Be Set Free

So Tony Campolo tells the story of a town where all the residents are ducks.

It's not in Oregon. Every Sunday the ducks waddle out of their houses and waddle down Main Street

to their church. They waddle into the sanctuary and squat in their proper pews. The duck choir

waddles in and takes its place and then the duck minister comes forward and opens his duck bible.

He reads to them, Ducks, God has given you wings. With wings you can fly.

With wings you can mount up and soar like eagles. No walls will confine you.

No fences can hold you. You have wings.

God has given you wings and you can fly like birds.

And all the ducks shout, Amen. And they waddled home.

They didn't really believe that they could fly. Oh, they enjoy coming to church

and singing about freedom.

Hearing sermons about their freedom. Somehow they're not all that convinced,

though. It seems to be that a lot of God's people live that kind of same way.

They listen to sermons about their salvation and freedom in Christ, but they

live like they're still in bondage to things like bitterness, lust, and fear.

They're stuck in their complacency with their wings clipped.

They say amen when the preacher says they can fly, and they love to sing,

I'll fly away. But they continue to waddle around in a complacent mediocrity.

Accepting their own sinful attitudes and actions as the norm for their life.

They like to say things like, nobody's perfect or we're all sinners.

They fail to realize that new birth brings freedom to live like Christ and not just be forgiven, although that's good.

They forget that they're no longer sinners, but the Scripture calls them saints,

made so by the blood of Jesus Christ.

Friends, why do so many people continue to live this way? Why do people not want to be truly free?

Turn with me, if you would, to Exodus chapter 11, and I'm going to be reading the Scriptures during the sermon

Exodus 11 · chapter mention

based on what we're pointing out, what we're going to be looking at.

This is where we see how God set his ancient people free after they had been slaves for 430 years in Egypt.

We have heard the story of the Israelite slavery in Egypt.

We have read that God saw their misery, heard their cries, and came to deliver them, but Pharaoh had turned his back on letting them go

even after nine devastating plagues.

In Exodus 11, verse 1, it says, Verse one, it says, now the Lord had said to Moses,

Exodus 11:1

I will bring one more plague on Pharaoh, I will bring one more plague on Pharaoh and on Egypt.

After that, he will let you go from here, and when he does, he will drive you out completely.

But the Israelites won't go away empty-handed. He goes on to say, verses two and three,

tell the people that men and women alike are to ask their neighbors for articles of silver and gold.

The Lord made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and Moses himself was highly regarded in Egypt.".

By the pharaoh and by the people. So God said he would take care of the people,

providing them with everything that they need when the Egyptians lose just about everything they have.

With that assurance, Moses goes on into the pharaoh one more time and says,

so Moses said to Pharaoh, this is what the Lord says. About midnight, I will go throughout Egypt.

Every firstborn son in Egypt will die. From the firstborn son of Pharaoh who sits on the throne,

to the firstborn son of the female slave who is at her hand mill,

and all the firstborn of the cattle as well, there will be loud wailing throughout Egypt,

worse than there has ever been or will ever be again.

But among the Israelites, not a dog will bark at any man or animal.

Then you will know that the Lord makes a distinction between Israel and Egypt.

Israel's God will protect his people, but the Egyptians' gods will be impotent

to protect the Egyptians, excuse me, Israel's god will protect his people,

but the Egyptian gods will be impotent to protect the Egyptian people.

The goddess Isis, wife and sister of Osiris, supposedly protected children,

but this last plague demonstrates her total incompetence.

And as we saw a few weeks ago, this was, the plagues were in direct conflict,

or direct competition to the gods of Egypt.

They were our God's way of saying, I am the only God.

So the Egyptians see that the God they trusted to protect their kids is a total fraud.

Then in verse eight, it says this, all these officials of yours will come to me

bowing down before me and saying, go, you and all the people who follow you.

After that, I will leave.

Then Moses, hot with anger, left Pharaoh. Even though Pharaoh was stubbornly refusing

to let God's people go, his own officials begged him to let the Israelites go.

Pharaoh, verses nine and 10 says this, the Lord had said to Moses,

Pharaoh will refuse to listen to you.

So that my wonders may be multiplied in Egypt. Moses and Aaron performed all of these wonders before Pharaoh,

but the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart and he would not let the Israelites go out of their country.",

So that's so God could demonstrate his power over all the Egyptians who were nothing but worthless idols.

So we want to look at what does this teach us today.

The first thing is, is don't trust in idols. Don't depend on worthless trinkets.

Don't rely on impotent icons. The Egyptians trusted in their gods,

and those gods failed to save them.

Their whole faith and everything about their culture was wrapped up in their idols.

Everything they did was based on those idols and what those idols granted them as favor.

And they found out that even those gods failed them.

And so it is when any of us trust in anyone or anything other than the Yahweh of the Bible,

the Lord of the Bible, anything or anyone we place our trust in besides God will at,

some point in time fail us.

How many of us have had jobs that we have trusted in completely and then lost those

jobs? So we've lost all of our welfare, everything that we have, our means of providing ourselves.

In his book, The Names of God, Ken Hemphill tells the story of a woman who made a frantic,

911 call, bringing police to her home. She had only been able to communicate that she

needed help and was being killed. When the police arrived, they found a bloody knife

beside her lifeless body on the kitchen floor. Blood was scattered across the room, yet police

found not even a single cut or puncture wound on her body. Then they noticed a trail of

blood leading into the next room and followed it. There they found a large, dying boa constrictor.

Apparently the snake, who had been raised as a pet, one day decided to wrap itself around

the woman while she was cooking in the kitchen. For whatever reason, she allowed the snake—this

is really gross—she allowed the snake to wrap itself around her body. I don't know if that was

a sign of the snake really loved her or what. But when it began to squeeze its

muscular body around her, she knew she was in danger. The constrictor, as God

made a constrictor, was to constrict. The purpose was to constrict. And it began.

Squeezing her muscles and squeezing her so she could no longer breathe. In a

panic, she grabbed a knife and began to slash away at the snake. She managed to

mortally wounded, but was in the process suffocated by the snake. That's what,

happens when we get too close and make pets of the idols in our lives.

First seems like harmless fun, but eventually it chokes life right out of us.

Many people who are caught in addictions think that it's just a simple thing to start out

with a glass of wine.

But if they're in addictive behavior, that soon becomes a crutch on them and overwhelms

them to the point that they can no longer take a sip of wine without being overcome

into a fit of drunkenness.

Seems like harmless fun, that little bit of drugs is not going to hurt you, soon begins

to have its way with us and eventually chokes us.

Now, we don't rely on ISIS or Osiris or any of the other Egyptian gods today—not by,

word anyway—but there are a lot of things that we rely on that are just as worthless.

In fact downright dangerous.

In his book The Reason for God, Tim Keller talks about the idols that drive us and enslave us today.

Here's what he says, "...if you center your life and identity on your spouse or your partner, you will be,

emotionally dependent, jealous, and controlling.

The other person's problems will be overwhelming to you. If you center your life and identity on your family and children, you will try to live

your life through your children until they resent you or to have no self of their own.

Worse yet, you may abuse them when they displease you." I know of many people who have lived their lives through their children, especially in

sports.

Out onto the football fields of our world and the soccer fields and all that, you see

a lot of parents living their life through their kids, and if their kids don't achieve

what they think they should achieve, they're yelling at them or beating on the refs or whatever.

We begin to center our lives around those. He goes on to say, if you center your life and identity on your work and career, you'll

be a driven workaholic and you'll be a boring, shallow person.

At worst, you will lose your friends and family, and if your career goes poorly, you're going

to develop deep depression." Again, he says, if you center your life and identity on money and possessions, you'll

be eaten up by worry or jealousy about money.

You'll be willing to do unethical things to maintain your lifestyle, which will eventually blow up your life.

I had one manager at a Christian business one time that told me that we were working

on a particular deal, and they wanted me to falsify the date, to date it back a ways,

so that we could take some prices that were a month or so before on sale, and I said,

you know, I can't do that, we didn't make this deal until today.

And I said, my Christianity won't let me to lie about what we've done.

And he said, well Tim, you're going to have to learn that someday you're going to need

to separate your business from your Christian life. Keller goes on to say if you center your life identity on pleasure, gratification, and comfort, you

will find yourself getting addicted to something.

If you center your life and identity on relationships and approval, you will be constantly and overly,

hurt by criticism, oftentimes losing friends.

If you center your life and identity on a noble cause, you will divide the world into

good and bad and demonize your opponents. Wow, don't we see that today?

If you center your life and identity on religion and morality, you will, if you are living,

up to your moral standards, be proud, self-righteous, and cruel.

If you don't live up to your moral standards, your guilt will be devastating.

I think Tim Keller was right about our world, wasn't he?

That's the ascension, the essence of idolatry, centering one's life and identity on anyone

or anything else other than God.

The Israelites knew that there's one God and one God only. You will serve one God and one God only.

But if we center our lives on anything or anyone else other than God, even if those

things are good things, they can lead us to bondage and pain.

On the other hand, if we center our life and identity on God and God alone, then we are truly set free.

If we can learn to depend on the highest power, we can learn to depend that everything revolves

and exists in Him, it makes our life so much easier, doesn't it?

The second thing we learn in this is we can trust in the blood of the Lamb.

Now depending on the blood of God's Lamb shed for you, rely on His sacrifice for your behalf.

That's what God told Israelite to do.

You remember the story found in Exodus chapter 12 verses 1 and 2, it says this, the Lord

Exodus 12:1

said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt, this month is to be for you.

Month, the first month of the year. In other words, what he was saying is,

you're going to begin your calendar with what I'm going to do now. Up until then, they had been

living their calendar based on who was king and things like that at the time. But he was going to,

base his calendar then from there on, this would be the first day of the first month of the year.

When the Passover happened. This was going to be a new beginning. And so what he told the people to

to do was this, he said,

"'Tell the whole community of Israel "'that on the 10th day of this month,

"'each man is to take a lamb for his family, "'one for each household.

"'If a household is too small for a whole lamb, "'they must share one with their nearest neighbor,

"'having taken into account the number of people there are.

"'You are to determine the amount of lamb needed "'in accordance with what each person will eat.

"'The animals you choose must be year-old males without defect, and you may take them from the sheep or the goats, take care of them

until the fourteenth day of the month, when all the members of the community of Israel

must slaughter them at twilight.

Then you are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and the tops of the door,

frames of the houses where you eat the lambs.

That same night you are to eat the meat roasted over the fire, along with it bitter herbs

and bread made without yeast.

Do not eat the meat raw or boil in water, but roast it over a fire with the legs, head, and internal organs.

Do not leave any of it till morning. If some of it is left till morning, you must burn it.

This is how you are to eat it, with your cloak tucked into your belt,

your sandals on your feet.

Staff in your hand, eat it in haste, it is the Lord's Passover.

So they're to eat it in preparation to be leaving.

They're supposed to be ready to go. On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn of both people

and animals and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt.

I am, if you heard that before, I am the Lord. The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are and when I see the blood I will

pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt." So we see,

that in this first thing there, to eat the roast, the lamb, with their traveling clothes,

because they're to be forced out of Egypt immediately. The blood of the lamb will be

their protection. It's to be on the doorpost and lintel, which is the overhead piece of

the doorframe, and it was to mark those homes that it would be a deliverance. The same thing,

happens for us. We are protected by the blood of God, the blood of the Lamb, Jesus is the

Lamb of God, and in a sense, His blood has been shed on our life, on the door of our

life and is put there so that the angel of death will pass over us. The blood of the,

Lamb is to be our deliverance. Dr. William Allen Dean, in his book entitled The Names

of God says that in every eastern country, blood at the door is always a symbol of welcome.

Wow.

Presence of inviting somebody to in. Very often a wedding is sealed simply by the

slaying of a sacrifice, and by putting that blood on the door sill,

while the groom carries his bride across that bloody door sill into his home. Thank goodness we don't have those things here. I'm not sure how many,

brides would want to go home with a groom, but by doing that, this groom is

welcoming his bride into his home, promising to take care of her for the rest of her life,

with a promise of his life to guard her.

In the same way blood on Israel's doorways welcomed Yahweh into the homes, God told them,

when I see the blood, I will pass over the angel of death will pass over you.

In other words, God will cross over the threshold, come into the home, but he will keep the angel

of death out from doing any harm.

In fact, according to Exodus 11, verse 7, God didn't even allow a dog to bark at the angel of death.

Exodus 11:7

God told Israel to trust in the blood of the Lamb, and that's what God tells us.

If you want my protection, He says, and if you want to be set free from the bondage,

then trust in the blood of the Lamb.

Remember in the Pharaoh, the plague rap, we said the blood of the firstborn brought salvation.

It is the blood of Jesus Christ that has brought us salvation.

Jesus Christ is our Passover Lamb, according to 1 Corinthians 5, verse 7.

1 Corinthians 5:7

John 1, verse 29, John the Baptist saw Jesus and said, look, the Lamb of God who takes

John 1:29

away the sin of the world.

1 Peter 1, verse 19 says, we are redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, the Lamb,

1 Peter 1:19

without blemish or defect.

Tells us, and we believe it, that Jesus is God's Passover Lamb. He shed His blood for us on the cross.

On the doorposts and the lintel of that cross that caused God to the danger of death to

pass over us and give us forgiveness. On November 26, 2008, a gang of terrorists stormed Taj.

Mahal Palace in Mumbai, India. After the carnage had left 200 people dead, a reporter interviewed

a guest who had been at the hotel for dinner that night. The guest described how he and

his friends were eating dinner when they heard gunshots. Someone grabbed him and pulled him

under the table. The assassins came striding through the restaurant, shooting at will until

everyone, or so they thought, had been killed. Miraculously, this man survived. When the.

Interviewer asked the guest how he lived when everyone else at his table had been killed,

He replied, I suppose because I was covered in someone else's blood, they took me for dead.

That's what Jesus did for us when he shed his blood on the cross.

His blood covers over us, every believer, with the result that we are not only forgiven,

but we live and have eternal life with God.

His blood covers over a multitude of sin. Not only that, but it covers us.

And then finally we need to get up and get out of the bondage.

He says to leave your life of captivity, get away from the place of slavery and the things that enslave you.

That's what Jesus meant when he caused Lazarus to rise from the dead, and he said take off

his grave clothes and let him free, set him free.

He meant for us to no longer be in those grave clothes of sin, but to be free.

Chapter 12 of Exodus verses 29 and 30 say this, at midnight the Lord struck down all the firstborn in Egypt

from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on the throne to the firstborn of the prisoner who was in the dungeon

and the firstborn of all the livestock as well.

Pharaoh and all his officials and all the Egyptians got up during the night and there was loud wailing in Egypt

for there was not a house without someone dead.

We talked about this, how devastating it must have been for the pharaoh to have his firstborn son die.

This one who was to be the next pharaoh, the next son of God for them.

Over the past few weeks and months, we have watched numbly, even in the past weeks,

we have watched numbly as Islamic terrorists have murdered Christians, Jews, and other Palestinians

in the land of Israel.

We've been horrified by hearing the stories of people being beheaded, children being burned,

and yet we wonder what's going to be happening, and yet even more horrifying is when people

around the world are placating the terrorists and saying they have a right to do that.

As horrifying as that may be, could you imagine what the parents and the families of those

who have been taken hostage her experience even right now.

May or may not be alive, their families may or may not be being tortured, they,

don't know. There's a fear of what is going to happen, and we understand that,

even from this in this time that there had to be a question about what was going to be happening on that night. And so Exodus chapter 12 verses 31 and

Exodus 12:31

32 says, during the night Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said,

said, get up, leave my people, you and the Israelites, go worship the Lord you have requested,

take your flocks and herds as you have said, and go and also bless me.

So what happened as a potential fear for the Israelites has been there for their release.

What God has done is he's humbled Pharaoh to the point that he can no longer worship

himself, to the point that he's begging for Moses and Aaron to bless him, finally,

to fear Israel's God and he wanted Yahweh's blessing, not the curse of his plagues.

Goes on to say, the Egyptians urged the people to hurry and leave the land, for otherwise.

They said, we will all die.

So the people took their dough before the yeast was added and carried it on their shoulders

and kneading troughs wrapped in their clothing. Now this is amazing.

You've got to think about this. We figure there were probably two million men of the Israelites.

So well, no, not two million total with men and women and children because there were

like 600,000 men of fighting age.

So they're all getting ready to leave Egypt.

And then it goes on to say, the Lord had made, so the Egyptians urged the people to hurry

and get out of their country, for otherwise they said we will die.

So the people took the dough before the yeast had been added, they put it in there, and

they gave them all of their clothing.

Then it goes on to say, the Lord had made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the

people and they gave them what they asked for, so they plundered the Egyptians.

Not only did they get set free, but they plundered the Egyptians, their slave owners, on the way out.

The Israelites journeyed from Ramses to Sukkot. There there were about 600,000 men on foot besides women and children.

Then it goes on, many other people went up with them as well as large droves of livestock,

both flocks and herds.

With the dough they had brought from Egypt, they baked cakes of unleavened bread.

The dough was without yeast because they'd been driven out of Egypt and did not have

time to prepare food for themselves.

By the way, the yeast was considered like sin.

When it goes into a bread, it infiltrates everything, Jesus talked about this, that,

it infiltrates everything.

To be gassy, but anyway, it causes gas bubbles to form and the bread rises in that.

So they left Egypt, and after 430 years of being stuck in slavery, God set them free.

Here's the lesson we need to learn. God has set us free through the blood of his Son.

We need to stop living in bondage.

Oftentimes the Israelites, and we will see that as we go on, when they go out into the

wilderness, they wander in the wilderness for 40 years until those that had gone out,

with them, gone out of Egypt with them, were all dead, because they grumbled against what,

had God done.

How many times do we, after we've been set free, go on and live in a life of depravity?

This phrase that I've heard over and over, we're all sinners saved by grace.

Well, that's true. We all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, according to Romans 3.23.

But Jesus didn't save us. He didn't set us free to remain in our sin and slavery.

He set us free to be free.

The lessons we learn from Scripture are simply this. We need to trust Lord.

We need to know what it is to live a life that is worthy of the calling of Christ.

We need to look at these lessons.

I mean, this to me, the plagues, the story of Exodus, is an exact pre-telling of the story of Christ.

It's the exact preparation for us of what it's going to be like for the firstborn Son

to take our place, and for the blood of the Lamb to be covering over us.

Not just covering over us, but freeing us from this angel of death.

I trust that even as we go on, we will not just ask God for forgiveness, but ask for,

God for free and new life and resurrection in Him.

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, as we close this service, we give you thanks and praise.

We're sitting here in a really comfortable building.

When we know that the Israelites were in slavery in Egypt, they didn't have the warmth of places

like a sanctuary where we meet.

In fact, when they left Egypt, they were wandering out in the desert, and after being provided

with food and water, they still grumbled.

Father, we ask that you would help us not to grumble, but that we would be transformed

by the renewing of our minds. We ask, Father, that you would set us free by the blood of Christ and help us to be free,

indeed. In Jesus' name, amen.