Winner of the No-Win Situation

Exodus 14

Fear not. Stand firm. See Jesus – the winner of no-win situations.

No Win Situation.

Pro-tip. Don't post pictures of you relaxing at the Red Sea when your wife has had the kids by herself for 3 weeks and is having a bad day.

Speaking of no-win situations. I put myself in that one. Maybe I should preach about grace and forgiveness, I am thankful for those!

Between the Army and Pharaoh

“Escaped” from Egypt and now led by the manifest presence of God, the swirling vortex, the pillar of cloud and fire, the Israelites are all set to escape Egypt. But they don’t take the main road, up the I-25 of the ancient world.

Which direction they go actually isn’t at all clear. But they go one way… for awhile, let’s say South towards Colorado Springs, perhaps. Then, they double back. Then they head East, maybe out towards Sterling.

Pharaoh is back in Egypt, trying to recover from economic and personal devastation in Egypt. Maybe it’s been days, or even weeks. Egypt is not only feeling the pain of its lost workforce, it has to be feeling the pain of its wealth and livestock… and the last remnant of that went with those Israelites. And he is hearing reports that the Israelites are wandering back and forth through the wilderness like lost puppies. Lost, like maybe they had been abandoned by their God, if he is anything like the capricious and distracted Egyptian Gods. Pharaoh decides to bring them back in, sets off with his people, picks the best of his army, especially the speedy chariots, the tanks of the ancient world, and sets off to recover his slaves.

The people of Israel have been marching for days, maybe weeks. Making no apparent progress towards anything. They follow the cloud by day and the pillar by night… but the pillar is acting awfully lost. We don’t know if they know it, but God is apparently dangling them around before Pharaoh like a string before a kitten.

On the Shore of the Red Sea

Pharaoh’s army quickly and easily catches up to the people of Israel… caught in perhaps the worst possible defensive position. They are backed up against a sea, a large body of water, probably the Red Sea which is a large inlet that separates Egypt (at the northern tip of Africa) and the Sinai Peninsula (the South East tip of Asia).

One important note: odds are good that none of them could swim, almost no one could back then. To them, this sea is an impossible barrier, an immovable object. When we consider that there were children and goods and livestock with them… it would be pretty impassable for us too.

They are up against the immovable object.

And here comes the unstoppable force. Pharaoh’s army coming after me. We don’t really react with any kind of terror at the image of a thousand plus chariots rolling down on us, so for our purposes, imagine a long line of Abrams tanks cresting the hill and taking aim. This is an unstoppable military force against an untrained, mostly unarmed, crowd of terrified slaves.

And there you are. In the middle of it. Holding your kids hands. Looking at your wife or your husband. Carrying all your possessions in the world. What do you do?

What do you do in a no-win situation.

Crying out to Yahweh

Probably, I would do exactly what the people of Israel did. Cry out to God. “HELP!”

10 As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians, marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the LORD.

Great growth on their part, last time they just screamed at Moses. God first, good idea, then scream at Moses

11 They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? 12 Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, “Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!”

I wonder if Moses said: no, I kind of don’t remember that. A little revisionist history there.

When it looks like you’ve reached a dead end, though, everyone becomes an expert on the would-have should-have could-have. But at least, at first, the people of Israel looked in the right direction for help.

In a no-win situation, the people cried out to Yahweh

Moses’ statement of faith

But what comes next is pretty spectacular.

I hope, on my best day, I might aspire to the kind of faith Moses shows in this moment of crisis. He shows incredible growth from earlier when he turned the panic of Israel right back on God.

Maybe Moses looks over at the pillar of cloud and fire and takes some comfort. “Oh look at the gigantic sign of God’s presence with us… I think we’ll be okay.” Maybe he learned something watching God work miraculously time after time, 11 signs of divine power.

Moses says this: 14:13-14

13 Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. 14 The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.”

So much good stuff in there. Fear not. Stand firm. See the deliverance of the Lord.

What looks like an unstoppable force, those Egyptians: you will never see them again.

Shut up, Yahweh is going to fight for you.

The unstoppable force you see assaulting you is just the next target for God’s victory.

What an amazing statement of faith. God hadn’t really told Moses what He was going to do… other than that He was going to gain glory.

But Moses makes this incredible statement of faith, he is starting to figure out just how God works.

Fear not. Stand firm. See the salvation of Yahweh.

Pay no attention to the unstoppable force. Pay no attention to the “immovable object.” You think you are in-between a rock and a hard place. You think you are crushed by circumstances.

You think you are in a no-win situation? Our God is the winner of no-win situations.

Result: Winning the no-win Situation

And then, immediately, God says to Moses, “Tell the Israelites to move on.”

“Raise your staff, stretch out your hand, divide the water and walk on dry ground.”

The immovable object you see blocking your way is the very path God has created for you.

Oh and that unstoppable force? That army of ancient tanks? Pharaoh’s army of men and chariots and all, God stands, as the cloud, in between them and this crossing force of men, women, children and livestock. Probably a slow process crossing the sea. Maybe it took hours, maybe days, but God himself stood the rear-guard.

Then maybe he messed with their heads a bit, hardened their hearts, such that they thought charging into the middle of this miracle after the Israelites might be a good idea.

As you might know, the end result was this:

Result, 14:29-31

29 But the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left. 30 That day the Lord saved Israel from the hands of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians lying dead on the shore. 31 And when the Israelites saw the mighty hand of the Lord displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the Lord and put their trust in him and in Moses his servant.

God was the winner of the no-win situation.

God moved the immovable to make a way. God stopped the unstoppable to free his people.

Our Salvation

What about our salvation? Ultimately, we know what that is. It is even in this passage:

Remember Moses’ statement of faith.

Fear not. Stand firm. See Yahweh’s salvation.

I like to phrase it that last way, we miss it if we say “deliverance of the LORD.” Yahweh’s salvation, remember what that is in Hebrew? Yehoshua… Yeshua… Jesus.

Fear not. Stand firm. See Jesus.

Yahweh’s salvation is, Yehoshua, or Yeshua… Jesus. Our ultimate salvation from slavery of sin and death is accomplished. The parting of the Red Sea was a step in the journey that led to the cross.

We were in a no-win salvation. Assaulted by sin. Backed up against death. But fear not. Stand firm. See Jesus. See salvation. God is the winner of no-win situations.

But we still find ourselves in no-win situations. We find ourselves at a dead-end. We find ourselves without options, without hope. We see enemy armies approaching and no way to escape.

And, like the Israelites, we cry out! Lord, save us!

And it is SO TEMPTING to just take this kind of salvation language and modify it to fit our situation. My debts are the Egyptian army, my job search is the Red Sea. God is going to conquer my bills and part the way to a new job!

We pray for that, we hope for that, but we just can’t use this as a script to command God’s action.

But we also know that Jesus, that Yahweh’s salvation, is not just something that happened long ago to give us eternal life insurance for what will happen far in our future. That we are in the midst of God’s salvation plan right now, and that God has a plan and abundant life for us now.

So what do we do in our dead-end no-win situation?

Our Walk through the Red Sea

What, truly, was their salvation?

God’s salvation was surprising

Even Moses, with his statement of faith, had to have been shocked by the way God won the no-win situation. God created options where there were no options. He temporarily altered fluid dynamics and surface tension and mud hydrostatic tension. Israel walked across dry land.

God’s salvation is surprising

God’s salvation was terrifying

This was no easy path or journey. It took a good deal of time. Maybe walking a few miles. And with 30+ foot walls of water on both sides. The weight of that, the terror of that. The wind is supposedly holding that back. Traveling with your kids through this howling wind tunnel, trusting every second that you won’t be crushed and drowning in the next moment.

God’s salvation road was terrifying… it took faith and courage to travel.

God's salvation was for his glory

Again and again in chapter 14, God says why he is going about the escape from Egypt in this way. It is for His glory. The Egyptians will know He is Lord. The Israelites will know and fear the LORD. God’s salvation glorifies God.

God’s salvation was for the good of His people

God’s salvation was for his glory, not for the comfort of His people… but it was for their good. Now they are free of Egypt… and Egypt’s military force is destroyed. Egypt is no longer able to pursue, and won’t be able to for generations because of the devastation of the plagues. It wasn’t comfortable, it wasn’t easy, but it was for their good.

Call up worship team

Some of you are walking in what looks like an awfully hopeless situation. What do you do when it seems like there simply are no jobs? What all your plans and dreams for the future keep coming up empty? What do you do when the doctors simply don't know what to do?

I don’t know how God is going to work in your situation. He is there, that pillar of cloud and fire is with you.

God’s salvation is surprising and unexpected. Sometimes the road he opens up is scary and terrifying, taking courage and faith to travel. Sometimes it stretches out far longer than we hoped.

But he will act for His glory and your good.

God will act for His glory, and He will work all things together for the good of those who love Him.

So, in the footsteps of Moses, let us adopt his words of faith in our trials.

Fear not. Stand firm. See the salvation of the Lord.

Fear not. Stand firm. See Jesus. What he has done for us, what he is doing in us now, what he has for eternally.

Fear not. Stand firm. See Jesus, the winner of no-win situations.