Foxhole Prayers

Will you pray?

Have you heard the term “foxhole prayers?”

They get their name from World War II

Where soldiers would dig a hole to get into for protection.

Initially it was supposed to be 4 feet in diameter and 3.5 feet deep.

If you stayed in that position for some time, it was expected to get deeper.

My family went shooting after Christmas.

Among our arsenal was a .308 - that was a bullet used in WWII.

It made a horrendously loud noise

And I thought of what it must be like to hear that for real.

I can certainly understand hearing that noise

Knowing it was aimed at you

And making promises to God.

“Lord, if you will get me out of this alive, I will...

One show I was watching the guy said he would do the 10 commandments and he started naming them.

After reciting two he stopped and said, “I’ll memorize the 10 commandments...”

That’s a foxhole prayer.

If you will get me out alive, I promise I’ll do this or that.

And of course, you get out alive and the promise may be kept for a season.

But it doesn’t last.

It was a foxhole prayer - prayed in the heat of passion

In a moment of terror or despair.

In a moment...

But what if the battle rages for longer

For days - weeks

Or like the Israelites in Egypt, for centuries.

What do your prayers start sounding like?

Our text today is short - 3 little verses at the end of Exodus 2.

So go ahead and start looking that up.

Kids, we give you three words each week to help you focus on the message.

It is our prayer you will hear the Word and the Lord will speak to your heart.

Today, the Lord is going to remind us what we should expect from our prayers.

Your three words today are Jesus, Prayer and Covenant.

But before you start tracking, let’s all open our Bibles to Exodus 2:23-25.

Hear now the Word of the Lord Exodus 2:23-25

Exodus 2:23–25 ESV

During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the people of Israel—and God knew.

This is the Word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God.

Every movie series has one movie that’s an interlude that these three verses.

The second Matrix movie wasn’t that great but had to be otherwise the final movie in the series wouldn’t work.

I watched the entire Harry Potter series - I hope that’s not scandalous - but I distinctly remember saying one of the movies was a tie

It wasn’t so great but had to be made to get to the rest of the story.

I’m sure there are movies like this in the Marvel Universe, Star Wars Universe, Batman - it happens in every series.

There are things you need to know to continue the plot

They aren’t written for excitement, they are written for anticipation and these verses do not fail to deliver that.

So let’s unwrap these 3 verses - four sentences.

And funny enough, they reveal 5 things. First,

The right politics will make some things easier

Exodus 2:23 “During those many days the king of Egypt died...

When were those many days?

They were the days Pharoah tried to get the midwives to kill all of the Jewish babies.

When that failed, they were the days when Pharoah had all of the boy Jewish babies thrown to the crocodiles in the Nile.

This went on for years - it was the law of the land - it was political - Pharoah and his ruling party had an agenda.

And the Hebrews suffered under it.

These days included the time Moses was being raised by Jochebed and Amran.

And then when Pharaoh's rebellious daughter raised Moses in the palace.

These days included when Moses killed the Egyptian and the Hebrews - his own people - ratted him out.

These days included Moses running for his life to Midian

And meeting Jethro and marrying Zipporah and having a baby.

And settling in life as a shepherd in the wilderness to live happily ever after.

Boy did he get a surprise.

Exodus 2:23 “During those many days the king of Egypt died

And here is the politics and a really good, modern day lesson for us.

The king of Egypt died.

In Egypt, it was the accepted practice that when a new Pharaoh ascended to the throne, he would grant amnesty to those guilty of crimes...

The change in the Egyptian politics helps Moses

When he returns to tell Pharaoh what the Lord tells him to say, he will not have to worry about being arrested for murder.

That’s good - sometimes the right politics will make some things easier, however, number 2

Politics will not solve the problem

Exodus 2:23 “During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery...

See, it was the accepted practice in Egypt that when a new Pharaoh ascended to the thrown, he would grant amnesty to those guilty of crimes,

and he would free the slaves.

Why did the people of Israel groan?

Because once again, a political leader lied.

The former speaker of the US House of Representatives said he would release all of the January 6 security tapes.

He’s the former speaker and very, very few tapes.

The current speaker of the US House of Representatives said he would release all of the January 6 security tapes.

One little section got released.

Nothing else - he lied.

Republicans and Democrats have had full control over two branches of government over the last decade

Who has fixed the illegal immigration problem?

Well, if Trump gets in...

Really?

We are in an election year and I sincerely implore you to get informed and vote well but

Whether you are a die hard Democrat or a staunch Republican - I don’t care which one you are

When the election occurs and the dust settles, do you really think any man or woman or group of men or group of women will really change anything?

The people of Israel groaned because the Pharaoh broke a political promise.

All prisoners will be released - all of the slaves will go free

Until they didn’t.

Exodus 2:23 “During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery...

Let’s tap into some of everyone’s political angst here.

Regardless of your political affiliation, how many times have you voted for someone and had such high hopes

And then within a year or two, you gut falls into your feet.

“Read my lips, no new taxes...”

Then taxes go up.

“No new wars”

Then Afghanistan, Kuwait, Iraq, Yemen, Ukraine, now Israel.

“We’ll give this group of illegal immigrants amnesty and then we’ll close the border.

And 15 million illegals later - no one has done a thing.

And let’s not mention the immorality that our government both participates in and exports around the world.

And these are people you voted for.

“Oh, I didn’t vote for a - fill in the blank.”

Didn’t have to - you could have voted libertarian or green or communist -

Did it make a difference?

Honestly now, did it make a difference?

Let this man who has seen a whole lot of elections happen in his life time answer this for us.

No.

Our leadership is on a path of deception and ungodliness and every election cycle we take the bait.

Why?

Because we’ve been praying foxhole prayers.

Prayers that are focused on us and how we want it to be.

You know that you know that you know that you know that the Israelites had been praying for the last 400 years.

But the bad Pharaoh died and a new Pharaoh came in

And it’s more of the same

And it took all of that to change the prayers of the people.

Third,

Things change when our prayers align with the Lord

Exodus 2:23–24 “During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.”

There are a couple of things here

First - when we read, we hear the words but we are missing the depth of the suffering.

The word groaning means to make sounds that express grief and physical and emotional pain.

Have you ever heard someone groaning before?

Maybe it was you.

Maybe the pain was so intense, all you could think was “make it stop.”

You didn’t care what was on the other side - just “make it stop.”

That’s where the Israelites were - they didn’t care where it all ended up.

But this work, these beatings, this killing of our kids - it’s got to stop.

We don’t know what we want it to look like, but it can’t look like this anymore.

Second - when we read, we hear the words but are missing the hopelessness.

The word slavery not only means that they worked hard, it means they have no hope.

This will never end - you’ve been there, right?

Tomorrow will be like today.

Next week will be like tomorrow.

10 years from now will look just like next week.

And I can’t stand this.

I’m stuck.

I’m trapped.

I’m done.

I can’t save myself, my family or my friends.

God heard their “cry for rescue...”

The word translated rescue is intensive

There is no stronger way to say it

“If you don’t rescue us, we will die.”

“We don’t care what you do or where you take us, it just can’t be here anymore.”

That’s not a foxhole prayer.

It’s no longer about what we want.

It is about the Lord and what He wants.

I’m not praying a foxhole prayer: If you deliver me, I’ll live up to your expectations.

That’s a lie before we even start.

No, this prayer says, without You, O Lord, we die.

And we wear your name.

Lord, for your own name’s sake, have mercy on us.

Exodus 2:24 “And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.”

Fourth,

The Lord will always do what the Lord promises He will do

“God remembered his covenant...”

It’s not like He forgot and said, “Oh, wait I minute. Did I not do that?”

This is an idiomatic expression that deals more “application rather than recollection.”

It’s not that the Lord had forgotten - it was that the Lord was waiting until the appropriate time.

And that time had come.

What is a covenant?

It is a treaty, it’s an alliance of friendship, it’s an agreement with obligations

But this covenant is unusual because it is so one sided.

In this covenant, God does all the work.

The covenant starts with Abraham and is repeated to Isaac and Jacob

And after 400 years of slavery, the Lord decides it is the right time to move on to the next phase of His covenant.

Listen to the covenant Genesis 15:12-21

Genesis 15:12–21 ESV

As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram. And behold, dreadful and great darkness fell upon him. Then the Lord said to Abram, “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age. And they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.” When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites.”

Notice the land that the Lord promised to give to the nation of Israel.

It includes all of the Sinai peninsula which is currently under Egyptian control.

Israel did conquer it during the Six-Day War in 1967 but gave it back to Egypt in 1979 as part of a peace agreement.

It includes a good portion of modern Jordan, all of Lebanon, and a great portion of Syria.

The Lord made this covenant with Abram over 3,900 years ago.

There is a modern debate about this land because of Hamas’ godless attack.

There are folks who call for Israel to be wiped out of Palestinian territory.

But there is no Palestinian territory.

No two-state solution will prosper because the Lord did not allow for a two state solution.

The Lord made a covenant with Abraham that the Lord and the Lord alone would deliver that land to them.

And the only reason they don’t own it all is their failure to follow the Lord’s instructions as they entered the promised land.

The Lord did what He promised to do.

He promised to give them a land and then He did.

The Lord always does what He says he will do.

Which brings us to number five:

The Lord wants His people to know Him

We are teaching your 4th and 5th grade children this truth:

“How and why did God create us?

God created us male and female in his own image to know him, love him, live with him and glorify him. And it is right that we who were created by God should live to his glory.”

That’s not egotistical on God’s part - it’s really magnificent.

He knows if we live with Him - what did Jesus tell the thief on the cross?

Luke 23:43 ESV

And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

Paradise - a new heaven and a new earth.

And here is my fear - we are still in a foxhole - we are still looking at that as a fairy tale

Mythology - analogies and metaphors

My fear is it will have to get a whole lot worse before we quit praying foxhole prayers and simply surrender our will to the Lord.

It’s not going to work until we do.

Moses could not have ended chapter two any better than he did: “And God knew.”

God knew they were ready.

God knew the plan.

God knew exactly what He was about to do

And He is about to take the Israelites on an adventure that literally will change the world.

I grew up with Preachers and Pastors and Evangelists inviting me to be saved.

To have my sins forgiven so I could live in heaven forever with God.

Jesus is the only way to heaven - it’s true - there is nothing wrong with that at all.

But it’s not the entire story.

Jesus isn’t just inviting you to heaven - Jesus is inviting you on the greatest adventure anyone could ever know.

Jesus will take you places you had no clue you would go.

Jesus will put you in situations you’d have never chosen

And He’ll bring you through those situations in a way you never dreamed you could have done.

But you did - because it wasn’t just you.

It was the Holy Spirit that lives inside of you - guiding you in the ways of Jesus.

Listen, I will agree with you that Christians are a bunch of hypocritical bums.

Everyone one of us in here professes to follow Jesus and every one of us in here does something unGodly almost every day.

We know that - but we are following Jesus the best we can

And that’s all He asks.

Listen, you are a bum too.

And in your heart you know it.

You might think you’ve got your adventure all mapped out but you’re neglecting a significant puzzle part.

The Lord God has the plan and no amount of planning on your part will alter what He is going to do.

You’re not good.

You’re not God.

Join us.

Become a part of the hypocritical crowd who has found the answer to life, the universe and everything.

Follow Jesus with us and learn what we are learning with us.

Ask Jesus to forgive your rebellion against God.

Tell him you want to be His rebel

That you want to follow Him as He places all of His enemies under His feet.

And one day live in a whole new world.

And brother and sister in Christ.

Forget the foxhole prayers - they won’t save America.

Tell the Lord, I don’t care where you take us, but we can’t stay here.

And may the Lord’s glory be shown all through the earth.

Let us pray: