God's Miraculous Deliverance Of Israel

Well, thank you very much for that special music. Very, very nice to have. We're surely happy to have you all here in the area, and glad you're able to help us, serve us, even with the musical talent that you have. We thank you very much for that.

Well, I wanted to cover something today that was at least somewhat connected to what we have been going over the last week regarding the Days of Unleavened Bread. But I don't know that I'm going to make a connection to this, because normally, during the spring holy days, we talk about what we find in Exodus 12, in Exodus 13, in Exodus 14, the time when Israel, the people of God, the people who actually God had sent into Israel back in the day of Joseph, and when his brothers and his father, Jacob, were able to be actually eventually brought down and preserved during a famine, and yet after several hundred years, the tribes, the families, the tribes, the communities had grown to where there were a massive number of Israelites in Egypt. And then, as we read in the miraculous way that he did, God brought them out of Egypt. He brought them out of that land that was a pagan land, that was a false land, had many false gods, and he preserved them. He actually rescued them. And I think most of us are very familiar with that story. It was something that, it actually is something that we rehearse almost every year, as you go through the past and then the current issues and lessons that we want to learn in connection with the Passover and in connection with the, again, the spring holy days, the days of Unleavened Bread. And I'm going to connect this. I'll read some of this in Exodus 14 in a second, but I want to connect it with something that, I guess, in my thoughts as a younger student in the past, I was kind of puzzled. I really didn't understand very much. This was when I was in college and actually that seemed like an awful long time ago. I can barely remember the years, the four years that I was in college. And yet, I remember one thing that to me seemed kind of odd.

You know, why was it, even though we had several different Bible classes every year, and of course at that time at Ambassador College there were, it was a liberal arts, it is a liberal arts, there was a liberal arts college at the time, so it wasn't just teaching Bible or theology. It had a lot of other things that should be taught and were taught at the time. But I recall one of the Bible classes, and I guess, I don't know whether this was a semester or whether it was a whole year, but they were spending a long, long time going through this book, not the Bible, but a book called the Genesis Flood. And I kept thinking, well, I wonder why we're going over this?

Because to me, it seemed rather simple. You can read Genesis 6, and if you already believe what the Bible says, if you are already committed to believing God and believing the Word of God, well then why are you concerned about verifying or learning about all the things that they were going over out of this book about the Genesis Flood? But of course, later I would learn that often biblical critics certainly want to dismiss the fact that there was a universal thought.

That's a pretty common thinking or a line of thinking that some people have. But also, not only do they want to dismiss the fact that the Flood occurred and that Noah was actually rescued and spared he and his family, and that there was a huge transition that occurred that time on earth. But they also want to dismiss, in whatever way they might choose to do it, the delivery of Israel out of Egypt through the Red Sea. How could that possibly be something that could have happened? I mean, that just doesn't make sense. That just is not something that, if people don't want to believe God, if they don't want to believe His Word, if they want to just postulate about whatever they think happens or is going on with their lives or the future, well then they want to dismiss these incredibly miraculous things that God has done. And not only that He has done, but He will yet continue to do some things in a similar way. And so, I guess it was a little confusing to me why that would be something that would be undermined in that way, but later on I can certainly see the reason for that. As I mentioned here in Exodus chapter 14, we've covered, again over the last couple of weeks, several different lessons out of Israel, out or about Israel, coming out of the land of Egypt. And here in chapter 14 you have, you know, the account. You know, they had begun, back in Exodus 12, they had begun that exit. They had begun to come out of the land of Egypt. They have, in a sense, been persecuted. They had been in captivity. They had been enslaved. They had been abused in many ways. And yet, God, working through Moses, was going to bring them out of that land. He started this by instituting the Passover.

And of course we read in chapter 12 more so, which I won't go through, how that there was going to be a lamb and each of the households, and there would be blood from that lamb then placed on the door posts of their house. And then there would be a Passover. They would be passed over. They would be rescued, and their first growing would not die like those in the land of Egypt did.

And then after that, then they were to be heading out of the land. And yet after they started that journey and then would go on that for perhaps seven days, they would come to a trap. See, whenever you look at a map, you could see if, well, if you're going from where they were in the northern part of Egypt up to where Israel is today, then going along the path of the Mediterranean Sea makes the most sense. It's the shortest route. It probably would be the easiest route, but that wasn't what God did. God sent them down into an area that would eventually just become a trap. It would become a trap because Pharaoh would follow behind them, and then they would have the problem of how are we going to get away. And again, crossing the Red Sea as we're going to read about it here, you know, what Moses was told. Let's see, let's start in chapter 14 and read some of this.

It says in verse 10, as Pharaoh drew near, the Israelites looked back and there were the Egyptians advancing on them in great fear. They cried out to the Lord. They said to Moses, was it because that there were no grapes in Egypt? That you've taken us away to die in the wilderness?

Now, as we read some of this, we should think about the fact that the Israelites were not really that close to God. Moses, you know, had been sent as a deliverer. He had been sent as a leader, but for the most part, there were a few who were seemingly cooperative and able to maybe understand, maybe have some faith in God, but most of them didn't. Most of them were going to be in the line of complaining and murmuring. It certainly wasn't because of their great responsiveness to God that God was going to deliver them, but here it says, you know, if you've taken us out of Egypt to let us die in the wilderness, what have you done to us bringing us out of Egypt? Verse 12, is this not the very thing that we told you in Egypt? Let us alone let serve the Egyptians?

See, that had been a common complaint up to that point. It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness, but Moses said to the people, don't be afraid.

Don't fear, but stand firm and see the salvation of the Lord. See the salvation, the deliverance the Lord will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians, whom you see today, you will never see again. The Lord will fight for you and you will have, and you have only to keep still.

And so, Moses obviously was responding to the direction that God had given him. He had been, in a sense, prepared for this role. He was, you know, quite an accomplished person. He had actually been sent and was a shepherd for a long time before he would get to this point where he would be shepherding the people of God, the people of Israel. It says in verse 15 that the Lord said to Moses, why do you cry out to me?

Just tell the Israelites to go forward. That was what they were to do. They were to have faith in God. Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, and yet he said they would need to go forward. God told Moses you would need to lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea, and divide it, and the Israelites will go into the sea on dry ground.

Then I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them, and so I will gain glory for myself over Pharaoh and all his army, his chariots, and his chariot drivers. So is this really about the Israelites and how much they deserve to get rescued? Well, no, it was about God. It was about him being able to display his power, being able to, as it says, gain glory for himself over Pharaoh. The angel of the Lord, verse 19, who was going before the Israelite army moved and went behind them, and the pillar of cloud moved from in front and took its place in the back, and it came between the army of the Egyptians and the army of Israel, and so the cloud was there with the darkness, and it lit up at night, and no one can come near them.

So in verse 21, Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the Lord drove the sea back by a strong east wind all night, and turned the sea into dry land, and the waters were divided. So again, this wasn't, as again some critics might say, to try to dismiss this miracle from God, this wasn't some just marshy land, or this wasn't some low area of a sea somewhere where, well, sometimes there's water and sometimes there's not. You know, there was clearly water, and there was water that was deep and deep enough, as it's going to be describing here, to eventually, you know, when it comes back, come over the horses and the chariots and the men of this army that is pursuing the Israelites.

So in verse 22, the Israelites went into the sea on dry ground, the water forming a wall for them on the right and on the left. The Egyptians pursued and went into the sea after them, and all the fabulous horses and chariots and chariot drivers, and at the morning watched the Lord in the pillar of fire and the cloud looked down upon the Egyptian army, and he threw the Egyptian army into panic. He clogged their chariot wheels so that they turned with difficulty, and the Egyptians said, let us flee from the Israelites, for the Lord is fighting for them against Egypt.

And so the Lord said to Moses in verse 26, stretch out your hand over the sea, so that the water may come back upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots and drivers. So Moses stretched out his hand and had dawned the sea return to its normal depth. So it had a depth. It was, as you sometimes see it pictured on, you know, old films often, of, you know, an exodus coming out of Egypt, and you have a pretty deep area of water and big columns on the side, and yet a dry path through it, and yet water that is just, you know, suspended there on either side, that can come back down as it's going to be describing here.

Moses stretched out his hand, and the Egyptians fled before it, and the Lord tossed the Egyptians into the sea, and the water returned and covered the chariots, and covered the entire army of Pharaoh, and that followed them into the sea, and not in one of them remained. But the Israelites walked on dry ground through the sea, and the water forming a wall with for them on their right hand and on their left.

So thus, in verse 30, the Lord saved Israel that day from the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore, and Israel saw the great work that the Lord did against the Egyptians, so the people feared the Lord and believed in the Lord and in His servant Moses. I would say that if you were among the people at that time, and if you were watching, and whatever you might have thought before, they had to start beginning to believe in God's ability to work through Moses, at least. Whether they would fully comprehend that they ought to obey God in a personal way, you know, that was not something that you were going to see a lot of.

But clearly, you know, these people at this time, you know, had to have, in a sense, a fear of God. They had to have a respect for Him, for His authority, for His power, and then for His servant Moses.

Now, I go over that simply because what we find here in Exodus 15 is what you would think would be one of the most joyous, one of the most jubilant songs that could ever be put together.

This is actually, here in chapter 15, the first part of it anyway, a song that Moses had passed on to the people of Israel. It says in verse 1, Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the people. And so Moses, and later it's going to talk about his sister Miriam leading the people in a dance, in a celebration. And yet, what I want to point out is the significance of this song that apparently Moses wrote, or at least he was inspired to put together. It looks to me like he also had over in Deuteronomy 32 another song that he gave them as even before they went into the Promised Land, even right before he died. So maybe he gave them far more songs than this. I'm not really sure. But I think there's reason to think that this particular song was a song that would be sung in excitement, with gratitude, with thankfulness, with probably excitement and wonder at what God had just done. And again, I would think, you know, that it would have been initially sung in great praise and great worship of the God who was delivering them from the land. I want us to look at one of the Psalms, or the songs that we have in our hymnal. It's on page 88.

I will read through part of this. If you want to look at it, you're certainly welcome to.

I would hope that we were able to sing that later on as we close our service. But page 88 of our hymnal, as most of our hymnal is, composed of different Psalms or hymns that often come out of the Bible. Some of them are more traditional hymns that are in this hymnal. But clearly, here in chapter, or in verse, you know, page. Page 88 is the one that I'm referencing, and the subtitle here references Exodus 15, verse 1. And it says, the words of this song are so meaningful, they're so uplifting, they're so encouraging. After God delivered the people of Israel, after he brought them through in a miraculous way, through and out of the land of Egypt, at least beginning. Now, they obviously were then going to wander for 40 years in the wilderness before they would ever be approaching going into the Promised Land. So this was certainly just the beginning, but a very powerful beginning. And one that should have been very exciting, it says in this hymnal, page 88, the hymn say, I will sing unto the Eternal. He is triumphed gloriously, he extended his right hand and cast the foe unto the sea. O Eternal, my great salvation, you my song in liberty, O Eternal God of my Father, you have set your people free.

And whatever we sing that, that should have, I think from us, a tone of excitement, a tone of jubilation. I will pass them and overtake them, catch them and divide them, says the foe, but my hand will destroy them. But the foe drowned in the sea. At your blast the waters were gathered, columns rose and depths congealed. They rose horseman and his chariot sank into the churning sea. Men and nations heard and trembled, fear and anguish on them fell by the greatness of your power. You sent forth in wrath to quell, O Eternal, who led his people over drag land through the sea. O Eternal, in your mercy, you have triumphed gloriously. See, now again, that's a song that we sing, not always just here in the springtime. We sing that here in services every now and then throughout the year. But I would contend that it ought to be a song that we have a connection to the Bible with, because when we take a look at Exodus 15, there are kind of three sections to this song, and I want to read the first part and then the second and then the third, and perhaps for all of us to just think about how it was that the Israelites, you know, had been rescued, how they had been delivered, and how thankful, how grateful they should have been.

And of course, the same thing applies to us. When we apply this whole principle spiritually, as we think about our spiritual life and our development and growth, as God starts that by drawing us to be a part of the Church of God, as He provides forgiveness through the blood of the Lamb, and as He then tells us to be on the journey of, you know, working against the sin that is so easily available in our lives, to stop that, to turn from that, to repent of that, and to seek God's help to help us. That's what we celebrate during the Days of Unleavened Bread. This kind of connects with that. The first section starts in verse 1 and goes down through verse 5.

It says, I'll sing to the Lord, for He is triumph gloriously, horse and rider, He is thrown into the sea. The Lord is my strength and my might, and He has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise Him, my Father's God. I will exalt Him. The Lord is a warrior. The Lord is His name.

He rose chariots in His army. He cast into the sea. His picked officers were sunk in the Red Sea, and the floods covered them, and they went down into the depths like a stone.

That first section basically just says, what happened? How were you delivered? Well, there was a dividing of the water. We went through, we were standing on the other side, and then the enemy went down into the sea, and God eliminated the enemy. That was what happened.

That was what they had just seen. The next section starts in verse 6. Verse 6 down to about verse 10.

It doesn't so much directly talk about what happened, although it does in some ways, but more importantly, it talks about the power of God. The fact that God did this, God achieved this incredible miracle in order to show His great power, to show His power and His might. It wasn't because of the righteousness of the people. It wasn't because of how good they were, because as we read, you know, they were complaining and moaning about whatever was going on. But here in verse 6 it says, your right hand, O Lord, glorious in power, your right hand, O Lord, your right hand, shattered the enemy. In the greatness of your majesty, you overthrew your adversaries. You sent out your fury. It confused them like stubble at the blast of your nostrils. The waters piled up. The floods stood up in a heap. They deeps congelled in the heart of the sea. And of course the enemy said, I'll pursue and I'll overtake. I'll divide the spoil. My desire shall have its fill of them. I'll draw my sword and my hand shall destroy them. In verse 10, you blew with your wind. The sea covered them and they sank like lead in the mighty waters.

Again, that was what happened, yes, but the focus in that section seems to be more on it was God's power. It was His authority. It was His strength. It was His greatness. It was His might that they needed to extol, that they needed to be grateful for, and that they needed to have trust, not just in Him, not just fear Him, which I think probably in many ways that was what they did. They feared Him, and they weren't having a heart of obedience like they should.

The last section seems to kind of conclude. This was what, again, Moses taught the children of Israel at that time and how thankful they should have been. Verse 11, who is like you, O God?

Who is like you, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic, in holiness, awesome, in splendor, doing wonders? You stretched out your right hand, and the earth swallowed them. In your steadfast love, you led the people whom you redeemed. And so very clearly, Moses is explaining in this psalm, in this psalm, I guess it would be, because it's not directly a psalm, although we see this referenced. And I'll point out at least a couple of times when this is referenced in the psalms. But you see, Moses recognizing, you know, that God was redeeming the people. In your steadfast love, in verse 13, you led the people whom you redeemed. You guided them by your strength to your holy abode. The people heard, and they trembled. Pangs seized the inhabitants of Festilia, and the kings of Edom were dismayed, trembling, seized the leaders of Moab, and all the inhabitants of Canaan melted away. Now, in a sense, some of that was even prophetic.

That was what was going to happen. That wasn't something that had already happened, or perhaps it was that the nations around were beginning to hear about what happened in Egypt. Now, today, we get instantaneous news, and we have far more of that than maybe we even need or want.

And yet, back then, it may have taken a while for things to spread around the region about what has actually happened, but a number of these countries that would have been in the surrounding area, again, were becoming aware of that. And I would say Moses was being a little bit predictive here, or prophetic about how God was going to bring them into the land that he had promised. In verse 16, terror and dread fell upon them, talking about the other nations. By the might of your arm they became still as a stone until your people, O God, passed by, until the people whom you acquired passed by. You brought them in, and you planted them on the mountain of your own possession. And place the place, O Lord, that you made your abode, the sanctuary, O Lord, that your hands have established, and the Lord will reign forever and ever. This seems to be somewhat predictive of what God not only was going to do for them by bringing them into the land of Canaan. Now that was going to be some 40 years later. But this was something that they were singing at that time. They were singing in celebration. If they had just seen this incredible miracle at the Red Sea, then they were going to see other miracles. And of course, surely they were. They were going to see miracles dealing with water. They were going to see miracles dealing with bread and quail. They were going to see other miracles, perhaps even of healing. That's mentioned here in the latter part of this chapter 15, that God could provide healing if He chose, if He needed to. And yet, as we know, the people continued to grumble. They continued to complain.

And so even 40 years later, as they were on the verge of going into the Promised Land and about to cross the Jordan and to go into Jericho, I want us to jump over to Joshua 2 and see what it was, what it was that the nations around them thought.

Joshua 2, of course, is preparing. This is 40 years later. This is after wandering in the wilderness while God is testing, while He is humbling, while He is working with the Israelites and actually allowing many of the older ones to die, who, he said, were faithless. And the younger ones were the ones who were going to go into the land and actually overtake the land we think of as Israel today and even the city of the Jebusites, Jerusalem, and that capital that ultimately would be the capital for the people of Israel, even when King David, when Saul and David and Solomon would be there in a powerful way. But here in chapter 2, you see spies being sent into the area. And starting in verse 8, it says, before they went to sleep, she came up to them on the roof and said to the men, I know that the Lord has given you the land. You know, this was, I believe, Rahab. Not exactly sure. I don't see that right there, but I think that is who it was, who was talking to them. And she came up and talked to them and said, we know that the Lord has given you the land. And the dread of you has fallen on us and all the inhabitants of the land melt in fear before you. For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you came out of Egypt. And what you did to the two kings of the Amorites that were beyond the Jordan to see on an og whom you utterly destroyed. And as soon as we heard it, our hearts melted and there was no courage left in any of us because of you, because the Lord your God is indeed God in heaven above and on earth below. See, this is what the people of Jericho, the people that they were going to be overthrowing and conquering, this is what they had heard. You know, they had heard, they had passed this long. It was well known that the Israelites had been drawn out of Egypt in a miraculous show of power and an incredible display of strength that none of the Israelites could take credit for. Now, if God were with them, if He was going to help them, if He was going to overpower those that they were sent to to displace, well then that was going to be possible.

But if if He didn't, if He wasn't the source of that, you know, then they would have little hope in achieving it. But as this is mentioning, you know, we know, we know what happened. We know the power. And of course, when you study what happened at Jericho, you know that something else also happened, you know, the walls of that city would fall. Not something that they anticipated or expected, but something that God did do. I want to go ahead and just point out to you a couple of different references here to the book, in the book of Psalms, because you have, in essence, this song that Moses gave to the people in Exodus 15 kind of became what would later be more of a kind of a national song, a national hymn that they would sing. And it would always be a part of their history, a part of their, now they would be coming and going over the next several hundred years.

You know, they didn't obey God clearly all the time. You know, sometimes it can seem completely unaware of what God wanted. Other times, you know, they were doing what was right in their own eyes.

And yet, when you read about their history, and that's what you find here, let's see, in Psalm chapter 78, in Psalm chapter 78, and you have several different Psalms here that, again, many of them are our songs, or that they were put to music by the people of Israel, or later the people of Judah. But often, you know, they were describing about the history of the people of Israel, and they would be talking about, you know, what should we remember? What should we think about? So here in Psalm 78, let's start in verse 41. Psalm 78, verse 1, well, let's back up to verse 40. It says, how often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and grieved him in the desert.

So there were so many times when they didn't remain thankful, they didn't remain jubilant, they didn't remain as, you know, this song surely indicates a gratitude for what God had done. In verse 41, they tested God again and again and provoked the Holy One of Israel.

They did not keep in mind his power on the day he redeemed them from the foe. When he designed, displayed, excuse me, his signs in Egypt and his miracles in the fields of Zoan, he turned their river to blood so that they could not drink of the streams. You know, the river Nile, you know, turned red. And that was a powerful sign that God would use.

He sent among them swarms of flies and frogs, and he, verse 46, gave their crops to the caterpillar in the locusts. He destroyed their vines with hail and their sycamores with frost. He gave over their cattle to the hail and the flocks to lightning bolts. He let loose on them his fierce anger, wrath, and indignation and distress, a company of destroying angels. He made a path for his anger, and he did not spare them from death. He gave them their lives, or gave their lives over to the plague. He struck all the firstborn in Egypt, in verse 51, the first issue of their strength and the tents of Ham. Then he led out his people like sheep and guided them in the wilderness like a flock. He led them in safety so that they were not afraid, but the sea overwhelmed their enemies, and ultimately he would bring them. He brought them to his holy hill, to the mountain that his right-handed won. See, this is a part of whenever you would have any kind of a overview of the history of the people, it was always include. What happened at the Red Sea? What happened when God performed as much an incredible miracle that should have always been not only remembered, but appreciated. In Psalm 105, we also have several Psalms here, 104, 105, 106, that kind of cover how it was that God was overseeing the people of Israel.

Psalm 105, if we are to read part of this, it will connect back to what we've read in Exodus.

In verse 1, O give thanks to the Lord. Psalm 105 verse 1, give thanks to the Lord, call on his name, make known his deeds among the people, sing to him, sing praises to him, sing of all his wonderful works, glory in his holy name, let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice, seek the Lord in his strength, seek his presence continually. Remember the wonderful works that he has done, his miracles and the judgments that he uttered. Of course, it talks about dealing with Abraham, dealing with Jacob, dealing with Joseph. If we drop down here to verse 23, verse 23, then Israel came to Egypt. Jacob lived as an alien in the land of Ham, and the Lord made his people very fruitful, made them stronger than their foes, whose hearts he then turned to hate his people to deal craftily with his servants. See, that actually is what happened. You know, as Israel gained in numbers there in Egypt, ultimately the people in Egypt started viewing them as a threat.

But in verse 26, he sent his servant Moses and Aaron, whom he had chosen, and they performed his signs among them the miracles in the land of Ham. He sent darkness and made the land dark, he rebelled against, or they rebelled against, his words. He turned their water into blood, caused the fish to die. The land was swarmed with frogs, even in the chamber of the king.

He spent, he spoke, and there came swarms of flies and gnats, and hail for rain.

In verse 34, he spoke, and the locusts came, and the young locusts, without number, they devoured the vegetation. In verse 36, he struck down all the firstborn in the land, the first issue of their strength. See, this was, again, something they were continually reminded of, but not something that they appreciated. And then he brought Israel out in verse 37, with silver and with gold. And there was no one among their tribes who stumbled. Egypt was glad that they departed, for dreaded them, if all went upon it. See, ultimately, Pharaoh and his courts and the people of Egypt were ready to just get rid of the Israelites. Verse 38, or verse, you know, Egypt was glad when they departed.

Verse 39, he spread the cloud, or a cloud, for a covering and fire to give light by night.

They asked, and he brought quail. He gave them food from heaven in abundance. He opened the rock, and water gushed out. It flowed through the desert like a river. He remembered his holy promise, and Abraham his servant. So he brought his people out with joy. His chosen ones were singing. He gave them the lands of the nations, and they took possession of the wealth of the people that they might keep his statutes and observe his laws, and praise the Lord. Again, you see that type of reference, which is referring back to what happened to them in Egypt. Now, you might ask, why should we go over this at this time? Well, whenever we start applying the lessons that we read about that are pointed out in the Old Testament, there's a spiritual application. A spiritual application that applies to us in our coming to understand God working in our lives, in our coming to see our need to turn from sin, to be able to recognize that, to see that through Jesus Christ we can be forgiven. And even as we've mentioned regarding celebrating the holy days, you know, those days actually point out a plan that God is working out and how it is that he is wanting us to overcome, how he wants us to grow and to develop. And whenever we read in the end of the book of Revelation, whenever we read in the latter part of Revelation, Revelation is, of course, a book that has many things written down, many, in a sense, very serious things that are even yet to happen on the earth. What is it that the people of God, people that God would choose to draw to Jesus Christ, people that God would begin to work with and to mold and shape and prepare for his coming kingdom? What is it those people are going to go through?

Is it always going to be as easy as we have it now? You know, we might think we don't always have it very easy. Sometimes we don't. Sometimes we suffer. A lot of times we suffer. A lot of times.

And yet many of us look back over our lives and we see a lot of ups and downs.

And yet we certainly want to learn the lessons that the Israelites seem to not learn and to not appreciate the miraculous power that God has and what he is able to do. I want us to just look at a couple of different sections here in Revelation that deal with situations that would certainly seem that they would only be solved in a miraculous way by the power of the great God, the power that brought Israel out of the land of Egypt. Here in Revelation chapter 12, Revelation chapter 12 identifies the church as a woman. And this woman goes through a number of things. Of course, some of these, you know, have a number of different symbols that are connected to them. And yet if you drop down to verse 9, you also see that opposing this woman is the great devil. In verse 9, the great dragon was thrown down, an ancient serpent who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world. He was thrown down to the earth and his angels were thrown down with him. See, this is describing something that, you know, has happened and yet something that we continue on in verse 13. You find that he's struggling. He's struggling with the people of God. He's struggling with those who would identify with God and his power. And it says in verse 13, so when the dragon saw that he'd been thrown down to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the man-child, but the woman was given the two wings of a great eagle so that she could fly from the serpent into the wilderness to a place where she is nurtured or nourished for a time and times and half a time. And then from his mouth, the serpent would pour water like a river after the woman to sweep her away with the flood. But the earth came to the help of the woman. It opened its mouth and swallowed the river that the dragon had poured from his mouth. And then the dragon was angry with the woman and she went off to make war on the rest of her children, those who keep the commandments of God and who have the testimony of Jesus Christ. You know, that's clearly describing conflict. Seemingly, and I'm sure many things in symbol, seemingly incredibly difficult, perhaps unbelievable things that are yet to happen to people who choose to obey God, who choose to keep the commands of God, who choose to have a close relationship with God the Father and with Jesus Christ our Lord. See, that's what this is talking about. And it would seem, you know, if you read through this, it seems like a certain amount of incredible protection. See, what did God do with Israel? Well, he protected them. He kept Egypt at bay when they were chasing them. He protected them until they would get through, actually through the Red Sea, and then were on the other side, and as the Egyptians were in the water, he caused the water to come back on top of them. You know, it sounds like he protected and then he delivered completely in a supernatural way. Now, I can't say that I know everything that this is describing, but it certainly appears that it might require God's supernatural help here in the future. And so he wants us, you know, to live with faith in him. He wants us to have faith. He wants us to believe.

He's able to do things that are incredibly difficult and otherwise impossible. He wants us to believe that. He wants us to have faith in that. And I think it's also interesting because we've been focusing on this one chapter back here in Exodus on this song that Moses gave to the people.

He gave it to them so that they would, you know, be able to remember, because sometimes you find you're able to remember things if you have a verse and song that goes a melody that goes along with it. You know, that's actually a benefit, something that many people, you know, would verify that even, you know, as people grow older and as they decline, and even if they're not as aware of their setting and circumstances as much as they might have been in the past, often music is something they still, you know, they still remember or they still are able to to join in and sing a certain familiar song. I'm sure this song was familiar to at least some of the Israelites, and yet I point this out only that here in the end of the age, here in the time leading up to Christ intervention, you know, we need to have that type of faith and joy and peace and calm to know that God, whether we know how He's going to take care of things or not. I don't think anyone and even until Moses was told what was going to happen, I don't know that he knew exactly how are we going to achieve this, and yet we want to live with faith in God, and we want to have a joyous relationship with God. I want to point out as well over here in chapter 15, because all of this, you know, kind of ties together. In chapter 15, I saw in verse 1 another portion in heaven, great and amazing, seven angels with seven plagues, which are the last plagues with which with them the wrath of God is going to end. And so this would be at the very end, before Christ intervenes, before He returns in power and glory. But it says, I saw what appeared to be a sea of glass mixed with fire and those who had conquered the beast and its image and the number of its name standing beside the sea of glass with harps of God in their hands. And in verse 3, they sing.

These are people who, you know, symbolically at least are the redeemed, those who are going to be honored, those who are going to be blessed with a relationship with God. He says they sing the song of Moses. You know, I think that would be a song that is a song of gratitude, a song that we read about in Exodus 15. I would think that that would certainly be a song. Now, it could be a different song that Moses wrote. As I said, we see at least one other that he did write. But that makes a lot of sense, that if you are at the end of the age and you are needing supernatural protection and deliverance, that singing, you know, the song of Moses, the servant of God, and they're singing the song of the Lamb that's referenced in chapter 14. And so you can kind of tie that together. But see here in verse 3 and 4 what that song says. Great, great and amazing are your deeds, Lord God, Almighty. Just and true are your ways, King of the nations, Lord, who will not fear your glory, or who will not fear and glorify your name. For you alone are holy, and all nations will come and worship before you, for your judgments have been revealed. Now that clearly seems to be right at the very end of the age when God is choosing to intervene and to restore what needs to be restored to this earth. And yet, I think that's interesting that he mentions a song of Moses, a song of gratitude, a song of excitement, a song that should be a song of faith. And so for us, you know, whenever we sing this, whenever we have this as a part of our services and as a part of our activity, then maybe it should take on more meaning. Maybe it should take on more significance than it has in the past. But I think Psalm, or song of Moses in Exodus 15, I think it ties together with what we read about them coming out of Egypt. I think it ties together because it points out, you know, what they were instructed to do. And I think in many ways we find that we're instructed to do the same thing. To have faith in God, to believe him, and even to look forward to being able to sing before God songs of praise and worship. So I'll ask that we sing that song for our final hymn, but I wanted to be able to cover this in connection with the end of the days of Unleavened Bread and, you know, the type of gratitude that God wants us to have to him as we don't walk by sight, but walk by faith and actually grow in our faith and our relationship with God.