Trusting in the Lord

Exodus: Called Out • Sermon • Submitted 3 years ago

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God concludes the giving of the law in Exodus by reminding Moses and His people that the Law only leads to true living as His followers trust in Him. The Law centers around placing the Lord and others before oneself. In prioritizing one’s life in this manner, the Lord promises that things will go well for them even though their priority and actions seem to contradict what is in their best interest. God is reminding His people that their prosperity and provision was never in their control. All good things come from the Lord and as we trust in Him, He is faithful to fulfill His promises.

Notes

Transcript

Personal Gain

Exodus 23:1–19 NIV

“Do not spread false reports. Do not help a guilty person by being a malicious witness. “Do not follow the crowd in doing wrong. When you give testimony in a lawsuit, do not pervert justice by siding with the crowd, and do not show favoritism to a poor person in a lawsuit. “If you come across your enemy’s ox or donkey wandering off, be sure to return it. If you see the donkey of someone who hates you fallen down under its load, do not leave it there; be sure you help them with it. “Do not deny justice to your poor people in their lawsuits. Have nothing to do with a false charge and do not put an innocent or honest person to death, for I will not acquit the guilty. “Do not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds those who see and twists the words of the innocent. “Do not oppress a foreigner; you yourselves know how it feels to be foreigners, because you were foreigners in Egypt. “For six years you are to sow your fields and harvest the crops, but during the seventh year let the land lie unplowed and unused. Then the poor among your people may get food from it, and the wild animals may eat what is left. Do the same with your vineyard and your olive grove. “Six days do your work, but on the seventh day do not work, so that your ox and your donkey may rest, and so that the slave born in your household and the foreigner living among you may be refreshed. “Be careful to do everything I have said to you. Do not invoke the names of other gods; do not let them be heard on your lips. “Three times a year you are to celebrate a festival to me. “Celebrate the Festival of Unleavened Bread; for seven days eat bread made without yeast, as I commanded you. Do this at the appointed time in the month of Aviv, for in that month you came out of Egypt. “No one is to appear before me empty-handed. “Celebrate the Festival of Harvest with the firstfruits of the crops you sow in your field. “Celebrate the Festival of Ingathering at the end of the year, when you gather in your crops from the field. “Three times a year all the men are to appear before the Sovereign Lord. “Do not offer the blood of a sacrifice to me along with anything containing yeast. “The fat of my festival offerings must not be kept until morning. “Bring the best of the firstfruits of your soil to the house of the Lord your God. “Do not cook a young goat in its mother’s milk.

God concludes the giving of the law by once again pointing His people to trusting in Him as they seek out what it looks like to truly live.

First, the Lord regards the resolve of our heart to get ahead in life’s circumstances. There will be times when our perspective will see gain able to be acquired as a result of responding to the needs of the moment through dishonest or disobedient means.

It is so easy to justify the means by focusing on the ends. In our sinful minds, every action is justifiable if it gets us to a profitable end.

In the Lord’s economy of living, the Lord is in control of the ends so the means are where our focus should be. As the Israelites would face the city of Jericho, the Lord had already established the end as being victory. He commanded the Israelites to focus on the means to reach the end which was obedience and not military prowess.

Our greatest strength is not our might nor the works of our hands. Our greatest strength lies in our ability to trust that the Lord is in control.

So as the Lord calls us to be truthful, honest and fair in our dealings with one another, He is reminding us that we do not need to take justice into our own hands but trust that as we remain faithful and obedient to Him, justice will always be served.

In regards to the Sabbath, the Lord calls us to break from our continual pursuit to once again be reminded that it is from the Lord that our actual provision comes.

Godly Ends

Exodus 23:20–33 NIV

“See, I am sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared. Pay attention to him and listen to what he says. Do not rebel against him; he will not forgive your rebellion, since my Name is in him. If you listen carefully to what he says and do all that I say, I will be an enemy to your enemies and will oppose those who oppose you. My angel will go ahead of you and bring you into the land of the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites and Jebusites, and I will wipe them out. Do not bow down before their gods or worship them or follow their practices. You must demolish them and break their sacred stones to pieces. Worship the Lord your God, and his blessing will be on your food and water. I will take away sickness from among you, and none will miscarry or be barren in your land. I will give you a full life span. “I will send my terror ahead of you and throw into confusion every nation you encounter. I will make all your enemies turn their backs and run. I will send the hornet ahead of you to drive the Hivites, Canaanites and Hittites out of your way. But I will not drive them out in a single year, because the land would become desolate and the wild animals too numerous for you. Little by little I will drive them out before you, until you have increased enough to take possession of the land. “I will establish your borders from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea, and from the desert to the Euphrates River. I will give into your hands the people who live in the land, and you will drive them out before you. Do not make a covenant with them or with their gods. Do not let them live in your land or they will cause you to sin against me, because the worship of their gods will certainly be a snare to you.”

Moses concludes this covenantal or causal law section of the book of Exodus by once again pointing the people to the promise of the Lord.

God always goes before us. Much of our struggle in faith comes from the inability to see that the Lord has and continues to go before us.