God Will Push the Hard and Lead the Humble
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Leadership -
Do we have any idol worshippers in the house today?
Any idolaters? none? no takers?
Well, I have to say that I wouldn’t have put myself in that category either. But since none of us raised our hands, we all are given a very stark warning in v12 of .
v 12 Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.
The falling here is falling into sin…into idolatry.
We know we struggle, and fall into temptations,
What will it take to feel victorious in your life?
But do you ever wonder why you’re not getting real victory in your life?
why you keep failing in temptations
The reason is, we likely have some idols of the heart.
For us to encounter trials and temptations and to emerge victorious, requires us to surrender those idols to Christ.
For you to encounter trials and temptations and to emerge victorious?
What will it take for you to claim the power of the Lord and conquer the sin in your life?
Here’s what it’s going to take: a humble trust in the leading of God.
The context of our talk today comes from the book of Exodus, where God dramatically and miraculously rescues his people out of slavery in Egypt.
STORY
For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.
Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did. Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.” We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer. Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come. Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.
Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.
STORY
Immediately after God’s final act of rescue, the people have seen the great power of the Lord, so the people fear God in great awe, and they believed in the Lord and his servant Moses.
And they sing this song to the Lord.
I will sing to the Lord,
for he has triumphed gloriously,
The horse and his rider he has thrown into the sea.
The Lord is my strength and song, and he has become my savior;
He is my God, and I will prepare him a house;
He is my father’s God, I will exalt him.
Who is like thee, O Lord of all the gods?
Who is like thee, glorious in holiness?
In thy mercy thous has led forth the people thou hast saved;
In thy strength thou hast guided them to thy holy dwelling.
Unfortunately, these people who are singing this song are the same people we will read about in ,
and *spoiler alert* they all die before they get to the promised land.
The reason was that they were all idolaters who refused to humble themselves trust the leading of God.
READ
Every time we pray the Lord’s prayer, we ask God to lead us somewhere.
In that statement we are declaring our humility to God’s leading. His guiding sovereignty over our lives.
Today we’re going to be talking about following the leading of God.
Humble leaders will trust the Word of the Lord
3 points
Moses
We don’t always choose the path that God calls us to
It may not always be glamorous
It always requires humility
Pharaoh
God will always accomplish his will even when we try to stand in his way
People of Israel
God will punish those who refuse to worship him
God will be faithful in spite of our faithlessness
God will never give us more than we can handle??
The statement removes something very important from one half of the equation.
Our ability > the temptation
GOD + our ability > the temptation
Temptation? SIN - separation from God, from his plan, his purpose, his presence.
The promise is that God will always be faithful to you IN the trial, the temptation, and will provide a way of escape from sin (which separates you from God).
He promises that there is never a time or situation the he allows into your life that is designed to put distance between you and God.
All the spiritual or moral choices we make are either driving us closer to God or further away from Him.
There will never be a time in your life where your only option is to be separated from God.
flee idolatry
idolatry is putting anything in a place of higher reverence and honor than God in your life.
valuing something other than God MORE than you value God.
Problem: It is easier to fall into idolatry than we realize and many of us live a life filled with idolatry.
It is easy teenager to worship what your friends think about you. To worship your emotions and your own sense of wellbeing that everyone in your family exists to make you happy.
It is easy parents, to worship your children, or your grandchildren, and their future that you neglect the things of God and encourage them to pursue every.
It is so easy men, to worship your career or your toys, and the almighty-dollar, and to fill our life up with stuff that we have no time to lead our family in worship, or to pray with our wives, or to do something for God.
Where does your idolatry come easy?
Flee Idolatry
we don’t have time to go over it, but Paul’s answer to fleeing idolatry is to run to the table of Christ. To run to corporate worship where we participate with eachother and Christ in something greater than our job or our sports team or our kids achievements.
What we will cover today his…Humble people trust God
Because God is God, he will push (punish) the proud, and lead the humble.
Because God is God, he will push (punish) the proud, and lead the humble.
He promises that there is never a time or situation the he allows into your life that is designed to put distance between you and God.
All the spiritual or moral choices we make are either driving us closer to God or further away from Him.
First we look at the life of Moses
Story of Exodus through him appearing to Pharaoh
The task God assigns to us
1. Is not something we get to choose,
Sometimes we think the task is too great. that we are unqualified for it.
how many have children/grandchildren? How many feel fully qualified for that responsibility to raise these children in the love and commandments of God? (nurture and admonition)
teens?
The task God assigns to us
2. May not be glamorous.
-my situation dirty diaper, yours may be carting children around. or just taking care of your house and hanging out with friends.
God calls us to mundane faithfulness
The task God assigns to us
3. Always requires humility
Moses initially argued with God about the task of leading the people of Egypt...
Thinking he couldn’t possibly do what God was telling him to do.
This wasn’t humility. It was pride, that he knew better than God.
tells us that Moses was the most humble man who ever lived.
He had to learn that humility.
As Rick Warren summarized, humility is not thinking less of yourself, it’s thinking of yourself less.
But there’s a often overlooked characteristic of humility, that for Christians to be truly humble, must be a part of our lives.
TRUST
Humble people understand that relying on someone better than themselves will work out better for then.
The humility is obeying the revelation that you have, believing that God knows what is best.
Humility is choosing to submit to Christ and his will, rather than desiring evil.
Second let’s look at Pharaoh
God pushes, or punishes the proud
When we stubbornly refuse to obey God, we cannot stand in his way or stop him.
Pharaoh gave it his best shot! He continued to harden his heart in pride. “who is God?”
water to blood
frogs
lice
flies
disease
boils
hail/lightning
locusts
darkness for 3 days
death of the firstborn
(he comes to his senses and asks, why did we let our servants leave?)...
11. eventually he drowns his entire army in the sea
Because of his pride…God humbled him. God pushes the proud where he will.
How often do we resist the conviction of God because we are too scared of the consequences?
One of the greatest stories in Israel’s history, one greater than the building of the temple or the return from Babylon is recorded in the second book of the Bible.
If I told someone about my secret struggle, I would loose face. They wouldn’t trust me any more.
So you go on and on without getting help.
If I obeyed God and refused to gossip and refused to grumble it would make my interaction at work so awkward.
If I gave God the offering and tithe I believe he wants me to give, I won’t have money to buy a new phone.
If I put my own answers on this test I’ll fail this class and have to retake it.
Take this phrase: IF I did what was right, I’ll loose this. You just found out what your idol is.
I believe God wants me to do this, but if I do that...
It is easy to be an idolater. It comes natural to all of us. To be fully self sufficient and never look to God.
Third Children of Israel
God will be faithful in spite of our faithlessness and sin.
Look at the incredible gifts and signs of the power of God they had. They saw the plagues, the cloud of protection rescue them from Egypt, the dry ground at the bottom of the red sea. And all along the way, they were doing what?
Doubting - desire evil - like Eve - looks so tempting. Did God really say?
v8 immorality
v9 - put Christ to the test
Paul is making the Exodus Christocentric. Jesus wasn’t born until 1500 years later, but Israel was testing the patience and love of God, and grumbling against God and Moses
Wouldn’t it have been better for us to live in slavery than to die here in the desert.
YOU SAW what God has done, and the power he has, and you don’t think he can take care of you?
v10 complaining/grumbling
God punishes them, by sending poisonous serpents to bite them, and almost all of them were ‘overthrown’ v5 in the wilderness.
Because of their unbelief, their pride that they knew better, MOST of them never made it to the promised land.
v11 - written for our instruction, ‘end of the age’ these historical events all culminated to the resurrection of Christ. We can connect the power of a God who can rescue his people out of Egypt to his Son, who became human and died in our place.
v12 - beware - pride - the sin of not needing God
LISTEN…if you’re not taking these lessons to heart, then you are a prime candidate to follow the same fate as the Israelites who refused to believe…they were separated from God forever.
What’s the common command in v7, v14
What’s the common command in v7, v14
flee idolatry
idolatry is putting anything in a place of higher reverence and honor than God in your life.
valuing something other than God MORE than you value God.
Problem: It is easier to fall into idolatry than we realize
and many of us live a life filled with idols of the heart.
It is easy teenager to worship what your friends think about you. To worship your emotions and your own sense of wellbeing that everyone in your family exists to make you happy.
It is easy parents, to worship your children, or your grandchildren, and their future that you neglect the things of God and encourage them to pursue every thing but their relationship with God.
We want our kids to have all the comforts of Egypt, but we don’t get to choose the cost. And often we fill their lives up with temporary pleasures and achievements rather than teaching them of what really lasts and what is truly important: to know God.
It is so easy men, to worship our career or our toys, and the almighty-dollar, and to fill our life up with stuff that we have no time to lead our family in worship, or to pray with our wives, or volunteer to do something for God.
Where does your idolatry come easy?
Flee Idolatry
we don’t have time to go over it, but Paul’s answer to fleeing idolatry is to run to the table of Christ. To run to corporate worship where we participate with each other and Christ in something greater than our job or our sports team or our kids achievements.
You say, it’s just too hard to be humble. To follow the leading of God. My situation is too big for God to fix, or I’m too insignificant for God to care about.
False.
v13
Some people say, God will never give us more than we can handle??
The statement removes something very important from one half of the equation.
Our ability > the temptation
GOD + our ability > the temptation
Temptation? SIN - separation from God, from his plan, his purpose, his presence.
The promise is that God will always be faithful to you IN the trial, the temptation, and will provide a way of escape from sin (which separates you from God).
He promises that there is never a time or situation the he allows into your life that is designed to put distance between you and God.
All the spiritual or moral choices we make are either driving us closer to God or further away from Him.
There will never be a time in your life where your only option is to be separated from God.
Leaders
Will you stand up in humility, and trust God’s leading in your life?
Some of you need to stop thinking of this church as a meeting to attend and start thinking about it as a family that needs you to bring your gifts and influence here.
Some of us need to step it up in our families and be the spiritual leader we’re called to be.
Some of us need to stand up to our friends at school and choose to do what is right even if it looses us a friend.
Where is God calling you to change leaders??
priorities, prayer, something you need to give up,
Maybe you say, I don’t really think God wants me to change anything. I’m happy right where I’m at.
It’s a dangerous place to be, my friend. Because the closer you get to God the more you realize how holy and pure he is and how much sin you still have in your life. If you’re not seeing the sin in your life and trying to fight it, you don’t have much reason to think you know anything about the God of the Bible. Or that you have a relationship with him.
You need to pray that God would reveal himself to you.
Being a Christian isn’t saying some prayer or coming to church. It is about having a relationship with Christ and submitting to him.
God always accepts us exactly as we are, but he never leaves us there.
God always accepts us exactly as we are, but he never leaves us there. He always guides the humble to a closer walk with him. So that our life matches more closely the life of Jesus Christ.
He always guides the humble to a closer walk with him. So that our life matches more closely the life of Jesus Christ.
maybe you just need to start listening to the prompting of the Holy Spirit in your life
Idolatry is easy…worship is hard.
You want victory in your life?
You want to conquer the doubt, and temptation, and fear?
You want to escape the spiral of complacency and self indulgence?
Humbly TRUST in our Sovereign God - to always be near you and provide a way to escape.
We will sing an old invitation song. A confession and a prayer. A song of surrender.
If you’re like me, you have some things to surrender to God today.
Maybe hurt you’ve been carrying for years.
Maybe an addiction that you need to renew a fight for.
Maybe a friendship you need to end.
Whatever it is, choose to be close to God and far away from your sin. He’s waiting at your door of escape, but you have to trust him and make the hard choice to worship him.
Be careful as you sing this. Because if you sing these words and mean them, and act on them, God will abundantly bless you, but he may do some idol smashing in your life.
The context of this great promise, however is one of the greatest stories in Israel’s history. One greater than the building of the temple or the return from Babylon.
Most of you will recognize the name of the book being the title of the greatest story.
And like most great stories, the inciting moment is the birth of a new baby.
The book of Genesis ends with the death of Joseph, the family of Israel is settled comfortably in Egypt and growing rapidly.
The conflict appears
God is sovereign
God is sovereign
Exodus 15:28-31
Exodus 15:28-30
Exodus 15:28-30
As Rick Warren summarized, humility is not thinking less of yourself, it’s thinking of yourself less.
tells us that
But there’s a often overlooked characteristic of humility, that for Christians to be truly humble, must be a part of our lives.
TRUST
Humble people understand that relying on someone better than themselves will work out better for then.
The humility is obeying the revelation that you have, believing that God knows what is best.
Humility is choosing to submit to Christ and his will, rather than desiring evil.