Extraordinary Promise

Well, royal scandals are everywhere on the pages of history.

For millennia, people have plotted, seduced, bribed, battled, beheaded,

and committed countless atrocities to either seize a throne

or to increase their access or their influence over a throne.

The greatest royal scandal these days is a young couple trying to get as far away as the throne as they possibly can.

But in world history, it doesn't sort of rate as a royal scandal.

I've never heard anywhere in the editorials about bringing back the chopping block

or anything like that to do with a young Harry or Meghan.

There have been many great royal scandals that have displayed the stupidity,

the ineptitude, the selfishness, and the cruelty of leaders.

Even in England, a number of them.

We don't have to go very much far back than Henry VIII,

woman in one hand and a leg of lamb in the other.

But even you go into the history of Egypt,

and again you come up with scandal after scandal of ineptitude,

stupidity amongst the pharaohs.

Pharaoh Pepe II, who oversaw the downfall of the sixth Egyptian dynasty,

he was pretty much a weird one.

He had many, many wives,

all of whom were his sisters.

That was creepy even in their day and their culture.

And apart from loving his sisters,

he is known for having some sort of weird fascination with pygmies

and would search the world for pygmies

and bring them back into the Egyptian empire,

to his cities and his palaces.

And he also loved his food like Henry VIII.

He would work apparently only very briefly in any given day,

but spend most of his days hosting feasts,

one after another after another.

The only thing he particularly hated about his feasts

was the constant need for him to shoo the flies away.

And so one thing that he decided to do,

one of his solution,

was to bring into his dining area a bunch of slaves,

have them doused in honey,

and get them to serve the food

and to stand to one side in order to draw all the insects.

Sort of like a living, breathing fly trap, if you like.

Now, like many before him and after him,

Pepe II oppressed others for his own glory and freedom.

And we see it again as we open up

the first two chapters of Exodus.

Again, jumping into the Egyptian empire,

but a terrifying situation of royalty behaving badly again,

but in this case, terrifyingly so.

This is a story,

Exodus is a story of salvation,

salvation from slavery.

So if you've got the St. Paul's app,

it'd be great if you could open that up.

And I've got three points there.

I want to run through today as we launch into this series.

Three things I want to say in the first two chapters.

The promise of salvation.

First of all, three principles of salvation.

And lastly, the person of salvation.

So firstly, the promise of salvation.

Now, the book of Exodus begins with the word and.

It's missing in virtually every English translation.

But the word and immediately alerts us to the fact that this book is part of a much bigger story.

Exodus flows straight on where Genesis left off.

In fact, the last three verses of Genesis give us a really strong hint

that there is a sequel coming to this movie.

It says,

Weird, because they weren't needing it in that moment.

We'll come to your aid and take you up out of this land to the land he promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

And Joseph made the Israelites swear an oath and said, God will surely come to your aid.

And then you must carry my bones up from this place.

So Joseph died at the age of 110.

And after they embalmed him, he was placed in a coffin in Egypt.

So the unfolding story of Genesis is the background to Exodus.

And more specifically, as highlighted there, is that the promises of God to Abraham are the background to these opening chapters.

In Genesis 12, 15 and 17, God made a promise to Abraham, just an ordinary bloke.

A man that he called out of idolatry to know him, to obey him and to follow him.

It's a promise God sealed with a covenant with Abraham.

A covenant is a binding agreement between two parties.

And there are two elements to this binding agreement to God's promise.

The first was the promise of a people.

Abraham, we are told from God, Abraham is told that he would become a great nation.

Leave your family, go and you will become a great nation.

And the second was the promise of a land.

Abraham's family would inherit the land of Canaan as their home.

And above all, God promised to Abraham that a descendant from Abraham would in fact be the savior.

The one who would defeat evil and rescue his people.

And 400 years before Exodus chapter 1, that promise was under threat.

Exodus 1 · chapter mention

A famine looked like it would in fact wipe out Abraham's family.

God, however, rescued his people through a descendant of Abraham.

A man named Joseph who rose up from slavery and imprisonment to become sort of like the prime minister of Egypt.

Through Joseph's leadership, all the nations were blessed and saved from starvation.

In those desperate times, Joseph's whole family settled in Egypt.

And so the promise of God was secure for a time.

Four centuries later, at the beginning of Exodus, God promised his promise of establishing a nation for himself is gradually being fulfilled.

The first five verses list the sons of Israel who came to Egypt.

The total number of Joseph's family who settled in Egypt was about 70.

Now, 400 years later, they have become a great nation.

As verse 6 and 7 indicate, they have multiplied greatly and have filled the lands.

In fact, they've become so great, they are now resented and feared.

So once again, the promise of God, his covenant to Abraham is under threat.

As Pharaoh enslaves the Israelites and works them ruthlessly.

So the book of Exodus is a story of God fulfilling his promise of liberation and salvation.

Israel is rescued from slavery in Egypt.

It's a rescue that points ultimately to a greater rescue.

And we will see this again and again as we journey through Exodus.

The liberation of God's people from slavery to sin.

We are spending this term in Exodus because this story of salvation 3,000 years ago is our story of salvation.

The Old Testament prophets promised a new Exodus.

And the trajectory of Exodus right from the opening verses just points us, takes us to Jesus.

This book is key to understanding the person and the work of Jesus Christ.

It points us to him and inspires us to worship him.

Secondly, Exodus 1 and 2 cover many decades of time.

They give us the background, if you like, and they set up the liberation that will come in the chapters to follow.

They also teach us in these first two chapters, they teach us some key principles of salvation.

The first principle is that salvation is rescue from the misery and the slavery of serving anything in your life as more important than God.

Let me say that again.

Salvation is rescue from the misery and the slavery of serving anything in your life as more important than God.

Have a look at me at verses 13 and 14 in Exodus 1.

The Egyptians came to dread the Israelites and work them ruthlessly.

They made their lives bitter with harsh labor in brick and mortar and with all kinds of work in the fields.

In all their harsh labor, the Egyptians worked them ruthlessly.

Now basically, and I don't like doing this as a general rule, but I think this is helpful in this instance.

Every English translation softens the original language in those verses.

You can see that when I give you a more literal reading of those verses.

Let me read it to you and I'll tell you why.

It makes it obvious why they soften it.

Right?

So here we go.

The same Hebrew verb is used over and over.

It's the word that means to serve.

Serving as if you are serving a master.

Israel is a forced servant of another.

It's a deep and oppressive service.

This is Israel's plight.

Ignorant of her God, she serves another with great pain.

Now one of the themes of the Bible, and it's here in Exodus,

it is in knowing and serving God that we find blessing.

We are freed from other oppressive masters.

As Jesus said, you cannot serve two masters.

And what he means by that is you can only serve one master.

We are truly free when we are serving the right master.

When Moses went to Pharaoh, let me just expand this point a little bit.

When he went to Pharaoh a couple of chapters later than this,

he did not say, let my people go.

Now I know Charlton Heston said that in the movie,

and I know we all want to believe that's what he said.

He did not say, let my people go.

He always said, let my people go that they may serve me,

that they may worship me in the wilderness.

That is, the book of Exodus doesn't end when Israel escapes through the sea

and out of Egypt's clutches.

There is a whole second section to this book,

and most of us get bogged down in the second section of the book.

Halfway through, we get bogged down at this point.

The first half of Exodus is full of special effects.

It's the exciting stuff, the miracles, the action, the power.

It's the stuff we want to read through.

The second half is page after page after page of instructions

on how to build a tabernacle

and what you're supposed to do when you build a tabernacle

and what goes on the doorposts

and what the priests are meant to wear.

It's the sort of stuff that, frankly,

doesn't ever get into a movie about Exodus.

But if you cut the second half of Exodus out,

you don't include it in the movie of Exodus,

you miss the entire teaching of the book.

You miss the whole point.

Exodus starts in slavery and it ends in worship.

It starts in service, the word service,

and it ends with the word service.

which in English translations are translated slavery and worship.

Service and service, the same word is used at the beginning and the end.

You go from serving one to serving another.

God's salvation means freedom,

liberation to serve the only one whose service will never crush us.

That's what liberation is.

Now, when we hear that in the modern context,

we interpret freedom very differently than that.

We interpret freedom as having no masters of constraints whatsoever.

No boundaries, no constraints.

It's freedom to choose to live life any way I want to live.

And Exodus works against that definition for us.

Until we are captivated by the beauty and the presence of the God who made us and love us,

we are never free.

Never free.

Unless we are centered on him and we serve him and we worship him,

then we are always a slave to something else.

Something else has captivated us.

Anything that we center our life on more than God makes us a slave to it.

How does that happen?

Well, every single human being has something that they live for.

Something that makes us think that if we have it,

we have security and we have significance.

It might be, let's just pick on us for a moment,

it might be a religious thing.

Where we feel significant, we feel secure,

we feel hopeful because we are devout and we are good.

Whatever it is, it might be our family,

it might be success, professional status, a good name.

It could be anything that makes us feel significant, happy and secure.

However, you can generally tell what it is because we generally respond with anger

when someone tries to take that thing away from us.

Or we are terribly despondent and troubled when we lose it.

Our sense of identity and worth is wrapped up in our career,

our work that we do, we lose it,

into depression real quick.

Can't focus in life.

But if you must have it, this is the thing,

if you must have that thing in order to feel good about yourself and your life,

then what that means is, is you are actually serving it.

Constantly striving for it, to have it.

You're not free, you're not living free,

you're pursuing that thing.

Striving to get that thing.

You are not free, you are chained to it

and anything that can threaten it.

And so therefore you live in fear.

Exodus tells us that our journey out of slavery isn't done

until we come to rest in worship and service and love of God.

He's the only one who deserves the highest allegiance of our life.

The second principle of salvation we see here

is that we are usually prepared for salvation

through difficult and hard times in life.

One of the striking things about the first two chapters of Exodus

is that God is hardly mentioned at all.

Things are going from bad to worse

and God hardly even seems to be around.

First, Pharaoh enslaves the people

and when that doesn't work,

he tries to kill all the male infants,

which is an act of cultural genocide.

And when he can't get the midwives to do it subtly and quietly,

then he orders everyone,

and I'm assuming here,

this is an order for not just the Egyptian population,

but for the Hebrew population as well.

You see a baby boy,

Hebrew boy playing in a playground,

you grab him and you throw him in the Nile.

It's an order for all of the population.

It gets worse and worse

and the one person

in chapters one and two,

the one person

who looks like he might be able to do something

turns out to be no good at all

when in anger he murders an Egyptian man.

In that act,

he alienates both God's people

and gets Pharaoh as an enemy.

He ends up running off into the desert,

gets cut off from the power

and the position

that he could have used

in order to help his people

out of the plight that they're in.

Everything gets worse

to worse to worse

and you've got to ask,

where is God?

Two long chapters

covering decades

and I mean decades

of Israel's history

and God is mentioned

in verse 17

and verse 20

and that's all.

That's all.

But is that not the natural sense

that we have

when things are going bad in life?

God, where are you?

You just don't seem to be there.

God seems absent.

He seems powerless.

He even seems careless.

And yet these chapters

turn that whole idea

on their head

when you dig in a bit closer to them.

Every bad thing here

turns out for good.

It's remarkable.

everything that Pharaoh

tries to do here

doesn't just backfire on him

but it accomplishes

the exact opposite

of what he was hoping to achieve.

He enslaves the Israelites

who didn't know their God

and he tries to get the midwives

to murder the male babies.

Verse 20 however

tells us

the midwives

feared God

they were brave

and

they had children

themselves

and the Israelites

increased in number.

One of the great

ironies of these chapters

is that it is only

because

it is only because

Pharaoh

tried to kill off

all the male infants

that Moses

was brought

into

the Egyptian palace

and received

the training needed

to become a liberator.

It's only because of that.

Only because

of the decree

to kill

all the male infants

is Moses

nursed

by his own mother

for the early years

of his life

probably three to four years

he received

his own

Israelite identity

before going

into the palace

and receiving

the best academic

and military training

in the land

in the world

at the time.

It's only because

of that decree

the ideal liberator

was created

by the decree

designed to destroy

the people

from whom

he came.

Even the stupidity

of Moses

gets turned around

he ends up

out in the desert

and he learns

the humility

over the course

of many years

the very thing

that he would not learn

in the palace

of Egypt.

Numbers 12

Numbers 12:3

verse 3

tells us

Moses was a very

humble man

more humble

than anyone else

on the face

of the earth.

He learned

not just the ability

of leadership

in Egypt

he learned

the character

of leadership

in the wilderness.

That was the missing

ingredient

when he decided

to take on

and kill

the Egyptian.

Now

we can see

this because

of the standpoint

of history

but they couldn't

see that.

They couldn't

see that.

In the same way

we cannot see

when God

what he's doing

and so question

whether

he is in fact

a promise

keeping God

a powerful

God

a caring

God.

We learn

here

that when

God seems

the most

hidden

and the

most absent

he's not.

He is

working for

our good

he is producing

miracle

after miracle

after miracle

he's working

for justice

and salvation.

The Bible

tells us

he doesn't

want anyone

to suffer

he takes

no delight

in the suffering

of any human

being

and yet

behind all

the suffering

he's working

to bring

about good

and justice.

Everything

that God

was doing

here in

these chapters

with Moses

was to

prepare

Moses

for an

unforgettable

encounter

in chapter

3.

Moses

at this

point

did not

know

his God

but he

does

in chapter

3.

The third

principle

is salvation

comes to the

weak and the

powerless

not the

strong and

the powerful.

God works

for and

with the

poor

the

marginalized

the excluded

the oppressed

he works

through weakness

not power

for the

outsider

he works

through

the outsider

God works

with the

second son

not the

first son

in cultures

where the

first son

had all

the rights

and the

privileges

you see

that

read through

Genesis

it's

Abel

not Cain

it's

Isaac

not Ishmael

it's

Jacob

not Esau

he also

works

through

the older

women

the barren

women

the unloved

women

it's

Sarah

not Hagar

it's

Leah

not Rachel

in

Exodus

1 and

2

all the

heroes

of salvation

are

females

all of

them

are

females

there are

only two

males

in

chapters

1 and

2

one's

wicked

and

one's

stupid

in

Exodus

1

the

two

heroes

are

the

two

midwives

verse 15

we are told

their names

Shipra

and Pua

what we

know

about

midwives

at the

time

is that

midwives

were mostly

women

who did

not have

children

of their

own

in

fact

in

verse

20

God

rewards

their

faith

by

giving

them

children

which

means

they

didn't

have

them

and

in

their

culture

these

women

without

children

were

considered

useless

or

even

cursed

by the

gods

family

was

everything

heritage

was

everything

and so

they were

given

a low

social

status

God

saves

his

people

through

those

with

low

ranking

women

who

courageously

obey

God

and not

the most

powerful

man

in the

world

and then

you move

to Exodus

Exodus 2 · chapter mention

chapter 2

and we

have

Moses

mother

she

like

the

rest

was

commanded

to throw

her baby

son

into

the

river

and so

she

does

just

not

quite

the

way

that

Pharaoh

had

in

mind

put

him

in

his

own

little

boat

instead

and then

there's

Pharaoh's

daughter

she's

a

Gentile

she's

a racial

and a

religious

outsider

and surprisingly

she is

compassionate

and she

takes a

huge

risk

to

defy

her

father

God

uses

a

Gentile

to

save

his

people

when

you

look

at

chapters

1

and

2

what

is

remarkable

and

it

is

no

accident

that

Pharaoh

is

not

named

the

most

powerful

person

in the

world

at the

time

we

don't

know

exactly

who

he

is

it's

speculation

to

this

day

but

we

know

who

Shipra

and

Pua

are

3,000

years

later

God

works

with

the

nobodies

of

this

world

and

he

gives

them

a

name

and

he

can

give

you

a

name

a

name

that

will

never

perish

spoil

or

fade

disappear

into

oblivion

his

salvation

makes

you

a

somebody

forever

of

course

when

you

have

experienced

God's

salvation

and

you

become

a

somebody

in

him

you

have

been

set

free

and

elevated

the

power

of

that

transformation

in

your

life

means

that

you

work

for

the

marginalized

and

the

disadvantaged

and

the

powerless

and

the

poor

in

this

world

they're

not

nobodies

so

those

are

the

three

principles

of

salvation

that

we

see

here

serving

anything

but

God

is

slavery

God

is

always

at

work

in

the

hard

times

preparing

you

for

salvation

and

his

salvation

comes

through

the

outsider

for

the

outsider

now

there's

one more

thing

that we

need to

see

though

because

if I

left it

there

and

time wise

I could

probably

leave it

there

I

leave you

with a

terrible

burden

if we

just

cut it

off

there

you

would

now

be

left

with

a

terrible

burden

terrible

burden

of

religion

and

striving

and

stoicism

and

guilt

principles

of

salvation

do

not

save

we

need

a

person

of

salvation

we

need

the

person

to

whom

Moses

points

and

as

we

read

through

those

first

two

chapters

I

wonder

did

those

first

two

chapters

sound

familiar

to

you

at

all

did

it

remind

you

of

anything

at

all

the

king

decreed

that

all

the

male

infants

should

be

killed

and

yet

a

child

is

born

and

escapes

death

at

the

hands

of

the

king

a

child

who

rose

up

and

liberated

his

people

he

is

rejected

by

his

own

people

and

goes

into

the

wilderness

and

is

anointed

with

the

spirit

of

God

in

order

to

lead

his

people

to

freedom

he

is

under

the

sentence

of

death

and

condemnation

but

because

and

through

that

sentence

of

death

he

is

raised

up

and

becomes

the

prince

of

peace

and

the

liberator

of

God's

people

sound

familiar

to

you

at

all

you

know

like

let's

see

if

it

doesn't

think

Christmas

Matthew

Matthew 2 · chapter mention

chapter

2

1

2

3

4

5

Jesus

ascends

the

mountain

gather

his

disciples

around

him

and

teaches

them

the

word

of

God

Exodus

20

Moses

ascends

the

mountain

receives

the

word

of

God

and

teaches

the

people

there

is

so

many

direct

parallels

between

Moses

the

great

liberator

in the

Old

Testament

and

Jesus

Christ

the

liberator

of all

people

in

Luke

9

we

are

told

that

Jesus

was

transfigured

on the

mountain

and the

disciples

saw him

filled

with the

glory

of God

and we

are told

this

in Luke

Luke 9:30

chapter

9

verses

30

and 31

two

men

Moses

and

Elijah

appeared

in

glorious

splendor

talking

with

Jesus

and they

spoke

to

Jesus

about

his

departure

which

he

was

about

to

bring

to

fulfillment

at

Jerusalem

the

word

departure

there

in

Luke

9

is

weird

it's

a

weird

word

it's

a

little

difficult

for

English

translators

it

literally

reads

that

Moses

and

Elijah

were

talking

with

Jesus

about

his

exodus

they

were

talking

about

his

exodus

his

crucifixion

the

thing

that

was

about

his

exodus

at

Jerusalem

the

crucifixion

as

his

exodus

exodus

was

great

but

it

was

limited

it

was

social

and

it

was

a

physical

liberation

for

one

people

group

at

one

particular

time

in

history

Jesus

is

about

to

perform

the

ultimate

liberation

Jesus

exodus

will

be

a

liberation

from

sin

and

death

for

all

people

for

all

of

eternity

Moses

liberated

the

risk

of

his

own

life

but

Jesus

liberated

the

cost

of

his

own

life

on

the

cross

Philippians

2

which

John

read

out

to

us

at

the

beginning

of

today's

service

tells

us

that

Jesus

left

the

throne

room

of

God

as

God

himself

the

eternal

palace

so to

speak

and

stepped

into

our

shoes

of

slavery

to

sin

Philippians

2

specifically

says

God

became

a

slave

he

became

a

servant

in

order

to

liberate

those

of

us

all

of

us

who

are

slaves

servants

to

sin

it is

the

liberating

work

of

Jesus

that

liberates

us

we

must

trust

in

his

ultimate

service

for

us

without

Jesus

as

the

liberator

without

him

as

the

savior

the

rescuer

then

serving

God

burden

that

I

must

fulfill

which

is

the

perfect

definition

of

what

religion

is

Christianity

take

take

Jesus

take

the

savior

out

take

the

person

of

salvation

out

Christianity

will boil

down to

my

effort

and

we'll

either

feel

guilty

for

not

performing

or

feel

proud

because

we're

doing

a whole

lot

better

than

everyone

else

and

when

we

do

that

we

become

our

own

liberator

we

become

our

own

rescuer

our

own

savior

because

we

trust

in

our

own

commitment

and

therefore

ultimately

we

will

be

crushed

by

our

own

service

it

will

never

ever

be

enough

without

Jesus

as the

liberator

the

savior

the

rescuer

then

our

suffering

will

either

break

us

or

it

will

turn

us

into

a

stoic

person

stoicism

can I

say

is

not

maturity

it

it

is

a

weakness

we

need

to

see

Jesus

who

suffered

for

us

suffered

because

of

us

he

has

been

there

and

knows

it

and

he

feels

it

he

is

not

distant

he

is

not

cruel

he

is

not

cold

without

Jesus

as the

liberator

the

savior

the

rescuer

then

working

for

social

justice

will

wear

us

out

or

make

us

angry

and

manipulative

will

either

be

tired

or

will

be

angry

Jesus

shows

me

that

God

loves

the

powerless

our

salvation

was

accomplished

because

Jesus

letting

go

of

power

and

dying

on

the

cross

his

salvation

is

brought

into

our

life

when

we

acknowledge

that

we

are

weak

that

we

are

poor

that

we

are

marginalized

that

we

are

broken

and

we

need

his

grace

when

we

realize

that

we

are

loved

and

we

are

accepted

though

we

are

unlovable

and

we

are

unworthy

until

we

fully

grasp

that

can

we

move

out

to

help

the

vulnerable

from

a

genuine

place

of

identifying

with

them

rather

than

elevating

ourselves

over

them

it

means

therefore

that

you

will

treat

them

well

only

when

we

see

the

person

to

whom

Moses

salvation

points

are

we

genuinely

set

free

and

that

is

Jesus

promise

to

you

to

me

to

all

of

humanity

to

you

watching

on

the

screen

that

is

Jesus

promise

to

you

Jesus

the

king

of

kings

the

prince

of

peace

calls

all

of

us

to

come

and

to

find

salvation

to

find

rest

in

him

liberation

in

him

freedom

in

him

in

Matthew

11

his

call

to

you

is

come

to

me

all

who

are

weary

and

burdened

and

I

will

give

you

rest

take

my

yoke

upon

you

and

learn

from

me

for

I

am

gentle

and

humble

in

heart

and

you

will

find

rest

for

your

souls

for

my

yoke

is

easy

and

my

burden

is

light

right

your

School

Think

do

stuff

鳍

about

ASMR

For

one

take

for

listen

to

uh

can

tap

刘

the

dreaming

can

Christ

even

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