Remember God

INTRODUCTION

Today we will wrap up our Exodus series; I pray that God touched and spoke to you somehow during this series.

I want you to think about something for a moment.

We all understand that this life is not eternal; in other words, there will come a time when we die and go on to the next life.

I do not know if I am the only one, but one of the things that really bothers me is the thought that I will be forgotten when I die.

For some reason, I fear that my being here made no difference.

Sometimes when I read biographies of those who have passed long ago, I feel a bit of jealousy.

These people, some of who died centuries ago, are still remembered.

We do a lot of things to keep the memory of some event or a famous person going.

If you have ever been to Washington DC, you will see statues and walls dedicated to the memory of certain events or people from our nation's history.

When I was in Italy, I was captivated by the history, the centuries of history.

There was a restaurant that had been in business, if memory serves me right, since the 1700s!

The owners were very old! 😀

We want people to remember the impact we had on their lives; we want people to remember the difference we made in their life.

All of my Grandparents have passed away, my Mother’s mom passed before I was born, so I did not know her, but I still remember the impact my Grandparents had on me.

I will never forget them.

There are so many people in my life who have passed away that I still remember.

I remember how they impacted my life, how they made me laugh and sometimes cry.

What about you?

Do you want to be forgotten?

Live, die, and be forgotten.

Exodus establishes some important images of who God is.

But even beyond the themes of the narrative, it stresses the importance of remembering.

God remembers his promise to Abraham and hears the cries of his descendants.

The Israelites are to remember the God who brought them out of Egypt through the Red Sea.

God wants to show his power so that we remember our relationship with him.

God desires us to remember Him.

God knew how quickly we forget.

Throughout the Bible, God had the people do things so they would remember; ceremonies, celebrations, and such were designed to help us remember.

The Passover was designed to help us remember.

The Lord’s Supper was designed to help us remember what Jesus did for us on the cross in the New Testament.

Today we will examine a couple of passages in Exodus that point to some areas of remembrance that God wants us not to forget.

As you think about it, how would it feel for you to be forgotten by those who you loved so much that you when you are no longer around?

Let’s begin by turning to Exodus 3:15 and 20:24

Exodus 3:15 (CSB)

15 God also said to Moses, “Say this to the Israelites: The Lord, the God of your ancestors, 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.

Exodus 20:24 (CSB)

24 “Make an earthen altar for me, and sacrifice on it your burnt offerings and fellowship offerings, your flocks and herds. I will come to you and bless you in every place where I cause my name to be remembered.

SERMON

I. Remember who God is.

In Exodus 3:15; which we covered a few weeks ago; we learned that this is where God is calling on Moses to lead His people out of Egypt.

Moses wants to know what to say if when he is asked who sent him.

God told Moses what to say!

God tells Moses that He is the God of their ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob!

This distinction is important because, through Moses, God is reminding the people who He is.

These people had been in bondage so long that they needed to remember who God was!

At the end of verse 15, God tells Moses that this was God’s name forever and that this is how God was to be remembered in every generation.

God had no intention of being forgotten!

When people ask who you are, what will you tell them?

As we discussed before, will you identify yourself by your job, position, political affiliation, or favorite sports team?

God could have appealed to the fact He is the creator of all things!

He could have said He was the ruler of the universe.

But instead, God appeals to His relationship with the people.

I am the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

God wanted the people to remember the relationship He has with the people.

Is He all the other things I mentioned, like the creator of all things? YES!

But God wants us to remember His relationship with us.

When we identify ourselves, our identity should be who we are in Christ!

I am a Christian, a follower of Jesus Christ, a child of God!

Then everything else falls behind that identity!

In Exodus 20:24God asks the people to build an altar.

Remember, Exodus 20 deals with God giving Moses the Ten Commandments.

The reaffirmation of God as Israel’s (as well as the rest of the world’s) God naturally led into a description of the proper worship of Him.

God says that He will come and bless them where ever He causes His name to be remembered.

Commentary on Exodus: The Second Book of Moses (The End of the Notes on the Decalogue)

Later in the wanderings, the tabernacle would be moved from place to place, and God’s name recorded at every place where the tabernacle came was an assurance of his blessing.

In the New Covenant, which is always pre-shadowed by everything that happened in Exodus, there would, of course, never be a physical altar, but the promise here still has significant meaning.

This fulfillment is found when one is baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

God will meet one in the baptismal waters, where God will bless us with forgiveness of sins as well as new life!

When we forget who God is, it throws our life into chaos because we try to do what God is supposed to do.

When we forget who God is, nothing good comes from it.

Just as we looked at the Ten Commandments, which of the ten will make your life worse for obeying?

When we forget who God is, we will miss His blessings.

We will live life however we see fit, and that, my friends, gets us into trouble.

Remember who God is, and remember you are not Him!

Let’s turn to Exodus 13:3 and Exodus 20:2.

Exodus 13:3 (CSB)

3 Then Moses said to the people, “Remember this day when you came out of Egypt, out of the place of slavery, for the Lord brought you out of here by the strength of his hand. Nothing leavened may be eaten.

Exodus 20:2 (CSB)

2 I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the place of slavery.

II. Remember what God has done.

Imagine something with me.

Imagine that all you have done in life, all of your accomplishments were one day forgotten.

Maybe someone remembers your name, but they do not remember what you have done.

We go to great lengths to make sure what we have done or accomplished in life is not forgotten.

We have class reunions so that we can reminisce about the good times of the past.

We get to relive the athletic accomplishments of our youth.

Not only do we want to be remembered, but we also want people to remember what we have done or accomplished.

Not only are we to remember WHO God is, but we also need to remember WHAT God has done!

In Exodus 13:3, after God instituted the Passover and subsequently took the life of the firstborn of all who did not have the blood of the lamb on their doorpost, Moses tells the people to not only remember who God is, but what he had done for the people!

God wanted the Israelites to remember forever the day that God delivered them from the bonds of slavery!

In an article in Christianity Today from February 3, 2015, entitled “Why It Matters That Exodus Really Happened,” author Gregory Allen Thornbury states.

God wants us (and our neighbors) free and not in bondage. So many in our world long for freedom and democracy.

It matters that the Exodus really happened.

In fact, no one story of the Bible has been more used for the cause of freedom and combating slavery than the story of the exodus.

Martin Luther King Jr. repeatedly referenced its imagery while fighting for civil rights in the 1960s.

“King repeatedly cast the struggle for civil rights against the historicity of the backdrop of the Exodus.”

All these centuries later, what God did for the Israelites is not lost to history; the actions of God yet inspire the cause of freedom today!

In the latter part of verse 3, we are reminded that the Lord accomplished the feat of freeing the notion by the strength of His hand!

We must remember that God is a powerful and sovereign God.

And that this powerful and sovereign God cares for people.

He hears their cries (Exodus 3:7).

He wants to be with people and love them like a father.

We are to remember not only what God has done, but WHY!

When you miss the WHY, you miss the point of life, the point of God sending His Son!

If we forget that God loves us and desires a relationship with us, we will tend to think that all God wants is to make our lives lifeless and boring.

As we examined two weeks ago, as we covered the Ten Commandments, God begins the Commandments by telling the people WHY He has the authority to set the commands, HE is the LORD THEIR God who brought them out of slavery!

When you are baptized into Jesus, you too have been freed from the bonds of slavery, slavery to sin!

God bought your freedom with a price; the price was His Son dying on the cross for you!

I wonder how many Christians have forgotten what God has done for them?

I wonder how many of us have been at it so long that we have forgotten that Jesus saved us from our sins?

Have you forgotten what Jesus has done for you?

Christians in Afghanistan are losing everything, including their lives, for their faith, in America, well, I will leave it at that.

Let’s look at a couple more passages for a final thought for the day.

Exodus 6:5 (CSB)

5 Furthermore, I have heard the groaning of the Israelites, whom the Egyptians are forcing to work as slaves, and I have remembered my covenant.

III. Remember what God will do!

When we are facing the stresses and difficulties of life, we need to not only remember who God is and what He has done, we also need to remember what He will do!

When God is speaking to Moses in Exodus 6:5, He tells Moses that He was moved to act because He remembered His covenant.

When God wants to get rid of the Israelites after the Golden Calf incident, Moses is speaking to God in Exodus 32:13Reminding God to remember His promise to Abraham, and by extension, to Isaac and Jacob.

Exodus 32:13 (CSB)

13 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac, and Israel—you swore to them by yourself and declared, ‘I will make your offspring as numerous as the stars of the sky and will give your offspring all this land that I have promised, and they will inherit it forever.’ ”

Remembering does not imply that God had forgotten His covenant, but rather, Moses is simply calling God’s attention to the promise of what He would do.

Moses pleaded with God to remember the promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Israel regarding their posterity being multiplied and regarding their entry into and possession of the land of Canaan.

Remember that God will ultimately bring about redemption.

The Passover of Exodus 12 reveals that God will save his people through the shedding of blood.

As John says, when speaking of Jesus, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29)

We have to remember what God has promised to do for us!

Revelation 2:10 (CSB)

10 Don’t be afraid of what you are about to suffer. Look, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison to test you, and you will experience affliction for ten days. Be faithful to the point of death, and I will give you the crown of life.

We live in a messy world; we have an eternal home in heaven that is the best!

Revelation 21:3–4 (CSB)

3 Then I heard a loud voice from the throne: Look, God’s dwelling is with humanity, and he will live with them. They will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them and will be their God.

4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; grief, crying, and pain will be no more, because the previous things have passed away.

When you are struggling, remember what God will do!

CONCLUSION

I hope our journey through the book of Exodus has blessed you in some way.

I see a lot of parallels in the book of Exodus to our lives today.

One constant thing, if we forget God, who He is, what He has done for us, and what He will do for us, we will go off track.

At some point, our faith has to mean enough to us to let it make a difference in our life.

COVID, persecution, laziness should never be allowed to shake our faith or put us into habits that are counterproductive to our relationship with Jesus and our fellow Christians.

Our Application Point for today is: We will remember that we serve a powerful, compassionate, promise-fulfilling, redeeming God.