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By now, you've found your place in the book of Exodus chapter number 17. And this is a familiar passage of Scripture here this morning. We're not looking to be here all day. Let's second, I'm sorry, Exodus 17. If you please stand, if you're able to, in the honor of reading the Father's Holy Word. And we are going to begin reading verse number 8. The Bible says, Then came Amalek, and fought with Israel in Rephidim. And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose us out men, and go out, fight with Amalek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in my hand. So Joshua did as Moses had said to him, and fought with Amalek. And Moses, Aaron, and Hur went up to the top of the hill. And it came to pass, when Moses held up his hand, that Israel prevailed. And when he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed. But Moses' hands were heavy, and they took a stone and put it under him, and he sat thereon. And Aaron and her stayed up his hands, the one on the one side and the other on the other side. And his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. And Joshua discomfited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword. And the Lord said unto Moses, Write this for memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the years of Joshua. For I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven. We'll go ahead and read verses 15 and 16. And Moses built an altar and called the name of it Jehovah Nissi. For he said, Because the Lord has sworn that the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation. You'll notice that the Bible says back there in verse number 8, then came Amalek and fought with Israel in Rephidim. The Lord being our helper this morning, we'd like to bring our sermon this morning on this thought, hounded by the enemy. Hounded by the enemy. Heavenly Father, thank you God for being so awesome to us, so good. We don't deserve any of it. But You loved us. You loved us before we even considered You, much less actually loved Yourselves. I thank You, Father, for saving a wretch like me. I thank You, Lord, that no matter how hard the going gets, no matter how rough the way is, that You are always there for me and with me, if I'll just turn back to You. And I thank You, Lord, for each and every one here at Antioch, and what a blessing they have been to me and my family over the years. And I pray, Father, that You just bless this church mightily, and pray, Lord, for the upcoming Tent Meeting. Lord, that they'll see such a great turnout, and not just a great turnout, but that they'll see souls saved, lives changed, people get help from the Master. And Father, be honest, we're hoping for that here this morning. Because we need You. We can't do this without You. We've got to have You. Because without you, we might as well just go on home. Thank you, Florida, for being so good. We love you, Father. In Jesus' name we do pray. Amen and Amen. You may be seated. Hounded by the enemy. Now what we've got here is a battle scene. We've got Israel marching along, doing their thing. And the enemy comes up and starts attacking. And in a spiritual plane, it happens the same way. We're just going along, minding our own business, and the enemy starts attacking us. The enemy starts hounding us. The enemy starts tempting us. The enemy wants to get us off track, wants us to run away, wants us to desert God. But that didn't catch God by surprise at all. He knew it was coming. He's ready. He doesn't have to get ready. He is ready. He doesn't have to sit here and come up with the battle plan. He's already got the battle plan drawn up for us, church. All we've got to do is submit to Him. We think about when they first crossed over there in the Canaan land there. And Joshua, he's over there, he's surveying Jericho. And he's looking out there, oh man, what's going on? And he looks over, whoa, where did you come from, dude? Are you with us or with them? And I like what the angel of the Lord said, neither. I am the commander of the armies of God. So it's you with me or you with them. Well, church is the same thing with us nowadays. God stands there at the ready. Are we going to be for Him? Or are we going to be for ourselves? Or are we going to be for the world? If we ain't being for Him, we are going to be in trouble. But be forewarned. You've got a real enemy. You've got a vicious enemy. You've got a bloodthirsty enemy after you. And while he may not be able to take you to hell, he can make your life miserable. No such thing as a bed of roses. And you wouldn't want one anyways because there's thorns in there. Okay? Well, we've got this battle. You are either in the battle right now, you are coming out of the battle, or you're getting ready to go into a battle. But I want you to know, first of all, this morning, that there is a place that this battle is going to happen. Verse number 8, the Bible says, Then came Amalek and followed Israel in Rephidim. Now the Amalekites, to give you a little bit of a geography lesson here this morning, they lived in this area. around Mount Sinai. Their range extended up into the southwest corner of Canaan land there. What this represents here for us, being here in Rephidim, outside of Sinai area, what this represents is those before they are saved. Those who are wanting to come to the Lord, they have been shown that they are sinners. They have been shown that they need a holy and righteous God. And what happens? The flesh comes up on you, and the flesh starts saying, you don't need that. The flesh starts saying, what about your good times? What about your drinking? What about your carousing? What about this? What about that? You need these things, you live in this world, don't you? and the enemy's coming along trying to attack you. You don't want to go, stay right there and hold on tight as necessary. You don't want to humiliate yourself by going forward and kneeling at that altar there. You don't want people to see you crying. You don't want people to see you responding, because that's for wimps and sissies. Watch this. Come on. You don't need to tell everyone your business. It's the enemy attacking. Canaanland part there, it talks about those who have been saved. We were talking this morning about how they still had to go out, they had five years of fighting to establish the resting place for them, but they still had to finish conquering Canaanland. We still have to go through this life. We still got trials. We still got tribulations. We still got temptations. We still got ourselves where we are going to be on the edge here, wondering if we are going to fall or not. And we are going to fall. We're going to come down. But God wants us to get back up again and serve. And your flesh is going to be right there. Your flesh is going to be reminding you, well that offering plate is coming around, but you've got Nipsco due. Oh, you've got that car payment due. Just keep that 10, 20 bucks in your pocket, because you know, God knows you need it more than you need to put the offering plate. Come on church, we've all been there. The flesh found you. You need that money more. God is telling you, come over here and get this man, get one of those fabulous handshakes and put some money in his hand there. And you say, but I need it more. I've got to put gas in my car after church. Enjoy flesh, Father. That's the enemy on the attack. That's the enemy hounding you. And if you give in, and you don't do what God tells you to do, and you shortchange yourself a blessing that God might have kept for you. Amen. Who knows? God may have been saying, put 10 in his pocket, and you walk outside, and there's another 20 for you. But you ain't going to find that 20 mountains if you didn't give him that 10. And if I did though, I might be a crazy guy. Sorry, that's my flesh speaking up there. But the place where the enemy attacks is right here. All this. The enemy used that car to break down. The enemy used the roof on your house to suddenly spring a leak. It's your job to do something. You get laid off. You get short-changed on your hours for the week. Whatever the case is, the enemy will work on your flesh in any circumstance he can get his hands on to attack you, to hound you, to convince you, you don't need to be in church. You don't need to be following after the Lord. It's Sunday morning, you've got a backache, stay home. It's Sunday night, you've got to get up early for church the next day. It's God's revival this week, but you've got to get off work the next day. Just stay home, stay home, stay home. And God says greater things than these I can do for you if you follow me. The place you're going to fight is here in you. The enemy's got a hound. Where is He going to hound? Well, it's the parts that He's going to attack. You want to hold your place here and turn with me over to Deuteronomy 25. Deuteronomy chapter number 25 verse 17. Moses is expounding upon what we saw here in Exodus 17. Verse number 17 of 25 says, Remember what Amalek did unto thee by the way when you were come forth out of Egypt, how he met thee by the way, and smote the hindmost of thee, even all that were feeble behind thee, when thou wast faint and weary, and he feared not God. Despite what Darwin will say, it is not survival of the fittest. It's those who are going to follow God and those who are going to yield to the flesh. I understand if someone gets sick and they can't come to church. I get it. But when we use that sickness as an excuse to stay out. We're well now, but just in case. Let's see what's happening church. Your mind. Making you afraid. He's going to work on your fears. He's going to play off of them. He's going to play off of your concerns. He goes after the sick. He goes after the feeble. He goes after the weak. And when he's doing it, there in nature you see a herd of zebras and a lion comes and he picks out the weakest and the sick ones and the ones who ain't strong enough to do the job. Yes, but a herd that needs to be stronger are surviving. But what it means for us is, when this person over here is sick, and they're out of church, now this one over here is sick, wow, I might be next. Start shrinking back. Start becoming fearful. Oh, that brother over there, look what just happened to him. I don't want to be as much of a target per se. So I'm just going to hide. I don't want to be out in the open anymore. Oh, oh, oh, got problems over there. Safe to come out yet? Nope, there's someone down there. I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't! God's attacking Parks Church. I can build you up. I can make you stronger. We can do greater things than these when we follow God. When the enemy is hounding in the places, and the enemy is attacking the parts, I'm so glad the Bible tells us that there's help. Where's their help? Back in our text. Exodus chapter 17 verse 9. And Moses said unto Joshua, Choose us out men, and go out, fight with Amalek. Number one, there's the preacher. The preacher that God's going to use to help you. The preacher that God's going to be using to go out there with the sword of the Word, which is the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God, and He's going to be leading the charge, and He's going to be telling you about it. This is sin. Don't compromise. This is sin. Don't compromise. This is what God would have you do. Follow after God. This is what the Bible says. This is what you need to do. And let me tell you how you can be saved. Let me tell you how God can fix you up. I understand you've gotten away from the Lord. But God will take you back. And the preacher is going to be leading the charge. Follow the preacher. When the enemy's attacking, counterattack! Don't yield, don't give up, don't quit, don't quit, don't quit! Anything else? Yeah, don't quit! The preacher's there, fighting on your behalf, follow him! You notice he doesn't say it. Moses said, Joshua, go out there and fight, I'm going to go by yourself. He said, choose yourself, men, to go and fight! So when the pastor gets up here and says, we're going to have a prayer meeting before a particular service, anyone who wants to come is welcome. Show up five minutes before the pastor does. Boy, I'll tell you what, God will encourage you. You know what, brother, God will encourage that preacher? Say amen! Yeah! Woo! It's like telling a hot dog, send him! That preacher will get the preaching even more! You want him to shut up? He'll either preach until he's sick and tired of looking at it, or you break one of the two. Or he'll break. Pray for him. Pray for him. He won't break. But that preacher's up there preaching his heart out for you. Follow him. Take notes, church. Believe. I'm going to elect you all in by some name. Tell Pastor Juan I said that. Take notes and double-check the Word. I can tell you anything I want. If you're not taking notes and you're not double-checking, you're going to believe me. And I can lead you straight to hell. Make sure that preacher is saying the right thing. And he is, follow him. Five away. number one verse number eight. And each shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, and in the innermost parts of the earth. I'll write it down real fast. There's a one word. Witnesses. For all of you who are sitting there saying, praise God for the pastor and preacher, he can get the job done. That word witnesses can't translate into preacher. You may not stand behind the sacred desk, but you're afraid to do. Go out and tell the world what Jesus Christ did for you, how he saved your soul from a burial, and how he does it into you. Tell them when your brothers are down, when your sisters are down, go ahead and pray for them. Go and encourage them! Go and visit them! Don't let them be alone! Don't let them fall to the wayside! Praise God! God told each one of us to go out there and do the job! It's not just for the family, it's not just for the Indian, it's all of us that are supposed to go out there and serve the Lord Jesus Christ! We're all in the battle! But if we let one be cut off, we might be next. But you know what? It ain't just the preacher. I kind of just touched on this. It's the prayer partners too. Moses there in verse number 9 says, Two stop men, attack, go out there, fight with Amulek. Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill and the rod of God in my hand. There's Moses. I hope you all don't mind me doing this. Please forgive me. However that goes. Moses is standing here. He's got that rod in his hand. And he's tired. Joshua starts losing. Hands go back up. Joshua starts losing. He's tired. He's an old man. He's in his 80s church. He's standing up there holding this rod. Aaron and Herb said, come on, Moses. We came alongside you. They took a rock and put it under her. Moses, you sit down on that rock. Her, you stand on one side. I hear you stand on the other side. And they held those hands up with that rod of God held up high above all. So it's that rod, the symbol of the authority of God Almighty. And Moses prayed to God Almighty for the people to be delivered, for Joshua and the army to win the victory that day. And they prayed, and they prayed, and they prayed, and they held up one side, and they held up the other side, and they were spying on behalf of Joshua! The prayer partners must be fighting on behalf of everyone else. Your pastor needs your prayers. All the money's nice, he needs your prayers. The parsonage is nice, he needs your prayers. The fellowship's nice, he needs your prayers. Pray one another. God said that my house should be called the house of prayer. We've gotten away from prayer! It's saying that we need prayer! Read through Acts! They're constantly praying! Come on, church! Make a prayer corner! Take those prayer requests! Write them down! And pray them while in front of God! Say, I've got a prayer request! Pray for me! Pray for your missionaries. Amen. Pray for the outcome you need. Pray for your fellow churches. Amen. Pray for the lost. Pray for the backslidden. Pray for me. Amen. The effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man availed little. If your Bible says that, Father, as mine says, it availed much. Amen. Prayer partners make the difference, Church. Amen. I got a verse wrote down over here, let's turn over quickly to Psalm 28. Psalm 28 verse 1-3 says, Unto thee will I cry, O Lord my rock. Be not silent to me, lest if thou be silent to me, I become like them that go down into the pit. My, my. Hear the voice of my supplication. The word supplication means earnest prayer. When I cry, when I shout aloud unto thee, will I lift up my hands toward thy holy oracle? Draw me not away. from the wicked and with the workers of iniquity which speak peace to their neighbors, but mischief is in their hearts." Man, don't let me get over there with them, God. I need to be separate from them. I need to be one of yours. That should be our prayer. And when you're running low, call someone and say, hey, I need you to pray for me. We've got the preachers and we've got the prayer partners. Neither one is going to be successful on their own. It requires both in order to see success. You say, you've got a Bible for that preacher? I sure do. Run over to Jude. The book of Jude, verse number 20. I just happened to have this marked already. Jude, only one chapter. Verse number 20 says, But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. In other words, preaching. And it says praying in the Holy Ghost. Preaching and praying, working together, so that we can grow. So that when the enemy hounds us, we are able to fight back. So that when the enemy is on the attack, we can chase them away. So that when the enemy comes a knocking, we can say, Jesus, answer the door! I don't need that temptation. But when we are not prayed up, when we are not read up, when we are not studied up, we are victims down for sure. And fifthly, when the enemy hounds, there's the place, there's the parts, we got a preacher, we got praying partners, we should have the proper position. Standing tall attitudes don't work. Moses tried it. He was standing, they finally had to sit him down there on a rock. He was up there, others had to come along and help him. The proper position of our hearts will see things done. We stand our tallest when we are kneeling before an almighty, holy, righteous God. Now Moses may have gone up there on that mountain bringing Aaron and her with him simply to have him some company. Maybe Brother Don, he was hoping to be able to talk to him a little bit while he was holding up those hands which were holding up that rod. Maybe he just, you know, good to have some company up here boys. Man, I've got this. Turned out real quick he ain't got it. But we come together. We come together in prayer. Now granted, we usually say at the end of the sermon that the altars are open, but the altars are always open. From the moment those doors opened up back there, these altars have been open. And quite frankly, if you're desperate enough to get to the altar to come and pray, go ahead and break through that glass and come on up here and pray. We'll get the door fixed. God says I want you to come, come. God says I want you to do something, do it. God says this, then that's what it is. Don't question Him. Don't pull a Simon Peter and say, not so, Lord. You can't say not so and Lord at the same time. It don't work. It's oil and water. It don't mix. And I will say yes, Lord, yes, to Your will and to Your way. I will say yes, Lord, yes. I'll trust You and obey. Are we doing that, church? Do we have that proper perspective? Moses had to accept the fact that he needed some faithful men to come along and help him. And what happened when he did acknowledge that? Well, we found that there suddenly was a very prostrated enemy. Verse number 13, and Joshua discomfited Amalek. That word, discomfited, means prostrated or laid out. What does that mean? That means God came along and, boom, right there, right in the face, knocked out the enemy. My pastor would go, he gave Satan a kick, kicked him out, gave him a black eye, punched him out. He laid him out there and the like suddenly found themselves defeated and before a rabble. These were not professional soldiers, they were professional slaves. These were not men going out there in full body armor with the latest machine gun in their hand. These were people going out there because they were called to fight and they went out there to fight and they won because they had God on their side because they followed what God said. You don't have to know every book in the Bible, front to back, and be able to properly answer Jesus and all this other stuff. You just gotta know, Jesus loves me, and He can save your soul from eternity hell, and you can say help someone, see their need to be saved, and help pull them out of that fire. Your own testimony is enough to see someone saved, church. But you got the heart to do it. If you do, you're going to see the enemy getting prostrate before you there, because he can't stand up against you. The Bible says the gates of hell will not prevail. Say, I just, I believe, but I just don't got enough faith. Then you need to make your prayer, Lord I believe, help my unbelief. He's done it before, he'll do it again. By the way, it won't be a one and done thing. You are going to fight your flesh the rest of your life. We see in verse number 16, it says, for he said, because the Lord has sworn that the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation, it's going to continue. In fact, you go through the Bible, you find Amalek constantly popping up. The first time the children of Israel refused to cross over into Canaan land to take possession, there in Numbers 14, Amalek comes and whoops them. When Gideon fought the Midianites, the Midianites had a contingent of Amalekites warriors with them, or Amalekite warriors with them. They're in Judges 6 and 7. Saul was ordered to slaughter the Amalekites, to wipe them out in 1 Samuel 15, but he didn't. And as a result, we see their ziklag being burned with fire by the Amalekites in 1 Samuel chapter 30. And let's not forget the book of Esther with Haman the Agite, a descendant of the Amalekite king Agag, who Saul tried to spare and Samuel had to come along and kill. Amalek constantly popping up, your flesh is going to constantly be popping up, and just like Amalek there was in part of Canaan land, your flesh is there, and you're going to have to continue to fight, but you can win! You can have the victory! You can see it happen! But only by following His plan. What's His plan, preacher? Read your Bible every day. Study your Bible every day. Brother Donald's talking about how it takes him so long to get through a chapter because he keeps finding something and it sticks out and he wants to find out about it. Let me help you with that one. Make a note as to what it was that stuck out and go back and finish reading. Once you've done reading, then go back and start studying out everything that came up and got your attention. It works. Trust me, been there, done that, got the t-shirt. Pray. Pray early. Pray often. Pray all day long. You say, but preacher, I drive for a living. I can't be closing my eyes and praying. God understands you can't close your eyes. Pray while you're driving. I've done it. Pray. Tell others about Jesus, how good He is to you. Get yourself in the habit of someone asking, how are you doing today? Well, praise God, God is good! You may be feeling awful. You may be feeling down. You may be feeling totally defeated. And they say, how are you doing today? God's good! It'll help get you in the right attitude to overcome. It'll help lay out that enemy there. Because we're going to have that struggle all the way through. But most of all, pass it on. We see here. Verse 14, and the Lord said unto Moses, write this for a memorial and a book and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua. Mark it down for your future self. You've struggled today, you will struggle with it again. Each one of us has a temptation that works on us. I don't know what it is that works on you, you don't know what it is that works on me, guess what, I'm not telling you. But I know what it is, that lure that Satan can dangle in front of my face that makes me want to jump at it so bad. I remember that. Now I've got to work on remembering that that is a lure, it will hurt, stay away! And pray about it. Say, preacher, I haven't fought that in weeks. Pray about it! Because Satan's getting ready to jump out of nowhere at you with it! Keep praying about it! Remind your future self that you failed at this particular thing in the past, but don't forget to remind yourself that you also succeeded eventually! That God is good, that God is still on the throne, and that God will give you the victory! That's why we've got Hebrews chapter number 11 there, and you read through that, and we see all the victories, we don't see the defeats! God is good. Remind yourself of that. Also, Teach that next generation. Don't just tell yourself. Tell those kids. Don't just tell those kids. Tell that new Christian convert. Don't just tell that new Christian convert. Tell that person who's been saved 20 years longer than you. Pass it along, church. It'll help. And it may not help you, but it'll help the next person. That's why he said to write it down and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua. And Joshua was to be the next leader. At this point in time, they didn't have a clue about that. But God did. Tell them the next generation. Maybe it's the next pastor of the church you're actually telling and you don't even realize it. Maybe it's the next pastor's wife you're telling about it and she's 15, 20 years away from getting married herself. Tell that next deacon about it. Tell that next Sunday school teacher about it. Tell that next person sitting next to you about it. See what God can do for you. I got just two questions and a statement for you this morning. Number one, are you fighting your flesh, or have you given in? Good news is if you've given in, you can get back up and get back into the fight. Number two, are you playing your role in the fight, or are you leaving others to their own fate? It won't help no one, especially them. And my statement is simply this. Today, it might not be us. But tomorrow it could be. Let's be ready. Heavenly Father, we thank you, Lord, for all that you've done for us. And we do pray, Lord, for your blessings upon this time here. And help us, Father, please, to be obedient to you, to understand the fact that we've got an enemy who wants to destroy us, who's looking to do anything and everything he possibly can. But you've made a way for us if we'll just follow your plan. Help us, Lord, please, because we so desperately, desperately need you. Thank you, Lord, for loving me, for saving me. For all the blessings you give me, I don't deserve any of it. And I never will. But thank you for being so good. We love you, Father in Jesus' name, we do pray. Amen and amen.
Hounded by the enemy
Series Sermons in Exodus
We have before us today a battle scene. What is taking place here on the physical plane represents what is going on in our spiritual lives. Our enemy will attack us without cause in any way possible and he knows just how to do it to be the most effective against us. Fortunately for us, God also knows what is going on and is on our side. He has provided help for us to see victory but we must follow His plan in order to receive it.
Sermon ID | 72418169410 |
Duration | 34:12 |
Date | |
Category | Sunday Service |
Bible Text | Exodus 17:8-16 |
Language | English |
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