward to this this series as we just get to focus on our great God and how he redeems our lives from slavery and from sin. And so let’s turn now back to chapter 3 Exodus and just focus on that chapter as we think about redemption. The first truth that I see here in the first six verses is that redemption begins with God’s holiness. Redemption begins with God’s holiness. Let me I put the first four verses on the screen Exodus chapter 3 1 through 4. It should be there somewhere Evie. There it is. But let me work through these six verses. So I’m just gonna start in Exodus 3 verse 1. Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law. Now let me just mention that Moses miraculously had been raised in the palace as an Egyptian. And so he had learned all that he could learn from from Egypt. All of their wisdom. All of their learning and knowledge. He was raised as just just like anyone else who was an Egyptian prince or leader. And yet that wasn’t enough. God had him on the backside of the desert for 40 years tending sheep so he could learn how to lead God’s people. That that really speaks to me this morning. You know there are so many things we have to learn to be useful in the hands of God and many of them are formal like certificates and degrees. But I think the best learning is just spending time with God. Just spending time in God’s Word. Just spending time letting God speak to your heart and and reveal things in your life that where you need to grow. Where you need to change. Anybody else feel like me that I haven’t arrived yet? I’ve still got a lot to grow. I’ve still got a lot to learn. There’s still some rough edges. God’s working in my life to try to make me more of who he wants me to be. And what I find is that when I’m not serving the Lord I can start to feel like you know I’m doing just fine. I’m doing pretty good. But as soon as you start trying to serve the Lord and serve God’s people you’ll start to realize man I got to grow. Man I need more humility. I need more passion. I need more love. I need to be more of what God wants me to be. And so here’s Moses on the backside of the desert for 40 years and he’s tending sheep and God is using that in his life to become the man that God wants him to be. His father-in-law the priest of Midian and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb. Now Horeb is kind of a general name for a mountain range in the southeastern part of the Sinai Peninsula. It’s the southern part of Israel. The Red Seas right there. And and that’s down where all of this took place. And so in the mountain range of Horeb would have also been Mount Sinai or the mountain of God. And Mount Sinai is where the Ten Commandments were given right. So it’s a really cool piece of land geography there. Verse 2. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire did not burn up. So Moses thought I will go over and see this strange sight why the bush does not burn up. When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look God called to him from within the bush Moses Moses. Now it’s interesting this reference to the angel of the Lord and we see this at very pivotal places in salvation history in the Old Testament. We see the appearance of this angel of the Lord and I don’t have time this morning to unpack a whole message on angels but I’ll just say this that the angel of the Lord is something more than an angel. The angel of the Lord is special. The angel of the Lord is unique and so angel just means messenger someone who’s coming to bring a message. And so this messenger is something more than just Michael or or just any any angel or Gabriel. I believe this angel is the Lord himself. In fact I would propose to us this morning that this angel the angel of the Lord is a pre-incarnate Jesus coming down in the Old Testament to bring a message from God because God it’s so important it’s so pivotal God is showing up himself. And this is not the only time that we see references to the angel of the Lord this unique messenger appearing at special times in salvation history. We see the angel of the Lord coming down and appearing to Hagar Genesis 16 Abraham Genesis 22 Jacob Genesis 31 Moses here in Exodus chapter 3 verse 2 the Israelites in Exodus 14 at Bochem in Judges 2 1 it this angel even appeared to Balaam in Numbers 22 to Joshua in Joshua 5 Gideon Joshua Judges 6 to David in first Chronicles Elijah in second Kings to Daniel in chapter 6 verse 22 and also to Joseph in the New Testament Matthew chapter 1 verse 20. So I wanted to point those out without digging too deeply into them to remind you that it is not a strange or seldom occurrence that the angel of the Lord would appear in some special way for a special event. All of this reminds me when Christmas time comes that we shouldn’t be surprised that God would come down. If we really study the scriptures and look at the stories in the Old Testament we see time after time after time that the God of heaven comes down to walk among his creation and to be a part of his purposes and his plan. Isn’t that amazing? And so it’s not just Christmas it’s not as if God is distant and God is not a part of anything that’s going on in human history and then Christmas happens and God shows up as a baby in a manger. I think somehow we may have that idea in our culture is that Jesus as a baby in a manger is the only time that God got involved in human history and yet I go back into these stories in Genesis when when God created and Genesis chapter 3 it says and God walked in the cool of the day in the garden and spoke to Adam and Eve and says where are you and then I read all of these stories about the angel of the Lord this mysterious angel that somehow more than an angel because even though the Bible says in verse 2 it’s the angel of the Lord then right after that it’s the Lord speaking and it’s the Lord talking to Moses and it’s the Lord God himself seeing Moses and interacting with Moses so it’s clearly more than just any average angel. I’m so thankful that God comes down to meet us and again you might be going through a delay. Israel went through 430 years of preparation and delay before God prepared Moses meeting him at a burning bush and deliverance was gonna come. Wow that’s a big delay and as you walk with the Lord you may be going through a delay you may be going through a season where you feel like when I look around me Lord I don’t see you showing up at all. Can you walk by faith just a little bit longer? Walk by faith don’t walk by sight. Keep trusting in the Word of God keep trusting in the purposes of God keep holding on to the promises of God because any saint of old or any modern-day believer who’s gonna hold on to God is gonna have to go through those seasons of life where you feel like God you’re delayed or you’re not showing up I don’t see your promises being fulfilled but hold on just a little longer God is at work and deliverance and redemption and rescue is coming. What I really see here in these first six verses is that rescue begins with the holiness of God the holiness of God. Redemption begins with understanding the holiness of God. Let me let me look at a few verses here as we as we just look at Moses response to this fearsome presence of God. I mean could you imagine that I don’t think we can that God would appear to us in a bush that is on fire but it doesn’t burn up and this is what Moses is seeing and he’s curious and he comes over and then God begins to speak out of the bush and in verse 4 the first response of Moses and his great reverence for God is great awe of God his first response in verse 4 is simply to say here I am here I am. You know I’ve found in my own life that when I don’t really experience the fear of the Lord when I don’t really experience the holiness of God I’m a pretty good guy I measure up with a lot of people. I mean do you understand what I’m saying is when I just think about my own goodness compared to your goodness I mean I’m okay with that I’m doing all right I got some bad days I got some good days but I mean compared to you know everybody else in the world I’m doing all right but see Moses came face-to-face with the holiness of God the awesomeness of God the purity of God the greatness of God and here’s what happens in our lives when we really come into contact with the greatness and the holiness and the purity of God we then realize wow I’m not holy at all I need help I’m not I mean I wouldn’t when I start to look at the goodness of God I wouldn’t describe myself as good I think this is so important today and in Columbia Missouri and modern-day America because we live in a city that believes we’re good and we’re really good at doing good we in fact it’s what I call the philosophy of do-goodism we give a little here we give a little there we’ve got on the radio stations we’ve always got something going on to remind how good of a community we are and how much we love everybody and that’s all great and then you just peel off a little bit of a layer just peel a little bit of that facade off to where people are really living and you realize wow there’s a lot of brokenness there’s a lot of trouble there’s a lot of problems there’s a lot of addiction there’s a lot of domestic problems there’s a lot going on underneath the hood that nobody wants to talk about because we’re a great city we’re a good city we’re good people and I can I can be that way too you can be that way until we come into the holiness of God and Moses came face to face with the holiness of God and the first thing he says is here I am he takes this posture okay Lord I’m ready to listen I’m I’m willing I’m available I’m surrendered to you and the second things thing he does in verse 5 is he takes off his sandals because God says hey you’re on holy ground in the presence of God and so he takes off his sandals he becomes barefoot before God God says don’t come any closer take off your sandals for the place where you’re standing verse 5 is holy ground sacred I think removing his sandals allowed Moses one to to be completely vulnerable before God is he takes off his sandals because God says, hey, you’re on holy ground in the presence of God. And so he takes off his sandals. He becomes barefoot before God. God says, don’t come any closer. Take off your sandals for the place where you’re standing. Verse 5 is holy ground, sacred. I think removing his sandals allowed Moses, one, to be completely vulnerable before God. I know I’m learning not to go barefoot because every time I do, I end up with something sticking into my foot and it hurts. It’s summertime, right? So I kind of like to go barefoot out on the porch or at night, I’ve got me a good pair of sandals like Pastor Ellis, because that helps a lot. But if you can just imagine there for a moment as Moses has been out shepherding the sheep and he’s got some pretty hefty sandals probably, and they’re probably worn, but they’re sturdy. And he uses those to climb rocks. He uses those to get around and everything he needs. And now he’s gonna take those off. And he probably didn’t really like that. Like I need these sandals to get around and run and move and do everything I need to do. But he was in the presence of a holy God. He was on holy ground. And God was saying, don’t come any closer. Take off your sandals. I’m gonna do something in your life. And what those sandals maybe represented was his old life of being a shepherd. And now God was going to call him to be a leader of his people. Something was gonna change. Something was gonna change. And then third, we see Moses hiding his face. Look with me there at verse six. Then he said, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. At this Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at God. Now I know in our culture today, we don’t like this word fear. In fact, the New Testament tells us fear, love cast out all fear. And I want you to know I believe in that. I believe that when you have the love of Christ in your life and you’re walking with Jesus, you don’t need to be afraid of God. But I would tell you that the fear of the Lord and a deep reverence for God and a deep respect for God is the foundation that needs to be laid in your life so that you can actually experience a relationship with God. If you think you can come and have a negotiation with God as if you’re on the same playing field as him, you’re never gonna experience the God of the Bible. Because the God of the Bible is way, way, way, way up here compared to me. He is a great God of holiness and truth and moral beauty and moral superiority, if you will. I mean, he is pure, 100%, no error, creator of the universe. And so when Moses came to God, he realized the holiness of God. He took off his sandals. He hid his face. He said, here am I, God. I love Proverbs. There’s a couple of verses on the fear of the Lord. Proverbs 9, verse 10 says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Proverbs 19, verse 23 says the fear of the Lord leads to life so that one may sleep satisfied, untouched by evil. Do you have the fear of the Lord at work in your life? It doesn’t mean to be afraid of God, but it means to have a deep reverence and awe for who God is in your life. The fear of the Lord caused Moses to be available, to be surrendered, to be humbled in the presence of God. Have you seen the Lord’s holiness? Have you experienced the holiness of God? The purity of God, the 100% goodness of God, because when you see the holiness of God, it’ll transform your life. Redemption begins with holiness. A second truth that we see in this passage, starting at verse seven, is that redemption is the result of God’s mercy. I’m so thankful for God’s mercy. Redemption is connected to God’s mercy. God sees you when you suffer. In fact, the message of Jesus coming to this planet and bringing the kingdom of heaven to earth is a message of God cares enough about your suffering, about your difficulties in life, that he’ll come to this planet and he’ll suffer with you. That’s the message of Jesus. That’s the message of the cross. Verse seven in Exodus three reads like this. And the Lord said, “‘I have surely seen the oppression of my people “‘who are in Egypt and have heard their cry “‘because of their taskmasters, “‘taskmasters, for I know their sorrows. “‘Misery, suffering and oppression move the heart of God “‘and it should also move our hearts.'” And again, I’m sure that there’s someone here this morning that you’re going through something very difficult and you’re wondering, does God really care? I want you to know God cares. You may not feel it right now, you may not see it right now, but God cares about what you’re struggling with. We’re all struggling with something different. We’ve all got different things going on in our life. It’s not all the same. But God cares about what you’re going through, misery, suffering, hurt, oppression. It gets God’s attention and it should get our attention. And I’m praying, Lord, give me a bigger heart for those who are struggling. Give me more compassion. I tend to be kind of an analytical, mind-led type person, at least most days, I’m claiming that. And, but I’m saying, Lord, enlarge my heart. Give me a bigger heart for people who are hurting and suffering. I’m praying for our church because I wanna be a church that shares hope. We’re on mission with Jesus, knowing God, building people and sharing hope. And I want this community to know, I want you to know that if you’re struggling, if you’re hurting, God cares about what you’re going through. God wants to get you to a better place. And as a church, we wanna help you. And the relationships in the church are here to help you. Psalms 34, verse 18 says, “‘The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and He rescues,’ there’s that redemptive word, “‘He rescues those whose spirits are crushed.'” Matthew 14, 14, Jesus saw the huge crowd and He stepped from the boat and He had compassion on them and healed their sick. I wanna just take a minute, not long, but what can we do? Knowing that God’s heart is moved by suffering, what can we do to help those who are going through misery, suffering, and oppression? I think the first thing we can do is we can cry out to God on behalf of those who need justice. We can cry out on behalf of those who are going through difficulty. Psalms 82, three says, “‘Give justice to the weak and the fatherless, “‘maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute.'” We can pray prayers like that. We can cry out to God and say, “‘God, help those who are going through difficulty, “‘help those who are suffering, “‘help those who are being oppressed.'” Secondly, we can do justice towards others. I love Micah chapter six, verse eight. “‘He has shown you, O man, what is good “‘and what does the Lord require of you, “‘but to do justly and to love mercy “‘and to walk humbly with your God.'” So we can take an active role in making sure we’re treating other people with justice. That means if you’re an employer here today, you need to make sure your people are paid. And I’ve been on that side before as an employer who pays people, and at times been late, and it always bothers me a bunch because I’m like, I know what the scripture says. If you’re employing people, you need to make sure they’re paid. If you’re a parent, you need to treat your kids right. If you’re a husband, you need to treat your wife right. Right, come on, somebody say amen to that. If you’re a wife, you need to treat your husband right. Ha ha ha. Oh, we should have had a bigger amen on the first one for sure. But how can we confront misery and suffering and oppression? We can cry out for those who are experiencing injustice and they’re hurting. We can cry out to God for help, but we can also live lives of justice ourselves. And then we can get personally involved. There’s so many stories, like the story of the Good Samaritan and others, where we can get personally involved in helping those who are hurting. But we can also direct people to the church. We can direct them to the benevolence program. We can direct them to other resources. Maybe we can’t do it all ourselves, but we can be a bridge. We can help direct them to where they can find the help they need. A third truth I see in the story regarding redemption is God comes down to bring redemption. He comes down personally. He gets personally involved. Look with me at verses eight and nine. So I’ve come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious or large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites. Now, therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians have oppressed them. I’m so thankful that God hears the cry, not only of the Israelites, but hears the cry of anyone that is oppressed or hurting or suffering, and he takes action. He comes down to bring redemption. I’m so glad that the God of the Bible is a God of human history. He’s not the deist God. He’s not a God who just wound a watch and left. The God of the Bible tells us that God is a God who wants to be a part of human history. Sometimes we maybe don’t see that, maybe we don’t feel that, but that’s the record of the Bible. The Bible’s clear. God is involved in human history. And one thing that means for me is I wanna find out what God’s doing, and I wanna get on God’s side. I wanna get on God’s team. I wanna figure out what God’s up to, and I wanna be a part of that in my life, in my marriage, in my family, in my church, and in my community. I don’t wanna live life as if God’s just not here, that God’s just not a part of anything. The Bible tells me in story after story after story, and certainly in the Exodus story, that God comes down personally to bring redemption to his people and to fulfill his plan. The word there, deliver, or deliverance, is this idea of to snatch away. He like wants to totally remove you from your suffering and from your enslavement, your oppression. He wants to totally snatch you away from that, but that’s not where he stops. I love how this verse talks about, in verse eight and nine, how God wanted to set his people free from slavery, but also lead them into the land that was flowing with milk and honey. You see, God doesn’t wanna just set you free from sin. God wants to set you free to live for him. God wants to bring satisfaction and abundance and joy and peace and love. God wants to bring good things into your life. This last week, I was thinking about some sermon series that I would like to put together and preach, and one of them is just really simple. God wants to bless you. God wants you to be happy. Now, I realize I’m gonna have to define that biblically. God is not just, I think he’s more interested in you being holy than he is you being happy, but I think that the church, in the church world, we can swing these two ways where we can get so over here that God wants me to be holy and doesn’t care if I’m miserable. That’s not biblical. See, because when I start getting holy and start walking with God and walking in his ways, I’m gonna be fulfilled. I’m gonna find new desires that fulfill me. I’m gonna experience the goodness of God. And so I can, with a straight face and a smile on my face this morning, say God does want you to be happy. God wants you to flourish. God wants you to be walking in his favor. God wants you to not just live in a life of sin and slavery, and then he comes and sets you free and nothing gets better. No, God wants you to live in a land of abundance as you walk with him. Look at John chapter 10, 10, the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I have come that they may have life and have it to the full. That’s the words of Jesus. Romans chapter 6, 11, in the same way, count yourselves dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Romans 3, or Romans 6, 23, for the wages of sin is death. That’s when you’re back in Egypt as slaves. But the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord. I wanna live on that side. I wanna walk in the gift. I don’t wanna walk in the wages. I wanna walk on the gift side of life because the wages of my sin produces death, but the gift of God in my life produces eternal life in Christ Jesus. Now I wanna pause just for a moment and just talk about God’s judgment because there’s a lot of questions in our hearts and our minds today about how could God, as God was saying he’s gonna set Israel free, how could God kick out the Perizzites and all those different groups of people? And there’s like seven groups of people and Canaanites kind of covers the whole group. So if we just call them the Canaanites, know that there was like seven, you can study it, seven different groups that God was going to displace as the Israelites are coming out of Egypt, 430 years of slavery, and now he’s gonna lead them to the promised land. And yet these other people groups are going to be kicked out. God’s plans for Israel to possess the promised land also means that God would judge the people of Canaan for their immorality. God ordered the Israelites to remove these seven distinct people groups from their land. The conquest really served two purposes. One, providing a land for Israel and two, judging the Canaanites for their wickedness. And all you’ve got to do is go back and look at Leviticus chapter 20 and a few other places, especially verse 23, to begin to understand the level of wickedness that was going on in the land of Canaan in that day. They were sacrificing their children to Molech. There was all kinds of horrible things happening in the religion of those people and God had enough. And God said, now it’s time not only to provide a place for my nation, for my people to be a light on a hill, but I’m gonna judge these other peoples because I’ve been patient, I’ve been patient, I’ve been patient, but now it’s time to judge them. And church, I want you to hear me say this. Our God is a God of judgment. He’s a God of wrath. He hates sin and He will be patient with you. He will be long suffering with you. But even His people, Israel, even the nation of Israel, we see it in the Old Testament that the time came when they turned away from an Almighty God and what happened? King Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians, the Assyrians, God brought in other nations to destroy Israel and to bring punishment to them. So even His own people aren’t somehow special in the sense that they would not be judged by God. God is wrathful towards sin. He hates it when we tolerate sin in our lives. He wants to lead us to a promised land where we can walk in the good things of God. And we can’t do that as long as we’re trying to say, I’m a Christian, but I’m gonna live over here in slavery. Because God hates that sin in our life. And I know it probably would take a number of sermons to even unpack God’s judgment in the Old Testament. But here’s what I know for sure. Our God is a God of judgment. He’s a God of justice, but He’s also a God of mercy. He is long suffering, not willing that any should perish. But we see these examples in the Old Testament that God will work in human history to judge nations, to judge people. We see it over and over again. So don’t think that America will miss out on the judgment of God. Don’t think that your family or my life, if I turn away from God and walk in habitual sin, that somehow I will miss the judgment of God because I’m special or I’m an American or… No, God will judge America. God will judge every nation on this earth because He’s greater than any nation or any people group. And He’s working in human history. And so even as God is bringing His people into a land that is spacious and flowing with milk and honey, God’s also judging the peoples that are there because of their evil and their wickedness. A fourth truth that we see in this story of redemption in Exodus chapter one through four is God partners with people in redemption. And we’re gonna begin wrapping up with the next couple of points, but verse 10 through 12, let me just read this. Exodus three, starting in verse 10. So now go, I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt? And God said, I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain. And so God works through people. God works through you and me. God has His sovereign plan. Whether we look at the Old Testament, the New Testament, or our day today, God is up to His purposes and His promises and His plan, but He’s looking for people that He can work in and work through. I don’t know if you happen to hear the 60-minute story of a recent Air Force pilot that was shot down. He was known as Bravo Alpha, also ejected. They were over Iran. They got hit. If you haven’t seen it, it’s on YouTube. It’s a 60-minute, it’s about 23, 25 minutes, powerful story of how this Air Force officer gives God the glory for even being alive. And his call sign, he was just Bravo, which I think means he was sitting in the back part of the jet, the F-15. He ended up spending a night in Iran. He had broke his back. He had broke his arm. He had successfully ejected, but the jet was injured. The armed forces came to find him, but to hear his story of, yes, he gave credit to good training, but over and over again, this Bravo guy, he said, it’s a miracle that I’m even here alive, giving God the glory for deliverance, for salvation. You see, God works through people. God works through you and me, whether it’s in the church today, in your home, in our community. God is looking for people that he can send. God is looking for people that he can work with and work through, and that’s what we see in Exodus chapter three. God has prepared Moses. God is calling Moses. God is wanting to work with Moses, work through Moses, and Moses, his response is humble, but also filled with excuses. Moses gives a response like I think a lot of you and I often give, which is he is humble, and the Bible says to us that Moses was a very humble guy, but there’s at least four excuses we see here. Verse 11, who am I? Verse 13, who were you, O God? Chapter four, verse one, what if they don’t believe me? Chapter four, verse 10 through 11, what if I don’t speak well? Moses has at least four excuses he gives for why he can’t serve God and be used by God to go and say to Pharaoh, let my people go. Who am I really is self-doubt. Where are you, O God, is doubting God. What if they don’t believe me is really the fear of rejection. What if I don’t speak well, fear of inadequacy? We have lots of excuses, don’t we, for maybe why God should choose someone else. I mean, honestly, Moses’ response to God’s call was here I am, Lord, send Aaron. Right, here I am, Lord, send someone else. Just for fun, I’m gonna have a little fun here. Just for fun, I thought of some excuses for why I’m no longer going to attend any sports competitions. I’m done. Number one, every time I go to a football game, they ask me for money. And I mean, it’s expensive. I’m not going anymore. Number two, the people sitting next to me didn’t seem very friendly. Number three, the seats were hard and kind of uncomfortable. Number four, the marching band was way too loud and out of tune. Number five, the referee made a decision I didn’t agree with, and I think he’s a hypocrite. Number six, the game went into overtime and I was late getting home. Number seven, the game was scheduled when I had other things to do, and it was early in the morning and I was tired. Number eight, my parents took me to way too many games growing up, and I’m done going. Number nine, I’m not gonna go to a football game and I’m not gonna go to a football game. I’ve played way too many games growing up and I’m done going. Number nine, I know more than the coaches do, and it’s because I’ve read one book on coaching. Nine excuses for why I’ll never go to a football game again. None of that’s true though, of course. I’m gonna go. Moses was called by God because God works through people like you and me, and he was humble in his response, but maybe a little too humble. He had a lot of reasons, a lot of excuses why God could never use me. I wonder what excuse you’re using to keep from getting engaged with the things of God, from showing up to church on a regular basis, to being part of a ministry, to making a difference, mentoring someone else’s life, to ministering and serving the children or the youth or the young adults. I wonder what excuse that we’re using today to say, God, I know you’ve got a great big plan going on, but you don’t really wanna use me. And we make all of these excuses to not be present, to not show up, to not serve, to not get involved in what God is up to. God works through people. That’s how he brings redemption. A fifth truth, God’s name, and we’ll wrap up with these verses. God’s name brings redemption. Redemption starts with holiness, but God’s name brings redemption. Look with me in verse 13. “‘Then Moses said to God, “‘Indeed, when I come to the children of Israel “‘and say to them, the God of your fathers “‘has sent me to you, and they say to me, “‘What is his name? “‘What shall I tell them?’ “‘And God said to Moses, I am who I am. “‘And he said, thus you shall say to the children of Israel, “‘I am has sent me to you. “‘Moreover, God said to Moses, “‘Thus you shall say to the children of Israel, “‘the Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, “‘the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, “‘has sent me to you. “‘This is my name forever, “‘and this is my memorial to all generations.'” So I wanna just take a minute and think about God’s name. How many names does God have in the Old Testament or the New Testament? Well, on the one hand, we could say, well, many names. God, he’s Jehovah-Jireh, and he’s Jehovah-Rophi, and he’s my provider and my healer, and I’ve got all, he’s my banner, and all these different names, but God really only has one name, and it’s here in Exodus chapter three. This is his personal name. Yes, there’s Elohim, which all of the peoples in the ancient Near East used that name for God, El, and Elohim is the plural, but this name that means the eternally existing one who is present and active, the great I am, the I am that I am, that is the personal name of God, and it’s connected with Yahweh, Yahweh. And so when God comes down to reveal himself to Moses and to call Moses and to recruit Moses and to equip Moses, God reveals his personal name to Moses and says, “‘If you have any doubts, “‘tell them that the great I am has sent you.'” The eternally existing one, the one that’s not created. I remember as a young dad, and eventually it happens to all parents, one of the children says, where does God come from? And the best I could ever think of was, well, that’s what makes God unique. He’s always been there. That’s who God is. God is eternal. He is eternally existing, and more than that, he is present and he is active in our lives today. He is the I am who I am. I don’t know if I’m doing justice to the Hebrew idiom here and helping us to understand what this really means, and maybe it would take a whole nother sermon, but I just want you to know that God loves you enough to come down into your life and to reveal his holiness and to reveal his personal name. He wants you to know him. He wants you to know him. He wants to walk with you. He wants to be a part of your history, not just human history, but your history. And then we have Jesus in the New Testament who grabs a hold of this and says, I am that I am. Jesus and John, we read it this morning when we started John 8, 58. Jesus said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am. And they knew what he was saying. Why? Because the Bible’s clear. They picked up stones to kill him. He was blaspheming. Someone will read the gospels and say, well, did Jesus really ever claim to be God? Well, right here, we see, yes, he did. He claimed to be God. He claimed to be greater than Abraham. And they knew what he was saying. And so every time in the gospel of John, when Jesus says, I am the bread of life, I’m the light of the world, I’m the only doorway, I’m the good shepherd, I am the resurrection of life, I am the way, the truth, and life, I am the true vine. What Jesus is doing is not just helping us understand who he is, as far as being a vine, or being true Israel, or being the only doorway. He’s saying, I’m connected to Yahweh in the Old Testament. I’m that Yahweh. I’m the Yahweh of the burning bush, is what Jesus is saying. See, redemption begins when we know the name of God. And I’m so glad this morning that his name is Jesus. We can know his name. God has a name. His name is Jesus. God didn’t create the world and then leave us. God didn’t create the world and then leave us guessing, but God came down, revealing his holiness. God came down, revealing his name. He’s let us know that his name is Jesus. Jesus is the great I am. You can have a relationship with him. You can experience freedom from slavery. You can be set free from your former life, from your life of sin, just like the Israelites. And you can walk in newness of life. You can walk in the promises of God. You are free from the judgment of God because your sins have already been judged. Now you’re walking in the word and in the spirit, and you’re living the new life that God has called you to live. That’s the message of Exodus. That’s the message of the gospel. Jesus is the great I am of the burning bush. Will you receive him? Will you invite him into your life? Will you respond like Moses responded, which was, wow, God, you’re awesome. Here I am. I’m going to take my sandals off. I’m going to hide my face because you’re so glorious. And my sin is not so wonderful. You’re going to bring me to a new place. You’re going to set me free from this life that is going nowhere, a life of brokenness and sin and hurt and chaos. And you’re going to set my feet on the rock and help me to live a new life for you, a life that will bring not only glory to God, but personal satisfaction. I am so thankful today that living for Jesus brings fulfillment. It brings joy. Being free of evil and sin in my life helps me to experience the good things of God every day. I’m not saying that become a Christian and life gets easy. I’m not saying that, because God’s going to put you in the battle. You’re going to get enlisted into the army of the Lord, and you’re still going to have struggles, and you’re still going to go through difficulties. But now you’ve got God with you. You’ve got purpose. You’ve got meaning. You’ve got significance, and you’re going to begin walking with the Lord, and he’s going to work through you. He’s going to call you to be a part of this redemptive plan. I want to encourage us this morning to invite the redemptive work of God into our lives. And certainly that’s for somebody here this morning that for the very first time, you want to say, pastor, I need Jesus in my life. I’ve never received that redemptive work of God’s grace in my life. I’ve never been called a child of God. I’ve never put my faith in God. Maybe today’s your day to say, Lord Jesus, I need you in my life to redeem me. But for all of us here today, I hope your heart is open to getting closer to God, to seeing more of his holiness, to learning more about his name, to learning more about what he wants to do in your life and in my life, because I need more of the redemptive work in my life. He is my rescuer. He is the one who restores me. He’s the one who regenerates me from the inside out. I need God to rescue me. And I hope that’s your heart today. There’s way too many people in our culture today who really deeply believe that they can do good all by themselves. They’re just fine. Oh, help us, Lord. We need Jesus. We need a savior. We need a savior. We need someone to transform us from the inside out. And so I want you to stand with me if you can this morning, and I wanna lead us in a prayer, and we’re gonna open up the altar just for a few moments. And the altar call is simple this morning. Do you need a redeemer? Do you need a redeemer? I wanna pray for us before we move to the altars this morning, but I wanna pray especially for that person who’s here today, and you are sensing the Holy Spirit. It’s not just the pastor talking. You’re sensing the Holy Spirit working in your heart, and you want Jesus in your life. You want him to redeem you of your sin, to set you free, and give you a whole new life. Church, I’d ask that you would just begin to pray. Begin to pray. There’s somebody here that needs to surrender, that wants to surrender their life to Jesus. And Lord, we pray for them right now. We pray, Lord, that today would be the day of salvation. Today would be the day of full surrender, where our sins would be forgiven, and that we’d be given a new life to live for you. New direction, new purpose. Lord, as we’re praying, if there’s anybody here this morning that wants Jesus to come into their life for the first time, would you just, by faith, lift your hand up boldly, and say, pastor, pray for me, I want Jesus. Pastor, pray for me, I want Jesus in my life. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Jesus. Gonna wait just a minute. For all of us here today, my heart is saying, Lord, I need you to be at work in my life. I want your redemptive work. Be active in my life, Lord. Be active in my family. Be active in my church. We’re gonna sing a chorus, and if you’d like to step out and just spend some time praying in the altar, or you wanna pray right where you’re at, let’s take a moment and just invite the redemptive work of God into our lives. I can promise you this. God doesn’t wanna leave you as you are. He wants to change you. He wants to grow you. He wants to do some mighty things in your life, and we just can’t take the attitude, God, I’m good all by myself. We have got to embrace the redemptive message of the Bible. God is a redeemer who comes down with his holiness and with his name, and personally wants to be a part of your life. Thank you, Lord. Praise the Lord. The Lord bless you and keep you and may his face smile upon you and give you peace. I feel like we’ve had church today.