THROUGH THE BIBLE - Exodus 1..

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com. That's cornerstonerbc.com. The Lord said to Moses, consecrate to me all the firstborn, whatever is the first to open the womb among the people of Israel, both man and beast is mine. And Moses said to the people, remember this day in which you came out from Egypt, out of the house of slavery, by a strong hand, the Lord brought you out from this place.

No leavened bread shall be eaten. Today, in the months of Abib, you are going out. And when the Lord brings you into the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, which he swore to your fathers to give you, a land flowing with milk and honey, you shall keep this service in this month. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, and on the seventh day there shall be a feast to the Lord. Unleavened bread shall be eaten for seven days.

No leavened bread shall be seen with you, and no leaven shall be seen with you in all your territory. You shall tell your son on that day, it is because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt. And it shall be to you as a sign on your hand and as a memorial between your eyes that the law of the Lord may be in your mouth for with a strong hand, the Lord has brought you out of Egypt. You shall therefore keep this statute and it's appointed time from year to year. When the Lord brings you into the land of the Canaanites, as He swore to you and your fathers, and shall give it to you, you shall set apart to the Lord all the first opens of the womb.

All the firstborn of your animals that are males shall be the Lord's. Every firstborn of donkey you shall redeem with a lamb, and if you will not redeem it shall break its neck. Every firstborn of man among your sons you shall redeem. And when in time to come your son asks you, what does this mean? You shall say to him, by a strong hand, the Lord brought us out of Egypt from the house of slavery."

For when Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us go, the Lord killed all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both the firstborn of man and the firstborn of animals. Therefore I sacrifice to the Lord all the males that first opened the womb, but all the firstborn of sons I redeem. It shall be as a mark on your hand or frontlets between your eyes. For by a strong hand the Lord brought us out of Egypt. When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them by the way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near.

But God said, let the people change their minds when they see war and return to Egypt. But God led the people around by the way of the wilderness towards the Red Sea. And the people of Israel went up out of the land of Egypt equipped for battle. Moses took the bones of Joseph with him, for Joseph had made the sons of Israel solemnly swear, saying, God will surely visit you, and you shall carry up my bones with you from here. And they moved on from Sackloff and camped at Etham on the edge of the wilderness.

And the Lord went before them day by day in the pillar of cloud and led them along the way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light that they might travel by day and by night. The pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night did not depart. from before the people amen this is the word of the lord well here it is for the people of israel now after so many years now comes their freedom we have been reading as a church family in the previous 12 chapters and and reading of their affliction of these people who once entered or first entered into egypt as a people of favor, people of honor, based on what Joseph had done for the land of Egypt. In fact, the whole world at that stage. But we've seen how that honor turned into oppression and that oppression into affliction and suffering.

We've seen that happen now. It's been 400 plus years that they've entered into the land of Egypt and they've been tormented for the most part. But now, Now the day has come where the great I Am will rescue his people from their distress. Now, this section in the latter part of chapter 12 and chapter 13 can have, we can say, an overarching theme to it. And that overarching theme is remembrance.

In fact, when Moses addresses the people, that's the first word we have in our ESV Bible. It says, remember this day. You see, it's been 12 supernatural plagues that the Lord has cast upon the people of Egypt. And it's after, on the 12th, I'm sorry, my apologies, 10. And after the 10th plague, the hardened heart of Pharaoh is finally shattered.

Finally, he concedes and lets these people go. Can you imagine the joy? Can you imagine the celebrations of these people when they first heard from Moses that Pharaoh has declared, now we can leave? this land. No doubt there would have been high joy.

No doubt they would have been on their knees worshipping and praising Yahweh for his almighty hand that has led them out of this land of bondage, this land of slavery. But here's the thing, and this is why this text really has the overarching theme of remembrance. As human beings, we have the tendency to forget. We have the tendency to forget the good things that God has done. We tend to enjoy the blessings, but in time we forget the one who gave us those blessings.

You know, it's hard to believe, but not long from now, in fact, in only a few days' time, these same people who have witnessed the mighty hand of God supernaturally work miracles they could never have fathomed, begin to mumble and groan and complain. Beloved, it is sickening, but that's our human nature, not only theirs. We quickly forget the good things and we seem to dwell on the bad things or the things that confront us, the here and now. And we seem to feel or believe that maybe we deserve better without looking back and seeing, in fact, it is God who got us here in the first place. You know, it's only by grace that these people are able to leave this land anyway.

It's only by grace that they're not mourning the death of their firstborn, both in beast and their sons. because it was only by the grace of God who provided for them, and our brother explained this for us last week, provided for them a way to be redeemed. That he said that a lamb is to be sacrificed, and his blood is to be painted upon the posts and on the lintels of your doors, and then death will pass over you. Beloved, it's not because the Israelites were more worthy of life, because they were not. It's because of the grace of God who had made a covenant with these people.

And this God is a God who provides and fulfills all his promises and his covenant will be fulfilled. And therefore, he saved these people. And as he said he would, he would take them out of this land of slavery and one day bring them into the land of promise. And, of course, we know, as our brother told us last week, that that Lamb was only a picture, a shadow, a symbol of the Lamb of God to come. Jesus Christ, who in His sacrifice, His shed blood, would pay the price of the wrath of God on His people and redeem a people unto Himself.

He would be the sacrifice. He would be the substitute on our behalf, so that those who would trust in Him may not be may not be punished under the wrath of God. may not die eternally, but rather have life. We must never forget this." So, as a people who have a tendency to forget, God commanded Israel to observe these things.

The Passover, the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Seven Days, and of course the last one, which is the consecration of the firstborn to the Lord. Now, although these are symbols, these are pictures and shadows of something much greater than themselves, but But the thing we must never forget is they are a reminder. They are a reminder of who God is. That He is a faithful God. That as the people look back, they're reminded of a God who has dealt with them graciously.

And this is a reminder that when the people are asked why it is that they celebrate these things in verses 3, 10, and 16, we're told that this is what you are to say. You are to say, it's with a strong hand that the Lord has brought us out of Egypt. On three occasions he said this. In three, in 10 and 16. You see, these ordinances are to be perpetually practiced and their meaning taught to all generations of the Israelites from the time they entered the land.

That's what it says. The children may have not been present when they were taken out of the land. But nonetheless, they ought to teach that generation and all subsequent generations of the mighty hand of God. In essence, they ought to teach that it is by the grace of God that we are saved. It's Yahweh who's our Savior.

They need to tell them and take the responsibility to tell the next generation how great and how gracious the Lord has been to us. We must never forget this. You see, the principle still applies today. Continually remembering what God has done in the Old Testament and through Christ in the New is an essential part of the New Testament Christian life. The Apostle Peter knew this, and listen to what he writes in the second epistle in chapter 3.

He begins with this. He says, You see, looking back at God's faithfulness naturally strengthens our faith for the future. The outworkings of a strengthened faith ought to be a people who get on their knees and worship and praise the almighty faithful covenant keeping God. Now, we as a people, we don't celebrate the Passover as it was celebrated. We don't celebrate the feast of unleavened bread and we don't consecrate our firstborns as they did.

But beloved, we do, however, celebrate the one who is the fulfillment of all these things. We celebrate Jesus Christ and his death on that cross. And we do it through the physical means of the celebration of the Lord's Supper. And that's what we do corporately. And that's a wonderful occasion where the church comes together corporately, reminded of the death of our Savior who bore the sins on our behalf.

and who rose again. And as we are trusting in Him, we too, we rise with Him in newness of life one day to enjoy all eternity with Him, because our sins have been paid for. This is a wonderful reminder as a church family. However, we also need to be mindful that what Christ has done applies not only to us corporately, but us individually. We ought to individually, every moment, of every day be reminded of what Christ has done for us.

You see, this is the essence of verse 16, I think. It says, it shall, talking about looking back and the things, the physical means of the reminder of God's faithfulness to his covenant and freeing these people, it says, it shall be as a mark on your hand and frontlets between your eyes. In other words, as often as you look at your hands, the work that you do is with your hands, as often as you have the strength to do anything with your hands, you ought to be remembering what God has done. You ought to be recognizing that the life you have, The spiritual salvation that you enjoy is only because of what God has done in Christ as New Testament believers. And for these people, they ought to be looking at their hands and being reminded of Yahweh who freed them from the torment of Egypt.

And a front lens between your eyes, that is that others will be able to also see. You see, it's like saying, as often as one looks upon you, not only is it recognised that within your own soul that you are trusting in the Lord and are being reminded daily of his goodness towards you, but he also should be seen by others. They ought to be looking at us Christians and seeing it is true, it's what we stand for. It should be as clear, your love for Him, your loyalty for Him, your trust in Him should be as clear to others who look upon your life and mine as though we have almost a tattoo on our forehead. It needs to be clear that it's a faith that begins within, that manifests also on to the outside.

Can we say, as Christians in good conscience, that both in our soul and before others, that this is the nature of our testimony. Can we truly say that what He has done for us in Christ is constantly on the forefront of our hearts and our minds, and it overwhelms us to the point that every facet of our lives, all that we do, all that we think, all that we say is governed by what He has done for us. Beloved, I pray that as Christians, this would be the goal, the purpose of our hearts, to honor Him in all that we do, all that we stand for. And beloved, that is in the private life, in the heart and in the mind, as well as what's seen on the outside, what's manifest from our actions and our deeds. Now for Israel, this is a multifaceted promise that the Lord had given to Abraham.

And it wasn't completely yet fulfilled. You see, at this point, it's estimated there would have been around about two million in total. We know 600,000 men with families, around two million in total. So the descendant promise given to Abraham has been fulfilled. And the promise that the Lord said in Genesis 15, when he said to Abraham that your descendants will be afflicted for 400 years before he frees them, that now is being fulfilled.

However, these people are waiting for the promise of a land, a land flowing with milk and honey as their reminder, where we've been reminded in verse five of our passage. And this is the thing. This is, brothers and sisters, why we ought to always be remembering. always why we ought to remember the promises of God that have been fulfilled faithfully in the past. When we read the Old Testament, when we read the New, and we see that the promises of God have been faithfully brought to pass, that He keeps His promises, not one does He forfeit, then as we look at that we can also establish That our God will also be faithful in keeping His promises in the future.

The ones that we haven't seen fulfilled as of yet. If He's a God who has fulfilled faithfully in the past, then He's a God who will faithfully fulfill in the future. Even, hear this, even if it's not in our own lifetime. This type of faith is found in Joseph. He's in our passage.

He's mentioned here, he swore, he made his, the sons of Israel, his own sons, he made them swore, he swore to them, my apologies, he made them swear that they will carry his bones and take him back with them, or take them with them to Canaan. Now what faith is that? He died in Egypt. How could he say these things? Well, he's a man who knew who God was.

He saw the outworkings of God, the faithfulness of God, and he knew no matter how much time had passed, that if God had given a promise, God will fulfill that promise, take my bones with you when he does. Whether it's a thousand years, four hundred years, ten years, it doesn't matter. He's believing because he looked back and he saw the faithfulness of God. God will keep his promises. And his bones served as a symbol to the people of Israel, a symbol of faith and hope in the covenant keeping God.

Now at last, in the last few verses of our chapter, I love these verses. They're so glorious. That although the road ahead for these people will be testing and difficult, This God will not depart from among his people. Let's read verse 21 and 22. And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way and by night in a pillar of fire to give them light that they might travel by day and by night.

Now hear this, the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night did what? Did not depart from before the people. Beloved, this is what it's all about. The presence of God among his people. This is the greatest blessing that can be fathomed to mankind, to people like us, simple, wretched people who are now able to be in the presence of God.

This is an incredible honour and privilege, that the journey and the road won't be easy. We know that. We've read the rest of the story. It will be difficult for these people. And it may be the same for us because we don't know what comes next.

None of us knows what even tomorrow may bring. But this is what we do know, that our good and gracious God promises that he's always with his people so we don't do it alone. Our Lord, our Saviour, our God, Jesus Christ, made this promise in Matthew 28. Before He ascended to the right hand of the Father, did He not say that I will be with you always, even until the end of the age? Beloved, doesn't this give you joy?

Doesn't this make your soul just happiness, just ooze out of you, that you're not on your own, that the God of the universe is with His people. Christ abides with His people by His Holy Spirit. And even though it's 2,000 years ago that He promised that he would return physically and bodily to gather his bride unto himself, that they would be with him in the joyous life, that there is no pain and no sickness and no suffering and no death. We, unlike the scoffers, beloved, in Peter, in second Peter, who deny his return, believe him because he is a God who fulfills his promise. He's a God who is a covenant-keeping God.

And therefore, by faith, we trust that the promises that are yet to come will definitely be fulfilled. In His timing, not ours, because He's faithful, and He always will be faithful. Amen.