Sermon for August 30, 2020 26 Minutes

Good morning everyone,,, watching by video.

Before I start with my sermon,,, I want to have announcements and praise and prayer request read.

Announcements:

We will have charge conference coming up soon. We will need to begin to prepare for that.

Praise Reports and Prayer request

I sent out text messages and Facebook post again this week,,, asking for praise reports and prayer request.

These are the ones that I've written down.

If I've missed yours,,, please text me or post it in the comments and we will do our best to add it at the end.

Praise reports

I continue with our thanks to our healthcare workers during this terrible pandemic. I believe that we truly know who our heroes today are!

Prayer Request:

Remember Shawn and Michele,,, praying for strength for them,,, and of course all the rest of the family as well.

Remember to keep Monica in your prayers also.

Remember Mrs. Mary Alice Martin Kitchens and her family, I found out this morning that they had her son's funeral yesterday.

Remember Holland Barton,,, born prematurely and having several issues. He's improved some but still in need of prayers.

Remember Kaye Lee from Prentiss.

Remember Betty Thacker from MS. Tank Co.

Remember Brad Lees as he battles his cancer diagnosis and deals with recovery from kidney stones.

Continue to remember Glenda Faye and the Coulter family

Continue to remember the healthcare workers

Remember all of the problems facing our nation

And,,,

Any unspoken prayer request.

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Before I begin with my sermon,,, I wanted to begin this morning with an opening prayer and lead into the Lord's prayer like we usually begin our worship service. That way if you like,,, you can join me in saying the Lord's prayer.

Invocation and Lord's prayer

Dear Lord, I thank you for your continued presence among us today and every day. I thank you for our healthcare workers who continue to work tirelessly and sometimes without a thank you! I thank you for those that are listening and watching by video. I ask for continued guidance for them and others. So we ask for healing for all of those that are sick this morning,,, we pray for all of those that we mentioned this morning,,, the unspoken request,,, those on our prayer list and even any needs that weren't mentioned,,, we ask for safety and guidance for our healthcare workers and all others that must work during this time. Lord,,, I pray for all of those that are still working on clearing storm damage and helping others. We ask for healing from all these events for our great nation,,, and

We ask these things in Jesus's name who taught us to pray, by saying:

Our Father, which art in heaven,

hallowed be thy name;

thy kingdom come;

thy will be done;

on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgive us our trespasses,

as we forgive those who trespass against us.

And lead us not into temptation;

but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom,

the power and the glory,

for ever.

Amen.

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This morning I'll be reading Exodus chapter 3 verses 1 through 15.

I'll be reading from the Holman Christian Standard Bible.

Exodus 3:1-15

In the verses that we will look at this morning,,, they cover Moses' call from God. He had spent the first 40 years of his life training under the courts of Pharaoh and was nearing the completion of 40 more years of his life as a shepherd.

Exodus 3:1-15

1 Meanwhile, Moses was shepherding the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian. He led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2 Then the Angel of the LORD appeared to him in a flame of fire within a bush. As Moses looked, he saw that the bush was on fire but was not consumed. 3 So Moses thought: I must go over and look at this remarkable sight. Why isn’t the bush burning up? 4 When the LORD saw that he had gone over to look, God called out to him from the bush, “Moses, Moses!” “Here I am,” he answered. 5 “Do not come closer,” He said. “Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” 6 Then He continued, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at God. 7 Then the LORD said, “I have observed the misery of My people in Egypt, and have heard them crying out because of their oppressors, and I know about their sufferings. 8 I have come down to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians and to bring them from that land to a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey —the territory of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. 9 The Israelites’ cry for help has come to Me, and I have also seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. 10 Therefore, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh so that you may lead My people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.” 11 But Moses asked God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and that I should bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” 12 He answered, “I will certainly be with you, and this will be the sign to you that I have sent you: when you bring the people out of Egypt, you will all worship God at this mountain.” 13 Then Moses asked God, “If I go to the Israelites and say to them: The God of your fathers has sent me to you, and they ask me, ‘What is His name?’ what should I tell them?” 14 God replied to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: I AM has sent me to you.” 15 God also said to Moses, “Say this to the Israelites: Yahweh, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is My name forever; this is how I am to be remembered in every generation.

God bless the reading and the hearing of your word this morning.

Let us pray:

Dear Lord,,, as we begin this morning,,, with all that are listening and watching by video,,, we ask that you open our ears to hear and our hearts and minds to receive the message that you have for us today,,, In Jesus' name I pray,,, Amen.

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Since we have been away from the church building for awhile,,, and not worshipping together as a group,,, have any of you thought about the way that we tend to downplay our thoughts of God?

The way that we,,, at times,,, don't give God the respect and glory that we should?

Moses was told immediately,,, not to come closer because the place where he was standing,,, was holy ground!

Do we,,, as Christians,,, truly pay any attention to the word,,, holy?

We are coming back to worship together next week and we need to be sure that our focus is on what really matters.

We need to seriously look at these verses this morning and see if we can learn anything about the respect that God deserves and expects from us.

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Verse 1 says: 1 Meanwhile, Moses was shepherding the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian. He led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.

As I said earlier,,, Moses had spent the first 40 years of his life learning from the teachers of royalty in the courts of Pharaoh.

Then he spent the next 40 years of his life as a shepherd in the wilderness.

Through both of these teaching parts of his life,,, Moses is ready to lead his people out of Egypt.

Moses could not have accomplished this feat without both of these times of learning.

God used both of the 40 year periods to teach him the skills that he needed to do the job that God intended for him to do.

So as Moses is leading the flock to the far side of the wilderness,,, he came to Horeb,,, the mountain of God.

I want to say just a few quick words about Horeb,,, the mountain of God.

In the Old Testament Commentary Volume 1 it says Horeb was the name of the whole mountain cluster of which Sinai was a single summit.

It says that in the Bible the two words are used interchangeably to symbolize the Mount of the Law; but before Israel reached the mountain district, like it's used here—and after they left it,,, as in Deuteronomy, when they were encamped in the plains of Moab—it is called Horeb,,, since at a distance the special summit isn't visible,,, but once they get close to the Mount of the Law,,, it is always (except only in Exod. 33:6) called Sinai,,, since,,, while among the mountains, it was necessary to specify the particular peak intended.

As an example,,, Moses smote the rock in Horeb (the district) before they reached Sinai, the mountain.

I said all of that because we can get so caught up in names that don't match and it can be used against the Bible by someone that doesn't understand that.

Just try to remember that if there is something that you don't understand,,, to spend time researching it until you understand it as well as you can.

I say,,, as well as you can,,, because sometimes there isn't a clear answer to what confuses us.

The main thing that I believe that we can do though,,, is to believe that the words that we are reading are true,,, we just haven't had it explained to where we can understand it because of limited information.

The day may come when we discover another piece of the puzzle and it is easily understood,,, in the meantime,,, rely on faith in God,,, because if what's in question was wrong,,, I believe that it would have been removed by now.

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Verses 2 and 3 say: 2 Then the Angel of the LORD appeared to him in a flame of fire within a bush. As Moses looked, he saw that the bush was on fire but was not consumed. 3 So Moses thought: I must go over and look at this remarkable sight. Why isn’t the bush burning up?

God chose the small burning bush as His way of revealing Himself,,, and he waited to see how sensitive Moses was toward the insignificant things of life before he invested him with larger tasks.

The fire symbolized God's powerful, consuming, and preserving presence

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Verses 4 and 5 say: 4 When the LORD saw that he had gone over to look, God called out to him from the bush, “Moses, Moses!” “Here I am,” he answered. 5 “Do not come closer,” He said. “Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.”

After God sees that Moses is looking,,, and he answers to God's reply,,, God sets up boundaries here where He told Moses "Do not come closer".

This was to prevent him from coming into the presence of God before he was ready,,, and,,, to teach him that God was separate and distinct from humans.

Because God was present,,, what had been ordinary became "holy ground",,, and consequently,,, "set apart" for a distinct use.

The place where sheep and goats had traveled just a short time ago was transformed into "holy ground" simply by God's presence.

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Verse 6 says: 6 Then He continued, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at God.

When the condition for meeting God had been satisfied,,, he revealed himself as the "God of your father."

The collective singular "father" had a special meaning,,, because it was through the "One" man of promise,,, that the "Many",,, were to receive the blessing of God.

Thus God assured Moses that the God of his father had not forsaken his repeated word of promise or his people.

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Verses 7 through 10 say: 7 Then the LORD said, “I have observed the misery of My people in Egypt, and have heard them crying out because of their oppressors, and I know about their sufferings. 8 I have come down to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians and to bring them from that land to a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey —the territory of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. 9 The Israelites’ cry for help has come to Me, and I have also seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. 10 Therefore, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh so that you may lead My people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.”

God then told Moses that He has observed the misery of the people,,, and heard them crying out,,, and how He would bring about the deliverance of His people.

He would use Moses,,, not in his own strength (Acts 7:25) but by His strength.

Interestingly,,, while God promised the people two things,,, (first was deliverance from Egypt and second,,, entrance into a new land),,, He only told Moses,,, to lead My people out of Egypt.

God knew,,, Moses,,, would not enter the Promised Land (Deut. 32:48–52).

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Verses 11 and 12 say: 11 But Moses asked God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and that I should bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” 12 He answered, “I will certainly be with you, and this will be the sign to you that I have sent you: when you bring the people out of Egypt, you will all worship God at this mountain.”

Any time that we are tasked with doing something that God has planned for us to do,,, our first response is usually like Moses' response.

We don't accept the fact that God isn't going to ask us to do something that cannot be done.

We too easily forget that God is supplying us with everything that we need.

We still look to our own personal strengths instead of relying on God's strength.

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Verses 13 and 14 say: 13 Then Moses asked God, “If I go to the Israelites and say to them: The God of your fathers has sent me to you, and they ask me, ‘What is His name?’ what should I tell them?” 14 God replied to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: I AM has sent me to you.”

Names were extremely important among the ancient Hebrews,,, because they revealed character even more than simply providing a way of identifying people.

Many times in the days of the patriarchs,,, an outstanding religious experience centering around a vision of God or the building of an altar brought the revelation or adoption of a new name for God,,, either in a larger understanding of His nature,,, or,,, in a sense reminiscent of that particular incident and place.

So when Moses came with his story of a marvelous vision from God,,, one of the most natural questions that could be asked to test the genuineness of his account would be,,, What was the name?

And the Lord quickly supplied that answer and the long phrase that was written out is traditionally translated "I AM THAT I AM".

And this name reveals God as the self-sufficient One,,, as the unlimited One,,, as the eternal One,,, as the God of the “eternal Now.”

It speaks of His self-existence,,, His mystery,,, His unapproachableness,,, His majesty,,, His omnipotence,,, His omniscience,,, His goodness and His grace all at once.

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Verse 15 says: 15 God also said to Moses, “Say this to the Israelites: Yahweh, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is My name forever; this is how I am to be remembered in every generation.

In this verse God advised Moses to add the more familiar name of Yahweh,,, the God your fathers,,, the name which was His forever,,, a name that would be remembered unto all generations.

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One of the most important things that we can learn from these scriptures is the respect that was required from Moses during his interaction with God.

As soon as God realized that Moses was paying attention to the burning bush,,, God commands him to remove his sandals.

This was something that was done to show respect and was understood at that time as being a way that the people interacted with each other in regard to that.

Another thing that comes to mind,,, is the fact that the ancient writers were so much in awe of the name of God that they didn't even write the vowels out in His name,,, they only used the consonants.

Do we give God the respect that His name really deserves?

This is something that we need to pray about and spend time listening to God about because this is something that we need to get right,,, at church and at home.

Any time that we use God's name it should be with the respect and admiration that He deserves.

Omg may not seem as serious as truly using God's name as a cuss word like we normally think of using God's name in vain,,, but it isn't using God's name correctly so I believe that we should be careful about anything like that.

We need to return to treating everything about God with the respect that He deserves instead of becoming complacent in our thoughts,,, our actions,,, and our worship.

God is so much more than we can truly understand or comprehend,,, so I believe that we should be very careful in our speaking and the way that we live out our life when it comes to living a life that is glorifying Him instead of mocking Him without realizing it.

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So I hope that each of you will pray about the way that you show respect to God.

Ask Him to reveal to you ways that you might be missing the mark and ways that you need to change if needed.

It's only through personal conversations that you have with God that will make a difference in your life.

I can preach all day long but if you don't act on these words then I'm almost wasting my time.

So remember these scriptures and what God was trying to teach us as we continue our walk with God this week!

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