The great escape

8. The great escape Exodus 14

10. Common way of reading Exodus 14 God will provide a way through our problems

11. How did the Israelites feel as they crossed the Red Sea?

12. For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers, that our forefathers were all under the cloud and they all passed through the sea. They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. 1 Cor 10:1-2 I tell you the truth , whoever hears my words and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned: he has crossed over from death to life. John 5:24

13. What have we been saved from? • How were we saved? • What are we saved for?

14. “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have brought us to the desert to die? What have you done by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone: let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!” Exodus 14: 11-12

16. We were saved from slavery to sin. • Sin occurs when God is absent in our lives. • Fear of man over the fear of God leads to idolatry.

17. vs

19. Financial security. • Acceptance by others. • Pleasure. • Success. • Health. • Comfort. • Safety. VS God.

20. Who do you really serve?

21. Idols include anything we worship: the lust for pleasure, respect, love, power, control, of freedom from pain. The purpose of all idolatry is to manipulate the idol for our own benefit. This means that we don’t want to be ruled by idols. Instead, we want to use them…We don’t want to be ruled by alcohols, drugs, sex, gambling, food, or anything. No, we want these substances or activities to give us what we want; good feelings, a better self- image, a sense of power, or whatever our heart is craving.

22. Idols, however, do not cooperate. Rather than mastering our idols, we become enslaved by them and begin to look like them. As idols are deaf, dumb, blind, utterly senseless and irrational, so “those who make them will be like them, and so will all who trust in them” (Psalm 1115:8). Idolaters lose their spiritual moorings, they are lost as sea. Idolaters are controlled by the lure of the sirens: “This is the way to feeling good, pleasure, belonging, and a better self- image. But they are doomed to crash on the rocks. Edward Welch, Addictions: A Banquet in the Grave

25. Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on. Raise your hand and stretch out your hand over the sea…” 14:15-16a • “You brought out your right hand and the earth swallowed them.” 15: 12

26. “I have seen these people,” the Lord said to Moses, “and they are a stiff necked people. Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation” 32:9-10 • But Moses sought the favor of the Lord his God. “O Lord,” he said. “why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? 32:11

27. We are saved by a mediator with God. • Jesus mediates between us and God. • How grateful are we for the sacrifices Jesus made on the cross in order to save us? • How does our salvation help us through difficult times?

28. “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have brought us to the desert to die? What have you done by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone: let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!” 14: 11-12 • “If only we had died by the Lord’s hands in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into the desert to stare this entire assembly to death.” 16:3 • “Why did you bring us out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?” 17:3

31. Despite our repeated disobediences and ungratefulness, God still saves us by grace, not by our works. • God’s grace should compel us to gratitude and obedience.

33. Umm, boss..the Red Sea….looks like it has been parted…….

34. @#$%&!!! Umm, boss..the Red Sea….looks like it has been parted…….

35. Like, umm…do we go after them or go back?

36. Go back sure no face… Like, umm…do we go after them or go back?

37. The consequences of hardening your heart

38. Speaking of Superpowers…..

39. When it comes to faith it is always more a case of us choosing not to believe, instead of us not being able to believe. • Pride is the most subtlest of idols.

40. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death- even death on a cross! Phil 2: 5-8

41. We have come to share in Christ if we hold firmly till the end the confidence we had at first. As has just been said: “Today if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion.” Who were they who heard and rebelled? Were they not all those Moses led out of Egypt? Hebrews 3:14-16

48. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord Romans 8:38-39

49. We are saved to persevere through trials and temptations to lead victorious lives. • God was saving the Israelites not only from the Egyptians, but also from themselves. • The Gospel is our anchor to move forward in life.

50. 40 years later….. “As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave or forsake you.” Joshua 1:5b