Well, the book of Exodus is a marvelous book and foreshadowing the person and work of Christ. And, uh, to introduce it, we're going to read from Exodus six and I'll go ahead and begin reading at verse one. Then Yehovah said to Moses, now you shall see what I will do to Pharaoh for with a strong hand, he will let them go. And with a strong hand, he will drive them out of his land. And God spoke to Moses and said to him, I am Yehovah. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty, but by my name, Yehovah was not known to them. I have also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their pilgrimage in which they were strangers. And I have also heard the groaning of the children of Israel, whom the Egyptians keep in bondage. And I have remembered my covenant. Therefore say to the children of Israel, I am Yehovah. I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. I will rescue you from their bondage and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. I will take you as my people and I will be your God. Then you shall know that I am Yehovah, your God, who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. And I will bring you into the land, which I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And I will give it to you as a heritage. I am Jehovah. So Moses spoke thus to the children of Israel, but they did not heed Moses because of anguish of spirit and cruel bondage. Father, we thank you for your Word. And as our hearts respond to it, I pray that we would grow. We would grow more into the likeness of the Lord Jesus Christ. As Jesus prayed to you, sanctify them through your truth. Your Word is truth. Father, that is our heart's desire, that we might grow up into you in all things, become more familiar with your Word, be transformed by that Word, be more able to have facility to handle that word. And so we pray that you would continue to receive our worship during this time in Jesus' name. Amen. Old Bibles can be really cool. When you look through some of the marginal notes, you'll sometimes discover insights you do not get from the commentaries that are out there. And I have the Bible notes from Pastor John Waddell. that date to 1918, and I love how he describes the call that each of the first books of the Bible have upon your life. And let me go ahead and read his marginal notes. Genesis, begin with God. Exodus, come out for God. Leviticus, get right with God. Numbers, get somewhere. I have no idea what he meant by that one, but Deuteronomy, stop and think. Joshua, take the land. Judges, watch the borders. And I think he's onto something there, especially in the first three books. Where Genesis calls us to begin with God in absolutely everything that we do, Exodus calls us to come out for God, to take a stand, to be willing to follow God and enter into fellowship with Him as our covenant Lord. Now in this book, Egypt is going to be a symbol of the world. Pharaoh and all of his soldiers are gonna be symbols of Satan and his minions, demonic hosts, and the exodus is a symbol of our salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ. And Satan wants to rob us of our liberty, rob us of our joy, but God takes us and gives us the opportunities to find full joy in the Lord. Now, the first chapter sets the covenant context for the book by connecting it to Abraham. Every covenant builds on the previous covenants. This is something that is completely missing in dispensational theology where they, it's almost as if, well, God failed on that one, let's try another covenant. Okay, that didn't work, let's try another one. No, there is an organic building, an expansion of the covenant as each one builds upon the previous one. And Galatians is quite clear, the Mosaic covenant did not replace the Abrahamic covenant, okay? All of these covenants worked together. Now take a look at the bondage that chapter 1 describes these people as being in. So we have the covenant, but covenant succession is not a given. It is not automatic. If we do not train our children properly, we can find that covenant succession cut off. And so here they were in the Egyptian training camps, so to speak, and the bulk of the evangelical church of today has very willingly sent their children to the government schools of Egypt to be trained by Egypt, and the present generation is disappearing from the church. It's just a really sad thing to see, and what happens then is they end up experiencing misery. Take a look at chapter one. We're gonna begin reading at verse 11. Therefore they, that's the Egyptians, set taskmasters over them, that's the Israelites, to afflict them with their burdens, and they built for Pharaoh supply cities, Pithom and Ramses. But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew. And they were in dread of the children of Israel. So the Egyptians made the children of Israel serve with rigor, and they made their lives bitter with hard bondage in mortar, in brick, and in all manner of service in the field. All their service in which they made them serve was with rigor. And then comes the killing of all of the male children that were born to the Israelites at the end of this chapter. Now, I want you to keep that misery clearly in mind because it illustrates the utter foolishness and irrationality of Israel's later constantly wanting to go back to the leeks and the garlics of Egypt. They're always wanting to do this, but they've got very short-term memory about the miseries that they had. They wanted to leave Egypt. They were utterly miserable in Egypt. But as soon as they left Egypt under Moses, what happens is they fear freedom and all of the responsibilities that are associated with freedom, and they want to go back into that. And this is an amazing picture of Christians who backslide. They forget the misery that they were in under Satan. They forget that they had no future in spiritual Egypt. They were headed toward hell, and they forget the incredible blessings that God has showered upon them and promised that in Christ Jesus, He will supply all of our needs in Him. And so, though God has redeemed us at infinite cost, Christians foolishly long for the cucumbers, the watermelons, the leeks, and the garlics of Egypt. Now, what would be the cucumbers and the leeks and the garlics that our modern generation longs for? Well, many times it's just simple things like pornography or materialism. It could be any number of things that people long for, but the world has a way of making us forget about the incredible privileges that we have in Christ and to long for the few scattered nuggets of pleasant things that they enjoyed while they were in bondage, in slavery to Satan. It's really irrational. So, this is a book that shows that even after conversion, God has his work cut out for him in reconstructing us according to his blueprints and ushering us into the sweetness of fellowship that we were actually purchased for. Okay, beautiful as that is, we tend to drag our feet We sometimes are reluctant to go through the first section of this book, into the second section of the training, the reconstruction of our lives, and then into the third section of fellowship. The Israelites dragged their feet right from the start, and they continued to drag their feet all the way through. Now initially, they thought, oh yeah, Moses, that'd be a great idea for us to get out from the burdens of the Egyptians. But the moment Pharaoh gave even the least little bit of pushback, they decided that they were not interested in this after all. That's chapter 5, verse 21. They reject the idea. And this very much discouraged Moses. So the background of this book is very similar to what Adam and Eve engaged in in chapter 3. They ran from God. They hid their sin. As soon as God exposes their sin, they're trying to say, it's not really as bad as you make it out to be. And yet what God did is He grabbed Adam and Eve, yes, against their will, and brought them back into the covenant, and in exactly the same way, chapter 6, verse 1, God says He's going to orchestrate the lives of these Israelites, grabbing them, so to speak, and motivating them to leave Egypt. In fact, He's going to make life so miserable for them, they're going to be forced to leave. They're going to be driven out of Egypt. That's chapter 6, verse 1. The point is, God's people have always been an unwilling people until God's grace changes them, and then suddenly, wow, they're very, very willing. Now, the whole book can be summarized by one word, and that's the word redemption. Redemption is a word that is related to the slave market. It's purchasing a slave out of the marketplace. So if you're still a slave, you're not redeemed. You know, there are Christians who think that all salvation is making a profession of faith, and then they continue to live as slaves to sin. Now, that's not what redemption is about. And I might as well deal with a key verse at the same time as the key word. The key verse is Exodus 6, verse 6. It's another very easy reference to remember. Six, six, just two sixes. Chapter 6, verse 6. But I want to read the whole context of verses two through nine, give a little bit of an exposition, because I think it introduces the book so well. Now, this is a part of the call of Moses, but it takes you from the beginning of the book to the end of the book. It's kind of a summary of what we're going to be looking at today, and that's why I say it's such a key passage. Now, It starts by pointing out that God planned redemption long before they were born. Exodus 6 verse 2, God spoke to Moses and said to him, I am Yehoah. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty, but by my name Yehoah, I was not made known to them. Now many had thought that this is an outright contradiction in the scripture because when you read through Genesis, you'll see all kinds of times when the patriarchs called upon the name of Yehoah, Abraham too. Genesis 12 verse 5 says, Abraham called on the name of Yehoah. In Genesis 14 verse 22, Abraham talked to the king of Salem and said, I have lifted my hand to Yehoah, God most high, the possessor of heaven and earth. So what is God saying here? It's actually very simple when you look at the grammar itself. Notice that God doesn't say Abraham didn't know his name Yehoah. That's what people assume, that's what it says. It does not say that. Instead he says that his name Jehoad did not make him known to them. They didn't understand what his name revealed about his character. His names always reveal something about God, something about his character. So El Shaddai reveals God to be the Almighty. He's called the Lord our righteousness, the Lord our provider in other names. But no one knew the meaning of Yehoah until God revealed it to him in Exodus chapter three. And God told him, hey, by the way, my name Yehoah means I am that I am. I am so self-sufficient. I have no needs. And it frees me up to do nothing but pour my life out in generosity to others. So that's basically what he's saying. He's telling Moses that he does not need to worry. He continues in verse four. I have also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their pilgrimage in which they were strangers. Now the first thing I want you to notice is the whole book of Exodus flows from the Abrahamic covenant. It is not at odds with the covenant of grace. So important to understand. Second, if God had already established that covenant, there was absolutely nothing that Pharaoh could do to hold that covenant back. We saw last week, it was last week, yeah, that I was on Genesis, we saw that God swore by himself. He passed between the parts of the cut apart animals to in effect saying, hey, if the covenant is broken, may I be cut off to make sure that this covenant is confirmed. So God would become a liar. He would cease to be God if he failed to follow through on his promise. Now God had already promised that he would, Allow these people to be in bondage in, in Egypt for a period of time, and they would come out with riches. And he's basically saying, don't worry, Moses, my reputation is at stake here. I have made a covenant. I will fulfill it. Redemption is inescapable. Redemption will be fulfilled. And the first third of the book is full of those kinds of reminders. Verse five. And I have also heard the groaning of the children of Israel whom the Egyptians keep in bondage. And I have remembered my covenant. He did not need to be reminded about the groanings of the Israelites. He knew about that. He was compassionate for them. And the scriptures indicate that even our tears are numbered. God remembers every tear that we shed. That's Psalm 56, verse eight. He sympathizes with you. With all the feelings of your infirmities, he is touched. Hebrews 4, verse 15. So he remembers his covenant even when you forget that covenant. But there are seven rich promises that God gives in verses six through nine that if you analyze them, they really take you from the beginning of this book right through to the very end of this book. Verse six, therefore say to the children of Israel, I am Yehovah. I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress has such a graphic image of the misery, the burden that sin can be to unbelievers. And what an incredible relief and joyous release it is when those burdens are lifted at Calvary. And by the way, he tells us throughout our Christian lives, cast your cares upon him, cast your burdens on him, knowing that he cares for you. So this is a marvelous aspect of redemption that is illustrated later in this book. Continuing in the second part of verse 6, I will rescue you from their bondage." Now, this is part one of the book, Rescue. God is not content to just let them get rid of their burdens and make their slavery easier. He's going to completely free them from their slavery. He wants them divorced from their old life. He wants them bound to Him. And this is the way that God deals with His people today. God wants us to have a complete severance from the world, the flesh, and the devil, and a new walk and fellowship with Him that requires what? It requires A whole new pattern of thinking and feeling and doing. That's the second section of the book. So that we can be ushered into the sweetness of friendship and fellowship with God in the last part. So many times people think of the law as being a burden. We're going to be seeing the second section of the book is not a burden. It is the blueprints that enables us to soar on wings like eagles. The only way we can have liberty is through His blueprints. So Jesus said, or Paul says, sin shall not have dominion over you. Going on in the third part of verse six, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great judgments. Now the word redeem, just like we saw in Genesis, means something that a kinsman redeemer does. He pays for a person to get out of slavery, or if a person is kidnapped, he pays the ransom for that person. And so just as Genesis foreshadows the incarnation of Jesus, this verse does as well. Now, some people have wondered about that. How on earth can he be called the kinsman redeemer when he is not yet incarnate? And it's really easy, you just say, well, in terms of God's decrees, it is as good as done. Take the crucifixion, for example. Because in God's predestination, that crucifixion had to happen on the exact day and hour and in exactly the way that it happened, God's decrees, revelation can say that Jesus was the lamb slain from before the foundation of the world. Now, it didn't literally happen then, but in terms of God's decrees, it's as good as done. And in the same way, because the incarnation of God the Son, as Jesus, was decreed It's as good as done, and God, long before the incarnation happens, could say, he's the redeemer, he's the kinsman of these people. Now there's more in here. This verse speaks of the redemption as being both by price and by power. You'll see that in the outline as well. Those are different sections. In the Old Testament, a kinsman redeemer could redeem with money, but he could also, well, not could, he had to be strong enough of a military man that he could crush the enemy. That's sometimes translated the avenger of blood, but it's the same Greek word, kinsman, redeemer, gaol. Avenger of blood is gaol. And so this too is a part of redemption. In the picture, the type of Jesus, the price was the blood of the Passover lamb. The power was the 10 plagues and taking Israel through the Red Sea. Well, in the same way, Jesus' blood was the price and his victory over the world, death, and Satan was the display of that power. And the interesting thing is that Ephesians 1, 18 through 19, says the same power that raised Jesus from the dead is at work in your mortal bodies right now. Some really cool stuff in there. Now Satan, that means has no power over us. Verse seven gives us a fourth promise. I will take you as my people. Now I find great encouragement in that because God did not take Israel because they were such a wonderful people. You look at their lives. They were an idolatrous, cantankerous lot. They were so difficult to get along with and yet God still chose to make them his people, to display his grace upon them. And we too, though utterly unfit for the least of God's mercies, are called God's special people. He cares for us. He lays down His life for us. He ministers and provides. He has made us accepted in the beloved. And if that does not melt your hearts in gratitude and praise to Him, I don't know what would. But here's the point. If God could take such a cantankerous, unworthy people and pull them to Himself and say, you are my loved ones, He could do the same for us. We're sometimes cantankerous too, aren't we? And this was a great encouragement to Moses. Fifth promise is also in verse seven, and I will be your God. So that's just the flip side of the coin. We belong to God, he belongs to us. He promises, I will never leave you nor forsake you. Sixth promise is in the last part of verse seven, then you shall know that I am Yehoah your God who brings you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians. That's an essential part of redemption, to bring us out. But verse eight speaks of the service that they were saved for. And I will bring you into the land which I swore to give to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and I will give it to you as a heritage I am Jehovah. If you are in Christ, then God redeems you to a task, and that task is to take this world for King Jesus and to inherit it. They were redeemed for a task, and that task was to conquer Canaan and to inherit it. That was their heritage. And if you are rejecting your task that you have been saved for, you're rejecting a central feature of the atonement, of redemption. Now, people say, but I've been freed from slavery. Now I've got a free will, right? Well, you've been freed from slavery to a horrible taskmaster, Satan, who wants your death, to a loving taskmaster. You're a slave, and yes, he's a gracious master who has also adopted you as sons and daughters and give you incredible privileges, but you're still a slave. And the point is, you have been saved to serve. You have been saved to serve. Verse nine. So Moses spoke thus to the children of Israel, but they did not heed Moses because of anguish of spirit and cruel bondage. The Israelites were unwilling to be redeemed, just as no man truly seeks God today apart from his sovereign grace. But Exodus is the symbolic story of how God takes us from being a people who actually want slavery We say we don't, but we actually deep down want slavery to sin, to being a people who are ready to worship and to fellowship and to enter into a loving relationship with Him. And yet what we find in the middle chapters is a people who, even though they're on their way toward this, they are dragging their feet, they are fearful, they have a hard time trusting God. And there's a story I want to tell you that I think illustrates two types of people in this book, and it's important to understand the difference between these two types of people. There are people like Caleb, and actually, most of the younger generation, under 20, fit into this category as well, but these are people who very quickly, by faith, entered into the fellowship and the friendship of God and all the heritage that God gave for them. And then there's other people who are very fearful, and they struggle with really believing and understanding the victory and the freedom that God has given to them. Now, here's the story. Many years ago, there was a man who was crossing the Mississippi River during the wintertime. It had already frozen over, but it was early enough in the winter. He wasn't sure how strong the ice was. But it was getting dark, and he was desperate to get over that river to the other side before it became pitch black. And so he started timidly testing the ice, and it seemed like it was holding his weight, but he was on all four knees at points. He was just on his stomach, trying to distribute his weight. He had painfully taken quite a while to get to the middle of the river, and he hears some singing behind him, and out of the dark comes this guy riding a sleigh laden with coal, and without any hesitation, this guy just runs the sleigh across the river. Now here's the thing I want to draw from that. The ice was solid. It was no more solid for the man who with total confidence and joy was riding over the river than it was for the man who was on all fours timidly crossing the river. Okay, but the one had joy, the other was in constant fear. Okay, those are the two types of people that we have in this book. And God upholds even the most fearful and insecure people today. But what God wants for us is the full joy of knowing that we are secure in God's redemption and in his promises. In other words, he wants us to enjoy the third section of this book because we've taken seriously the first two sections. Now I'll admit, painfully creeping across the river is better than not going across the river, right? But my prayer for you is you would have such faith in God's promises that with confidence you cross when God calls you to cross, and you find joy in that. In fact, this is the summary statement of the gospel section of the 10 foundations. So one of those 10 foundations of a healthy church is the gospel, and here is the purpose statement for our church on that foundation. to see our members so secure in God's grace, so knowledgeable in God's law, and so confident in His promises that they are freed from self-doubts to joyful service. That's the direction that the whole book takes us on. Now let's take a look at the book's outline. The outline of the book captures this key passage in three key words, rescue, reconstruction, and fellowship. And I've given a visual outline of that in your bulletins. I've taken this from the master outline of Moorcraft's fabulous three-volume study on Exodus. If you ever get a chance to get one of those, they've never been in print, but I got some copies from him. But if you're a visual person, I think you'll see the logical flow of the book as a whole. There are three columns in your outline there under the book's theme, God's Redeeming a People to Himself. First column is Rescue, which is chapters 1 through 18, Reconstruction, which is chapters 19 through 24, and Fellowship, which is chapters 25 through 40. Now those three words come under the master theme of the redemption of God's people. Redemption is not just paying for a slave and then leaving him in the marketplace. Redemption is purchasing him, providing for him, bringing him into the fellowship of your family. That's true biblical redemption. And each of those three sections then has a further three subdivisions. And so there's a beautiful symmetry in this book So that's the big picture flow. Let's dig a little bit deeper. The first subsection under the rescue column is covenant, and that's chapters 1 through 4. Does God make his covenant with them because they earned it? Hardly. They were a stubborn people engrossed in idolatry. Did he make his covenant because they wanted to be redeemed? Hardly. The verses that we just read earlier basically have the leaders of Israel telling Moses, no, thank you. We're not interested in this at all. It's making us have more trouble. This is truly God's sovereign grace and mercy that granted people liberty from slavery even though they had absolutely nothing within them to warrant it, nothing. It is a beautiful illustration of unconditional election. The next subsection, chapters five through 11, is called Confrontation because God confronted the idols that the Israelites had trusted in and was bringing those idols to nothing. These Israelites were not in bondage by accident. People say, oh, that's too bad they got in bondage. No, they got an outward bondage because their heart was in bondage and slavery to the idols of Egypt. God wanted them to be miserable, right? This was because of their worshiping other gods. So in chapter five, God begins to make them ready by making the bondage even more unbearable. He doesn't want them to find satisfaction in worshiping other gods. He wants them so miserable that they will be motivated to leave Egypt. In chapter seven and following, God brings the 10 plagues, not only to show his power over the gods of Egypt, but again to wean His people away from trust in those gods. The message of redemption is not complete until you are tearing down idols. That's the message there. Now take a look at chapter 12 and verse 12, because God gives the purpose for these plagues in these words. For I will pass through the land of Egypt on that night and will strike all the firstborn of the land of Egypt, both man and beast, Notice especially that phrase, against all the gods of Egypt, I will execute judgment. This was a war against idolatry. God had been showing in the previous plagues the utter impotency of the gods that they had been trusting in. Chapter 18, verse 11, this is Jethro's father-in-law. He's heard the whole story, and he says much the same. He says, now I know that Yehovah is greater than all the gods, for in the very thing in which they behave proudly, he was above them. How are the gods behaving proudly in various things? Well, he was saying each of these gods claimed to have a jurisdiction, claimed to have expertise in a given area, and God, by these plagues, was showing he was infinitely above them. And there's two other places where this purpose for these plagues is given. Each plague took on at least one other god of Egypt. Let me go through each plague and show that. The first plague in chapter seven, verses 14 through 15, turned not only the entire Nile River to blood, but any water that was carried from the Nile. You can dig up water from wells and things like that, but any water that was carried from the Nile was turned to blood. Why? Well, the Nile was considered divine by the Egyptians. They believed it was the bloodstream of one of their greatest gods, Osiris. They also worshiped the crocodile god Hapi and Khnum, the guardian of the river Soros, but I think it was Osiris that was likely in view, especially since the Nile was said to be his bloodstream, okay? The Egyptian hymn to the Nile states that it is, quote, the bringer of good, rich in provisions, creator of all good, Lord of majesty, sweet of fragrance." Well, by the time God got done with this Nile, it was not sweet of fragrance. It stank. All of the fish had died, and it was a smelly meth. The second plague, in chapter 8, verses 1 through 15, was the frogs. The Egyptians worshiped the goddess Hecate. Sometimes it's spelled Heqt, H-E-Q-T. It's the same god. And they associated her with fertility, water, renewal of the land, and she is frequently pictured with the head of a frog. Okay. True God made the demon goddess Hecate very unpopular, very unpopular as frogs swarmed into houses, into bedrooms, into kitchens, basically driving them out of their houses. What God was doing is, hey, if you're going to worship the frogs, I'm going to make you miserable with these frogs. Until finally, Pharaoh says, please take them away, which by the way would have been a gross insult to the goddess Hecate. Take these frogs away. We've had enough of them. So God then kills all of these frogs. So both the bringing of the frogs and the taking away of the frogs was God smacking down this demon God, Hecate. It was a declaration, he alone is sovereign over nature. The third plague in chapter 8 verses 16 through 19 turned dust to lice as Moses struck the ground, the dust of the earth with his rod. And all of the dust turned to lice. That's a lot of lice. And they were miserable. They were just crawling with lice. So much for the Egyptian god Gabe, which is sometimes spelled K-E-B or S-E-B, but it's all the same god. This god was supposedly the lord of the dust, controlled how the dust functioned. Well, he didn't seem to have the same kind of control that God had, and when the magicians could not reproduce this miracle, they confessed that this was an evidence that this was the finger of God, an expression that means the kingdom of God. Let me tell you something. Redemption is connected to kingdom. You're redeemed into God's kingdom, so never think that God's kingdom is lawless. We'll see that in the second section. The fourth plague, which is in chapter 8, verses 20 through 32, was a huge manifestation of the blood-sucking dog fly that was feared and worshipped, and the god of that blood-sucking fly was the god Uatchit. Now, this plague was only on the Egyptians, not on the Israelites. The previous ones had actually made the Israelites miserable, too. That was part of God's purposes. But God now starts making a distinction between the Israelites and the Egyptians. It's like He's siccing their gods upon them and making the Egyptians absolutely sick of them while He's protecting the Israelites. Now, some think this may have also been striking of the Egyptian god of creation, the movement of the sun, the rebirth of the earth, because that god had the head of a fly. But I really think it's the previous god, maybe it's both, that were in view. But Morecraft states this, because of this distinction, God would save Israel in spite of her sin and condemn Egypt because of hers. God has mercy on whom he will and hardens whom he will. The fifth plague, which is in chapter 9, verses 1 through 7, killed cattle with disease. And this plague was a direct attack upon Hathor, the goddess of love and protection, who was pictured, oddly, with the head of a cow. These gods, you would think they'd come up with better looking gods than these. They were really ugly. But it may have also been an attack against the gods and the goddesses of cattle, Ptah, Menebis, Ammon, and Apis. And it not only brought economic loss to Egypt, massive loss, but it showed that the gods of Egypt were nothing. The sixth plague in chapter 9 verses 8 through 12 was boils. Now, supposedly the lion headed goddess Sekhmet was a protector against diseases and boils. And when that didn't work, well, then they would worship Amunotep, Serket, Tabichet, Imhotep, Khonsu, Nefertum, and Serapis, the Egyptian gods and the goddesses of healing and medicine. They had a lot of gods and goddesses. They had more than that even because they were always afflicted with diseases, which God spared the Israelites from. So when every Egyptian was in agony with these horrendous boils, the healing gods were completely discredited. Davis in his commentary says, magicians, priests, princes and commoners were all equally affected by the pain of this judgment, a reminder that the God of the Hebrews was a sovereign God and superior to all man-made idols. The seventh plague in chapter nine, verses 13 through 15, was the worst hail that Egypt had ever seen. So much for the protection of Nut, the goddess who was said to control the sky. Nor were Isis and Seth any help. They were the agricultural deities. Nor was Shu, the god of the atmosphere, any help. And again, huge economic loss, but there was no loss to the Hebrews and Goshen. The eighth plague in chapter 10 verses 1 through 20 was locusts. And to the horror of the Egyptians, everything else that was spared was eaten up by these locusts. They worshiped the locust God, Serapis, in order to keep the locusts away. And they worshiped Seth, the god of storms and any other disasters. But the true God showed that he controlled the locusts at Moses's word, and at Moses's word, he takes a wind and drowns them in the sea. And even the drowning of these locusts in the sea was a testimony that God is the judge of these demons, and he can protect his people from these demons. In chapter 10, verse 2, chapter 10, verse 2, God says why he brought the locusts upon them. And that you may tell in the hearing of your son and your son's son the mighty things I have done in Egypt and my signs which I have done among them, that you may know that I am Yehovah. The ninth plague in chapter 10 verses 21 through 29 was darkness. Now this was a blow to the heart of Egypt's false worship because it discredited their greatest god, the sun god, Ra. And it's spelled different ways, but Ra is one of the common ways. It probably also discredited the numerous other gods and goddesses that were associated in some way with the sun. God could blot out the sun at any time. It belonged to him. Now Pharaoh, the protector of Egypt's families, was discredited in the 10th plague, which killed the firstborn of Pharaoh and all other firstborn that did not have the blood of the Passover sprinkled on their doorposts. Pharaoh had no power to protect them. He was a lousy god. By the way, all states are lousy gods. We tend to look to the state that way, but they're lousy. Now, of course, since this happened at the time of the Passover, it showed clearly that God, yes, He can protect us from all demonic forces, but it's only through the blood of the Lamb, which points to Jesus. His blood protects us from the demon gods of this world. And since all the gods were mediated to the people through Pharaoh, Exodus inescapably contrasts the true God with statism, all statism, or state claims to sovereignty over the people. And this is an essential part of redemption too. Redemption confronts all idols without exception and calls us to leave them behind and to submit to the true God. I believe and there's many scholars who are with me on this, that statism is the biggest idol in America, and most Christians are right in bed with this idol. They're always looking to the state for education, for healthcare, for every imaginable remedy. If you go to the The website of Washington, D.C., I think it's over 100 agencies that cover every facet of life and try to get Christians to say which agencies they would cross out. There aren't very many. Statism is their big God. So too many Christians fear the risks of liberty, and they're constantly going back to Pharaoh. And I believe it may take God's judgments to drive Christians in America, as chapter six, verse one, drive them from their idols and away from Pharaoh. So I think Exodus is a much, much needed book to confront the compromised Christianity in America. So on your outline, you can see that the rescue column involves covenant, confrontation, and the power of God in judgment. I mentioned earlier that the power of God in redemption was displayed, not just in the plagues, but it was also displayed in their crossing of the Red Sea and drowning the Egyptian army. Song of Moses in chapter 15, all Israel rejoices in God's judgment. So the mercies of redemption are brought into even brighter relief when you see the judgments on everything that was left. And this section ends with God's marvelous provision for his people of water in chapter 17, and then the establishment of the synagogue system in chapter 18, which is identical to New Testament Presbyterianism. Identical. Why did God put the establishment of the church at this particular place rather than elsewhere in the book? Well, I believe it's because any time there's redemption out of something, it's into something. And if you're not a member of a church under the authority of elders, as is commanded in chapter 18 of Exodus, then redemption's purpose for you has not been finished yet. I don't have the time to do an exposition of chapter 18. I hope to write a book on ecclesiology that deals not only with Presbyterianism being solidly rooted in the New Testament, but it's in the Old Testament as well, and especially this is the seedbed of that doctrine. But right here in Exodus 18, you see the synagogue system has authority, discipline, protection, there's required membership, and there is accountability. We are rescued from the world, not to be on our own, but to be part of the body of Christ. That's the point. Then comes the next major section of the book, Reconstruction. That's the second column. After you have been rescued and constituted as a church, God educates you. He realigns your heart. He realigns your thinking, your words, your actions, your relationships, your emotions. He realigns everything. And the whole third, second section, second third of the book is the reconstruction of the lives of Christians with God's biblical blueprints. And he divides this section on reconstruction or realignment of the redeemed one's lives, this is all under God's law, he divides them into three sections, the Ten Commandments, the judgments, or the case laws, and the ordinances or the affirmations of the covenant. And Moorecraft points out that the Ten Commandments that are listed in chapter 20 really are designed to protect. First commandment protects true theology. Second commandment protects true worship. Third commandment protects the name of God. Fourth commandment protects the Sabbath. And really, the Sabbath, since it's a symbol of the covenant, it protects the whole covenant. The fifth commandment protects the family. Sixth commandment protects life. Seventh commandment protects marriage. Eighth commandment protects private property. Ninth commandment protects truth and the 10th commandment protects our hearts. So these are blessings. These 10 commandments are blessings. They protect us. They rise and they fall together. Too many people pick and choose. They want to leave out the Sabbath or something like that. No, all of these commandments lie together. You take out any one of these commandments, the whole covenant is messed up. So James says, whoever shall keep the whole law and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all. God made all ten commandments to fit together beautifully. You can think of them as ten facets of one diamond or ten windows looking into the moral character of God. and those ten are a summary of the moral law of God, and they are only a summary. Too many people think the Westminster Confession only calls us to follow the Ten Commandments in their bare form. No, it calls us to follow the whole moral law, and the Ten Commandments are a summary of the whole moral law, as we see in the next section. Now, we don't have time to go over these brilliant case laws, in chapters 21 through 23, but it is interesting to at least contrast the case laws in these chapters with those in Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy has 20 chapters of case laws. These are applying the commandments with enough illustrations so that we can do similar things and apply them in our lives. So, Deuteronomy has 20 chapters This only has three, so even the case laws here are only a summary of the case laws in Deuteronomy, and they complement each other. A second difference that you will notice in your outlines is that Deuteronomy's case laws are grouped in exactly the same order that they were given in, 1 through 10, whereas in Exodus, it starts the exposition of the Ten Commandments with Commandment 5. and then goes through to 10, and then it backs up to commandment four, and then three, and then two, and then one. Now, I haven't figured out why God gave this different order in Exodus. It is so deliberate, so pronounced, I'm sure there is a purpose for it. So if any of you figure out the purpose for this inverted order, let me know about it, because I'm very curious, very, very curious about it. It's a deliberate change of order. Now, there's one other interesting feature in the case laws of Exodus. The exposition of the seventh commandment, you shall not commit adultery, which is outlined in chapter 22, verses 16 through 20. You'll notice in your outlines, that is placed right in the heart of the exposition of the Eighth Commandment, you shall not steal, which takes place in 22, verses 1 through 15, and verses 21 through 31. Now, perhaps it was placed there to emphasize that all of these commandments relate to each other. Just like James said, you break one, you're breaking them all. And here, if you commit adultery, you're also stealing. You're also committing some form of theft. Otherwise, there are a lot of parallels between the two sets of case laws. And I'm going to wait till we get to the book of Deuteronomy. to comment on how brilliant these are for providing all of the blueprints that we need, all of the foundations we need for absolutely every area of life, not just individuals, but families, businesses, politics, you name it. And I'm looking forward to Deuteronomy. So God reconstructs his people graciously by the law. And That's chapter 24, laws of God are embraced in a covenant ceremony that commits them to keeping God's law. So redemption is not to lawlessness, or as Paul worded it, shall we sin that grace may abound? And he answers, certainly not. Or as the King James words it, God forbid. The ratification ceremony is prefaced with blood sacrifices and with eating communion meals signified by the peace offering. So this shows you cannot keep grace and law apart. Without God's law, we wouldn't even see our need for grace, and grace is always moving us to be more and more conformed to God's law. So God reconstructs his people graciously by the law in order to make the third section of the book possible. So we have rescue in the first third of the book, then reconstruction of people's lives in the second section, then fellowship in the third section. Fellowship with God is what every chapter in this book has been driving us towards. In the last section, that's chapters 25 through 31, well, that's the first part of the last section, first third, makes it crystal clear that fellowship with God can only happen through the coming Messiah, Jesus. And this was symbolized by the detailed instructions concerning the tabernacle by which God would dwell with his people. Now obviously, there are a lot of other axioms that are given in those chapters. For example, Sir Isaac Newton I had a heyday with the tabernacle, because all of these measurements, these detailed measurements, you got all the axioms of geometry there. You also have axioms of arithmetic, and there's other axioms you'll find there. But in terms of the overarching main themes, what we see here is that every portion of this tabernacle, its furniture, its sacrifices, pointed to Jesus, enabling God to dwell with man. and man to dwell with God. All of their tents are right there with God's tent, right in their midst. I love the statement by the French theologian, Pierre Corthiel. Just started reading his book, Day of Small Beginnings. Marvelous book. In 2018, he wrote, Out of the warmth of his affection for Israel, out of a desire to meet with Israel, out of the close intimacy that he wants to have with Israel, God goes so far as to pitch his tent among the tents of Israel that their lives might be centered on him. He chooses to live right in their midst. I will be with you, the Lord had promised. The tent of meeting, the tabernacle, is the movable memorial to the promise that he will go with his people every step of the way from Sinai to Jerusalem. And of course, true fellowship is contrasted in chapters 32 through 34 with the false worship of the golden calf. There are always people who try to short circuit God's means toward fellowship. And so this golden calf illustrates that. And then the tabernacle is completed in chapters 35 through 40. So hopefully, having given you that overview, you can see there is a beautiful logic that drives you from the beginning of the book through to the end of the book. And I'm not dealt with Christology yet, So I want to end by briefly giving two types that point to Jesus as our Savior, and it really is sad that I can't give you the rich symbolism in this book, but it would take a year just to point out the Christology of this book. When I was up at Prairie Bible Institute, They offered a three-credit-hour course that just dealt with one of the many types of Jesus in this book. It's the tabernacle. A whole semester, three hours a week, you spent looking at the symbolism of the tabernacle. We're not going to spend that much time, but there is so much. This book is chock full of symbols of Jesus. What you would expect if this is central, uh, purpose of this book is redemption. You're going to expect, you're going to have all kinds of symbols of Jesus in it. So Moses stands as a type of Jesus as do the festivals, the Exodus itself, the manna, the rock that was struck, the sacrifices, the tabernacle and all its furniture and the high priest. So I'm just going to give you an incredibly cursory look at two of those symbols. The Passover in chapter 12 is perhaps the most important chapter in this whole book. And each of the points that I'm gonna give you here, and I'm just gonna, you're not even gonna be able to take notes. Just listen, it'll be impossible. Well, if you can do it, show me your notes afterwards, but we're gonna race through this. Each one of these points could be fodder for much, much more exposition, but at least there are 15 ways that this Passover foreshadows the person and work of Jesus. In verse three, a lamb was taken. John 1, 19 says, Jesus is the lamb who takes away the sin of the world. Verses four through five, the lamb had to be without blemish. Well, the only way Jesus could save us is if he was totally without sin. 1 Peter 1, 19, 2 Corinthians 5, 21. In verse five, the lamb had to be a firstling or in its prime, could not be younger than a year old, had to be older. Jesus was not a babe when he died. He was in his middle years, he was in his prime. Verses 3 and 6 say that this land had to be set apart on Nisan 10, four days before the Passover, had to be marked just as Jesus was marked with oil, anointed with oil for his death, four days before the Passover on Nisan 10. The land was slain on Nisan 14 just as Jesus was crucified on Nisan 14, John 19, 14 and 31. All Israel had to kill the Lamb in verse 6. Just as several New Testament passages say all Israel killed Jesus, and later it says all Christians, we all killed Jesus with our sins. In verses 7 and again in 22, the blood was applied to the doorposts to protect the people just as Christ's blood must be applied to our hearts and to our homes if we are to have protection. In verses 8 through 10, the Israelites had to partake of the lamb, just as John 6 says, we have no life in us unless we partake of Christ. John 6, 53 to 55. And verses 8 through 9, the lamb was roasted with fire, could not be boiled, had to be roasted with fire because it was symbolizing the fact that Jesus would bear the wrath, the fire of his judgments. And there are several scriptures I have to that. In verse 8, it calls for eating bitter herbs of Egypt to symbolize the bitterness of sin and bondage. Verse 10 says that what was left over had to be burned. It could not be eaten by the Egyptians, could not be eaten the next day. And in the same way, numerous verses indicate that Christ's redemption is for the elect alone. It is particular redemption. By the way, these things have application to the Lord's table. In verse 10 it had to be eaten immediately not put off till the morning just as Hebrews 3 warns us to appropriate Christ today and 2nd Corinthians 6 2 says now is the acceptable time now is the day of salvation verse 11 says that those who ate Needed to gird up their loins be ready to follow Moses out of Egypt immediately just as Hebrews 13 says Christ if we're redeemed are called to leave the spiritual city of Jerusalem, right, were to go outside the camp and join him and bear his reproach. In verse 46, not a bone was to be broken, and John 19, 32 to 33 says it was because not a bone of Jesus was broken. There was no yeast allowed, just as Christ has cleansed us from the yeast of sin, 1 Corinthians 5, 5-7. And there's actually other applications you could make. This is an incredibly rich picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I want to end with a very brief description of the tabernacle. This symbolizes how God dwells with us in friendship and fellowship. The tabernacle was set up on Kislev 25 just as Jesus was born, or if you hold to the other dating, He was conceived on Kislev 25. So the tabernacle refers to the body of Christ according to the New Testament. as a whole. The first sacrifice there was on Nisan 14, just as Christ was sacrificed on that date. John 1 14, several other passages say that God tabernacles with men, how? Through Jesus, and so the tabernacle as a whole points to Jesus, and there's a whole bunch of scriptures I have on that. Hebrews draws parallels between the high priest and Jesus as our high priest There's only one door that can go into the tabernacle and Jesus said hey if you want to have access to God You got to go through me. I am the door. He's the only door Immediately after entering that door, what do you see? Well, you see the bronze altar, which represents the crucifixion of Jesus. But after you've had that appropriated to you, what do you see next? You see this laver of water, which represents the washing of the Holy Spirit that comes into our lives as a result of Christ's work. Then there is the holy place, where there's a menorah, which speaks of the perfection of Jesus as our light, John 8 verse 12. Across from the menorah is the table of showbread, which had communion elements on it, just like these communion elements, they point to Christ's broken body and blood. These pointed to the fact that without Christ's sacrifice and our partaking of Christ, we have no fellowship with God. Then you move forward, And there's the golden altar of incense, which represents the prayers of Jesus. Without his prayers, we don't have a chance. Then right behind that incense altar, you have the curtain that divided the holy place from the most holy place, and Hebrews tells us that that curtain was his flesh. Until his flesh was torn, that curtain could not be torn. All the furniture was made of acacia wood, which represents the humanity of Jesus. But all of the acacia wood was covered with gold, which represents the deity of Jesus. The various silver items in the tabernacle speak to redemption. Bronze speaks to judgment. Blue fabrics represent heaven. Purple represents royalty. Scarlet represents sacrifice. You guys writing fast enough yet? Fine linen speaks of purity. Each of the layers of skins that went over the tabernacle show one facet or another of Christ's For example, the ram skins that were dyed red points to the substitutionary atonement of Christ. And then there's these badger skins. Why on earth would they put unclean animal skins on top of the tabernacle? Because Jesus became sin for us, but that's covered over with goat skins that represent the atonement of Christ. Every day, the Israelites were surrounded with images of the gospel and images of the coming Messiah. All of those images, the whole gospel, helped them to more effectively enter into all three parts of this book—rescue, reconstruction, and fellowship. sweet fellowship and friendship with God, which is what you would experience in the tabernacle. Now we'll wait till Leviticus to deal with some of the other symbols of Jesus that God began to develop in Exodus, but I think that's enough to give you a good bird's eye view of this book. Let's pray. Father, we are grateful for all of your words. And as we become more and more familiar with the different parts of your word, I pray that you would help us to see the flow of redemption, the flow of your purposes in our lives. Help us to grow in you, especially as we've examined rescue. May each one of us experience full rescue from bondage. as we've looked at the reconstruction of our lives with the beauty of your grace and your law. May each of us experience those blueprints being more and more consistently lived out. Father, as the third section of this book pointed to the beautiful fellowship that Jesus has ushered us into through the Lord Jesus Christ, may we experience an increasing intimacy with you, our Father, Holy Spirit, Lord Jesus, May we never neglect you. You are our life, and we want our hearts to ever be drawn out to you. So Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, continue to receive our worship as we sing Psalm 1 and glorify your great and holy name. And it's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen.