God of Promises | Week 3 | Moses

Intro

for the past few weeks we have been looking at promises God made with humans.

Week 1 we looked at the promise God made with Adam and Eve. That eve’s offspring would crush Satan’s head.

Genesis 3:15 NIV

And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring  and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”

Week 2 Casey talked about God’s promise with Abraham. That he would make his family into a great nation - that every nation would be blessed through him.

Genesis 12:3 NIV

I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

Truth

This week we are looking at another promise God made.

We are going to be in exodus 19. And this next promise God makes takes place about 600 years after he makes the promise with Abraham.

To give you some context, God’s people, the Israelites. have spent 400 years in Slavery by the Egyptians.

Their numbers have grown to about 2 million people by this point and they want to be free from Egyptian rule.

God uses moses to free his people by doing some pretty crazy stuff. God uses plagues to show his power to the Israelites and the Egyptians to free his people.

God leads them into the desert, away from the Egyptians. and 3 months after being freed from Egypt God leads them to mount Sinai where is going to make a promise or covenant with the Israelites.

A covenant is - A sacred kinship bond between two parties, ratified by swearing an oath. Covenant making was a widespread custom throughout the ancient Near East and Graeco-Roman culture, serving as a means to forge sociopolitical bonds between individuals or groups. God’s covenants are prominent in every period of salvation history. Divine covenants reveal the saving plan of God for establishing communion with Israel and the nations, ultimately fulfilled by the death and resurrection of Christ.

Simply a covenant from God is a promise God makes to demonstrate his love and devotion to those he wants to be in relationship with.

COVENANT = PROMISE

He made a covenant with Adam, with Noah, with Abraham, and in Exodus 19 he makes one with Moses and Israel.

Exodus 19:4–6 NIV

4 ‘You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. 5 Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, 6 you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites.”

First God reminds them of what he brought them out of. He reminds the people of how he rescued them.

in verse 5 he gives them an option, he is inviting them into relationship with him. and is also telling them of the befits of obedience to him.

There are two sides to this covenant. He is making a special promise but there are expectations to this. The Israelites are going to have to give up something in order for this to work. They have to give up their way, the way THEY think live should be lived

He is saying to the Israelites I will choose you, if you choose to obey me.

Exodus 19:5–6 (NIV)

5 Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, 6 you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’

God is saying he will set the Israelites apart, that he is going to make them into a Kingdom of Priest!

He is going to make them God’s representative to the whole world!

He also says he is going to set them apart, that they are going to be a holy nation!

However, the expectation is to obey him fully.

In chapter 20 God gives the 10 commandments. He gives them how exactly how he wants them to live.

He tells them exactly how they can receive the promise to be his treasured possession and representatives to the whole world!

Priests in the old testament would speak to God on behalf of the people. If you weren't a priest, you could not communicate to God on your own. you would have to go talk to a priest is you wanted wanted to be near God.

By God telling the Israelites that they will be kingdom of priests, he is communicating a closeness with the Nation of Israel.

But again, the expectation is they obey him fully.

All they need to do is follow his rules, simple right?

Some of us hate rules. They can feel restrictive, boring or even Lame. you might think having rules means that your missing out on something. It feels like you don’t have freedom.

But for the most part rules are put in place for a really good reason. They are there to protect us.

When the person making the rules loves you, they are intended to keep you safe. They are there to help you make the wise choice

Rules help you know what you CAN DO BY CLEARLY COMMUNICATING WHAT CAN’T DO.

Cliff picture

Look at this cliff. This is a spot in Ireland called the Cliff’s of Moher. Now imagine a kid playing on the side of this cliff. What would be the most loving thing to do? Let kid play on the side of the cliff or make sure he is on the other side of the fence. (if you look closely you might be able to see the fence)

Without the fence, without rules there to keep the kid safe, there is no reason a kid should playing there at all! The fence does not limit the enjoyment.

Sometimes this is the same for us. We get so focused on the fence we miss the enjoyment of why it is there in the first place - to keep us safe.

The interesting thing about this particular fence is that this is on the west side of Ireland. to the right of this picture, to the east is the rest of the country.

There is so much more to enjoy than just this one spot. This is the same with us. When we get too focused on the rules we can miss the rest of what is out there to enjoy

God’s rules are like the fence

GOD’S RULES ARE BOUNDARIES TO PROTECT MY FREEDOM, NOT BARRIERS TO PREVENT MY FREEDOM.

God’s rules are not given to make our lives worse.

When you follow God’s wisdom, will and instructions - makes your life better. That’s why God gave his people this plan.

Gods rules are the best way to live.

God’s rules will make you seem different from the world around you. This is on purpose.

Thats what he wanted for the Israelites and thats what he wants for us.

you can’t be Holy and look like everyone else.

You can’t be a kingdom of priest and look like rest of the world around you.

It’s like what syndrome says in the Incredibles “ When everyone’s super, then no one will be”

you can’t be different when you look like everyone else.

But the 10 rules God gave the Israelites, do you think they obeyed them? NO!! They broke every single one of them!

And i get it, I would do the same thing… I have done the same thing. I break Gods commandments and I sin every day.

I often feel like Paul does in romans 7, I know the good i want to do and love Jesus with all of my life but I still get angry, I still say unkind words, i still sin.

So what about God’s promise? What happens, what does God do when they don’t keep his promise? How does God respond when they disobey him?

The Truth is God ALWAYS keeps his end of the deal. He ALWAYS keeps his promise.

How does he do it? THROUGH JESUS.

He doesn’t just ignore that we don’t follow through on our end of the deal. He doesn’t sweep it under the rug, he doesn't say never mind. He sends Jesus. God in the flesh, the only one who could ever keep every command.

Matthew puts it like this

Matthew 5:17 NIV

17 “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.

Jesus came and lived a perfect life. He lived a sinless life and offered himself as a Sacrifice for OUR messups anyway. He followed the law perfectly and therefore was the perfect sacrifice.

He chose to die so we could be forgiven and acted as the final sacrifice for our sins.

He is our High Priests so we could receive God’s promise and become a kingdom of priest.

So we can be God’s representative to the world with the hopes they could be in relationship with him.

Application

So what do we do? How do we respond? There are 2 key things I think we should do

1. Realize - Salvation is not something you earn. It is a gift you receive.

Ephesians 2:8 NIV

8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—

God already did the heavy lifting, and now, if you haven’t experienced life with Him, the gift of Salvation, he offers it to you. This is not something he will force on you nor is it something that you automatically get be cause you were born a certain way, or you are generally more “Good” than you are bad. or even if the rest of your family goes to church.

This is a gift that is offered to each of you, individually.

2. START obeying God because he knows best.

Worksheet - We obey God because he knows best

The world will try to convince you that the Rules God gives are there to keep you from freedom. Like Eve in Genesis chapter 3 we might be tempted to think God is holding out on us with the rules we have in life.

The truth is cares more about you than you do yourself. The rules he gives us are to give us life.

Landing

When we stop trying to earn a relationship with God, when we submit and surrender our lives to Jesus when we put our faith him, we receive the same promise he made with the Israelites.

To be his chosen people, his special treasure, and to be a kingdom of priests.

AKA - we are his children, a part of His Kingdom.

Thats a promise he made with Moses that is fulfilled in Jesus and we can be a part of through him.

So as you go to groups tonight, I want you to answer the question - In what ways do I have trouble trusting God’s promises?

Lets pray…