Exodus 5:22-6:27 – “Not Why, But Who”
I.) Intro.
Have you ever been anxious over a situation, fretting about what might take place, only to find yourself exactly in the place that you feared the most? If you are anything like me, it is right then that you say those familiar words, “I knew this was going to happen, but why does it always happen to me?” Moses’ greatest fears from chapters 3-4 have become the reality of chapter 5. Now, God had told Moses that this was going to happen, but that in the end, Pharaoh would be forced to let Israel go.
Folks, we can only grow in faith when the Lord allows us to be put in situations that we would not choose for ourselves. God reveals to us that He has everything in control, and we rejoice—only to come up against a situation that appears to reveal to us that He is not in control. Sound familiar?
This week, during our prayer time on Wednesday, we were discussing the situation of still not having the title deed to the land. All the paperwork had been turned over to the lawyer three weeks ago for him to write out the paper, which should have only taken him a few minutes to complete. The more we spoke of it, the more anxious we became. All the “what ifs” started flying around—“Maybe the guy is one of those crooked lawyers?” During the prayer time, the Lord impressed upon me, since I was already going to Fresno, to drop by and check this crook, I mean, lawyer, out.
So, as I drove up to his office, walked by the fountain, and into his plush fourth-floor office, I could feel my fears surface. The man was polite, but I was sure that it was all an act. He apologized that the title deed had not been finished but explained that he had just gotten back from two weeks’ vacation in Maui. “That figures!” I thought. He told me that while there, he had the opportunity to attend the Calvary Chapel located there. I quickly put him to the test, “Which one?” I asked. He got it right.
He then asked me if I had ever met Jon Courson, a well-known Calvary Chapel pastor. “Yeh, I’ve heard of him.” “Well,” he continued, “I was the best man in his wedding.” The short of it was that Mr. Bruce Binkle is a right-on believer in Jesus. And as I left his now-not-so-plush office, we prayed that the Lord would be glorified in the land that was gifted to us. Folks, God was in control all along, and He brought me to Fresno to meet Mr. Binkle to show me how foolish my doubt was. Moses is going to learn that lesson as well in this section of scripture.
II.) Vs. 22-8 I Am & I Will
Vs. 22-23 Now, under the affliction of Pharaoh, the Israelites cried out to Pharaoh and cursed Moses (5:16-21). Moses now cries out to the Lord. There is a sense in which Moses’ complaint to the Lord is a good thing. At least he knew who to cry out to. Forty years earlier, he had failed and ran away from his problems. Now he issues his complaints to the Lord—that’s progress.
The gist of Moses’ complaint is that, “Forty years ago I failed, and now I come back in obedience to You and I fail again. Lord, I’m just a loser. I told you I was. Why, Lord, if you knew that I was just going to blow it again, would you send me back to Egypt just to fail?” (Vs. 22) I suppose all of us have felt this way before when our fears become reality. We tend to think that God is making some sort of cosmic joke out of our embarrassment.
Folks, it seems to me that we human beings are most prone to ask the WHY question. If we don’t ask the WHY question, then we will at least ask the WHAT do you want from me, God? question. I submit to you that though these are valid questions to ask, they are not the ones that tend to bring you peace of mind. Security is a fragile thing when we are trying to make sense out of life’s uncertainties.
Let me give you an analogy: If you were to give me a complicated algebra question with lots of formulas and tell me that I must solve it in order to eat, I’d be in big trouble. You could say, “Dale, I’m going to give you the answer to the question of why; if you apply this formula and that formula, multiply by this number, and divide by that number—now remember that Y+7-e= 37—you will come up with the right answer.” I’m still not going to understand it! “Dale, I’m giving you the WHY of the problem.” “I don’t care, letters can’t be numbers, man, and I’m getting hungry!”
You see, WHY does not bring me out of my problem; I just don’t understand algebra. But now if you come up to me and say, “Dale, you can try to figure out this problem, or you can trust me—I know the answer, I’ll do it for you!” I’m going to head on over to the table and save you a seat. Do you know the reason for my new confidence? Because the answer to my problem was not WHY—it was a WHO!
Vs. 1-8
- Vs. 1 Notice here the certainty of God’s answer back to Moses: “Now you shall see what I will do to Pharaoh.” There are no ifs or maybes here, only “shall see” and “will do.” The first thing God does for Moses is to remind him that what He said He will do, He will do. In Mal. 3:6, the Lord reminds us that, “I am the LORD, I do not change.”
- Second, notice that the Lord tells Moses that he shall SEE the Lord work on Pharaoh with a mighty hand, so that Pharaoh will let them go. So? Well, God is telling Moses that he is going to find out based on firsthand personal knowledge. Why is that important? Because when we SEE what God is doing, we will be better able to know WHO He is! That supports my next point.
- Vs. 2 Four times in these 8 verses, God answers Moses’ WHY question with the words “I Am,” which tells us that God is revealing WHO He is (vs. 2, 6, 7, 8). Do you see what God is doing here? Moses asks WHY, and God does not answer the WHY. Instead, He says, “Moses, the better question—the question that will make sense of the WHY—is the WHO. Therefore, you need to know WHO I Am. So, this is WHO I Am, and this is what I’m going to do with little old Pharaoh. And further, Moses, you’re going to get to watch me defeat him.”
- Vs. 3 Here, we have a curious statement by the Lord to Moses. First, God says that He “appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty.” The words “God Almighty” are “El Shaddai” and refer to God’s invincible power and might. Though God did reveal Himself by this name some 6 times in Genesis and 31 times in Job, He clearly was known by His covenant name as well. In fact, Yehovah appears some 162 times in Genesis alone. So how could God say that by that name He was not known to them? The key to understanding this is found in the word “known.” There are two basic uses of the word “known” in Scripture: the first has to do with a casual acquaintance, and the second refers to knowledge by experience. So it appears that the patriarchs knew God casually by His covenant name but not personally.
This brings me to my second point: God clarifies His covenant name here by making 8 statements about it. Now we are going to look at those 8 statements in a moment, but for now, let me just say that in each case, they emphasize God as the One Who Redeems His people. Simply put, the “I Wills” reveal His will, which is to redeem.
Ok Pastor, what is it that you are trying to say? I’m saying that God is telling Moses that the patriarchs had no personal understanding of God as their Redeemer. God is saying in verse 4 that though they understood God as the One who kept His promises, they, according to verse 5, were not the ones that would understand HOW He was to keep His promises—namely by redeeming them out of bondage.
Do you get the beauty of this? God is showing Moses that all that is happening is just furthering His work, which is to reveal WHO He is. In a sense, this goes to answer part of Moses’ WHY and WHAT questions. “What does God want?” Well, He wants to set you free.
The truth is that God’s purpose and plan in allowing all that took place was to reveal to His people the only way that they could understand that He was, by His very nature, a Redeemer—a God who desires to set you free. Why couldn’t He just tell them? Well, how could you explain freedom to someone who had no idea what it was to be enslaved? “Well, it’s kind of like…freedom, you know?”
Just one other point on this whole “freedom” thing: I want you to see that there are two parts to freedom:
- Vs. 5 To set a person free from bondage. We are most familiar with this concept—release from the things in this life that hold us. But I want you to see that God’s redemption has another equally important part.
- Vs. 4 It is also to place someone in a new place that is characteristically full of joy—the Promised Land, if you will. Interestingly, God places the joy before the release from the things that hold us. Why? Because God would have us run to something, not away from something. We will only let go of the things that hold us if we are certain that what we are going toward is better.
Man, what a great truth this is: “God does not just want to set you free from the things that hold you; He wants to place you into a new state of eternal joy!”
Vs. 7-8
- Vs. 7 “I am the LORD your God who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.” Do you see those words, “out from”? That’s the first part of redemption or freedom: taking you “out from the burdens” of what enslaves you.
- Vs. 8 “And I will bring you into the land which I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; and I will give it to you as a heritage.” Do you see those words, “bring you into”? That’s the second part of redemption: bringing you into the new place of joy.
Now let’s look at those 7 “I wills” in verses 6-8:
- 1. I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. This speaks of God’s gracious purpose: to redeem us from the world. Folks, the things of the world are oppressive. So God promises to bring us out of this world system.
- 2. I will rescue you from their bondage. This is more than just relief from the things that burden us—it is a complete severance from the condition. A slave can be sold to a good master, but he is still a slave. God is promising to take us away from slavery altogether. Today, this speaks to us about the slavery of sin and the fact that God is rescuing us from the slavery of sin. As believers, when we sin, we do so not because we are slaves to it, but because we choose to.
- 3. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm. Here, the promise is to purchase us by use of His own outstretched arm. It takes no imagination to see what God is saying here, does it? Our redemption will be through His purchasing us. And how did He do that? Through His Son’s outstretched arm! 1 Peter 1:18-19 tells us that we were purchased with the precious blood of Jesus.
- 4. I will take you as My people. Here, we see that they are promised to occupy a unique relationship to God; they would be His people. God does not save us and then run off and leave us. No, He takes us back to His house so that we can live with Him! If you are truly saved, you won’t run off and start living as you once did because you have been transformed.
- 5. I will be your God. Here, we see a God who serves us, who ever lives to bless us. God chose us and has placed His love on us—not because we deserve it, but rather because of who He is. When you are weak, He will be strong, and so on.
- 6. I will bring you into the land. Here, we see that He will always keep His promises, even if they were not made to us but to our forefathers, or even if we do not live to see them completed. He will always keep them. Why? Because He has a plan, which is to bless you!
- 7. I will give it to you as a heritage. Lastly, we see that He also has a purpose: to give you a heritage. Did you see that this is a gift? Folks, what He gives you is a gift—you cannot earn it. In Eph. 1:3, we read that He has “blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.” It’s our inheritance, which, as we all know, is ours by way of relational association. Simply put, we did not earn it—we were born into it!
III.) Vs. 9-13 Stick to My Plan
Vs. 9-13 In these verses, notice that in verse 10 and again in verse 13, God gives Moses an opportunity to go by himself. Then, after Moses hesitates, God includes Aaron. So? Well, I think God is always giving us the opportunity to grow and mature.
Vs. 12 Moses says that the Jewish leaders won’t listen to him, so how does God expect Pharaoh to listen to him? And again, Moses is looking at this through his own ability (or the lack of it).
Vs. 13 God does not give in to the pity party; instead, He commands them both to go. Folks, the consequences are not up to you and me—they are up to God, and He knows just what He is doing. How many times have you and I given up after the first try, dealing with discouragement? God is telling Moses here, “Don’t give up—get going!” Man, is that ever a good word! Endurance to God’s plan is the key to seeing success!
IV.) Vs. 14-27 Called by Grace, Not Giftedness
Vs. 14-25 Right in the middle of all of this, God has Moses write down his family background from Jacob’s first three sons—Reuben, Simeon, and Levi (Moses and Aaron’s forefather). Why? What’s the point? To let them know that God had not made a mistake; He had it all planned out. Even from a bunch of losers like these guys, He could still accomplish His purposes. If He could do it through their ancestors, then He could do it through them. Why? Because it was not about how talented they were—it was about God’s ability. All they had to do was follow God. The fact of the matter is that God had prepared them for the task they had, and it was seen in their being born into that family. Folks, God’s calling automatically means God’s enabling!
Vs. 26-27 God tells us here that He is so sure that these two guys are going to succeed that He is recording the ancestry to prove that they are the same two losers. God can spin gold out of straw, and He does, so that all may marvel—not at the straw, but at Him who alone can do wondrous things.