Push Through (Part 3): Do It, God!

We are preaching through Exodus.

This is our Relaunch Sermon Series. It is called “The Journey Ahead: From Identity Crisis to Missional Community”

Exodus tells the story of how God took a motley group of people in a bad situation and turned them into a nation that would testify to the world of His glory.

I believe that this is what God is doing through the Relaunch.

He is taking a modest congregation of saints with a unique set of challenges and turning us into a movement that will witness to this region of goodness and the love of God in Jesus Christ.

We have camped for a few weeks on this portion of the narrative where Moses gets off to a shaky start.

Moses was called by God in the mountain…though an encounter with God at the burning bush.

But when he goes to Egypt and begins the ministry to which he had been called and ordained; things don’t go as he expected.

In fact, things get a lot worse.

And so we have been closely inspecting how Moses survives the shaky start so that we can know what we must do in those moments when the Relaunch campaign is not what we think it should be…when it is not going how we think it should go.

We’ve had parts 1 and 2 of a sermon called “Push Through: How to Survive Setbacks and Overcome Opposition”

We have observed in the last two weeks that we must:

Maintain a state or readiness

And that we must Persevere by keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus.

But, beloved, a major part of how we will survive setbacks and overcome opposition is not through anything that we must do, but through what the Lord can do.

Now, I have to tell you that Sometimes, in the ministry of preaching, the preacher is the one in need of the preacher's preaching.

God has given me a word this morning that, if it isn’t for anybody else, it’s for me.

So, I want to preach to me this morning, and pray that you get something from it as well.

So I’ve titled the sermon with the prayer that I’ve been praying earnestly in my heart for almost 24 straight hours: DO IT, GOD!

I don’t know if anybody in the room has ever gotten to the place where you’re doing all the things you know to do, but there are still some gaps…

You’re trying as hard as you can, but it’s just doesn’t seem to be enough…

The goal of this message is not to suggest that there won’t be any work involved…but simply to remind us that at the end of the day, God has to get in our work…in our mistakes…in our triumphs…in our failures…

We are going to see that is actually God Himself who moves narrative forward and powers this great deliverance of His people.

Somebody needs to say it…DO IT GOD!

PRAYER

God Writes The Past

The narrative seems to be interrupted with this genealogy)...never skip the genealogy.

There are two things that we can take from the genealogy here in Exodus.

The first thing the genealogy establishes is that Moses and Aaron are Levites

Now if we read this from our vantage point, that sounds like a good thing.

If you know your bible, then you know that the Levites are the priestly tribe…the tribe who had God as their inheritance.

But the Levites had not become, at this point in the nation’s history, what the Levites would become.

The genealogy only includes the eldest 3 patriarchs (Reuben, Simeon, and Levi)...three tribes that had received a less than desirable blessing from Jacob because of their own sin.

In Genesis 49, we can read the blessing that Jacob speaks over Simeon and Levi when he is getting ready to die

Let my soul come not into their council; O my glory, be not joined to their company. For in their anger they killed men, and in their willfulness they hamstrung oxen. Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce, and their wrath, for it is cruel! I will divide them in Jacob and scatter them in Israel.

How is that for some last words from your Father?!

The writer of Exodus is saying, look God chose a couple of Levites…the tribe with the stain and shame…that’s who God called to deliver His people.

Beloved, maybe you feel like

you don’t have the right background to be on plant team for a church…

you don’t have the pedigree to be a pray or to prophecy.

Maybe you feel like God would probably use a bigger church with a better leader to spark a revival movement in Southland region of Chicago

Beloved, the God writes the past…Is the God who is writing this story.

And here’s what I like about it: not only does God write the past, God rights the past.

In Genesis chapter 15, God warned Abraham that his descendants would be enslaved in a foreign country for four hundred years and promised that they would be liberated in the fourth generation.

Check the genealogy

You’ve got: Levi (1st Generation), Kohath (2nd Generation), Amram (3rd Generation), Aaron (4th Generation)

God used a divine moment to shift the heritage of the Levites…

God used Aaron to birth something new in the Levitical bloodline.

Aaron’s fathers had been scoundrels and murderers. But, Aaron’s sons would be keepers of the house of God.

Beloved, I stopped by to tell you that the God who writes the past is in the business of RIGHTING the past.

I declare that this Relaunch is a divine moment

And I declare that God will use this moment to birth something new in your bloodline

A new legacy

A new anointing

A new heritage, if you will.

God has the power

After the genealogy, we get flash back to the conversation that God is having with Moses concerning Pharaoh.

Moses says to God, “the people haven’t listened to me, why would Pharaoh listen to me?”

And we learned in the last sermon that God gave Moses “a charge” concerning Pharaoh.

Well, here we see exactly what that charge is.

Here’s the text in chapter 7 verse 1: And the LORD said to Moses, “See, I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron shall be your prophet.

But, in the Hebrew there is not word “like”

It really reads, “I MAKE YOU GOD TO PHARAOH”

Now this doesn’t mean that Moses became divine

This is God saying to Moses: This is not about your speech impediment.

I am placing a grace on you so that every time Pharaoh sees you, He is going to see me.

I don’t know if I have any Lion King fans.

But there’s scene when Simba and Nala a still young cubs and they sneak off to an elephant graveyard and end up getting cornered by some hyenas.

And little Simba faces off with the hyenas and lets out his little cub growl…

The hyenas laugh at him and get ready to attack.

But, Simba rares back and opens up his mouth a second time and there comes the roar of mighty lion.

It’s not Simba’s voice…

His father, Mufasa has showed up to the scene.

I believe that God is saying to us what he was saying to Moses

Don’t worry about your speech impediment. Because from here on out, it’s going to be your mouth, but it will be my roar.

Your ministry. But, my anointing.

Your business. But, my favor.

Your meeting. But, my ideas.

Your prayers. But, my power.

Beloved, I declare that we are about to experience what it really means to be Ambassadors of Jesus Christ.

God is making us emissaries of Heaven.

Deputies of the Kingdom of God.

The express presence of Glory right here in this region.

Not by our own might or by our own power, but by the Spirit of the Living God.

God Calls His People

Exodus 7:7 Reads:

Now Moses was eighty years old, and Aaron eighty-three years old, when they spoke to Pharaoh.

Now, if you think that Exodus 7:7 is a flex, then you are absolutely right:

Moses was eighty years old, and Aaron eighty-three years old, when they spoke to Pharaoh.

Moses says, “If you didn’t recognize it, let me tell you; Me and Aaron were a couple of octogenarian brothers when we got started in ministry”.

But, it's not just a flex. It’s an exhortation.

Moses is saying, “We were too old for this. Only, there is no such thing as too old when God calls you.”

I believe that it was this portion of the Hebrew tradition that Caleb had in mind a generation later when he tells Joshua, “I am not too old to possess my inheritance.”

Exodus chapter 7 verse 7 is there to remind God’s people in every generation: DON’T EVER COUNT YOURSELF OUT, WHEN GOD HAS PUTS YOU IN.

The devil is constantly trying to tell the people of God why we are disqualified from doing what God has called us to do.

You disqualified because you’re too old

Too young

You sinned too much

You don’t have the degree

You don’t hold the credential

You don’t have the experience

You’re a woman

You have a disability

I’m sorry devil. But it’s not up to you. And honestly it’s not up to me either. Because God calls people.

So, I might be a little old for this. But, God called me. And he’s about to work through this old man.

Yes, I might be a little young for this, But, God called me and He’s about to work through this young lady.

I might be a woman in a man's world. But, God me. And they are to learn what a woman can do.

I may not have the degree, the experience, or the credential. But, I’ve got the call of God on my life.

He’ll give me ideas

He’ll give me the skill set.

He’ll give me everything that I need to get the job done well.

Beloved, we all have weaknesses that make us unlikely candidates for the work of the Lord.

But, I declare with the Apostle Paul, that God’s strength is made perfect in our weakness.

So, don’t count yourself out.

God is the one who calls people for His work.

Here’s the upshot of the message: we have a part to play…we have a work to do.

But, we must always remember that we are not working for God, God is working with us.

WE ENGAGE, BUT GOD DOES THE WORK.

Work out your own soul’s salvation with fear and trembling…for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. (Php 2:13)

Beloved, our job is to honor and obey the Lord…and then watch Him do His thing.

I believe that God is ready to move on behalf of his people who are ready to take this posture:

I’m going to be attentive to your voice

I’m going to obey your word.

But, I need you to do it, God!

The Lord prompted me bring this draft of the Relaunch ministry plan as a representation of the Relaunch…

You have something that represents a situation in your life

Bring it to the altar

Let’s Pray…DO IT GOD…

Open Doors

Break Chains

Heal Bodies