Please turn with me in God's Word this morning to Exodus chapter 3. Exodus chapter 3. Page 46 and the Bible's there in front of you. Last week I pointed out that Moses' time in the house of Reuel or Jethro was a time of reintroduction. to the God that he had heard of as a small child. Moses is set before us, we wonder where is this individual going to fit in and Moses is set before us because God is going to do a great thing, a special work through him, using him in a special way. Before he's given that special task, God comes down to talk with him. Just as God comes down to talk with Adam in the garden, comes down to talk with Adam and Eve in the garden to tell them how they are to live, how they are to serve Him, to lead the creation. Now, Moses hears from God as God comes down to speak to him and says, you're going to bring my people, Israel, out of the land of bondage, out of slavery, a picture of that, of deliverance that God wants or that God will work, rather, for his people. He comes to prepare Moses for this task, and we want to hear that this morning as we look together at Exodus 3, starting verse 1. This is the word of God. Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. And Moses said, I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned. When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, Moses, Moses. And he said, here I am. Then he said, do not come near. Take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground. And he said, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God. Then the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and I have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. And now behold, The cry of the people of Israel is, come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppressed them. Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt? He said, But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you that I have sent you. When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain." Then Moses said to God, if I come to the people of Israel and say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you, and they ask me, what is his name? What shall I say to them? God said to Moses, I am who I am. And he said, say this to the people of Israel, I am has sent me to you. God also said to Moses, say this to the people of Israel, the Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob has sent me to you. This is my name forever. And thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations. go and gather the elders of Israel together and say to them, the Lord, the God of your fathers, God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has appeared to me saying, I have observed you and what has been done to you in Egypt. And I promise that I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. A land flowing with milk and honey. and they will listen to your voice and you and the elders of Israel shall go to the king of Egypt and say to him the Lord the God of the Hebrews has met with us and now please let us go a three days journey into the wilderness that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God. But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go unless compelled by a mighty hand. So I will stretch out my hand and strike Egypt with all the wonders that I will do in it. After that, he will let you go. And I will give this people favor in the sight of the Egyptians. And when you go, you shall not go empty. But each woman shall ask of her neighbor and any woman who lives in her house for silver and gold jewelry and for clothing. You shall put them on your sons and on your daughters. So, you shall plunder the Egyptians. So far, the reading of God's own holy word this morning. May he have his blessing, the reading and proclamation of it this morning. Dear people of God, a long time has passed since the days of Joseph. Since the days of Joseph and the residing in the land of Goshen. The people had multiplied and spread out, but almost no one remembered the, as we like to say, the good old days. For the oppression of the Egyptians was great. Indeed, many of the Israelites had come to serve the gods of Egypt. We know this because it's recorded for us. God speaks of this in Ezekiel chapter 20. The people of promise seemed a failure. They were heavily oppressed by the Egyptian overlords and seemed in danger of being swallowed up or simply just assimilated. After much tribulation, they cried out to God. and God heard their cry. We saw that at the end of chapter 2 where he says that he had heard their groaning, he had heard their cry and that he was remembering his covenant and that he saw and that he knew. Much assimilation had happened. God had every right to reject his people. but he would not so that his glory might be revealed. Remember the theme of the book of Exodus, saved for God's glory. I was looking at this passage. This week, again and again and again, I thought, how am I going to preach this passage? I came to it with the thought of, well, this is the introduction of Moses. Moses is here. This is all about Moses. What do I want to say about Moses? What does the passage say about Moses? And the more I sat with it, the more I looked at the passage, the more I read it through and studied it and thought about it, I thought, this isn't about Moses. This is God reintroducing himself to Moses in a fuller way than he already had in Jethro's household. You remember we talked about that last week. Now he appears to Moses and Moses is now going to reintroduce this God, the only true God, to his people. This passage is about the awesome God of glory. Moses is a central figure here, no doubt, but God and His character is set before us. And today we consider His attributes and, Lord willing, you will see the importance of theology, doctrine, and how it impacts the way that you live. That's my desire. That's my hope this morning, that God, by His grace and mercy, would help us all to see how the study of God applies to our daily living. Now let me say that today's sermon might well be one of the most political-sounding sermons you'll ever hear from me. Now don't be nervous. I'm not going to talk about the Republican and Democrat platform or any other party's platform. But I saw parallels here as Israel is in a position of groaning and they need a deliverer, they're looking for a deliverer. And I see a parallel in our own nation, a moment of crisis and the candidates portraying themselves as deliverers. Groaning is heard, complaining, there's anger. We're not enslaved as the Egyptians were, but we're certainly grumbling. We know as Christians that our deepest issues aren't solved by politics or by politicians. Our deepest issue in this country is moral decay. And we won't be delivered by a politician. What we need is to be reintroduced to God. That brings peace. That brings confidence. That instills in us courage and hope for the future. This passage is not about Moses, primarily. There are a few things we can learn from Moses, how and how not to respond to a divine call, what faith or doubt sounds like, how feeble the best men are. There's other things that we could learn. Lord willing, we'll look at those in coming days, but today we want to see the awesome God of glory as He sets Himself before Moses and as He sets Himself before us in the midst of the threats and the promises and all of the rest that are going on through our leaders today, we need to remember God is over all. And right theology is fortifying. Right theology is strengthening. Before God delivers His people, He reintroduces Himself to prepare us for His glorious act of deliverance. His self-description is meant to remove any doubt that we might have that He's able to do what He promises He will do. We should be swept up in awe as we read of our glorious God. God declares who he is first this morning. God declares who he is. God can fulfill all of his promises. He doesn't act in a way, he doesn't always act in ways that we would prefer, in the timing that we would like, or with the personnel, the people that we would like him to use, and yet God will accomplish his will. When we grumble and we complain, it's because we've lost sight of who God is and what God can do, as we'll see also this morning. Though we're often confused about His timing and those that He uses, God will accomplish His will. Here in Exodus 3, we're 40 years on into the training of God's deliverer. Forty years! God's heard them. End of chapter 2 and we learn later in Exodus, Exodus chapter 7 and then in Stephen's sermon in Acts chapter 7 that 40 years later Moses has this encounter with God at the burning bush. And they're 400 years into their bondage in Egypt, 400 years. This deliverer taking care of sheep on the far side of the wilderness hardly seems like a good plan. One day, as Moses tends to the sheep, he sees something unusual, a bush on fire that isn't burning up, and he says in verse 3, I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned. As he draws near, God calls to him, Moses, Moses! And he says to him, do not come near, take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground. And he said, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. He says, I've seen the affliction of my people. I know, I understand what they are going through and I will deliver them and I'm going to send you to deliver them. And Moses then says, verses 13 and 14, if I come to the people of Israel and say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you and they ask me, what is his name? What shall I say to them? God said to Moses, I am who I am. And he said, say this to the people of Israel, I am has sent me to you. Well, is that helpful? Or is that simply too deep for us to understand? It's a little of both, isn't it? I am who I am. There's mystery there. Who is this God? Who is the one true God? He says, I am who I am. I can't possibly communicate all I am to you. You couldn't handle it. In your finite mind, you cannot contain the infinite. So right off we see that there is mystery here, and yet we need to know who this God, the one true God, is. Most of you know Ligonier Ministries and R.C. Sproul. Years ago when that ministry was just starting and it was growing rapidly, they had consultants come in. They wanted to know how to make this ministry as effective as it could possibly be, as far-reaching as it possibly could be, and the consultants came in and they wanted to ask him some questions. Well, what is the purpose of this ministry? What do you want it to be? What do you want it to say? So the consultant had this question for Dr. Sproul. What is the greatest need of the people in the world? What do you think he said? He said this, people in the world need to know who God is. Okay, said the consultant, good. What do you think the need of the people in the church is? Without hesitation he said, the people in the church need to know who God is. The whole trajectory of our lives, everything about our lives, our thoughts, our decisions, our actions, everything is determined by who we understand God to be. Who is He? What can He do? Will He respond? Will He keep His promises? Who is He? Nations' destinies, because after all, that's just people, right? Number of persons added together. Nations' destinies are determined as well by who they see God to be. They rise or they fall accordingly. They rise as they worship the one true God, they fall as they rebel against the one true God. We say that's rather simple, isn't it? Look through the account of the history of the world from Genesis to Revelation and tell me what you find. It's the story of the rising and falling of nations, those who honor Him, those who rebel against Him, and their respective trajectory, whether they're going up or they're going down. We'll be looking at how idolatry, making, inventing false gods destroys people and nations tonight as we look at the first commandment, Lord's Day 34, the Heidelberg Catechism. I invite you to be here for that. God says to Moses, tell them I am who I am has sent me to you. There is a mystery. God uses human language to explain himself to us, but he can never explain to us who he is in himself. our minds couldn't contain it. Now let me just be clear, there are those who say, well because we can't know all that God is, we can't know anything about who God is. And I say no, and you say no, because he tells us who he is right here, in his word. He declares, this is who I am, this is what I do. Though He is infinite in His being and we are finite in our ability, yet we can receive of Him in His revelation as He condescends to speak to us. What else is in this name? There's that mystery, but then there's also the notion of His perfection. I am who I am. He does not add to Himself. He does not grow in any way having to learn something, having to gain strength or to do anything of this nature. He is perfection in fullness. He does not need to add anything from anyone to His being. He doesn't depend on anyone or anything for His existence. He is totally independent from His creation. He is eternal, unchanging, self-existent. And we can spend our life studying about God's perfections and only begin to grasp His being. For brevity and simplicity, we say He is unlike anything we have ever encountered or experienced. God is not just a better us, He is altogether unlike us. There is a transcendence there. I don't want to discount the eminence of the incarnation, but as we look at theology proper today, God, who He is, is a transcendence, creator, creature. He gives us his word to help us understand who he is, but we can never fully wrap our heads around his glory. John Owen, perhaps one of the greatest of the Puritans, had a massive theological mind and he wrote massive and extremely helpful books on God and who he is. And as he was on his deathbed, his book, The Glory of Christ, was nearing publication, and his friend came to him and told him of the progress of the book and said, it's nearing publication, and John Owen's response is worth pondering. He says, I am glad to hear it, but oh, the joy I feel, for the long wished-for day has come at last, in which I shall see the glory. of God in another manner than I have ever done or was capable of doing in the world." In all of his erudition, in all of his excellence in being able to present on God, he says, I won't even, it won't even compare when I see Christ as he is and see the Father through Christ in glory. This great man knew he could not grasp, could not begin to grasp the glory of God. Yet he was strengthened by his pursuit in this understanding. I want us to understand that. I want us to hold on to that. To pursue understanding of God is not wasted time. To be motivated to present whatever weak witness we have to others is not a fool's errand. It is our call to proclaim the greatness, the glory, the splendor of our God that we might, while I'm letting out some of the application, that we might not fear. That we might have courage and hope for the future. The angels who appeared before Isaiah declared, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. That is, it's overwhelming. Perhaps it's a bit vague to us this morning too. Holy, holy, holy. What fills our minds? Well, I want us to be filled by this thought today. He is completely other. He has no limitations as we have. No weaknesses. No shortcomings. No failures. He is perfectly faithful. Wholly good. Abundantly loving. What is amazing is how God comes down to Moses and presents his glory in this little bush. Just this little bush. His glory in the bush is not consumed, and yet God declares, take your sandals off for the place where you are standing is holy ground. I have sanctified this by my presence. This God's glory, the one true God, and His glory will one day overwhelm the world. Every knee will bow, every tongue will confess the awesome God of glory. There will be no argument, no surveys taken. Well, do you think He's the greatest? Do you think God is the greatest? Or what do you think? It will be overwhelming glory. Yet here He reveals Himself in this way, in this out-of-the-way place to this shepherd. It was not beneath his coming to earth. Do you hear something of the parallel of the incarnation here? The Son of God comes down to an out-of-the-way place. The one who had glory with the Father from eternity as he says in John 17. He had one there veiled in flesh. He comes to save sinners by offering himself as payment for sin. The heavens couldn't contain the joy of the angels. The skies break open and the angels say, glory to God in the highest. And an earth peace to men upon whom his favor rests. Well, this theme of God's glory is huge. We could spend weeks on it, but we must move on. This is who God declares himself to be. Secondly, God describes what he will do. He came down not only to declare who he is, but also to describe what he would do. He says in verses 7 and 8, I will, or I have seen the affliction of my people. I have heard their cry. I know their sufferings. I have come down to deliver them, to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land. And then verses 16 and 17, go and gather the elders of Israel together and say to them, the Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac and of Jacob has appeared to me saying, I have observed you and what has been done to you in Egypt. Then I promise that I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt. Here we're kind of Falling back into the previous point, who is this God? A few other things here. He's good and faithful. He says, I know, I see, I remember my covenant and I will deliver you. He has omniscience. He is omnipotent. I will deliver you. There is no, well, let's see how this goes with God. He says, let it be and it is. Study of God, study of theology is meant to fortify our faith, to strengthen us in our living. God promises to deliver His people from bondage so that they might worship Him. Beloved, God brings you out of sin so that you might worship Him. God wants you to live in peace and with a solid hope of deliverance from death. Sin has brought death into the world. It has brought all kinds of hardship and bondage. But the Son of God has come to release us from the fear of death and the power of sin. That is what God does. That is what He is doing. God also says that even the evil of men will bring Him glory, for He will show Himself stronger than them. Verses 19 and 20, he says, I know, I know this also, I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go unless compelled by a mighty hand, so I will stretch out my hand and strike Egypt with all the wonders that I will do in it. After that, he will let you go. God knows what Pharaoh will do. God ordains whatsoever comes to pass that it might display his glory. No threat of man, no power of nation will thwart God's plans and purposes. He will do what He has planned. Indeed, not even death could defeat His plans. He will deliver His people. Well, thirdly, he tells us what we must do. God tells us what we must do. What were the people of God called to do upon deliverance from the land, from bondage? They were to worship, and in their worship, they were to teach the next generation of the awesome nature of God, the wonders that he performed for his people. God would give the people a rite, a ceremony to remember the deliverances he had provided. You can look ahead a few chapters to Exodus chapter 12 and verses 24 and following, where he says to his people after they have been delivered, you shall observe this right as a statute for you and for your sons forever. And when you come to the land that the Lord will give you, as he has promised, you shall keep this service. And when your children say to you, what do you mean by this service? You shall say, it is the sacrifice of the Lord's Passover, for He passed over the houses of the people of Israel and Egypt. God will show His means of deliverance, and that means will be through His Son, the perfect Lamb without blemish. The psalmist write of Write songs of God's deliverance. We don't have time to look at them all this morning, but Psalm 105, the first 27 verses. Oh, give thanks to the Lord. Call upon His name. Make known His deeds among the peoples. Sing to Him. Sing praises to Him. Tell of all His wondrous works. Glory in His holy name, the I am who I am. Let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice. And He goes through what He has done. How Joseph is brought into slavery in verse 17. His feet were hurt with fetters, verse 18. His neck was put in a collar of iron. until what he had said came to pass. The word of the Lord tested him. The king sent and released him. He's made a ruler. Then Israel came to Egypt. Verse 23, Jacob sojourned in the land of Ham and the Lord made his people very fruitful and made them stronger than their foes. He turned their hearts to hate his people, to deal craftily with his servants. Then 26, he sent Moses his servant and Aaron whom he had chosen. They performed his signs among them and miracles in the land. Those miracles which Lord willing we'll be looking at as we continue our study in Exodus. Psalm 107 also speaks of God's salvation of his people. So many different accounts of God's work. Well, let's come back to what I mentioned at the opening. Our present moment is a moment of groaning. We don't want to lose our way of life. We want to vote for whoever promises to maintain that way of life that we've come to expect as a right, as something that we're entitled to. We want to vote thinking that man will give us what only God can give, which is life. joy, peace. Truly, we have things that we live for other than God, and we think that our electoral system is the way to keep things going. We do have an election coming up, in case you weren't aware. And I will say it does matter that you vote. And I would encourage all those who are eligible to vote to do so. That's not my point. It's not to say we'll just give up on the system and say forget it. Totally unnecessary. God has given us that opportunity. Who rules and their principles and the one to whom they look matters. Politics sadly has become a tool or mechanism used to preserve a way of life Not a science that studies. What is best for the polis for the city? Which then seeks to execute it nevertheless is important We're engaged We care about these things To lessen the evil to increase the good The way politics operates will be determined by those operating it of course no system is Foolproof it's run by fools. It will be foolish We pray and we Are active in who we vote for but our hope is not in politics Most of us if not all of us here have opinions on who would do a better job of keeping things moving in the right direction And the thought of the other side winning brings anxiety and frustration and fears We might lose what we have and But I want to remind us this morning that God is the only hope of any person or group of people. Without Him, life will be nothing but groaning under the sun, seeking to collect more stuff, gaining the world while losing one's soul. Ask Solomon about that. He has something to say. It's called the book of Ecclesiastes. God wants to deliver us from sin so that we might love Him, live for Him, to love others. He wants to set people free to worship Him. The Son of God came down not to establish a throne in Jerusalem, but to call the nations to repent of sin and to turn to God. He came to die to make atonement for sin that we, sinners, might be reconciled to God and put on the path to life. I don't know if you're reading the devotional, the nearer to God devotional, but this week there was an instance where God's glory did consume it was the soldiers who were sent out by King Ahaziah to take Elijah back to the king to imprison him and as they came remember what Elijah said if I'm a man of God let fire from heaven come down and destroy these men and it happened twice until the third The centurion or leader came and pleaded with Elijah, if you respect life, please spare us and our children. And my men, excuse me. Therein was a fear of God and God refrained. God is not about destruction just to show his power. God is about the destruction of evil and all that which stands over against God's people in the coming of His kingdom. But to those who will humble themselves, God shows Himself powerful to save, to deliver. He shows in the horrific event of the cross how He bears the penalty Sending his son to die to bear sin's curse that those who would believe in him might escape or be delivered rather from the curse, not being consumed, but one day having an eye for God's glory and rejoicing in him forever. Politics is not where it's at. No politician can save. Well, just one lesson from Moses before we close. I couldn't help but take at least one lesson from Moses. He is quite prominent in this passage, and it is this. Take his example to heart. When he saw this great sight, as he calls it, verse 3, the awesome God of glory, what does he do? He draws near. He draws near to see. I want us to ask ourselves some questions this morning. Ask yourself, do I have that desire to draw near to the God of glory? Is my heart stirred to worship the one true God and to draw near in Christ? Does my study of God give me a holy fear of God and a fearlessness in the face of man? It's important to study theology, to study God. For the more we know of the God of glory, the more we know of His glorious being, His glorious plan of redemption, the less fearful we are over the actions of men. Studying theology brings courage and strength and vision and peace, something that we all need in these anxious times. God sees and knows what his people are going through. He has provided a Savior to deliver you from death. And one final warning and exhortation. What happens when you live in a culture enslaved to sin? Easy to become enslaved, isn't it? Easy to, bit by bit, take those principles, those priorities and begin to look like the culture. Here Moses is in the wilderness being trained, taken out of Egypt. This morning we're here in this quote-unquote wilderness as God has called us to Him to worship. The world thinks that we're in this out-of-the-way place. What a ridiculous thing you do on Sunday. Isn't the action at Soldier Field? Isn't the action at the local high school for the lacrosse game? Isn't the real action somewhere else? Some entertainment somewhere? Aren't you guys putting yourselves in the wilderness? away from what's important where life can truly be found? And we say no, we want to draw near to our God through Christ in whom he says to you, grace and peace, that we might know that grace and peace, that we might live the new life in him. That we might be able to say what an awesome God of glory we serve. Amen. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven. You the awesome God of glory. We thank you for this opportunity to worship today. Call us out of cultural bondage to those things, those gods that would seek to bind us, to want to worship you, to give ourselves to you, and then to tell others. As we tell our children, as we tell those all around us here, to go out and tell others. There is a way to be freed from anxiety and fear. We're not called to let go of responsibilities, to just become passive. No, but when we do act, when we do live out our lives from day to day, knowing who you are, we can do so with joy. A joy that the world can't bring with hope. of a certain future which no politician or government can bring. And with a steadfastness from day to day that enables us to get up each morning and to say, this is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it. Lord, may we know that, may we experience that as we learn of you more and more. Thank you for saving us. for delivering us, help us to live as those who are set free to serve, not self, but you. Not to love self, but to love you above all else, to love our neighbor as ourselves. Hear us for we ask it in Jesus' name, amen.