What Is Our Focus in Life

Brother, I have used the preacher's outline and sermon Bible commentary to prepare today's message. In our society today, brethren, we are becoming far too often. We're seeing people who play the victim card. Do you know people who play the victim card? Those who have this vantage point in life feel they're the victim of society's ills. Too many times they indulge in self-pity. They place the blame for their situation in life on others instead of taking responsibility themselves. And too often, brethren, as I see this creeping into the church, I see another aspect of this, and that is that we want to blame Satan and keep our blame on Satan. And, you know, indulge in the self-pity, spiritually speaking. And many times we stop right there. We play the pity game, the blame game, but Satan's after me, Satan's done this. And, you know, truly, brethren, there's truth in that. Satan is alive and well, and he rules planet Earth. Truly, every one of us in this room has been victimized by Satan. So I'm not saying anything other than that. The Bible is very clear on that point. But I think where we get into problems is sometimes, brethren, we stay at that point where we want to blame Satan, and we're thinking about Satan. Isn't it, you know, it's all Satan. It's as opposed to saying, yes, we give the devil his due, quite literally. But then we move past that and realize, with God there are answers. With God there are solutions. And it's one thing to say, well, you know, today Satan was, you know, really attacking me. Okay, I understand that fine. But do we move past that and say, now, here's what I'm going to allow God to work in my life after that point. So please understand where I'm going to come from in today's sermon. Now, the definition of terms, I think, is appropriate. A victim is a person who is abused. You know, they legitimately have issues. They've legitimately been hurt, oppressed, either by other people or by Satan himself.

And many times have an inability to break free. Now, we can get into some of the reasons why sometimes people don't break free from the mentality. To be quite honest, sometimes people begin to love their pain. Sometimes people begin to view themselves as, well, people know me because I'm a sufferer. I suffer. That's who I am. I suffer. And again, brethren, I know that there are many in this room who are going through an awful lot of suffering. I'm not trying to be insensitive. I'm not trying to admit the obvious. Yes, we go through a lot of suffering and so forth. But we don't want to just stay there, and that is our outlook on life. I am a sufferer. Let's look at Proverbs 23 and verse 7. We want to look at the whole view that God would have of our situation, not just the partial view. Certainly, Satan is alive and well, and Satan persecutes us and victimizes us. No question about that. No argument for me at all on that. I am no different than you. I can stand up here and go through all sorts of lists as to how Satan has victimized me in my life and those I love in their lives. But God doesn't want us to stay there. He wants us to move past that way of thinking. Proverbs 23 and verse 7. For as he thinks in his heart, so is he. As he thinks in his heart, so is he. Brethren, my topic for today, if you want to take notes, I am asking a question. And here is the question. What is our focus in life? Are we victims of Satan or overcomers with God? Are we victims of Satan or overcomers with God? And again, I know all of us have been victimized. I'm not doubting that. I'm not naysaying that. I'm not trying to diminish that. But if all we do is go through life looking in the rearview mirror at what Satan has done to us or what others have done to us, and we don't move forward, then we're not learning the lessons that these days of a living bread teaches.

And to be quite frank, I've had to give this sermon to myself on a number of occasions over the years. It's easy for any of us to play the pity card. We set the table. I'm as good as any at setting a pity party table. We sit there. We have a nice cushy chair. We think to ourselves, all the ways we have been hurt and who has hurt us, and we can actually assemble faces along our table.

And these are the people who have wronged us and done us in and done us bad and so forth. I've been pretty good at that. I can give a pretty good ad color about that sort of thing. But, you know, I don't think I'm alone in that. I believe that you're probably the same way. There's a gentleman. His name is Hendrick Edberg.

He's a Swede. He writes what he calls the Positivity Blog. He had a column, and I found this as I was doing research. I thought it was interesting, because he was showing some of the benefits that people have who play the victim card. Some of the benefits. And he labeled four of them. People can get attention and validation by being a victim. People can get good feelings from other people as other people see, wow, they've been victimized. They've been hurt.

Because they've been hurt, we've got to help them out. And so you can get some attention that way. You get attention. You get validation. I've nicknamed these people the sufferers. Another viewpoint that sometimes the victim mentality will give us is, you know, we just don't have to take any risks. We don't have to take any risks. I'm a victim. I don't need to take any action. I've been hurt. I've been rejected.

I've failed at this and that and the other. And so I'm a play it safe Sam. Or I'm a play it safe Samantha. Another aspect of the victim mentality is you don't have to take responsibility for your life. Taking responsibility for your life can be hard work.

It can be difficult. It means you have to get yourself out of some difficult positions. Perhaps you put yourself in or I put myself in. You and I go through life and it's not, brethren, that you and I are where we're at because of everything everyone else has done to us. Many times where we're at in life is because of what decisions we've made and the other decisions we haven't made to get ourselves unstuck from where we're at. So we might be called the no responsibility Billy.

The fourth area that this man talked about was when you are playing the victim card, it makes you feel right. Because obviously everybody else has hurt you and they're wrong and they're the bad guys. And it gives people a certain degree of who are into this a certain degree of pleasure. They're the pleasurable Pauls. Now some of that may sound ludicrous to others if you might think, well, that sounds fairly reasonable. Some of you might say, well, you know, I've actually kind of been there myself, depending upon what your situation is. Have you seen a brother in the faith who feels like they have to constantly remind everybody about how they were treated poorly back in the day?

I've seen a lot of that over the years as a pastor. The pastor that I've had, brethren, where I've had, you know, emergency move one after another, I've never had a move that wasn't an emergency move into an area. Not one. From my first move into North Carolina, then my next move into Tennessee, then to West Virginia, then to here. Every move has been an emergency move.

Every move has been, well, the pastor preceding me has done all sorts of things to hurt the congregation. And people would come and say, well, you know, this pastor or this minister or these people, they've really treated me badly. And some people live back there, and they don't seem to move off at that point.

You can have a sister in the faith who loves to tell fellow sisters in the faith how she has to do all the work around the house and no one ever helps. And that may be true. You may have a long-time believer who feels like he or she has been shortchanged in the church and how they have served and how they should have been made a deacon or a deaconess somewhere along the line, or an elder. Or there are the believers who always seem to have some new problem in their life, but they never seem to have the good days.

They never seem to have the good days. So, brethren, the question again I have, and again, I'm not dismissing trials. I've given enough trials. I've gone through enough trials in my life. I'm not dismissing the fact that we have been victimized, that we go through trials. But, brethren, where is Jesus Christ in our life? Where is the power of God in our life? Where do we think about the solutions that God offers us and the power that He offers us?

And the ability He has to not be victims stuck in the past, but overcomers who are heading for the kingdom of God. Isn't that the lesson of this first day of unleavened bread? I felt energized by this. I was talking to a member, somebody I respect a great deal, and they were discussing this with me some few weeks ago, and I thought, well, you know, this person's absolutely correct. Absolutely correct. I've fallen victim myself too many times where I'm thinking about, ah, Satan's done this to me, and Satan's done that to me.

In Delistandra, you've got to get off that point, and you've got to move forward. If anybody can claim to be a victim, it was the Apostle Paul. Let's take a look at 2 Corinthians 11. 2 Corinthians 11. 2 Corinthians 11, verse 24. From the Jews, five times I received forty stripes minus one. Brother, I would dare say there are people in this room, maybe myself included. I get thirty-nine stripes, I might die. And yet he received these five times. Three times I was beaten with rods.

Once I was stoned. We often wonder if that was the reason why he was losing his vision. Three times I was in a shipwreck. You know, there's sharks out there. A night and a day I've spent in the deep, in journeys often, in perils of water, in robbers, in my own countrymen, in perils of the Gentiles, in the city, in the wilderness, in perils of the sea, in wariness, in toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.

Besides these other things, what comes upon me daily, my deep concern for all the churches. Now, if there's a man here who can talk about being victimized and all that's happened to him in his life, spend the Apostle Paul. It's the Apostle Paul. And yet, here we, how does he, how does he conclude this section?

Verse 31, The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed forever, knows that I am not lying. In Damascus, the governor under Aretas, the king, was guarding the city of the people there in Damascus with a garrison, desiring to arrest me. But I was let down in a basket, through a window in the wall, and escaped from his hands. So, after talking about all these grievous trials that the Apostle Paul went through, he said, But you know what? I'll give you an example of what God's done in my life, time after time. He gave me a way to escape.

And, of course, a little tongue-in-cheek here says, you know, how do I escape? I'm a great escape artist. I was let down a basket on a basket. Now, I'm kind of a basket case. God let me down in a basket through this window. Let's turn our attention now to Romans 8. Romans 8. Verse 34, Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore has risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.

Verse 35, Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Now, here's a man who's gone through all the things I've just read to you. He's now playing the victim card. Here's a man who knows that he wants to be an overcomer with God. And notice what he says here. Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or the sort? All these things that have been victimizing people, he says, you know, we can go through all those things, but you know what?

We're not going to stop there, are we? For as it is written, For the earth's sake we are killed all the day long. We are counted as sheep for the slaughtered. Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. We are more than conquerors despite the victimization. And again, I'm sure you have been victimized grievously. I'm not doubting that one bit. I'm not trying to de-escalate the level to which you have been victimized or I have been victimized. Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. God helps us to conquer these things by either removing them from us after, you know, solid prayer and fasting and people being there for us, or if God doesn't remove it, he helps us to go through it.

There are times, brethren, you don't get a chance to just say, well, you know, I waive this trial. I have a get out of jail, I get out of a trial-free card here. In the monopoly of life. Don't have that. But God says, I will help you. If not to take it away, I'm going to help you go through it.

Verse 38, for I am persuaded that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other created thing, including Satan, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

We are more than conquerors. I would like to read you a section from Barnes' Notes. This is a commentary. This phrase here in verse 37, where it says that we're more than conquerors, this is what Barnes' Notes says on that particular phrase. And I quote, Keep on being conquerors to a greater degree, or keep on winning a glorious victory. We gain the victory that is, they have not the power to subdue us, to alienate our love and confidence, to produce apostasy. We are the victors, not they. Our faith is not destroyed.

Notice what he says. Our faith is not destroyed. Our love is not diminished. Our hope is not blasted. But it's not a simple victory. It is not mere life. And it continues with what we had before. It's more than simple triumph. These trials, Barnes goes on to say, augments our faith, increases our strength, expands our love to Christ. The word used here is strong, emphatic, such as the Apostle Paul often employs, and which is used with great force and appropriateness here.

This is what God wants from us. Now, let me give you an example, an unleavened-bred timestamp example of this. Let's go back to Exodus 14. Exodus 4, we're to see some people who very much were victimized, very much so. But unfortunately, they weren't leaving the victim mentality behind in Egypt. Exodus 14, starting here in verse 5. Now, I was told the king of Egypt that the people had fled, in the heart of Pharaoh and his servants were turned against the people. And they said, why have we done this? Why have we let Israel go from serving us? And, brethren, as you're aware, Pharaoh here represents Satan.

When you came into the church, God opened your heart, he opened your mind, you came into the church, Satan was forced to let go of having you in his hip pocket. But once you came into the church, Satan says, why? And you put your name in the blank. You know, why did I let Randy Delos and go? Why did I let so-and-so go? I've got to go back after them.

That's why it seems so much, brethren, that as you and I, after we've come into the church, so many times our trials seem stronger, harder, more difficult, more intense, more complex. Why? Because Satan wants you back in his hip pocket. And he's going to, just as God is going to fight to keep you out of there, Satan is going to fight to put you back in there.

And so here we say, we have Pharaoh saying, you know, why did we let him go? Just like Satan said, why did I let, you know, use your name? Why did I let that person go? So he made ready his chariots and took his people with him. So Satan made ready the world you live in, the circumstances you have to face. He brought his chariots to bear on your life. Also, he took 600 choice chariots and all the chariots of Egypt with captains over every one of them.

And Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and he pursued the children of Israel. And the children of Israel went out with boldness. We came into the church. We came into the church with boldness.

We were so happy to be a part of God's church. And we had all sorts of ideas. I remember when I first came into the church, I walked into Murphy High School, or Junior High.

I just passed that location here probably about 10 days ago. I was over there on Finkel and Telegraph. And I said, hey, Murphy is over here. Nice pull down the street. And there it was. After I graduated from Ambassador College in 1974, I came back here to Michigan. And there were, what, 600 of us that used to meet there at Murphy Middle School, whatever it was called back in the day, Murphy Junior High.

And we came out of the world with boldness. Israel here is coming out of the world with each of the boldness. Verse 9. So the Egyptians pursued them with horses and chariots of Pharaoh. His horsemen and his army overtook them and camped by the sea by Piah Hyrath before Beowzaphan. And when Pharaoh drew near, the children lifted up their eyes and behold. The Egyptians marched after them so they were afraid. And the children of Israel cried out to the Lord. And they said to Moses, because there were no graves in Egypt, have you taken us away to die in the wilderness?

Why have you so dealt with us to bring us out of Egypt? Because it's not the word we told you in Egypt, saying, Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians, for it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness. Brethren, here in verse 10, 11, and 12, what are we seeing? We are seeing a victim mentality. And truly, these people were victimized. For hundreds of years, Israel was victimized, and no one can nay say that.

And they're saying, You haven't been victimized. These people have been victimized, but they weren't moving past that state of mind. They wanted to keep on looking backward. What did they want? They wanted somebody to blame. They don't want to take responsibility. No one put a gun or a sword or a dagger to their head or to their neck and said, You've got to leave with Moses. No one did that. They made a choice to leave.

But now they want to abdicate their responsibility. They want to blame somebody who won't blame Moses. Moses, you're the problem here. And brethren, for you and I, it can be very easy for us, if we're not careful, to default to these old ways of thinking. Of looking back, looking over our shoulder. You know, I really wish I wouldn't have done this or that thing, because God's really not been there. If He was there, why would He allow this to take place?

And you know, brethren, I think it takes a certain degree of courage for all of us to admit that we probably all said that. Haven't we all said that? Where we've been faithful, we've done what we should do, as far as we know, we've not been perfect, but we've tried to honor God and do the things of God, and it seems like everything blows up on our face.

Could be our marriage, could be our kids, could be our job, could be any number of things. Well, where's God in all of that? Well, you know, God's getting... again, chances are you or I have done some things, made some decisions, taken some actions that were ill-advised. But it's so easy to want to blame God. It's always easy to want to look backward and have this victim...

I've been victimized! But let's notice now what God's solution is to this problem. The problem we see during the day, the very first part of the Unleavened Bread here. Exodus 14, starting in verse 13. And Moses said to the people, So here we see people who have been legitimately victimized.

And Moses says, okay, you've been victimized. God says you've been victimized. But what are we going to do about that? What we're going to do about that is we're going to be overcomers with God's help. And how do we overcome? He gives us the formula here. Number one, don't be afraid. We've got to get rid of the fear. We'll talk more about that last day of Unleavened Bread. Secondly, we've got to stand still or stand firm with what we believe and who we are.

And as we see in verse 15, we have to go forward. Let's quit looking in the rearview mirror. Yeah, life's been rotten. Life's handed us a bad hat and a card. Yeah, I don't have the health I should have, or I don't have the job I should have, or I don't have the marriage of the kids, or whatever I don't have. Part of that's my issue. The decisions I've made. But God wants me to work past that, just as God wanted the Israelites to work past the situation they were in, to look forward.

So let's take and let's analyze this a little bit. Overcoming with God. First thing we see here, verse 13, Moses and the people, do not be afraid. Do not be afraid. Fear not. If you and I are going to overcome the victim mentality, brethren, we need to kill this idea of fear.

We need to kill that. We need to ask God to help us kill that. I don't care what circumstances you're facing, or I'm circumstances... You know, it could be tremendously bad circumstances. And again, I'm not naysaying that some of you aren't in really awful circumstances right now, because some of you are. And I'm not trying to be insensitive to that. I've been in some pretty rough circumstances in my life, too.

But, you know, none of us should be able...we want to stay there. Let's take a look at 2 Kings 6. 2 Kings 6. 2 Kings 6 and verse 8. Now the king of Syria was making war against Israel, and he consulted with his servants, saying, My camp will be in such and such a place. And the man of God sent to the king of Israel, saying, Beware, that you do not pass this place, for the Syrians are coming down there. So here you've got the king of Syria, he's making war against Israel. He comments to his staff, Well, here are my plans. And as he comments to his staff what his plans are, then the man of God tells the king of Israel, Well, here's what the enemy's plans are.

Now, he wasn't in the room at the time. There was no spy. God inspired the man of God to tell the king of Israel to beware of the trap that was being set. Verse 10. Then the king of Israel sent someone to the place of which the man of God had told him, and he warned him that it was watchful there, not just once or twice. Therefore the heart of the king of Syria was greatly troubled by this thing. And he called the servants and said to them, Will you now show me which of us is for the king of Israel?

You know, the king of Syria couldn't understand how this information was getting out to the king of Israel. How in his own close quarters, you know, all the moves were being telegraphed. Verse 12. And one of his servants said, None, my Lord, no king, but Elisha the prophet who was in Israel tells the king of Israel the words that you speak in your bedroom. Brethren, do you need somebody to speak the word for you? Do you need somebody to be an advocate on your side? We've got Jesus Christ. He is our advocate. He is the one, you know, maybe you've got a problem with your boss. You've got a problem with this individual, that individual.

You know, God can do all sorts of miraculous things, but we've got to ask him. We've got to have faith in him. We've got to rely upon him. Verse 13. So he said, Go and see where he is that I might send and give him. And it was told him, saying, Surely, Elisha is in Dothan.

Therefore he sent horses and chariots and a great army. Now picture the scene, brethren. Here's an army coming after one guy. An army coming after one guy. They came by night and surrounded the city. When the servant of the man of God rose early and went out, there was an army surrounding the city with horses and chariots. And the servant said to him, Alas, my master, what shall we do?

Verse 16. So he answered, Do not fear, for those who are with us, are more than those who are with them. And Elisha prayed and said, My Lord, Lord, I pray, Open his eyes that he might see. And the Lord opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw, and behold, a mount was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. Here's somebody who was an overcomer with God. He didn't fear because he knew what God was capable of doing. Brethren, our God is our protector. Our God is our defense. Our God is our fortress. Our God is our shield.

He is our refuge. I have scriptures on all of those points here. I don't have time to cover all of those points with you. But all those points, that God is our protector, defense, fortress, shield, refuge, show reasons why we not fear. We need not fear. If we're going to be over an overcomer with God, we've got to go through life and realize that God is there to help us. We saw there in Exodus 14, in verse 13, where not only should we not fear, but we should stand still or stand firm and see the salvation of the Lord.

Stand firm. Let's take a look at that aspect of what we need to do to be overcomers with God's help. 2 Timothy chapter 1 and verse 7. For God has not given us the spirit of fear. See, God understands, brethren, if you and I have the spirit of fear, if we're always looking in the rearview mirror, if we are victims of Satan, and that's where we want to have our mind stay, then we're always going to be people who are subject to fear.

And fear paralyzes. God doesn't want you and I to be paralyzed by fear, by anything. For God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. The spirit of power. You may not have a naturally powerful personality. You may be a Casper Milktoast. You may be the kind of person that you do a really good job of blending in with a wallpaper. And yet, maybe you've got a boss that's a real fire breather. Maybe you've got an next-door neighbor that every time you walk out the door, it's like open season on you. They all take out their hunting rifle and go after you.

You dare not put one foot on one of their blades of grass lest they get after you. So you may not have the powerful personality or being built like Arnold Schwarzenegger once was or a mini-ninja or something like that. But God gives us the strength and the power we need if we're close to Him. If we go to Him and we ask for that power and that strength. Let's take a look at Mark 13, verse 11.

Mark 13, verse 11.

Mark 13, verse 11. But when they arrest you and deliver you up, do not worry beforehand or premeditate what you will speak, but whatever is given to you in that hour, that speak. For it is not you who speaks, but the Holy Spirit.

It's the Holy Spirit. And notice, this is a stressful time. This is a difficult circumstance. When you are arrested and you're delivered up in front of the magistrates and maybe some really bad things might happen to you. God says, I'm going to be there. I'm going to give you power. Because you are close to me and I'm close to you. I'm going to let that power flow into your heart and mind. Don't be worried. Don't be concerned. Because I'll be there with you. I'm your advocate. I'll inspire your heart. I'll inspire your mind.

God also gives us the power of love. Not just the power of a sound mind, but also of love.

To be able to speak properly to people. To be able to know tact. You know, brethren, there are things we do need to learn on our own.

Some of us in this room are very skilled with the social graces. And that's a wonderful thing when done properly. There are others of us in this room who probably don't know there are such things. A social crisis. I mean, there are some in the room, to be quite honest. They can be the bull in a china shop. They can say all the wrong words at all the right times, get everybody upset. And if that is you, we need to grow in that area.

Now, I think and feel I can always grow in that area as a pastor. I'm never complete along those lines. But are you? Do you feel you're complete along those lines? Are you the perfect person with tact and diplomacy? And knowing just how to approach every individual at the right time, the right way, with the right word. I think we all have a long way to go there.

Second Timothy 1, 7 also says that, you know, we need to have self-discipline.

I want to read from a life application commentary about this section, where it talks about having self-discipline, so that we are, you know, having a proper frame of mind. It says, this can also be translated self-control or sound mind. To put it another way, God gives us a cool head.

How many times, brethren, I've lost track of the times where I've gotten myself in trouble, because I didn't have a...because I got hot-headed. And I said things in the heat of battle that I shouldn't have said, and I really came to regret. But again, am I the only person who's done that? Have you found yourself in the heat of battle, in the heat of an argument with somebody? Maybe somebody you love a great deal, and you've said just the wrong word, and you've really put yourself behind the eight ball. Maybe you've said some things that really people just can't. They would like to forgive, and they probably do forgive, but maybe they just can't forget.

Because it's been so hurtful, it cuts right to the quick, it goes right to the core of who they were.

God's Spirit will give us a spirit of a cool head. So we need to allow that spirit to really flow into us, and allow God's Holy Spirit of self-control to rule.

Moses also told the people there in Exodus 14 to go forward.

Let's go back to Exodus 14.

Exodus 14.

And notice we don't have the Detroit Recorder up here. I'm hoping that we're recording all of this, and everything is taken back there.

Exodus 14. What's interesting is that I was putting my thoughts together here.

Somebody sent me, and this is going to be a part of a sermon somewhere down the road, but somebody sent me a little seven-minute video clip, almost eight-minute video clip. It was about the first day of Israel's history back in 1948.

And it was so interesting about God's miraculous help, and how in 1948 you had five Arab armies coming against Israel. They were just a fledgling nation. They didn't have much of anything. There were 10,000 Egyptian soldiers and tanks coming at them from one direction. And what did Israel have? They recruited six pilots from World War II. This is 1948. They recruited six men who were pilots in World War II. They found a few boxes of parts scattered in Europe, mostly in Czechoslovakia. And these parts were airplane parts. And they were able to take these airplane parts and bring them over into Israel and assemble planes. And you know what they assembled? German Messerschmitt, ME 109s. So here you've got the Israeli Air Force flying German Messerschmitts. Planes were just built out of crates, out of boxes. They were not new. They had never been test flown. The first time that they were turned on, the guys didn't know if they were going to blow over. Now, most of these pilots, incidentally, were Americans, Jewish Americans. And one guy said, here I am, a guy from Minneapolis. I'm getting into this plane. Never had flown this thing before. I'm a pilot from World War II. How am I dressed? I've got a German helmet on. I've got a German uniform on. I've got a German parachute on. I'm flying a Messerschmitt 109. And these guys made a difference. They made a difference. God will make the difference. Exodus 14. Exodus 14, verse 16. But lift up your rod, and stretch out your hand over the sea, and divide it. And the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea. We drop down to verse 21. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night. And he made the sea into dry land, and the waters were divided. You know, I hadn't really thought about it this way until I was thinking I got to thinking about that clip that somebody sent me about. The quote-unquote Israeli Air Force. All six guys who made a tremendous difference and turned a tide of the battle, incidentally.

But, you know, here we have God using a strong wind. Ever heard the term kamikaze? I think most of us are familiar with World War II history. We know the kamikazes were suicide attack aviators of Japan's. At the end of the war, when things were looking very desperate for Japan, they turned to the kamikaze. These gentlemen were trained. They had never flown before. It was one white trip. They realized, you know, they had their sake before. They had their special service. They had their little glass of sake. They realized this was a suicide mission. They weren't coming home.

They learned to fly the plane. They never had to learn how to take off. They were not told how to land because they wouldn't be landing on land. They were going to be ramming their airplanes into Allied shipping. During the course of the Second World War, almost 4,000 kamikaze pilots were killed.

Nineteen percent of those kamikaze attacks managed to hit one of our ships. Now, they called themselves the kamikaze, and why was that? Back in 1274 and 1281, Kublai Khan was wanting to mount an invasion against Japan with a mighty fleet. And in both cases, typhoons wrecked the fleet of Kublai Khan. And the word kamikaze means a strong wind or a divine wind. Here, in Exodus 14, we've got God using a strong wind. A kamikaze wind, if you will. God knows how to protect his people.

He knows how to give miraculous help. Verse 19, And the angel lord who went before the camp of Israel moved and went behind them, and the pillar of the cloud went before them and stood behind them. So it came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel.

So it was a cloud in darkness to the one, and it gave light by night to the other, so that the one did not come near the other all night. So what do we have here, brethren, in terms of God doing powerful miracles? Again, if we have been victimized, can God do powerful miracles in your life?

Why not? We've got a tremendous history of this in the Scriptures. We see God moving from the front of his people to the rear of his people. So the Egyptians were in darkness, and they couldn't see, and they couldn't move about. It is thought that they had such bad vision, bad visibility, they could hardly see the hand in front of their face.

So they obviously could not mount an attack on God's people. On the other side, on the one side, there was darkness. On the other side, God's people had light and brightness, and they can prepare, and they can get ready, and they're about ready to go through the... they helped that God was going to give them, going through the Red Sea. Verse 21, Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night, and made a sea into dry land, and the waters were divided.

So the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea on dry ground, and the waters were a wall to them on their right hand and on their left. Now, typically, brethren, I know that we preach this on the last day of Unleavened Bread, because we feel this is when this took place. I understand that.

That is not my point today in terms of chronology. My point today is that here we see God, again, miraculously, from his perspective, being there for his people. Now, again, if we're going to be... the mindset is victims of Satan, we're going to say, Wow, we're fishing a barrel. We're going through this little channel here, and Pharaoh's going to come down with his armies, and we're going to be annihilated.

He knows right where we're at. We're all there. He comes down. So that's the mentality of a victim. But the mentality of the overcomer sees the same circumstance and says, You know what? God is a brilliant general. Because of those walls of water on our right and left, the Egyptians cannot flank us. They can't go around. They can't surround us and then annihilate us. They are limited as to what they can do. And God is going to give us the victory. It's a matter of perspective, brethren. Are we going to be victims of Satan or overcomers with God? Verse 23, And the Egyptians pursued and went after them into the midst of the sea.

All Pharaoh's hosts and his chariots and his horsemen. Now it came to pass in the morning, and washed that the Lord looked down upon the army of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and cloud, and he troubled the army of the Egyptians. He took off their chariot wheels, so they drove them with difficulty. And the Egyptians said, Let us flee from the face of Israel, for the Lord fights for them against the Egyptians. Brethren, this is very important. Not only are the Israelites helped here, not only are the Israelites going to a place of safety, and God's protecting them, and so forth, but God is also using this situation to be a witness to people he's about ready to kill, to take their lives.

God loved the Egyptians as much as he loved the Israelites. Make no mistake about that. And there's going to come a time when God's going to resurrect these same Egyptians and say, Hey, remember when you guys tried to take off and get my people? Remember the difficult time you had? Remember in your mind you knew, after going through those ten plagues in your country, that you knew what was happening, and you knew it was the God of Israel that was doing this to you? Well, you've been dead these many centuries.

You've been dead thousands of years now. I've resurrected you. You know that you were dead. You know you remember the very last thoughts? You may have been praying to some of your false gods. Well, where are those gods? I'm the true God. And let me tell you what we're going to start doing. We're going to start educating you about the truth. You see, brethren, as you and I, as we are overcomers with God, that also affects those around us.

We have a different mindset, and because of the mindset we have, we affect others in a more positive way. Verse 26, Then the Lord said to Moses, Stretch out your hand over the sea, and the waters may come back upon the Egyptians on their chariots, on their horsemen. And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea. And when the morning appeared, the sea returned to its full depth, while the Egyptians were fleeing into it. So the Lord overthrew the Egyptians in the midst of the sea. The waters returned and covered the chariots. The horsemen, all the army of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them, not so much as one of them remained.

Brethren, the point I like to make at this point here in this narrative is what problems do we have? God says, if you are faithful, if you are, you know, you kill the fear, you stand strong, you move forward, then either I will help you go through the issue, as through the Red Sea, or will help you conquer it. And as it says here, none of these Egyptians remained. The whole problem was taken care of. God's way. I would like to add a... I can see we're coming close to the end of the sermon. I'll probably maybe take you over a few minutes, but...

I'd like to add a postscript to this. Let's take a look at Exodus 40. Exodus 40. And we want to take a look at the pillar again. There's a little bit of a postscript here. That we want to take a look at that I think is very interesting. Exodus 40, verse 34.

Then the cloud covered the tabernacle of meeting. The same cloud that went behind the children of Israel to protect them, to be a difficulty to the Egyptians, but a help to the Israelites. Then the cloud covered the tabernacle of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. The glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. The glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Brethren, are you a temple of God's Holy Spirit?

Are you a tabernacle of God's Holy Spirit? Is God filling you? Absolutely, He is. As a matter of fact, keep a marker here. We're going to come back, but put a marker here. Let's go over to 2 Corinthians, chapter 12. 2 Corinthians, chapter 12. I hadn't really put this together until a while back, and it just kind of struck me as I was thinking about that section in Exodus, chapter 40, and what Paul, what I've read to you so many times, and you've read as well so many times in your own personal study. 2 Corinthians, chapter 12, verse 9.

I'd rather boast in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me, that the power of Christ may rest upon me, just as that cloud rested on a tabernacle, and filled a tabernacle, representing God's power, God's Spirit. God's Spirit rests on you, rests on me, fills us up, so we can do the things that God wants us to do. I'd rather boast in my infirmities that the power of Christ, that pillar of cloud, that pillar of fire, may rest upon me. The word rest there in 2 Corinthians means to fix a tent upon. It's very similar to what we see there in Exodus, chapter 40. The idea is that the power of Christ rests upon the believer, just as the presence of God dwelt in the holy place on a tabernacle.

To me, I find that to be very encouraging. Let's go back to Exodus, chapter 40. Verse 35, Moses was not able to enter the tabernacle of meaning, because a cloud rested above it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. The glory of the Lord fills your hearts and minds. It doesn't fill your heart and mind to be fearful. It doesn't fill your heart and mind for you to deny to be victims. It fills our hearts and minds so we can be overcomers. Verse 36, Therefore, when the cloud was taken from above the tabernacle, the children of Israel would go onward in all their journeys. But if the cloud was not taken up, then they did not journey until the cloud was taken up. Brother, know we see here a picture of God's Spirit moving in us, helping us to overcome, helping us to move forward, giving us direction, telling us, there are times we need to stand still, get our bearings, understand what's happening around us, kind of survey the situation, think about things, make some good, wise decisions. And then there's times, as we see here, where it's time where the cloud would move, and God's Spirit helps us to move. It tells us when timing is critical. Timing is critical. You can do the right thing at the wrong time and not meet with such good success. Timing is critical. But here we see where God, you know, He knew the proper time. He said, time to move. And here's the direction we're going to go. And this is analogous to God's Holy Spirit, telling us when it's time for us to move, to move forward in which direction we're going to go. Verse 38, For the cloud of the Lord was above the tabernacle by day, and fire over it by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel throughout all their journeys. Brother, isn't that true of you in all of our journeys, as we go through our life? Isn't God there to lead us, guide us, direct us? We should not be fearful. We should not be viewing ourselves as victims of Satan. But we should be viewing ourselves as overcomers with God's help. We're not going to be overcomers without His help. We're going to be overcomers with His help. Now, you can see I've got a number of pages of my notes here off, so I'll do that. But, you know, brethren, in the final analysis, we're Christians. And to be a Christian means that we watch the example and look at the example of Jesus Christ. Nobody was any more victimized than Jesus Christ. Nobody was any more victimized than the Apostle Paul, or very few people. And yet, you didn't see Jesus Christ whining and complaining. And please, brethren, I'm not saying that any of you are whiners and complainers. I don't view any of you that way. I think sometimes I've whined and complained, I would admit to that. But too many times I know I viewed myself too much as a victim. And I know that maybe some of you have done the same thing. And so I put together this message in view of the fact that I don't know that I'm that much different than most of you. And I think that perhaps too many times you and I do view ourselves as victims, and we need to get away from that. We need to think about the power, the tremendous power of the great God as He moves in our hearts and our minds, and allow Him to continue to be that influence and to be strong in the power of the Lord.