“And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud, to lead them in the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light to go by day and night. 22. He took not away the pillar of cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night, from before the people.”
As Israel was preparing to leave Egypt, God did not leave them to wander blindly to Canaan, but He gave them the “pillar of cloud” by day and the “pillar of fire” by night. This was God’s way of leading Moses and His people through the journey that they were about to take. We can say that the cloud and fire are types of the leadership of the Holy Spirit in our lives. God is always willing to give us the wisdom of His leadership. It is when we fail to follow that leadership that we get into trouble – as Israel proved time and time again. There are reasons that God gives us spiritual leadership in our lives, and if we are wise we will follow His leadership? Why? We need to follow God’s leadership because He knows where the pitfalls are located. We serve a God who knows everything from one end of eternity to the other, and He alone knows where the dangers lie. When people go on safari in Africa, they do not just go to Africa and start their journey. They hire a guide who will be able to keep them away from the places that would be dangerous to them. Sometimes we step into the devil’s traps because we do not follow God’s leadership. The devil sets up traps all along the way of our lives, and we need God’s vision and God’s wisdom to stay out of those traps. I think we can all look back on our lives and say to ourselves: “What was I thinking? I should have seen it coming.” Then we remember that we were not following God’s leadership in our lives. God allows us to go off track sometimes, because He knows that we will learn better, or I should say that hopefully we will learn better. We need to follow God’s leadership because He knows where the challenges are. A good example of this was when the Israelites left Egypt; there was a more direct route to Canaan than the way they took. What was the reason that God led them around by the Red Sea instead of in the more direct route? One reason was because they would have to fight the Philistines if they went on the more direct route, and they were not ready for that. However, since God could have given them victory over the Philistines, I think that a more compelling reason was that if they defeated the Philistines, they could claim that they did it themselves. Sometimes God wants to challenge us to see Him do what only He can do. When they went by way of the Red Sea, the Israelites became upset when they realized that Pharaoh’s army was pursuing them, and they began to complain. But in the final analysis, when God divided the Red Sea for them, they could not claim that they did it themselves. When you are following God’s leadership in your life and you come upon what seems to be a pitfall, remember that it might be a challenge so that you can see what God can do. We need to follow God’s leadership, because if we are not careful we will lose the way and wander through the wilderness. Israel had to wander for forty years through the wilderness because they failed to follow God’s leadership. He offered a challenge to go into Canaan, and they refused to go out of fear. There are many Christians who have been derailed by the devil because they were afraid to follow God’s leadership. God did not create us to wander, but we will if we do not stay close to Him and follow His leadership. Whose leadership are you following today? If it’s not the Lord’s Holy Spirit, stop where you are and go in the direction that God would have you go. Bro. Joe
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"The Lord is my light and my salvation: whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life: of whom shall I be afraid.”
Psalm 27 is one of David’s most eloquent statements of his faith in and dependence on the Lord. The first verse gives an apt description of this motif. In this verse, David gives us a glimpse of his relationship with the Lord. “The Lord is my light.” Among other things, this is a reference to the guidance of God. In John 8:12, Jesus said: “I am the light of the world: he that follows me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.” This is the same spirit in which David wrote in our text. If we want to live in God’s will, we will certainly walk in His light. This will mean that we will have to spend time in prayer and in a study of God’s word. David wrote “the Lord is my light.” We follow God’s light in a personal faith relationship with Him. “The Lord is…my salvation.” As a shepherd in his younger years, David learned to depend on the Lord’s salvation. Before his engaging Goliath, David shared with Saul that as a shepherd, “The Lord has delivered me out of the paw of both the lion and the bear, He will deliver out of the hand of this Philistine…” David did all that he did with the understanding that the Lord was with him, and that He would deliver him. We see this borne out in David’s life on many occasions. We can certainly depend on God to be our salvation in our lives. “The Lord is the strength of my life.” As I pointed out above, David always depended on the strength of the Lord. He didn’t just say that the Lord gave him strength, he said, “the Lord is the strength of my life.” Because the Lord was his salvation and strength, David declared twice in this verse that he would not be afraid. He wrote…”Whom shall if fear.” Because the Lord was His strength, David was not afraid of people. David had a lot of powerful enemies, and because of the Lord’s strength he was not encumbered by fear of them. The Lord has given us the strength and power of the Holy Spirit, to enable us to meet life's challenges without fear. If you haven’t already, make the Lord your light, your salvation and your strength. If you have, praise Him and live victoriously. Bro. Joe “Then the whole community broke into loud cries, and the people wept that night. 2. All the Israelites complained about Moses and Aaron, and the whole community told them, if only we had died in the land of Egypt, or if only we had died in this wilderness! 3. Why is the Lord bringing us into this land to die by the sword? Our wives and little children will become plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt? 4. So they said to one another, ‘Let’s appoint a leader and go back to Egypt.’” HCSB
This is a sad commentary on the history of God’s people. Just a short time before this, the Israelites marched out of Egypt with their heads held high. Four hundred years of captivity had ended. God had miraculously delivered them from Egypt. He had miraculously gotten them through the Red Sea. He had given them manna to eat every morning and provided quail along the way. What did God have to do to show them that He meant business? Now they want to erase all of this, backtrack and go back to captivity in Egypt. Why? As the Israelites got closer to the “promised land,” Moses sent out twelve spies to spy out the land that they were to conquer. The report of the spies was that it was as good a land as God had said it was. The problem was that the people were big folks, and the Israelite spies, except for Joshua and Caleb, said that they seemed like “grasshoppers” in their sight. Wow! They have gone from the victorious people of God with their heads held high to “grasshoppers.” Of course, you know that they never returned to Egypt but the fact that the thought was there and a plan presented proved a lack of faith on their part. This made me wonder about how many times have I come to a bad place in my life and in my heart devised a plan to “go back to Egypt”? Just as God’s plan for Israel was to forge ahead and not go back to Egypt, so it is with us. . If God wants me in Palestine, He doesn’t intend for me to go back to Egypt. Thus far I have been nice, because I have referred to my own lack of faith. What about you? How many times have you made plans to “go back to Egypt?” Somehow we think that when God makes a promise to us, it will be fulfilled without a great deal of responsibility on our part. It just doesn’t work that way. God has “the promised land” in our future, but there will be struggles and fights along the way to get there. If the struggle seems bigger than God, then we will want to back up and not carry out in our lives what God wants. Where are you sitting now in reference to God’s plan for your life as against what you want for your life? If you are like a lot of people, you will not really worry about what God wants and go on your merry way. You don’t have to worry about going back to Egypt, because you have never left your "Egypt.". But if you really care, you need to plan to face the struggles and fight the fights that are ahead of you to do and to be what God wants you to be. These struggles and fights need to be carried out with faith. And, unlike the Israelites here, we need to realize that though we seem like “grasshoppers” our God is considerably bigger than a grasshopper and is capable of helping us through whatever we need to go through. What happened as a result of this plan to “go back to Egypt”? The Israelites were made to wander through the desert for the next forty years until the generation that left Egypt died out. They wasted forty years because of a lack of faith. How much time have we wasted in our lives because of our own lack of faith? Be sure that I am not fussing at you, I’m saying to you what I say to myself: “Get up off of it. Trust God. Get in the struggle and stop wasting time.” Stop making plans to “go back to Egypt” and get on with what God wants for your life. You can be sure that the Lord does want something for your life and it is worth the struggle to find it. Bro. Joe “And Moses said unto the people, Fear not, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will show you today: for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you shall see them again no more stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will show you today: for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you shall see them again no more forever. 14. The Lord shall fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.”
This text is one of greatest statements of faith in the Bible, and is a recurring theme in my preaching and writing. Moses led the children of Israel out of Egypt, now they have the Red Sea in front of them and Pharaoh’s army behind them. What do they do now? They can’t swim across with all of their animals and belongings. There are no boats to carry them across. There are no buckets big enough to bail all of the water. What can they do? They can do absolutely nothing. This situation is far beyond the ability of Moses, Aaron, and all of the Israelite people to do anything to help themselves. Here is the point: They needed for God to do what only God can do. This is a test of faith that we sometimes encounter in our lives. We come to some crisis that we can do nothing about. This is when real faith kicks in and waits for God to do what only He can do. These two verses hold the keys to what we should do in case this happens in our lives – and it will at some time or other. The first thing that Moses told the Israelites was to “fear not.” Moses knew that the Israelite people were afraid, and who wouldn’t be? After all, Pharaoh’s army was the greatest army in the world at that time in history. Moses told them to allay their fear because fear causes panic and panic erases clear thinking. The first thing that we need to realize when we face trying times in our lives is to not let fear rule our hearts and minds. Psalm 56:3 tells us what to do when we are afraid: “What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee.” The second thing that Moses told the Israelites to do was to “stand still.” Another translation of this is “stand firm.” In our fear we might try anything to try to get beyond the situation. When we face the crises of life, we need to stop in our tracks, stand still and stand firm. As we would say today, “stand till and don’t do anything stupid.” We need to remember that God knows what we are going through and He knows what the solution is. As result of our faith, we are to stand firm in the Lord and wait and see what He can do. Sometimes we do not stand firm in our faith and wait, and we make mistakes that only complicate the situation. Moses said: “Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will show you today…” They just needed to wait on the Lord, which is good advice for us as well. The third thing that Moses told the Israelites was: “For the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you shall see them no more forever.” In times like this, God says I will handle your enemies, you just stand still. In Romans 8:31, Paul wrote: “If God be for us, who can be against us.” That’s a good thing to remember when the devil is hard at work in our lives trying to defeat us. We need to always remember that our greatest enemy is the Devil and only God can handle him. Just as the Egyptian army was too strong for Israel to fight alone, the devil is too strong for us to fight alone. If God is for us, even the devil cannot bring his harm into our lives. The fourth thing that Moses told the Israelites was: “The Lord shall fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.” Basically, what Moses is telling the people is to “shut up and watch what God can do.” We should just stop complaining about the hard situations in life and realize that the Lord is fighting for us. He even fought for our salvation on the cross. He still fights for His people. We just need to trust Him, stand still, and realize that God is fighting for us. What a comfort! Don’t you agree? Bro. Joe “What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee. 4. In God I will praise His word, in God I have put my trust, I will not fear what flesh (people) can do to me.
Notice that the psalmist wrote:“What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee…” It can also be translated: “When I am afraid, I will trust in thee.” This was an admission by David that he would be afraid, and that when fear came upon him, he would not be ruled by it, but would trust God. If you remember, David had a lot to be afraid of. King Saul chased him all over “kingdom come" trying to capture and kill him. Saul was very serious in his pursuit. David would have been more than a human being if he could face a daily death sentence with no fear at all. Then there was the problem with his son Absalom. When David was older, his son Absalom took over the kingdom. He did not ultimately succeed, but in the process David was again under a death sentence. It is no wonder that he said, “When I am afraid I will trust in thee.” Get this down good: fear is not a sin. Some great general, whose name I can’t remember said that “courage is fear that has said its prayers.” Another great general, whose name I also can’t recall, said while waiting to go into battle: “Afraid? Me Afraid? If you could see my knees shaking right now, you would know that I am afraid.” When does fear become a sin? It becomes a sin when it takes over our lives and we live in fear every day. There are people who are literally afraid of life. They can’t enjoy life because they are afraid of what life might bring. Life can bring all sorts of things, but we need not fear them. In our text, David gave the key to facing life without being ruled by fear. First, he wrote that when he was afraid, he would trust God. I am glad that I believe in a God who loves me, has my best interests at heart and will lead me through anything that I might face. If you don’t believe in the God who you can trust, I would not join you in your misery. If I thought that the only tools that I had to face life with were the tools at my command in this world, I would be very afraid. When you are afraid, you can trust God. He will lead you through, over, or around whatever life brings. I have certainly had dreadful moments in my life, and at times I was afraid that they might defeat me. But God has delivered me through them all. (Notice that I wrote“through them all,” not “around them all.”) The same can be true for you. Trust God! Second, David wrote: “In God I will praise His word.” When we are afraid, we can turn to the Bible for comfort. I have favorite scriptures that I turn to when all else seems to fail. In fact, the text used in this blog is one of my favorite texts to turn to in times of fear. Another is Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” I can turn this text into, “I can go through all things that life brings through Christ who strengthens me.” Jesus told Paul: “When you are weak then I am strong.” (Not a direct quote) Jesus invites us to lean on His strength as we face the difficult times of life. His grace is always sufficient for us. Third, he wrote: “I will not be afraid what flesh (people) can do to me.” My Granddaddy Cooper once told me: “Don’t ever be afraid of any man.” He lived up to that credo. There are some people who are fearsome, but they are not greater than God. What are you afraid of today? Reread the text at the top of the page and rejoice. Bro. Joe |
AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
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